reservation appeared in the receipts given by the embassy, and the embassy never considered the sums received as interest. It also follows that the parties not only mapped out plans to bring about payment, but abstained from mentioning interest during a period of some ten years. It follows, above all, that the two governments interpreted in the same manner the term balance of the indemnity; that this term, used for the first time by the Ottoman Ministry of Foreign Affairs in its communication of March 27, 1893, frequently recurs thereafter; that the two governments have constantly meant by the word balance the portion of the principal remaining due on the date the notes were exchanged, which sets aside moratory interest; that the Russian Ambassador at Constantinople wrote on May 23/June 4, 1894: "I am obliged to insist that the total of the balance due Russian subjects, which amounts to 91,000 Turkish pounds, be, without further delay, paid to the embassy, in order to give satisfaction to the just complaints and claims of those interested * ** and thus really put an end-to use Your Excellency's expression -- to the incidents to which it had given rise"; that this sum of 91,000 Turkish pounds was exactly the sum which was then due on the principal and that thus moratory interest was not considered; that on October 3rd of the same year, 1894, Turkey, about to make a payment on account, of 50,000 pounds, announced to the embassy, without meeting with any objections, that the Ottoman Bank "will guarantee payment of the balance of 41,000 Turkish pounds"; that on January 13/ 25, 1896, the embassy again used the same term, balance of the indemnity, in protesting against the handing over by Turkey to the Ottoman Bank assignments of revenues which were already pledged to the Imperial Russian Government for the payment of the war indemnity; that on February 11th of the same year, 1896, at the time of the discussion of the resources to be furnished to the Ottoman Bank, the Sublime Porte mentioned, in a note addressed to the embassy, "the 43,978 Turkish pounds, representing the balance of the indemnity"; that a few days later, February 10/22, the embassy replied, making use of the same words balance of the indemnity; and that on May 28th the Ottoman Ministry of Foreign Affairs mentioned once more "the sum of 43,978 Turkish pounds representing the said balance"; that the same was true of a note of the embassy dated April 25/May 8, 1900, although more than four years had elapsed between this communication and the communication of 1896, and that the question of interest should have been again called to attention in some way after so long an interval; that this same expression, balance of the indemnity, appears in the note of the Sublime Porte of July 5, 1900; that, finally, on March 3/16, 1901, the Russian Embassy, after having stated that the Ottoman Bank had not supplied further funds "for the payment of the 43,978 Turkish pounds, the amount of the balance of the indemnity due to Russian subjects," asked that categorical orders be sent to the proper person "for the payment without further delay 'of the above mentioned sums""; that this balance, or practically this amount, having been held by the Ottoman Bank at the disposal of the embassy, it was not until several months later, June 23/July 6, that the embassy transmitted to the Sublime Porte a request of "those interested," demanding payment of some twenty million francs for interest on account of delayed payments, expressing the hope that the Sublime Porte "will not hesitate to recognize in principle the just grounds for the claim," except "to refer the examination of the details to a" mixed Russo-Turkish "commission"; that in short, for eleven years and more, and up to a date after the payment of the balance of the principal, there had not only not been a question of interest between the two governments, but mention had been made again and again of only the balance of the principal. When the tribunal recognized that, according to the general principles and custom of public international law, there was a similarity between the condition of a state and that of an individual, which are debtors for a clear and exigible conventional sum, it is equitable and juridical also to apply by analogy the principles of private law common to cases where the demand for payment must be considered as removed and the benefit to be derived therefrom as eliminated. In private law, the effects of demand for payment are eliminated when the creditor, after having made legal demand upon the debtor, grants one or more extensions for the payment of the principal obligation, without reserving the rights acquired by the legal demand (Toullier-Duvergier, Droit français, vol. III, p. 159, No. 256), or again, when "the creditor does not follow up the summons to the debtor," and "these rules apply to interest-damages and also to interest due for the non-fulfilment of an obligation or for delay in its fulfilment" (Duranton, Droit français, X, p. 470; Aubry and Rau, Droit Civil, 1871, IV, p. 99; Berney, De la demeure, etc., Lausanne, 1886, p. 62; Windscheid, Lehrbuch des Pandektenrechts, 1879, p. 99; Demolombe X, p. 49; Larombière I art., 1139, No. 22, etc.). * * * In the relations between the Imperial Russian Government and the Sublime Porte, Russia therefore renounced its right to interest, since its embassy repeatedly accepted without discussion or reservation and mentioned again and again in its own diplomatic correspondence the amount of the balance of the indemnity as identical with the amount of the balance of the principal. In other words, the correspondence of the last few years proves that the two parties interpreted, in fact, the acts of 1879 as implying that the payment of the balance of the principal and the payment of the balance to which the claimants had a right were identical, and this implied the relinquishment of the right to interest or moratory interest damages. The Imperial Russian Government cannot, when the principal of the indemnity has been paid or placed at its disposal, validly reconsider one-sidedly an interpretation accepted and practised in its name by its embassy. III IN CONCLUSION The arbitral tribunal, basing its conclusion upon the statements of law and fact which precede, is of the opinion That in principle the Imperial Ottoman Government was liable to moratory indemnities to the Imperial Russian Government from December 31, 1890/January 12, 1891, the date of the receipt of the explicit and regular demand for payment, But that, in fact, the benefit to the Imperial Russian Government of this legal demand having ceased as a result of the subsequent relinquishment by its embassy at Constantinople, the Imperial Ottoman Government is not held liable to pay interest-damages by reason of the dates on which the payment of the indemnities was made, And, consequently, DECIDES That a negative reply is made to Question 1 of Article 3 of the compromis, thus stated: "Whether or not the Imperial Ottoman Government must pay the Russian claimants interest-damages by reason of the dates on which the said government made payment of the indemnities determined in pursuance of Article 5 of the treaty of January 27/February 8, 1879, as well as of the protocol of the same date?" Done at The Hague, in the building of the Permanent Court of Arbitration, November 11, 1912. LARDY, President. MICHIELS VAN VERDUYNEN, Secretary General. BOOK REVIEWS L'Asile interne devant le Droit International. By Dr. C. M. Tobar y Borgoño. Paris: V. Giard & E. Brière. pp. 367. The purpose of the author is primarily to develop the history of the right of asylum. To this end, he begins with the earliest cities of refuge and traces the political and religious idea involved in their existence down to the present, particularly devoting himself to the modern development illustrated in the reception by legations and consulates of those who flee from arrest for supposed political offenses. Although a South American, the design of the author is to attack from the standpoint of logic, as well as of precedent, the rightfulness of recourse to such asylum. His opening chapter indicates very well the underlying idea of the book. "International law," he says, "notwithstanding the inequality of countries, should apply to all alike, since it is the expression of reason and justice; so that were another rule adopted, international law would disappear, for it would become unjust and irrational. This is why we have undertaken to consider the right of asylum, which has disappeared in Europe, and which, however, some desire to preserve perpetually in Latin America, creating thus, between free and independent, and consequently equal, countries an impossible and unjust legal distinction. Diplomatic asylum, serving no purpose in international politics, and being, on the other hand, an institution which places certain countries in a juridical condition inferior to others, is absurd and unjust." The author asks himself whether the abolition of the right of asylum is proper and feasible. His answer is in the affirmative, and he believes, evidently, that the abolition of the right of asylum would have a material effect in doing away with the revolutions which still continue to curse some of the countries of South America. The work under consideration is a large storehouse of information relative to modern instances of resort to the right of asylum and of illustrations of the attitude of various nations with regard thereto. A student of the subject should, however, supplement this work by reference to Moore's International Law Digest, with which, apparently, the author is unacquainted, but which gives in detail the American position |