CHAPTER XXIX.

Falkland Islands-Controversy between the United States and the Argentine Republic, in reference to our right to a free use of the fisheries in the waters which surround these islands and their adjacencies.

TOWARDS the conclusion of our last chapter, among other things we mentioned the arrival of the Potomac at the Falkland Islands, and that it was the intention of the commodore to have stopped at Port Egmont, agreeably to his conditional instructions from the department, had not the thick fogs, contrary winds, and exceedingly rough weather, rendered it impracticable to do so.

While in the Pacific we had occasionally seen, through the medium of the Buenos Ayrean press, some accounts of the late controversy between the United States and the Argentine Republic, in relation to the sovereignty of these islands, and of our rights to a free use of the fisheries there. The subject struck us at the time as one of deep interest, because there are a thousand other points on the globe where similar questions affecting our rights might be set up with equal pretensions.

We have taken a great deal of pains to inform ourselves of the merits of this controversy, and we have now before us a quarto pamphlet of about one hundred and twenty pages, in Spanish, purporting to be "A collection of Official Documents, showing the origin and present state of the question between the two countries."

This publication, however, is not the best source for obtaining accurate and exact information of the state of the controversy between the United States and the Argentine Republic; but, as yet, it is the only source: for on the ground that the negotiation is still pending, the president did not communicate the correspondence relating to it when called for by the House of Representatives, on the motion of the Honourable John Quincy Adams.

The correspondence contained in the pamphlet to which we have alluded, was published by order of the government of

Buenos Ayres, soon after Mr. Baylies, the late chargé d'affaires of the United States, left that country; and his part of the correspondence, as well as that of the Consul Slacum, as yet, can be seen only through the medium of two translations, first from the English into Spanish, and then from the Spanish into English. Of the instructions to Mr. Baylies, and his correspondence with his own government, we, of course, can have no knowledge; and we have been obliged to rely on this foreign publication, and on information from sources which we believe to be accurate, for the following account of the negotiations.

The attention of the public within a few years has been attracted to the Falkland Islands; and controversies have been revived, with a change of parties indeed, like those which once employed the pens of Junius and Johnson, and called out the eloquence of Lord Chatham! One of the Hispano-American colonies has endeavoured to maintain, in its own behalf, those rights of sovereignty and jurisdiction once claimed by Spain; and a new element has been infused into the existing controversy, which embraces the right of the people of the United States to a free fishery at those islands, and those adjacent.

The steril soil and inhospitable climate of the Falkland Islands, have hitherto prevented their occupation; they were uninhabited when discovered, and, with the exception of occasional and transient residents, have so remained. Yet their position will always render them important in the estimation of commercial nations.

This group, consisting of two large islands and many smaller ones, some of which are mere rocks, is situated for the most part between the fifty-first and fifty-second degrees of south latitude, and nearly opposite the southern extremity of Patagonia, which is the nearest land. The islands lie near the track of all the navigation which passes around Cape Horn, and at no inconvenient distance from the Cape of Good Hope, the harbour of Rio Janeiro, and the Rio de la Plata.

In the long voyages around Cape Horn, into the Pacific Ocean and back, ships are frequently in want of provisions: if a depot were established at the Falklands, supplies might be obtained without any great deviation from a direct course; and this depot might sometimes be of service to the crews of vessels, when,

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baffled in the attempt to double the Cape of Good Hope, they have been brought upon short allowance. If there were also a depot of naval stores, vessels which had been crippled by the furious winds and storms of the southern seas, would find these islands a convenient place for refitting; such a depot might also be of service to the vessels engaged in the whale-fishery on the Brazil Banks.

Considered in a military view, the Falkland's are a commanding position, from their proximity to the track of navigation in passing around Cape Horn, or through the Strait of Magellan. All the vessels engaged in the seal-fisheries at these and the adjacent islands would be exposed to the depredations of armed cruisers issuing from their various harbours, whose cruises could be easily extended, to the great annoyance of that rich trade which is carried on between Europe and the United States, and India and China. It is true, there is no timber or materials for shipbuilding on the islands, but a maritime people can always provide themselves with vessels. A piratical people, in possession of this station, could annoy the commerce of the world more effectually than all the piratical states of Barbary, and this evil the people of the United States, in some degree, have already experienced.

Before the revolution, the North Americans, as they were termed in South America, had extended their voyages so far, that, in the language of Burke, the Falkland Islands were but a stage in the progress of their victorious industry. Soon after the peace of seventeen hundred and eighty-three, these voyages were resumed. The fisheries on the Brazil Banks and in the Pacific Ocean employed a great number of vessels, many seamen, and much capital. The seal-fishery also became important, and our mariners frequented these desolate islands and coasts during the period of the Spanish domination without interruption, and their right to pursue this fishery there was never questioned by Spain: nothing was done to impeach or deny it until June tenth, eighteen hundred and twenty-nine, when, during the temporary existence of a government at Buenos Ayres, originating in a mutiny, and disgraced by the murder of the chief magistrate, one Louis Vernet, a German adventurer and a naturalized citizen of the United States, obtained a decree by which he was constituted civil and military governor of the Falkland Islands, Terra del Fuego, and the adjacent islands.

The decree asserted the right of Buenos Ayres to the Falkland Islands and all the others, on the ground of having been formerly occupied by Spanish subjects, and of having been incorporated in the viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata, when under the Spanish monarchy, whose successors the government of Buenos Ayres claimed to be, by virtue of the revolution of the twenty-fifth of May, eighteen hundred and ten.

It is proper to state here, that by this revolution the dominion of the Spanish nation was thrown off at Buenos Ayres, but not that of the Spanish king. Ferdinand VII. was acknowledged there until eighteen hundred and sixteen, and, in some parts of the viceroyalty, several years longer.

This decree was never communicated to the government of the United States, nor to Mr. Forbes, our resident at Buenos Ayres, nor does it appear that he protested against it. Mr. Parish, the British resident, under instructions from his government, formally protested against it as early as the nineteenth of November, eighteen hundred and twenty-nine, on the ground that the Argentine Republic had assumed authority over the Falkland Islands incompatible with his Britannic majesty's rights of sovereignty, which were founded on original discovery and occupation, and sanctioned by the King of Spain, who, on the requisition of the King of Great Britain, had formally restored them after a military occupation; and when they were abandoned by the British forces, in seventeen hundred and seventy-four, there was no intention of abandoning the sovereign jurisdiction, and therefore "the marks and signals of possession and property were left upon the islands," indicating an intention of resuming possession at a more convenient period.

Vernet had resided at the islands previous to his appointment. Soon afterward he issued a circular, which fell into the hands of some of the Americans who were in that region, in which all persons were required to desist from the use of the whale and seal-fisheries in the waters and on the coasts of the islands included in the decree. Considering these waters and coasts as free to all nations, and the exclusive property of none, our countrymen continued their fisheries as usual.

Vernet did not commit any violences until after the death of Mr. Forbes, which happened on the fourteenth of June, eighteen

hundred and thirty-one. On the thirtieth of July following, the Harriet, Captain Davison, of Stonington, was taken while in harbour. On the seventeenth of August, Captain Carew, commander of the schooner Breakwater, also of Stonington, while on shore, was arrested and confined, and on the next day his vessel was seized he was compelled, against his wishes, to embark in a British vessel bound to Rio Janeiro, but his vessel was recaptured by the crew. On the nineteenth of August, Captain Stephen Congar, of the schooner Superior, belonging to the city of NewYork, was arrested and imprisoned-his vessel seized, and his crew confined.

The seizures were attended with many outrages of a piratical character. The crew of the Harriet were put in close confinement; her papers were seized, and a part of the cargo was sold, without condemnation or legal process. While Davison and Congar were in confinement, this civil and military governor compelled them to sign a contract, by which they became obligated to proceed with one of the vessels to the western coast of South America, to catch seals on his account: without condemnation, he substituted himself forcibly in place of the owners, and compelled the imprisoned shipmates to obligate themselves, by oaths, "not to do any thing to prejudice his interests ;" and to agree that any deviation from this compulsory contract should be considered as a breach of faith," and that no law should liberate them from such penalties and forfeitures as he should impose upon them; "thus attempting (in the words of Mr. Baylies) to secure his own piratical interests from the operation of the laws, by oaths of his own devising." Without bringing them to trial for their alleged offences, he compelled them to agree to enter his service for his private and personal benefit, using his civic and military powers to extort from them a written obligation in the shape of a mercantile contract, to go beyond his pretended jurisdiction to catch seals on his account. The Superior and Captain Congar were selected for this service.

Seven of the crew of the Superior had been left on Staten-land, who were engaged in taking seals there, and were to be taken off at the end of six months, for which time they were supplied with provisions. Congar was prevented from relieving them, by being compelled to go directly through the Strait of Magellan to the