require that the intercourse of correspondence with the enemy's country should not be altogether interdicted; it would be almost tantamount to preventing the residence of an ambassador in a neutral State, if he were debarred from the means of communicating with his own.

Lord Stowell does not here lay down the doctrine that a belligerent may take an envoy out of a neutral ship. That question was not before him. He founds chiefly upon Vattel (whom the earlier part of his judgment especially cites) the general dictum that the belligerent may seize the ambassador of another belligerent at a certain period, namely, before he has been accepted by the State to which he is sent; after that event, the belligerent may not seize him anywhere. Before that event, he may seize him—but where? Why, the reference to Vattel clearly shows

when he is passing through his own territory. Vattel justifies the seizure by England of a French ambassador in passing, on his way to Berlin, through the Electorate of Hanover, because Hanover at that time belonged to England. "Non seulement donc on peut justement refuser le passage aux ministres qu'un ennemi envoie à d'autres souverains: on les arrête même s'ils entreprennent de passer secrètement et sans permission." Where? "Dans les lieux dont on est maître.”—(Droit des Gens, 1. 4, c. 7, s. 85.) Not on board a neutral royal mail ship on the high

sea's. Let Lord Stowell's judgment be read by the light of this passage in Vattel, to whom he had referred. These are his words:

The former cases were cases of neutral ships, carrying the énemy's despatches from his colonies to the mother country. In all such cases you have a right to conclude that the effect of those despatches is hostile to yourself, because they must relate to the security of the enemy's possessions, and to the maintenance of a communication between them; you have a right to destroy these possessions and that communication; and it is a legal act of hostility to do so. But the neutral country has a right to preserve its relations with the enemy; and you are not at liberty to conclude that any communication between them can partake, in any degree, of the nature of hostility against you.

The enemy may have his hostile projects to be attempted with the neutral State; but your reliance is on the integrity of that neutral State, that it will not favour nor participate in such designs, but, as far as its own councils and actions are concerned, will oppose them. And if there should be private reason to suppose that this confidence in the good faith of the neutral State has a doubtful foundation, that is matter for the caution of the Government, to be counteracted by just measures of preventive policy; but is no ground on which this Court can pronounce that the neutral carrier has violated his duty by bearing despatches which, as far as he can know, may be presumed to be of an innocent nature, and in the maintenance of a pacific connexion.— (Robinson, Reports. Vol. vi. p. 466. The Caroline.)

It does not seem to be denied in America that this is both the general and the correct law respecting ambassadors; but the conduct of England eighty-two years ago is cited against her. It is stated in a letter of Mr. Sumner (not we believe the Chairman of the

Committee of Foreign Relations in Congress) that England, in 1780, took Mr. Laurens, the Envoy, from the rebel colonies of North America to Holland, out of a Dutch ship, and committed him to the Tower as a traitor. For the moment we pass by the change effected in International Law since those days with reference to colonies which have established their independence. We presume that America does not think Mr. Laurens was a rebel, though the denial places her at present in an awkward dilemma-that she does not approve his being sent to the Towerthat she does not, in fact, adopt the only precedent which she quotes. Suppose, however, these difficulties are surmounted, our next remark is, that the facts of the seizure are not only most superficially but most inaccurately stated. We will take from Adolphus a very correct epitome of them:

:

Meanwhile, [says this historian] the state of sullen dissatisfaction which occasioned the abolition of the ancient connexion between Great Britain and Holland, resolved itself into active hostility; the mystery which had covered the views and conduct of the Dutch was removed; and the Court of Great Britain was impelled to a firm and decisive mode of conduct, as well in resentment of past treachery, as with a view to counteract the effects of the neutral league. The Vestal frigate, commanded by Captain Keppel, took, near the banks of Newfoundland, a Congress packet. The papers were thrown overboard; but, by the intrepidity of an English sailor, recovered with little damage.

They fully proved the perfidy of the Dutch, who, before the

existence of any dispute with Great Britain, had entered into a formal treaty of amity and commerce with the revolted colonies, fully recognising their independence, and containing many stipulations highly injurious to England and beneficial to her enemies, both in Europe and America. Disagreements on some of the arrangements had occasioned delays in its completion; but Henry Laurens, late President of the Congress, who was one of the passengers in the captured vessel, was authorized to negociate definitively, and entertained no doubt of success. On his arrival in London, Mr. Laurens was examined before the Privy Council, and, on his refusal to answer interrogatories, committed to the Tower.-(Adolphus, History of England, vol. iii. p. 221.)

Adolphus is perfectly accurate in saying that the Mercury, commanded by Captain Pickles, was, as the names indicate, an American belligerent vessel. The despatches from Captain Keppel to the Admiralty afford proof of the fact. The vessel was condemned in the Vice-Admiralty Court (commissioned as a Prize Court), in Newfoundland. Laurens was brought to England. Now observe the difference (setting aside the question of the Royal Mail Packet) between this case and that of the Southern Envoys. First, despatches were thrown overboard an act which alone almost enures to the condemnation of a neutral ship. Secondly, the ship was not Dutch, and neutral, but American, and belligerent. Thirdly, Holland was only professedly neutral, but really belligerent against England, as those very despatches demonstrated. The declaration of war by England against her fol

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lowed close, namely, on the 20th December, 1780. Fourthly, the ship as well as the man was captured. So clear, indeed, was the justice of the seizure, that neither Holland herself nor any other State uttered, then or afterwards, the semblance of a remonstrance against the act. This supposed precedent turns out, then, to be no precedent at all. Were it otherwise, international law is not made out of a single bad precedent, but out of sound principles applied to each case as it arises, and illustrated by consistent practice.

Next we come to what may be called the impressment argument. It is urged by Americans that England, during the last war, continually took by force English sailors and soldiers out of American ships. This is a strange argument in the mouth, so to speak, of America. She always complained of this conduct as an unjust extension of English municipal law beyond its proper limits as an invasion upon the most sacred rights of independent nations. Does America mean now to practise what she then condemned? to stultify her most solemn repeated public acts? How can a State which deliberately does what she has up to this moment consistently reprobated, appeal hereafter to any principles of International justice. Retaliatory measures of this kind at the time would perhaps not strengthen the moral influence of a State; but re