1834.] 
FALKLAND ISLANDS. 
485 
western, coast of South America, and by being interdicted from 
all communication with the sealers by the terms of the contract. 
Vernet attempted to entice American seamen into his service 
by the promise of extravagant wages. 
He arrested and imprisoned four seamen,^a part of the crew of 
the schooner Belville, wrecked on the coast of Terra del Fuego : 
he took from them a quantity of sealskins- and whalebone, which he 
converted to his own use : he compelled them, under threats of 
being sent to Buenos Ayres to be tried as pirates, to sign an 
agreement in behalf of themselves and five shipmates then on 
Eagle Island engaged in building a shallop, stipulating that the 
shallop, when completed, should be employed in the seal-fishery 
on his account ; and he engaged to share with them the plunder 
of vessels which they should capture, — thus inciting them to en- 
gage in a piratical warfare against their own countrymen. One 
seaman he endeavoured to force into his service, by depriving 
him of food while in prison. He declared to Davison that it was 
his determination to capture all American vessels, including wha- 
ling as well as sealing vessels, on the arrival of an armed vessel 
for which he had contracted. While he was pursuing this sys- 
tem of depredation and outrage against American commerce, he 
spared the Adeona, a British vessel, whose crew were taking 
seals at the mouth of the harbour, declaring that he could not 
take an English vessel with the same propriety that he could an 
American ! These outrages of Vernet are set forth at length in a 
communication of Mr. Baylies, addressed to the minister of 
foreign affairs at Buenos Ayres, dated June twentieth, eighteen 
hundred and thirty-two. 
The government of the United States having obtained knowl- 
edge of the existence of the decree of the tenth of June, eighteen 
hundred and twenty-nine, formally instructed Mr. Forbes, the 
agent at Buenos Ayres, to address to the government of the 
Argentine Republic an earnest remonstrance " against any meas- 
ures that may have been adopted by it, including the decree and 
circular letter referred to, if they be genuine, which are calculated 
in the remotest degree to impose any restraints whatever upon 
the enterprise of the citizens of the United States, engaged in the 
fisheries in question, or to impair their undoubted right to the 
freest use of them." . 
