Doc. No. 73. 



123 



also, Jackson ex. dem._, Sparkman vs.Porter, 2 Paine's Circuit Court Re- 

 ports, p. 457.) 



It cannot be doubted that from the establishment of Spanish dominion 

 in Guatemala, the river San Juan has been the principal avenue to and 

 from the Adantic for at least that part of Central America lying around 

 Lake Nicaragua. It is behoved, also, that a Spanish fort had been main- 

 tained at the port of San Juan, if not for as long a period, at least from 

 about the year 1665. 



This undisturbed use by his Catholic Majesty of the river San Juan 

 and the port at its mouth must have continued until some time after the 

 conquest of Jamaica, by Cromwell, in 1656. According to the British 

 parliamentary document, entitled '^^Commercial Tariffs," of 1847, vol. 64, 

 page 28, the Mosquito King, Avith the concurrence of his chiefs and peo- 

 ple, placed themselves under the protection of Charles the Second, and 

 the governor of Jamaica, in the name of his sovereign, accepted this 

 union, and promised them the royal protection. Macgregor, the author 

 of the document above referred to, professes to have obtained the proof 

 of this from the records of the British Board of Trade and Plantations. 

 The date of the transaction, however, is not mentioned, and there is 

 every reason to believe that it was clandestine, and neither connived at 

 nor authorized by Spain. Indeed, it can scarcely be questioned that 

 throughout the reign of Charles the Second the public relations between 

 him and his Catholic Majesty were such that he could not, without a 

 breach of faith, have accepted the allegiance said to have been offered by 

 the Mosquito monarch, and have promised the protection referred to. 



The act, if performed subsequently to the treaty of Madrid of 1667, 

 was invalidated by its second article, which declared that neither of the 

 said Kings (of Great Britain or Spain) nor their respective people, sub- 

 jects, or inhabitants within their dominions, upon any pretence, may, in 

 public or secret, do, or procure to be done, anything against the other, in 

 any place, by sea or land, nor in the ports or rivers of the other, but shall 

 treat one another with all love and friendship." Again: by the 8th arti- 

 cle of the treaty between the same parties, of 1670, it is stipulated that 



the subjects and inhabitants, merchants, captains, masters of ships, 

 mariners of the kingdoms, provinces, and dominions of each confederate, 

 respectively, shall abstain and forbear to sail and trade with the ports and 

 havens which have fortifications, castles, magazines, or warehouses, and 

 in all other places whatsover, possessed by the other party in the West 

 Indies, to wit: the subjects of the King of Great Britain shall not sail 

 unto, and trade in, the havens and places which the Catholic King 

 holdeth in the said Indies," &c. 



All the Spanish possessions in America having been called West In- 

 dies " and Indies," the stipulation above quoted of course included the 

 Mosquito shore. 



Under these circumstances, it may be confidently asserted that, if the 

 transaction between the Mosquito King and the authorities of Jamaica ac- 

 tually took place, it was most probably at a time when Spain was at peace 

 with England, if not when the treaties above referred to were in force, 

 by which treaties it vvas expressly prohibited; that if it had been known 

 to Spain, she would have protested against, and, if necessary, otherwise 

 resisted it. No nation or individual could, by any law known among 

 civihzed men, have lost its title by a secret trespass on an unguarded 



