sea otter skins* obtainable there, and carry them for sale to Canton : but the enterprise proved unsuccessful, as the agent could only obtain a small number of furs, of inferior quality, the produce of the sale of which in China did not cover the expenses of their transportation.

Considerable uneasiness was also created at Madrid, by the endeavors of the British government to advance the whale and seal fishery in the seas surrounding the southern extremity of America. A number of experienced whalers, especially from Nantucket, had been induced, immediately after the peace of 1783, to engage in this business, under the British flag; and high premiums were offered by act of Parliament, in 1786, to encourage perseverance in the pursuit. As British vessels and subjects would thus necessarily frequent the unoccupied coasts of Patagonia and the adjacent islands, it was apprehended, by the Spanish government, that establishments might be formed in those regions, for their protection; the natural consequence of which would be, the introduction of foreign merchandise, and of opinions contrary to the interests of Spain, into the contiguous provinces. In order to provide against these evils, the Spaniards increased their garrison at Port Soledad, in the Falkland Islands, as well as their naval force in that quarter; and an attempt was made, under the patronage of their government, to organize a company for the whale and seal fishery in the Southern Ocean, which proved entirely abortive.

It was from Russia, however, that the Spanish government anticipated the greatest danger to its dominions on the Pacific side of America. Of the commerce and establishments of that nation on the northernmost coasts of the Pacific, enough had been learned from the narrative of Cook's expedition, and other works then recently published, to show their advancement, and the enterprise of those by whom they were conducted, as well as the determination of the Russian government to maintain and encourage them; and La Pérouse, during the stay of his ships at Conception, in Chili, in 1786, promised, at the particular request of the captain-general, to communicate confidentially to the viceroy of Mexico the results of the observations on those subjects which he might make in Kamtchatka and the islands and coasts of America adjacent. La Pérouse, however, did not return to America after his visit to Kamtchatka, nor was any information on the points in question received from him by the Spanish authorities; and the viceroy of Mexico,

* La Pérouse - Portlock.

having waited in vain for the promised intelligence until the end of 1787, resolved to despatch vessels to the North Pacific, in order to ascertain the truth with regard to the trade and settlements of the Russians and other foreign nations on the coasts of that division of the ocean.

Before relating the particulars of the expedition made for that purpose, a circumstance may be mentioned, which serves to show the state of feeling of the Spanish government at the period in question, with regard to the proceedings of foreigners in the Pacific, and the extent of the measures which it was ready to adopt in order to exclude them from that ocean. It has been said, in the preceding chapter, that the ship Columbia having received some damage on her way from Boston to the north-west coast of America, in May, 1788, entered a harbor in the Island of Juan Fernandez, where assistance was afforded in refitting her by the Spanish commandant Don Blas Gonzales and his garrison. After her departure, the commandant communicated the circumstances, by a despatch, to his immediate superior, the captain-general of Chili, who thereupon recalled Gonzales from the island, and placed him in arrest, addressing, at the same time, a report on the subject, with a request for instructions, to the viceroy of Peru. The viceroy, after consulting with his official legal adviser, replied to the captain-general at length on the subject, and expressed his surprise and displeasure at the misconduct of the commandant of Juan Fernandez, in allowing the strange ship to leave the harbor, instead of seizing her and her crew; as he should have known that, by the royal ordinance of November, 1692, every foreign vessel found in those seas, without a license from the court of Spain, was to be treated as an enemy, even though belonging to a friend or ally of the king, seeing that no other nation had, or ought to have, any territories, to reach which its vessels should pass around Cape Horn or through Magellan's Straits. In so serious a light did the viceroy regard the matter, that a ship was sent from Callao to track or intercept the Columbia; the authorities on the coasts of Peru and Chili were specially enjoined to be vigilant, and, in case any foreign vessel should appear in the vicinity, to seize her; and the whole affair was made known by a despatch to the viceroy of Mexico, in order that similar precautions might be adopted on his part. The unfortunate commandant Gonzales was cashiered for his remissness; and he subsequently addressed a petition to the government of the United States for its intercession with his sovereign. Thus were half of the Spanish do

minions in America thrown into alarm and agitation, by the appearance of a trading ship from the United States on the Pacific: yet Teodor Lacroix, the viceroy of Peru, and Ambrose O'Higgins, captain-general of Chili, were men of education and experience, distinguished for their courage and sagacity; but such was the jealous system which they were bound to support.*

For the expedition of inquiry to the north-west coasts of America, the viceroy of Mexico employed two vessels, the corvette Princesa, commanded by Estevan Martinez, (who had been the pilot in the voyage of Juan Perez, in 1774,) and the schooner San Carlos, under Lieutenant Gonzalo Haro. They were instructed to proceed directly to Prince William's Sound, and to make every possible inquiry and examination respecting the establishments of the Russians there and in other parts of America adjacent; having completed which, they were to explore the coasts southward to California, if time should be left for that purpose, seeking particularly for places convenient for the reception of Spanish colonies: and they were especially enjoined to treat the natives of the places which they might visit with kindness, and not to engage in any quarrel with the Russians.

Of this voyage of Martinez and Haro, a short account will suffice. They quitted San Blas on the 8th of March, 1788, and, on the 25th of May, they anchored in the entrance of Prince William's Sound, where they lay nearly a month, without making any attempt to examine the surrounding shores. At length, in the end of June, Haro, having sailed, in the San Carlos, along the coast of the ocean farther south-west, discovered a Russian establishment on the east side of the Island of Kodiak, under the command of a Greek, named Delaref, with whom he was able to communicate; and from this person he received detailed accounts of all the Russian establishments in that quarter. On the 3d of July, Haro rejoined Martinez, who had, in the mean time, explored the coasts of Prince William's Sound; and they proceeded together along the eastern side of the

* The petition of Gonzales, with copies of his reports to the captain-general, and the sentence pronounced against him, remain in manuscript in the archives of the Department of State at Washington. Mr. Jefferson, secretary of state of the United States, recommended his case to the Spanish government, in a letter to Mr. Carmichael, then plenipotentiary at Madrid, dated April 11th, 1790, with what success is not known. The other particulars here related of this curious affair are derived from the General Report, or Instructions, left by the viceroy of Peru to his successor, on his retirement from that office, which was published at London in 1822, in the Biblioteca Americana.

peninsula of Aliaska, to Unalashka, the largest of the Aleutian Islands, where they arrived on the 30th of August. There they remained until the 18th of September, receiving every attention from the Russians belonging to the factory, and then sailed for the south. In their voyage homeward, the vessels were separated: Haro reached San Blas on the 22d of October; Martinez did not enter that port until the 5th of December, having put into Monterey for refreshments.*

*

The geographical observations made in this expedition were of little value at the time; and it would be needless to notice them here, as the coasts to which they relate have been since completely surveyed. Agreeably to the report presented by Martinez, on his return to the viceroy of Mexico, the Russian establishments in America at that time were in number eight, all situated east of Prince William's Sound, on which, however, one was then in progress; and they contained, together, two hundred and fifty-two Russian subjects, nearly all of whom were natives of Kamtchatka or Siberia. Martinez was, moreover, informed that two vessels had been sent in that summer from Kodiak, to found a settlement at Nootka Sound, and that two large ships were in preparation at Ochotsk, for further operations of the same nature. The vessels sent from Kodiak were doubtless those which proceeded, under Ismyloff and Betscharef, along the coast eastward to the foot of Mount St. Elias; the others were those intended for the expedition under Billings, which was not begun until 1790.

These accounts of the establishments and projects of the Russians were immediately communicated to the court of Madrid, which addressed to the empress of Russia a remonstrance against such encroachments of her subjects upon the territories of his Catholic majesty. In the memorial conveying this remonstrance, it is to be remarked that Prince William's Sound is assumed as separating the dominions of the two sovereigns; it being doubtless intended,

* The preceding account of this voyage is derived from the journal of Martinez, of which a copy, in manuscript, was obtained from the hydrographical office at Madrid.

The first notice of this expedition, published in Europe, was taken from a letter written at San Blas, soon after the arrival of Haro at that port, in which it was said that the Spaniards had found Russian establishments between the forty-ninth and the fiftieth degrees of latitude, instead of between the fifty-ninth and the sixtieth degrees, and on this error, such as is daily committed by persons ignorant of nautical matters, M. Poletica, the Russian envoy in the United States, endeavored, in 1822, to found a claim for his sovereign to the whole of the American coasts and islands on the Pacific north of the forty-ninth parallel. See hereafter, chap. xvi.

west.

by means of this geographical obscurity, to leave undefined the delicate question as to the limits of Spanish America in the northThe empress of Russia answered that orders had been given to her subjects not to make settlements in places belonging to other nations; and, if those orders had been violated with regard to Spanish America, she desired the king of Spain to arrest the encroachments, in a friendly manner. With this answer, more courteous than specific, the Spanish minister professed himself content; observing, however, in his reply, that Spain "could not be responsible for what her officers might do, at places so distant, whilst they were acting under general orders to allow no settlements to be made by other nations on the Spanish American continent." *

In the mean time, however, the viceroy of Mexico, Don Manuel de Flores, had, in virtue of his general instructions, taken a decisive measure with regard to Nootka Sound. For that purpose, he despatched Martinez and Haro from San Blas, early in 1789, with their vessels manned and equipped effectively; ordering them, in case any British or Russian vessel should appear at Nootka, to receive her with the attention and civility required by the peace and friendship existing between Spain and those nations, but, at the same time, to declare the paramount rights of his Catholic majesty to the place, and the adjacent coasts, firmly, though discreetly, and without using harsh or insulting language.†

Before entering upon the narrative of the events which followed, it should be observed, with regard to the right of the Spanish government thus to take possession of Nootka, that, before the 6th of May, 1789, when Martinez entered the sound with that object, no settlement, factory, or other establishment whatsoever, had been founded or attempted, nor had any jurisdiction been exercised by the authorities or subjects of a civilized nation, in any part of America bordering upon the Pacific, between Port San Francisco, near the 38th degree of north latitude, and Prince William's Sound, near the 60th. The Spaniards, the British, the Russians, and the French, had, indeed, landed at many places on those coasts, where they had displayed flags, performed ceremonies, and erected monuments, by way of taking possession-as it was termed of the ad

* Memorial addressed by the court of Spain to that of London, dated June 13th, 1790, among the Proofs and Illustrations, in the latter part of this volume, under the letter D, No. 3.

+ Abstract of these instructions to Martinez, in the Introduction to the Journal of Galiano and Valdes, p. 106.