the middle of the channel of the St John: thence the middle of the Channel of that river ascending it to the point where the river St Francis empties itself into the St John; thence the middle of the channel of the river St Francis, ascending it to the source of its south-westernmost branch: thence a line drawn due west to the point where it unites with the line claimed by the United States of America.

This award, though it gave the United States the larger portion of the territory, provided the British with the essential communication between Quebec and New Brunswick by the St John river. But Maine would not agree, and though the President was inclined to recommend its approval the Senate rejected the decision.

Difficulties soon reappeared, culminating in the serious "Restook War" in 1838-9, which assumed such proportions that the legislature of Maine placed eight hundred thousand dollars at the disposal of the Governor for military defence, and the President was authorized by Congress to call out the militia. Hostilities were held off only by skilful and influential mediation. Moved by the acute danger, Daniel Webster, then Secretary of State, himself initiated in 1841 direct negotiation with the British Government. Lord Ashburton was sent out in 1842 as a plenipotentiary. His experience in public affairs and his relations with American business men made him an excellent negotiator for the matter in hand, and he and Webster came to an agreement. By this the

essential features of the award of the King of the Netherlands were confirmed, though the state of Maine received about nine hundred square miles less of territory; but access to the sea by the St John river was conceded to her lumbermen and farmers on the same terms as the inhabitants of New Brunswick enjoyed. Webster faced great difficulties in getting their agreement through the Senate, and sugar-coated the pill with a vote of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to Maine and of fifty thousand dollars to Massachusetts.

Here comes in the episode that has been called "the Battle of the Maps." Unfortunately there never was a map attached to the treaty of 1783, and that of Mitchell used by the negotiators had disappeared. But shortly before the Webster-Ashburton negotiations began an American had discovered in Paris a map which he assumed had been sent by Franklin to the Comte de Vergennes, on which a red line was traced south of the St John river, presumably giving Britain a large portion of Maine. As a matter of fact the British knew about it, but Sir Robert Peel said in Parliament in 1843 that they had been unable to trace any connection between it and the dispatch sent by Dr Franklin to the French Count. However Webster probably believed it to be genuine, and he showed it discreetly to members of the Senate to persuade them of the value of his award.

Several other maps were used, one of which, found in the British Museum, with a red line traced by Oswald who negotiated the treaty of 1783, was of some importance in the discussion in the English Parliament as showing that Ashburton had done well for England. But the final decision was not determined by the maps, and "Ashburton is reported to have said that the maps were not made public at the time or the treaty would never have been effected1."

The rest of the award may be quickly dealt with. A survey made in 1818 had proved that an error had been made in drawing the boundary line which was supposed to be the 45th degree of latitude running from the "highlands" to the river St Lawrence. The Americans had erected fortifications, at great expense, at Rouse's Point which were found on the new survey to be within British territory. The AshburtonWebster treaty confirmed the "old line," thus validating the property rights which had been granted by the respective governments, and the states of Vermont and New York gained a more important piece of land than fell to the British provinces in the much larger territorial concession made by Maine.

The treaty was received at the time with violent criticism in the United States, the British provinces and Great Britain. Each side insisted that its rights had been sacrificed, and to this day in Canada AshI Hon. J. W. Foster, A Century of American Diplomacy, p. 286.

burton usually comes in for censure. But the preceding recital is sufficient, it is hoped, to show that he deserves a better reputation; inherited prejudices should yield to the opinion of impartial experts. If New Brunswick lost a portion of Maine through the ignorance of officials it was not Ashburton's fault; it may have been due to a change in the wording of the commission given to Wilmot as governor of Nova Scotia in 1763, in which the boundaries of that province were defined as a line running "due north from the source of the St Croix river, whereas in the original grant to Sir William Alexander in 1621 they were described as "an imaginary straight line which is conceived to extend over the land or to run northward to the nearest bay, river or stream emptying into the Great River of Canada." Another token of the weakness of the extreme claim made by New Brunswick is found in her later action, when in her controversy with Quebec on the boundary her representatives put forth some of the same arguments that had been employed formerly by the United States.

This question has been dealt with at some length not only because it issued in what Mr Root has called "the most important treaty that has ever been made to preserve peace between Great Britain and the United States in settling the boundaries," but be

1 James White, Canada and its Provinces, VIII, pp. 756764.

cause it is an example of those not infrequent traditions which are a source of lingering irritation long after the international differences have been settled on reasonable terms.

Another portion of Article II of the treaty of 1783, already quoted, runs as follows: from where the 45th degree of north latitude

strikes the River Iroquois or Cataraqui thence along the middle of said river into Lake Ontario, through the middle of said Lake until it strikes the communication by water between that Lake and Lake Erie; thence along the middle of said communication into Lake Erie; through the middle of said Lake until it rises at the water communication between that Lake and Lake Huron; thence along the middle of said water communication into the middle of Lake Huron; thence through the middle of said Lake to the water communication between that Lake and Lake Superior; thence through Lake Superior, Northward of the Isles Royal and Phelipeaux, to the Long Lake; thence through the middle of said Long Lake, and the water communication between it and the Lake of the Woods, to the said Lake of the Woods; thence through the said Lake to the most North-Western point thereof, and from thence in a due West course to the River Mississippi.

From the St Lawrence river up to Lake Superior each side has fared reasonably well, Canada, for example, having secured Wolfe Island which dominates the City of Kingston, and the United States aving got some advantage in other islands. A sensible arrangement was come to whereby all the