to be declared contraband, and expofed to confifcation; but the hip with which they were freighted, as well as the reft of the cargo, were to be regarded as free, and in no manner vitiated by the contraband goods, whether thefe belonged to many, or to one and the fame proprietor. It was ftipulated, that all things on board fhould be reckoned free belonging to the citizens of one of the contracting parties, although the cargo or part of it should belong to the enemies of one or other, contraband goods always excepted.If the fhips of the citizens of either nation fhould be met on any coaft, or on the high feas, by any thip of war or privateer of the other, to prevent all diforder, the hips of war and privateers were to keep out of cannon-fhot, and fend their boats to the merchant veffels they fhould meet. It was not to be lawful for two or three to go on board to atk for the pallports and certifextes concerning the property of the fhip. It was exprefsly agreed, that the neutral fhould not be obliged to go on board the vifiting vellel, there to produce his papers, or to give any information whatever.

Thefe ftipulations with regard to the conduct to be held on the fea by the cruifers of the belligerent party to the traders of the neutral party, were not to be applicable but to fhips failing without convoy; and, in the cafe of fhips under convoy, the intention of the parties being to pay all refpect due to the protection of the flag carried by the thips of the nation, it was not to be lawful to vifit them. The verbal declaration of the commandant of the efcort, that the veffels under his convoy belong to the nation whofe Ang he carries, and that they have

nothing contraband on board, was to be confidered by the refpective cruifers as fully fufficient: the two parties reciprocally engaging not to admit, under the protection of their convoys, any veflels carrying prohibited goods to an enemy's port. That the hip and cargo might be watched over with care, and for the prevention of wafte, it was farther agreed, that the mafter, captam, or fupercargo of the captured veffel, fhould not be removed from on board, either while the hip fhould be at fea, after having been taken, or during the proceedings which should take place against her, her cargo, or any thing relating to her.

Various other cafes were provided for by this treaty; and very great care was taken to fecure both expedition and justice at the tribunals eftablished for prize caufes in the refpective countries. Thetreaty is given at full length among the State Papers in our last volume; but it appeared proper to bring the particulars here extracted under the immediate view or recollection of our readers, becaule it is a model and exemplification of that maritime law, which the French government, in order that Britain might derive. no advantage from its naval fuperiority, wifhed to prevail all over the world. They will ferve to convey, in an eafy manner, an idea of the objects contended for on either fide, which were principally three. First, one party infifted that neutral nations should be allowed to carry on the coafting trade of the belligerent powers, and to fail freely for this purpote, from one port to another of the fame country: this claim, maintained now by the French, the British government did

not

not admit. Secondly, France held it for a maxim, that free fhips make free goods, with the exception of goods comprised under the defcription of contraband of war, and which have been just specified. Great Britain neither admitted that maxim, nor limited contraband goods to the articles there particularized, but confidered as contraband various materials that formed naval and military ftores. Thirdly, the French required that thofe ports only fhould be confidered as blockaded, at the entrance of which the blockading fhips were actually anchored, and that fo near as to create, at all times, an evident danger to thofe fhips which might attempt to enter. The English infifted, that blockades might be conftituted by cruifing fquadrons, anfwering, in a naval war, to thofe real or virtual lines of circumvallation, which belong to a fiege by land. Thele ideal lines on the fea, though not defended in every point by an equal force, they held fufficient to exclude all right of commerce with the towns fo invested: it was by this fyftem only, that many ports hoftile to England, and particularly that of Breft, could be effectually blockaded. The eagerness of the French government to exhibit to the world a proof and example of their maritime jurifprudence and moderation, was difplayed by fome facrifices, on the part of France, to that object. By the treaty between Great Britain and America, of 1794, it was fiipulated, that a free entrance fhould be granted into their respective ports, with complete protection to the privateers and fhips of war of the two countries, and the prizes taken from their enemies; and they engaged never to conclude a treaty, extend

ing the fame favour to any nation at war with either of the contracting parties. The treaty of 1778, having been annulled by the latter, and now regarded as if it had never exifted, they could not allow the fame privileges to France, without vio-. lating their treaty with England. By the fame treaty, the United States were prevented from acceding to the great principle of the new maritime fyftem, viz. that free hips make free goods, without an excep tion in favour of the fuperior naval power of England. They admitted the right of fearch on the part of England. In return for fuch comp'aifance, certain advantages were accorded by the British government to the Americans, as will appear from the treaty. The French commiffioners in their negotiations with the Americans, urged how hard it was that France, for the fake of establishing univerfally the rights of neutralits, and the law of nations, fhould be obliged to recognife and ratify, in favour of her rivals and enemies, proceedings fo little expected on the part of the Americans, with whom he had fo recently made a common caufe against thofe very enemies, directed to the fame object, for which France herfelf was now at war, the attainment of lberty and independence: but the diplomatic conferences were con dufted throughout in the moft amic. ble manner. The American ambaffadors, during their refidence at Paris, were treated with every poffible mark of relpect. The French negotiators laboured hard to renew the treaty of 1778, with certain mo difications; but, when they found that this could not be done, they only expreffed their regret that it fhould be impoffible to remove the [G 3]

difficulties

difficulties which had occurred.Even before the treaty was brought to a conclufion, the French commiffioners, by the authority of their government, declared, that, even in cafe of the prefent negotiation not terminating in a treaty, the American flag fhould, nevertheless, continue to be refpected, and their veffels, in the French courts of law, be treated as thofe of a friendly nation. Orders were issued to the privateers to refpect all neutral flags, among which thofe of the Americans were by far the most numerous, and American and other veffels were daily releafed, with damages against the owners of the privateers. Soon after the conclufion of this commercial treaty between the Americans and the French, an ambaffador was fent, for the first time, to the United States from Denmark. While the French government, by the fhew of a frank and equitable conduct towards all nations, endea voured to conciliate univerfal confidence and attachment, the British cruifers continued occafionally to knock about them, and to feize the fhips of neutrals fraught, or fufpected to be fraught, with military or naval ftores to the enemies of Britain, as ufual.

A fleet of Swedish merchantmen, carrying pitch, tar, hemp, deals, and iron, to feveral ports of France, was taken, January, 1798, failing under convoy of a fhip of war, and proceeded againft for refiftance of vifitation and fearch by British cruifers. Sir William Scott, the judge in our admiralty court, after ftating the law of nations, and that there did not exist any fpecial circumfrances in the cafe in hand, which ought, in any manner or degree, to affect the application of that ge

neral principle, which he held to be incontrovertible, obferved, "That it was his bufinefs merely to decide, whether, in a court of the law of nations, a pretenfion could be legally maintained, which had for its purpose, neither more nor lefs, than to extinguish the right of maritime capture in war, and that by the direct use of hoftile force on the part of a neutral ftate. It was high time that the legal merit of fuch a pretenfion fhould be difpofed of one way or other, It had been for fome few years paft preparing in Europe, and it was extremely fit that it fhould be brought to the test of a judicial decifion; for a worse state of things could not exift, than that of an undetermined conflict between the ancient law of nations, and a modern project of innovation, utterly inconfiftent with it; and, in his apprehenfion, not more inconfiftent with that, than with the amity of neighbouring states, and the perfonal fafety of their refpective fubjects." The judge, then, having allowed fuch cofts as feemed equit able, condemned the hips and cargoes, directing, at the fame time, all private adventures to be restored; and he concluded in thefe words: "This is the fubftance of what I have to pronounce judicially in this cafe, after weighing, with the most anxious care, the feveral facts, and the learned arguments that have been applied to them. I deliver it to my country, and to foreign countries, with little diffidence in the rectitude of the judgement itfelf. I have ftill more fatisfaction in feeling an entire confidence in the rectitude of the confiderations under which it has been formed."

It is not common for men to bear with equanimity even the

judge.

Judgements pronounced against them in the name of law, much lefs do they endure with patience lawlefs and violent aggreffion. The condemnation of the Swedish veffel as legal prize, by our court of admiralty, was lefs irritating to the pride and refentment of the Swedish king and government than an affair that happened afterwards to a Swedish vessel at a harbour of Spain. Two Spanish frigates, of 22 guns each, rode at fingle anchor in the Mole, or inner harbour of Barcelona About the end of Auguft, 1800, two Englith men of war, with a frigate, appeared off the port, and continued to blockade it till the 4th of September. On the afternoon of that day, the English frigate, together with a boat from one of the hips of the line, the Minotaur, boldly fet out from the fquadron to which they belonged, with an intent to attack them and carry them off out of the harbour. On their way, they fell in with a Swedish merchantman that was paffing them under fail. To expedite their scheme, and keep their force more compact, they laid the Swede along-fide, put a number of their men in the veffel, and took her in tow into the harbour;* but, before they approached clofe, the frigate and boat caft off from the Swede, and plyed on their own oars along fide the Spanish frigates, which they found fo far from being in a state of warlike refiftance, that, on board the largeft,

preparations were made for a grand ball and fupper. The table was laid' in grand tyle, and many of the principal people of Barcelona were momentarily expected on board. It is not improbable but they thought that the boats contained their guefts, inftead of fo rude interrupters of their gala. The veffels were eafily carried; but the aflailants had a confiderable diftance to tow their prizes down the Mole, before they could pafs Mount Jove. The pride of the Spaniards was the more hurt at this affair, that there was fomewhat in it of the ladicrous. The officers of the two Spanish frigates had recourfe to every fhift to excuse their unwarlike conduct, and endeavoured to divert the refentment of the government at Madrid from themfelves to the Swedish fhip preff ed into the service of the English.

As the war between Spain and, Great Britain did not permit the Spanish minifter to addrefs a complaint on the affair of Barcelona directly to the court of London, he contented himfelf with denouncing the fact by a circular let'er, dated at St. Ildefonfo, September 17, 1800, to all the ambaladors of foreign powers then refident at Madrid, and with giving more particular information of it to the Swedish government, whom this event interefted more than any other, exhorting him to demand from the British government a fatisfactory reparation for the infult offered to his flag, and

[G4]

exemplary