The lease and the leased territory were investigated by the committee and the evidence in regard to them was published as part of the report made to the House of Commons. John Rae, Esq., one of the witnesses before the committee, stated that the "strip of land" leased was shown on the charts "running along the shore." Sir George Simpson was asked: "Besides your own territory, I think you administer a portion of the territory which belongs to Russia, under some arrangement with the Russian company?". To which question he replied: "There is a margin of coast marked yellow in the map from 54° 40′ up to Cross Sound, which we have rented from the Russian American Company for a term of years." In response to another question he replied: "The British territory runs along inland from the coast about 30 miles; the Russian, territory runs along the coast; we have the right of navigation through the rivers to hunt the interior country." It is apparent that Sir George Simpson, who had visited the region and was thoroughly familiar with its topography, believed that the only way to reach the British territory lying behind the lisière, was by the rivers. The lease, which had been extended from time to time, was to expire May 31, 1867. In March the Russian American Company made a report upon the subject to its government. By this report it appears that the minister of the United States at St. Petersburg, acting on behalf of a Californian company, had proposed to obtain the grant of exclusive fishing, hunting and trading within certain limits. This area included Lynn Canal and the region north of it "to the boundary between Russian and English possessions." The territory desired by the American company, the report stated, was, with the exception of the islands, "exactly that which is now leased to the Hudson's Bay Company." It is apparent, and there is no evidence to the contrary, that all parties to the lease fully understood that the boundary line of the lisière extended around all the inlets and indentations of the coast, and that for over twenty-five years they acted in accord with that understanding. But there is even stronger proof that the Hudson's Bay Company considered all the inlets within Russian domain. Every year during a U. S. Counter Case, App., p. 37. b Ibid., p. 38. Ibid., pp. 39, 44. e Ibid., d Ibid., the latter years of the lease the trading vessels of the company made three or four visits to Taku, Lynn Canal and Chilkat. When the United States came into possession of the region under the treaty of 1867, the company ceased its operations, withdrew from the territory and sent out an agent to close all accounts with the natives." If the Chilkat, Chilkoot and Taku Inlets, the great highways of trade into the interior, had been, as Great Britain now claims them to be, within the British possessions, the Hudson's Bay Company would never have abandoned them, but would have taken steps for their permanent occupation. The British Case, anticipating that the events in connection with the lease and occupation by the Hudson's Bay Company of the lisière under that instrument could be employed as evidence to substantiate the position of the United States, has endeavored to weaken their force by declaring that the Hudson's Bay Company was not, "during the period in question, in any sense a representative of the British Government, and no action of the Company could possibly affect the question at issue." From this declaration in regard to the materiality of evidence relating to the lease of the lisière, the United States dissents; and affirms that such evidence is material, not only because it shows the interpretation placed upon the treaty by the party most in interest, but because west of the Rocky Mountains the company was the de facto government and, therefore, the agent and representative of Great Britain upon the Pacific coast. It has been shown in the Case of the United States that the Hudson's Bay Company was substantially the directing power in the negotiations which related to the boundary and which resulted in Articles III and IV of the treaty of 1825; and the proof of this fact has been materially strengthened by the additional correspondence published, for the first time, in the British Case. Mr. R. M. Martin, whose work on the Hudson's Bay Company was published in 1849, stated that the company "materially aided Mr. Canning in 1825, in the restriction of the Russians to their present northern territories"; and that but for it "Great Britain would probably have been shut out from the Pacific" through the operation of British Case, p. 87. @T. S. Counter Case, App., p. 228. the treaty of 1824 between the United States and Russia. It has been shown' that Mr. Canning was indifferent to the delimitation of the boundary, and that it was the Hudson's Bay Company which was the active force in urging British interests in this particular. In all the vast area, lying westward of Hudson's Bay and extending from the Columbia River to the Arctic Ocean, the Hudson's Bay Company was the only representative of British sovereignty. Lieutenant Colonel Scott in 1867 in reporting on the Indian policy of the company declared: "There is not a regular soldier in all British Columbia (excepting marines on shipboard and at Esquimalt)." Throughout the entire region the government was in the hands of the governor of the company and a council composed of its chief factors who made ordinances and directed the territorial affairs. Justice was adminis tered in accordance with the laws of England by the factors, whose commission as such was "understood to answer the purpose of a commission as magistrates." Over the Indians of those territories the company exercised absolute authority, arresting and punishing offenders. These facts were brought out in the investigation conducted by the select committee in 1857. And, knowing that the company had been the only representative of British sovereignty in "those extensive regions, whether in Rupert's Land or in the Indian Territory," the committee declared it to be its opinion that the privileges of the Hudson's Bay Company should be continued, the primary consideration being, "the great importance to the more peopled portions of British North America that law and order should, as far as possible, be maintained in these territories." In fact the region west of the Rocky Mountains was known in 1823 as the "possessions of the North-West Company" and was, in 1854, designated by the British Foreign Office “possessions of the Hudson's Bay Company." a U. S. Counter Case, App., p. 47, also p. 48. b U. S. Case, p. 59. U. S. Case, App., p. 350. dU. S. Counter Case, App., pp. 37, 40. Ibid., p. 41. f Ibid., pp. 38, 42, 45. gIbid., p. 38; U. S. Case, App., p. 350. U. S. Counter Case, App., p. 36. British Case, Atlas, No. 10. JU. S. Counter Case, App., p. 18. Having for a long period had no other officials in its Indian territories than the factors of the Hudson's Bay Company, having maintained British rule over the aborigines through that company, and having, in fact, delegated to it sovereign rights or at least permitted their exercise in the preservation of "law and order", the British Government cannot now, it is submitted, declare that the company was in no sense its representative. Having secured the benefits of such relationship, it is too late to repudiate the company's acts and to deny its public character. At the time when the lease was in contemplation the British Government was earnestly pressing for the payment of the Dryad claim, and must have been in constant communication with the representatives of the Hudson's Bay Company in London. The correspondence between the Foreign Office and Governor Pelly, which is produced in the British Case, appears to end in February, 1836," although the matter was a subject of discussion at St. Petersburg throughout the two succeeding years. It cannot be doubted that the British Government was fully cognizant of the proposed lease, and gave its assent to its execution by the Hudson's Bay Company. The company, dependent for its privileges upon the will of the British Government, would not have entered into an agreement to obtain control of the territory of another power without obtaining the definite assent of Her Majesty's Government to such a course, especially when such action might involve the political relations of the two powers. Nor would it have entered into such an agreement, which was clearly ultra vires, without first securing governmental sanction. The lease, furthermore, involved the settlement of a claim in the hands of the minister of Great Britain at St. Petersburg, and the Foreign Office must have been notified of the proposed method of its settlement. The governors of the two companies also arranged to meet by reporting to their respective embassies in Berlin. The United States submits that the presumption that the British Government gave its assent to the lease, is too strong to be dismissed by the statement made in the British Case that "there is no evidence that Great Britain either approved or disapproved the lease.” In confirmation of the conclusion, which must be reached from the @ British Case, App., p. 158. ¿U. S. Case, App., pp. 292–307. e U. S. Counter Case, App., p. 5. d British Case, p. 87. known relations existing between the British Government and the Hudson's Bay Company, Mr. R. M. Martin states that, "after negotiations between the two governments, and the two chartered Companies, it was agreed in 1839 that from 1st June, 1840, the Hudson's Bay Company should enjoy for ten years the exclusive use of the continent assigned to Russia by Mr. Canning in 1825.”a Mr. Martin. in his book, was defending the Hudson's Bay Company from the numerous attacks which were in 1848 being made upon it. He undoubtedly had every facility offered him to confirm his statements. On this account, his assertion carries the added weight of being to all intents endorsed by the company itself. In any event, the subsequent course of the British Government in offering no objection to the lease, and in recognizing the mutual interests of the two companies by agreeing with Russia in 1854 to preserve neutrality on the Northwest Coast' constituted a substantial confirmation of the lease, which described the Russian possessions as extending south as far as 54° 40′ and comprising not only the mainland coast but the Interior country" as well. Moreover, as has been stated, a map showing the Russian territory was before the select committee of the House of Commons, and that territory was pointed out by witnesses. The map was published with the report. In attendance upon that investigation was Honorable William H. Draper, Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas of Upper Canada. He had been sent to London by the Canadian Government to watch the investigation. Thus both Great Britain and Canada were fully notified of the interpretation placed upon the treaty by the Hudson's Bay Company. Yet the following year the company was permitted to renew the lease without protest or objection by either the British or the Canadian Government as to the extent of the Russian territory and the course of the boundary around the inlets. The United States, therefore, contends that the Hudson's Bay Company, being from the first the party in interest in the fixation of the boundary and the best informed as to the region, was the most competent British authority to interpret the meaning of the treaty; that the admissions made by that company in the lease and in its interpretation were made by the only representative of the Brit @ U. S. Counter Case, App., p. 47. p. 18. Ibid., p. 45. British Case, p. 87. |