H.] PROOFS AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 451 



himself to possess, to the exclusion of other subjects of the same sov- 

 ereign ? — charters binding and restraining those only who were within 

 the jurisdiction of the grantor, and of no force or validity against the 

 subjects of other states, until recognized by treaty, and thereby becom- 

 ing a part of international law.* 



Had the United States thought proper to issue, in 1790, by virtue of 

 their national authority, a charter granting to Mr. Gray the whole extent 

 of country watered, directly or indirectly, by the River Columbia, such a 

 charter would, no doubt, have been valid in Mr. Gray's favor, as against 

 all other citizens of the United States. But can it be supposed that it 

 would have been acquiesced in by either of the powers, Great Britain 

 and Spain, which, in that same year, were preparing to contest by arms 

 the possession of the very country which would have been the subject of 

 such a grant 1 



If the right of sovereignty over the territory in question accrues to 

 the United States by Mr. Gray's discovery, how happens it that they never 

 protested against the violence done to that right by the two powers, who, 

 by the convention of 1790, regulated their respective rights in and over a 

 district so belonging, as it is now asserted, to the United States? 



This claim of the United States to the territory drained by the Co- 

 lumbia and its tributary streams, on the ground of one of their citizens 

 having been the first to discover the entrance of that river, has been here 

 so far entered into, not because it is considered to be necessarily entitled 

 to notice, since the whole country watered by the Columbia falls within 

 the provisions of the convention of 1790, but because the doctrine above 

 alluded to has been put forward so broadly, and with such confidence, by 

 the United States, that Great Britain considered it equally due to herself 

 and to other powers to enter her protest against it. 



The United States further pretend that their claim to the country in 

 question is strengthened and confirmed by the discovery of the sources of 

 the Columbia, and by the exploration of its course to the sea by Lewis 

 and Clarke, in 1805-6. 



In reply to this allegation, Great Britain affirms, and can distinctly 

 prove, that, if not before, at least in the same and subsequent years, 

 her North- Western Trading Company had, by means of their agent, Mr. 

 Thomson, already established their posts among the Flat-head and Koo- 

 tanie tribes, on the head-waters of the northern or main branch of the 

 Columbia, and were gradually extending them down the principal stream 

 of that river; thus giving to Great Britain, in this particular, again, as in 

 the discovery of the mouth of the river, a title to parity at least, if not ' 

 priority, of discovery, as opposed to the United States. It was from those 

 posts, that, having heard of the American establishment forming in 1811, 

 at the mouth of the river, Mr. Thomson hastened thither, descending the 

 river, to ascertain the nature of that establishment.f 



Some stress having been laid by the United States on the restitution 

 to them of Fort George by the British, after the termination of the last 

 war, which restitution they represent as conveying a virtual acknowledg- 

 ment by Great Britain of the title of the United States to the country in 

 which that post was situated, — it is desirable to state, somewhat in detail, 

 the circumstances attending that restitution. 



* See p. 350. t See p. 291, 297. 



