effective enough to make the risk of capture consi- Chap. XII. derable, swell the blockade-runner's profits, and inflict severe suffering both on the Confederate States and on England, but that it was not effective enough to make the risk prohibitory. It was maintained, to a great degree, by cruising-vessels which kept watch along an immense coast-line. Cruisers driven by steam can now patrol a much greater space than could formerly be covered by sailing ships. Indeed, whether cruising or at anchor, the blockader is comparatively independent of weather; he may defy to a great degree the winds by which in former times squadrons were frequently blown away; while the increased range and weightier metal of modern ordnance give him a longer reach, and enable him to deliver a more crushing blow. But to the nimble and wily adversaries whom it his duty to baffle and intercept, the fleetness and handiness which steam-power confers are perhaps more advantageous still. They can seize opportunities, profit by dark nights or thick weather, wind through difficult channels, creep under the shadow of the land, and by a sudden exertion of speed scud away from an enemy who may be swifter than themselves, but cannot chase them to any distance lest he leave his station unguarded. If the history of the blockade were written, it would be a history of the daring and adroit use of these advantages by men rendered expert by practice. As the nature of the risks to be encountered, and the precautions to be observed, became better known, vessels began to be built specially adapted for this purpose. In the Clyde, as I remember, any observer might have noticed in 1863 and 1864 more than one speedy and insidious-looking craft fitting for sea-long, very low, drawing little water yet with considerable stowage, painted of a dull greenish-gray colour, with a short, raking funnel or pair of funnels, and nothing aloft to catch the eye. These were blockade-runners of the newest pattern.

Chap. XII.

Mr. Mason, who continued to reside in London until the autumn of 1863, in the hope of being received as accredited Minister for the Confederate States, was earnest and unremitting in his efforts to induce the British Government to declare the blockade ineffective, and throw open the Southern ports to trade. He forwarded to Lord Russell from time to time long lists of vessels which had succeeded in entering and sailing from Southern ports, and he urged that to recognize such a blockade as effective was inconsistent with the definition adopted in the Declaration of Paris :

"It may be readily admitted that the fact that various ships entering or leaving a port have successfully escaped a blockading squadron does not show that there may not have been an evident danger in so entering or leaving it; but it certainly does show that the blockade was not, in the language of the Treaty of Paris, 'maintained by a force sufficient really to prevent access to the coast of the enemy.' "I have, therefore, the honour to request, for the information of my Government, that your Lordship will be good enough to enable me to solve the doubt entertained by the President of the Confederate States as to the construction placed by the Government of Her Majesty on the text of the Convention of Paris, as accepted by the Government of the Confederate States in the terms hereinbefore cited, that is to say, whether a blockade is to be considered effective when maintained at an enemy's port by a force sufficient to create an 'evident danger' of entering or leaving it; and not alone where sufficient 'really to prevent access.

1

On the 10th February, 1863, Lord Russell wrote as follows:

Sir,

"Foreign Office, February 10, 1863. "I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the January, referring to the letter which you addressed to me on the 7th of July last, respecting the interpretation placed by Her Majesty's Government on the Declaration with regard to blockades appended to the Treaty of Paris.

"I have, in the first place, to assure you that Her Majesty's Government would much regret if you should feel that any want of respect was intended by the circumstance of a mere acknowledgment of your letter having hitherto been addressed to you.

"With regard to the question contained in it, I have to say that

1 Mr. Mason to Earl Russell, 7th July, 1862.

Her Majesty's Government see no reason to qualify the language Chap. XII. employed in my despatch to Lord Lyons of the 15th of February last. It appears to Her Majesty's Government to be sufficiently clear that the Declaration of Paris could not be intended to mean that a port must be so blockaded as really to prevent access in all winds, and independently of whether the communication might be carried on in a dark night, or by means of small low steamers or coasting craft creeping along the shore; in short, that it was necessary that communication with a port under blockade should be utterly and absolutely impossible under any circumstances.

"In further illustration of this remark, I may say there is no doubt that a blockade would be in legal existence although a sudden storm or change of wind occasionally blew off the blockading squadron. This is a change to which, in the nature of things, every blockade is liable. Such an accident does not suspend, much less break, a blockade. Whereas, on the contrary, the driving off a blockading force by a superior force does break a blockade, which must be renewed de novo, in the usual form, to be binding upon neutrals.

"The Declaration of Paris was, in truth, directed against what were once termed 'paper blockades;' that is, blockades not sustained by any actual force, or sustained by a notoriously inadequate naval force, such as the occasional appearance of a man-of-war in the offing, or the like.

"The adequacy of the force to maintain the blockade must indeed always, to a certain extent, be one of fact and evidence; but it does not appear that in any of the numerous cases brought before the Prize Courts in America the inadequacy of the force has been urged by those who would have been most interested in urging it against the legality of the seizure.

"The interpretation, therefore, placed by Her Majesty's Government on the Declaration of Paris was that a blockade, in order to be respected by neutrals, must be practically effective. At the time I wrote my despatch to Lord Lyons, Her Majesty's Government were of opinion that the blockade of the Southern ports could not be otherwise than so regarded; and certainly the manner in which it has since been enforced gives to neutral Governments no excuse for asserting that the blockade has not been efficiently maintained.

"It is proper to add that the same view of the meaning and effect of the Article of the Declaration of Paris on the subject of blockades which is above explained was taken by the Representative of the United States at the Court of St. James's (Mr. Dallas), during the communications which passed between the two Governments some years before the present war, with a view to the accession of the United States to that Declaration.

Chap. XII;

Mr. Mason renewed his remonstrances, reverting to the terms of the Paris Declaration :

"The terms of that Convention are, that the blockading force must be sufficient really to prevent access to the coast. No exception is made in regard to dark nights, favourable winds, the size or model of vessels successfully evading it, or the character of the coast or waters blockaded; and yet it would seem from your Lordship's letter, that all these are to be taken into consideration, on a question whether the blockade is or is not to be respected.

"It is declared in that letter that it appears to Her Majesty's Government to be sufficiently clear that the Declaration of Paris could not have been intended to mean that a port must be so blockaded in all winds, and independently of whether the communication might be carried on of a dark night, or by means of small low steamers or coasting craft creeping along the shore.' As a general rule, the ports and harbours of the Confederate States are obstructed by bars, which do not admit the passage of large vessels. What might be considered a 'small' or a 'low' steamer, coming in from sea to the port of New York, would, at one of those Southern ports, be rated a vessel of very fair size when referred to the ordinary stage of water on its bar; yet I look in vain in the terms of the Convention referred to for any authority to expound them in subordination to the depth of water, or the size or mould of vessels finding ready and comparatively safe access to the harbour.

"In regard to the character of this blockade, to which your Lordship again adverts in the remark that the manner in which it has been enforced gives neutral Governments no excuse for asserting that it has not been efficiently maintained, although I have not been instructed to make any further representations to Her Majesty's Government on that subject since its decision to treat it as effective, I cannot refrain from adding, that for many months past the frequent arrival and departure of vessels (most of them steamers) from several of those ports have been matters of notoriety. A single steamer has evaded the blockade successfully, and most generally from Charleston, more than thirty times. And within a few days past it has been brought to my knowledge that two steamers arrived in January last, and within ten days of each other, at Wilmington (North Carolina) from ports in Europe, one of 400 and the other of 500 tons burthen, both of which have since sailed from Wilmington, and arrived with their cargoes at foreign ports. I cite these only as the latest authenticated instances. And as another remarkable fact, it is officially reported by the Collector at Charleston that the revenue accruing at that port from duties on imported merchandize during the past year, under the blockade, was more than double the receipts of any one year previous to the separation of the State; and

this although the duties under the Confederate Government are much Chap. XII. lower than those exacted by the United States.

"As regards other portions of your Lordship's letter, I may freely admit, as it is there stated, that a blockade would be in legal existence although a sudden storm or change of wind might occasionally blow off the blockading squadron. Yet, with entire respect, I do not see how such principle affects the question of the efficiency of such blockade whilst the squadron is on the coast. And again, whilst I am not informed whether or no a defence resting on the inadequacy of the blockading force has been urged in cases of capture before the Prize Courts in America, I can well see how futile such defence would be when presented on behalf of a neutral ship whose Government had not only not objected to, but had admitted, the sufficiency of the blockade."1

66 'Sir,

Lord Russell replied :

"Foreign Office, February 27, 1863. "I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your further letter of the 18th instant on the subject of the interpretation placed by Her Majesty's Government on the Declaration of the principle of blockade made in 1856 made by the Conference at Paris.

"I have already, in my previous letters, fully explained to you the views of Her Majesty's Government on this matter; and I have nothing further to add in reply to your last letter, except to observe that I have not intended to state that any number of vessels of a certain build or tonnage might be left at liberty freely to enter a blockaded port without vitiating the blockade, but that the occasional escape of small vessels on dark nights, or under other particular circumstances, from the vigilance of a competent blockading fleet, did not evince that laxity in the belligerent which enured, according to international law, to the raising of a blockade.

Besieged on the one side by the expostulations of Mr. Mason, the Queen's Government had to reply, on the other, to the complaints of Mr. Adams. It was the 'painful conviction" of the American Minister that there was in Great Britain "a systematic plan to violate the blockade." "The toleration of such conduct in subjects of Great Britain is surely a violation of neu

1 Mr. Mason to Earl Russell, 18th February, 1863.