when completed, always understands that this protection and guarantee are granted conditionally, and may be withdrawn by her if she should deem that the persons or company undertaking or managing the same adopt or establish such regulations concerning the traffic thereupon as are contrary to the spirit and intention of this article, either by making unfair discriminations in favor of the commerce of any nation or nations over the commerce of any other nation or nations, or by imposing oppressive exactions or unreasonable tolls upon passengers, vessels, goods, wares, merchandize, or other articles.

The aforesaid protection and guarantee shall not, however, be withdrawn by Her Britannic Majesty without first giving six months' notice to the Republic of Honduras.

The present additional article shall have the same force and validity as if it were inserted word for word in the treaty of friendship, commerce, and navigation signed this day. It shall be ratified, and the ratifications shall be exchanged at the same time; and its stipulations shall, subject to the same condition of notice on the part of Her Britannic Majesty, provided for in the preceding paragraph of this article, be permanent between the contracting parties.

In witness whereof the respective plenipotentiaries have signed the same and have affixed thereto their respective seals.

Done at London the 27th day of August, in the year of our Lord 1856.

[L. S.] L. S.]

CLARENDON.
VR. HERRAN.

No. 5.]

43.-Lord Napier to Lord Clarendon.

WASHINGTON, March 12, 1857. (Received March 29.)

MY LORD: I had this afternoon an interview with General Cass, when I requested that he would communicate to me the views taken in the Senate with reference to the Central American treaty, as far as was consistent with the secrecy of the pending deliberation.

The Secretary of State replied that the subject was at that very hour under discussion, and that opinions were divided in the following manner: Some held that the treaty should be sanctioned in its original form, others that it should be accepted with certain modifications, while a third party advocated its rejection, but proposed to temper this course by the adoption of certain resolutions embodying sentiments of a friendly disposition towards Great Britain, and approving a settlement of the Central American question in conformity with the spirit of the treaty agreed to by your lordship and Mr. Dallas. General Cass appeared to anticipate that the last alternative would prevail.

I remarked that I was not surprised by the result which he predicted, for impressions of a similar character had been imparted to me at New York; but I added that Her Majesty's Government would certainly learn with concern that all the efforts of Mr. Dallas, aided by your lordship's generous co-operation, had not succeeded in framing an arrangement acceptable to the Senate; such an issue had not been anticipated by the United States minister, and your lordship's expectations of the success of the treaty had been confirmed by the intelligence derived from Mr. Dallas that he (General Cass) had given the measure his support in the first instance.

The Secretary of State explained that at an early period a general outline of the projected arrangement had reached him, and had certainly

obtained his warm approval, but that when he came to know the details more accurately he recognized in them principles of foreign intervention repugnant to the policy of the United States. The treaty engaged the Government of the United States to combine with that of Great Britain in urging a certain course of conduct on a foreign state. This could not be allowed; it was not consistent with the common practice of his country. The object, indeed, was good, and he hoped it might be attained in another shape. It might be prosecuted by a direct and distinct negotiation between Great Britain and Nicaragua, in which Her Majesty's Government would, if necessary, have the good offices of the President.

General Cass then passed some reflections on the Clayton-Bulwer treaty; he had voted for it, and in doing so he believed that it abrogated all intervention on the part of England in the Central American territory. The British Government had put a different construction on the treaty, and he regretted the vote he had given in its favor. He did not, however, pretend that the British Government should now unconditionally abandon the Mosquitos with whom they had relations of an ancient date; it was just and consistent with the practice of the United States that those Indians should be secured in the separate possession of lands, the sale of which should be prohibited, and in the enjoyment of rights and franchises, though in a condition of dependency and protection. The British Government had already removed one impediment to the execution of the Bulwer-Clayton treaty by the cession of their claims on Ruatan; two difficulties now remained, the frontier of Belize and the delimitation and settlement of the Mosquito tribe. If the frontier could be defined, and if the Mosquitos could be placed in the enjoyment of their territory by treaty between Great Britain and Nicaragua, in which the concessions and guarantees of the latter in favor of the Indians should be associated with the recognition of the sovereignty of Nicaragua-so I understood the general-then the Bulwer-Clayton treaty might be a permanent and satisfactory settlement between the contracting parties. The United States desired nothing else but an absolute and entire neutrality and independence of the Central American region, free from the exercise of any exclusive influence or ascendency what

ever.

The Secretary of State terminated a rather desultory conversation on these matters by stating that his present remarks were to be regarded as of a merely general and speculative nature. The Senate had not yet pronounced; as soon as the decision was known and the resolutions taken they should be transmitted to your lordship through Mr. Dallas, and communicated to myself.

General Cass, before I took my leave, offered me an emphatic assurance of good will to the Government of Great Britain, and expressed the satisfaction which he hoped to find in his correspondence with Her Majesty's mission.

I have, &c.,

The EARL OF CLARENDON.

NAPIER.

No. 14.]

44.-Lord Napier to Lord Clarendon.

[Extract.]

WASHINGTON, May 6, 1857. (Received May 25.) On receiving your lordship's dispatch of the 17th ultimo on the 2d instant, informing me that Her Majesty's Government had not found it expedient to ratify the Central American treaty in its altered shape, and instructing me to propose the conclusion of a new treaty embodying all the resolutions of the United States Senate, with the single addition framed as a safeguard for British interests in the Bay Islands, I determined not to carry your lordship's orders into execution without previously soliciting an interview with the President. His excellency did me the honor to appoint an early day for this purpose, but an attack of illness prevented me from availing myself of his goodness, and it was not until this afternoon that I was enabled to pay my respects to his excellency. I found the President fully informed of the grounds on which Her Majesty's Government had based their resolution, and of their desire to enter into new engagements, but I think he entertained an impression that the reason alleged by Her Majesty's Government did not really express the whole or the most cogent motive of their objections, and he was not apprised of the terms of the simple qualification which Her Majesty's Government propose to add to the treaty as modified by the Senate.

I placed your lordship's instructions in the hands of the President. He assured me that he was now quite convinced that the non-ratification of the Honduras treaty formed the true and only motive for the rejection of that negotiated by your lordship with Mr. Dallas; that he could hardly understand the importance attached to this point by Her Majesty's Government; that he deeply regretted their determination, and that it was the last ground on which he had anticipated any reluc tance.

The President thought Her Majesty's Government had acted unwisely in neglecting this opportunity to close the Central American discussions and place the relations of the two countries on a satisfactory basis at a moment when the public feeling was so friendly on either side of the Atlantic.

After reading the article proposed by Her Majesty's Government he told me, not without some appearance of regret, that unless he changed his opinion, of which he saw little prospect, he could not assent to a stipulation which would involve the recognition by his government of a treaty between Great Britain and Honduras relative to the Bay Islands, and if he did accept such a stipulation it would infallibly be rejected by the Senate.

I argued that whatever there was repugnant to the feelings of the Senate in reference to slavery, or whatever there was unacceptable in regard to trade or government in the treaty of August 27, 1856, might be subjected to some change, and I offered to bring his views on this subject under your lordship's notice, but his excellency held out no hope; his objection pointed to the recognition of any treaty at allto the bare allusion to it. Great Britain and Honduras might frame any settlement they pleased for the future government of the islands; it was their business, not that of the United States. The United States could not take cognizance of those arrangements in any degree, however remote and indirect.

Finding the President quite firm in this position, I shifted the discus

sion to the relations of the two countries in case of the official rejection of your lordship's present proposal, remarking that we should fall back on the Clayton-Bulwer treaty, a basis which, if not fixed by arbitration or in some other way, would break up under our feet.

The President denounced the Clayton-Bulwer treaty as one which had been fraught with misunderstanding and mischief from the beginning; it was concluded under the most opposite constructions by the contracting parties. If the Senate had imagined that it could obtain the interpretation placed upon it by Great Britain, it would not have passed. If he had been in the Senate at the time, that treaty never would have been sanctioned. With reference to arbitration (which I had only thrown in as a suggestion of my own), he observed that he could not give any opinion at present. The President also inveighed against the success of treaties, affirming that they were more frequently the cause of quarrel than of harmony, and that, if it were not for the interoceanic communications, he did not see there was any necessity for a treaty respecting Central America at all.

The EARL OF CLARENDON.

NAPIER.

45.-General Cass to Lord Napier.

WASHINGTON, May 29, 1857.

MY LORD: I have received your lordship's note of the 6th instant, communicating the resolution of the British Government to advise the Queen not to ratify the treaty of the 17th October, 1856, respecting the affairs of Central America, and which had been modified by the Senate of the United States, and in its modified form submitted for the consideration and action of your government. I have laid before the President this note, together with the accompanying projet of a new treaty, and I have received his instructions to make known to you his views upon the subject.

The Clayton-Bulwer treaty, concluded in the hope that it would put an end to the differences which had arisen between the United States and Great Britain concerning Central American affairs, had been rendered inoperative in some of its most essential provisions by the different constructions which had been reciprocally given to it by the parties; and little is hazarded in saying that had the interpretation since put upon the treaty by the British Government, and yet maintained, been anticipated it would not have been negotiated under the instructions of any Executive of the United States nor ratified by the branch of the government intrusted with the power of ratification.

A protracted discussion, in which the subject was exhausted, failed to reconcile the conflicting views of the parties; and as a last resort a negotiation was opened for the purpose of forming a supplementary treaty which should remove, if practicable, the difficulties in the way of their mutual good understanding, and leave unnecessary any further discussion of the controverted provisions of the Clayton-Bulwer treaty. It was to effect this object that the Government of the United States agreed to open the negotiations which terminated in the treaty of October 17th, 1856, and though the provisions of that instrument, even with the amendments proposed by the Senate, were not wholly unobjectionable either to that body or to the President, still, so important

did they consider a satisfactory arrangement of this complicated subject that they yielded their objections and sauctioned, by their act of ratification, the convention as amended. It was then transmitted to London for the consideration of Her Britannic Majesty's Government, and having failed to meet its approbation has been returned unratified. The parties are thus thrown back upon the Clayton-Bulwer treaty, with its disputed phraseology and its conflicting interpretations; and, after the lapse of seven years, not one of the objects connected with the political condition of Central America, which the United States had hoped to obtain by the arrangement, has been accomplished.

Under these circumstances your lordship informs me that the British Government, appreciating the differences which this subject has caused "between the two countries," have determined to propose to the United States the conclusion of a new treaty, and in conformity with your instructions this proposition is accompanied with the projet of a convention which, if ratified by the President and Senate of the United States, it is engaged will be ratified by Her Britannic Majesty.

The draft presented is identical in its language with the treaty of October, as ratified by the Senate, except that to that clause of the second separate article which provides for the recognition of the Bay Islands as under the sovereignty and as part of the Republic of Honduras " there is added the provision:

66

Whenever and so soon as the Republic of Honduras shall have concluded and ratified a treaty with Great Britain by which Great Britain shall have ceded, aud the Republic of Honduras shall have accepted, the said islands, subject to the provisions and conditions contained in the said treaty.

This provision is a substitute for the provision relating to the same subject contained in the rejected treaty, and which referred to a subsisting convention with Honduras for the cession to that republic of the Bay Islands. Taken in connection with this convention, of which your lordship was good enough on the 10th instant to communicate a copy to this department,upon my application, that provision, whilst declaring the Bay Islands to be "a free territory under the sovereignty of the Republic of Honduras," deprived that country of rights without which its sovereignty over them could scarcely be said to exist. It separated them from the remainder of Honduras, and gave them a government of their own, with their own legislative, executive, and judicial officers, elected by themselves. It deprived the government of Honduras of the taxing power in every form, and exempted the people of the Bay Islands from the performance of military duty, except for their own defense, and it prohibited the republic from providing for the protection of these islands by the construction of any fortifications whatsoever, leaving them open to invasion from any quarter. Had Honduras ratified this treaty, she would have ratified the establishment of an "independent" state within her own limits, and a state at all times liable to foreign influence and control. I am not, therefore, surprised to learn from your lordship that "Her Majesty's Government do not expect that this treaty, in its present shape, will be definitely sanctioned by that republic."

But, while this expectation may be justified by the event, it is certain that the new provision, like the former one, contemplates the cession of the Bay Islands to Honduras, only upon certain "conditions," and that these conditions are to be sanctioned by this government. The proposition, therefore, though changed in form, is the same in substance with that which was recently rejected by the Senate of the United States, and a just respect for the Senate would prevent the President from now consenting to its insertion in a new treaty. The action of that body,