15 OCTOBER 1842, Page 10

was drawn up to serve as a model for all

others: it was ratified, and British Commissioners, Messrs. Munoz and FEATHERSTONHAUGH ; extended to the Neckar, the Maine, the Moselle, the Meuse, and and has laid down on it the boundary-lines claimed by Great Britain the Scheldt. A similar convention was entered into by Russia and and the United States, as also the line awarded by the King of Austria for the rivers of Poland. Great Britain, as a party to the Holland, and that settled by Lord ASHBURTON'S treaty. Mr. Act of the Congress of Vienna, is bound to conform to this law of WYLD has thus made palpable to the senses the literal truth of river-navigation wherever it has been recognized, and to make ex- Mr. FEATHERSTONHAUGH'S statements at the dinner of the Corn- anions to have it universally recognized. wall Polytechnic Society, that " the disputed territory had resolved There are two discussions in which Great Britain has just been into an area of country consisting of about 7,000,000 acres of land," engaged which ought to have been settled by the principles of the and that "the territory has been divided into equal moieties SS Act of the Congress of Vienna—the navigation of the river St. nearly as possible." Any person, by taking in his hand Mr. WYLD'S John, and the Stade-duties. Let us inquire how far this has been map and a pair of compasses, may satisfy himselfthat Great Britain he case. and the United States have terminated their dispute by agreeing to The third article of Lord ASHBURTON'S treaty provides that the take each a fair half of that territory of which each claimed the navigation of the St. John, where it " is declared to be the line whole : and this simple fact exposes the late hollow and un- of boundary," shall be free to both parties; that the British meaning, if not mischievous and unprincipled declamation, about inhabitants of the Upper St. John shall have free access to those sacrifice of British interests and surrender of British rights.

parts where the river flows wholly through the State of Maine, There is something extremely appropriate in Mr. WYLD'S being " for their produce ;" and that the produceof the citizens of Maine, the person to put an extinguisher upon all this "pribble-prabble." grown on the banks of the St. John or its tributaries, shall have Mr. WYLD is not a politician, but a geographer ; and perhaps free access to the mouth of the river, and shall be-dealt with as if geography gains most by the settlement. As long as there was a it were the produce of New Brunswick. This is not so much as question about the boundary, no Englishman and no American Great Britain would have been bound to concede to a party to dared believe the form and disposition of the country in which it the act of the Congress of Vienna, and not so much as it was lay to be different from that which their respective countries saw bound in consistency and fair play to any other friendly nation. It fit to assert : but now both are free to believe that it has the form does not give the free navigation of the St. John to all nations and disposition which Nature gave it, to the great gain of science. wishing to trade with Maine by that river and conforming to the Mr. WYLD'S map is published in honour of the day which eman- police regulations. The privilege conferred upon American pro- cipates English and American geographers from the necessity of duce grown on the St. John and its tributaries, to be dealt with as telling lies for the honour of their countries.

if it were the produce of New Brunswick, is in reality a boon to the In taking leave of the controversy thus appropriately closed, we New Brunswickers. It makes St. John's the harbour both of the beg to offer a resume, by way of winding-up. American and the British territory on the river. There never was The country in which the disputed territory is situated is nearly a more idle cry than that attempted to be raised against Lord an oblong rectangular parallelogram, having its greatest length in ASHBURTON for conceding this privilege to the Americans without a direction from South-west to North-east. The river St. Law- exacting some favour in return, unless men are to insist upon being rence on the North-west side, and the Atlantic Ocean and the Bay paid for serving themselves. of Fundy (an indentation of the Atlantic) on the South-east, form

The bearing of the principle of the free navigation of rivers two of its parallel sides. The other two are—an imaginary line upon the question of the Stade-duties is this. The Stade-duties passing through the source of the Connecticut, terminated by the are not payment for any service done to navigators : they are a Atlantic and the St. Lawrence, and at right angles to both ; and remnant of old feudal exactions. They are of that class of duties the coast of the Gulf of St. Lawrence from Cape Rosters to the which it is the object of the regulations sanctioned by the Act of narrow isthmus which joins the peninsula of Nova Scotia to the the Congress of Vienna to reduce in all cases as much as possible, mainland, and a line drawn across that isthmus to the innermost and to abolish wherever it can be done. The proper way of deal- recess of the Bay of Fundy. Throughout the whole length of this ing with the claims of the King of Hanover would have been to tract of country, from the sources of the Connecticut to the Gulf persuade Austria, Saxony, and Prussia, all of whom are riverains of St. Lawrence, the land rises from the banks of St. Lawrence of the Elbe, to combine with Great Britain to urge on the applica- river on the one side and from the Atlantic on the other. The tion of the principles established by the Congress of Vienna to rivers which flow down the North-western declivity, and those which that river. The King of Hanover is the representative and heir of flow down the South-eastern declivity, have their sources close to- a monarch who was a party to that treaty. By an agreement be- gether. Several ranges of bills extend along this country in the tween Great Britain and the States mentioned above, to pay the direction from South-west to North-east, parallel (or nearly Stade-duties under protest until he agreed to a joint commission for parallel) to each other, to the Atlantic, and to the river St. Law- regulating the navigation of the Elbe, be must ultimately have been rence ; but not one of these constitutes the watershed between the forced to yield. Any compensation then made to him for the abo- streams flowing to the ocean and those flowing to the river St. lition of the Stade-toll would have been estimated upon the foot- Lawrence. There is a general rise of the land independent of ing of what he could claim by old treaties : now it must be esti- the hill-ranges; and its crest, or axis of highest elevation, forms mated upon the footing of what has been conceded by the present the watershed. The plain lying between the hill-range along Government, and we cannot protest against the exaction of what which the Americans wished to run the boundary and the hill- we have consented to pay. If the current account of the arrange- range along which the British wished to run the boundary is higher ment with the King of Hanover be correct, a precipitate and ob- than the plains at the opposite bases of these ranges. The rivers

jectiouable settlement of the Stade-duties has been made. Metis and Chaudiere rise in this elevated central plain, and, break- But these two cases do not exhaust the uses to which the Act ing through the American hill-range, fall into the St. Lawrence : of the Congress of Vienna may be turned. It is the key which the Penobscot and the St. John rise in this central plain, and, may be made to open to us the free navigation of the Elbe, the breaking through the British hill-range and another still more to Vistula, and the Oder. It is the instrument by which the reluc- the South-east, fall into the Atlantic. This formation of country taut Government of Holland may ultimately be forced to relin- must be kept in view in order to appreciate the temper in which quish its exactions on the Lower Rhine. It is the foundation of an the controversy, now happily terminated, has been carried on by improved system of international law as regards river-navigation both countries.

for the whole world. It recognizes the great principle that navi- The central part of the district we have been describing was gation ought to be free, and that it ought to be free because such called in 1816, by Mr. GREENLEAF, an American geographer, "the freedom is conducive to the happiness of nations. It is a new mountainous district " ; and this designation is adopted by Messrs. principle recognized authoritatively for the first time by the Powers M

„uman and FEATHERSTONHAUGH in their report. MT. GREEN- met in Congress at Vienna in 1815. It is already strong in the LEAF describes "the mountainous district" as about 60 miles in adhesion of the mightiest powers in the world, but not yet so breadth ; Messrs. MUDGE and FEATHERSTONHAUGH, more cor- strong as to have entirely superseded the old and false doctrines of rectly, as about 100 miles. This collective epithet "mountainous which it is meant to supply the place. The Governments which country" is equivalent to the term " highlands." The word originated the Act of the Congress of Vienna have been shame- " highlands " does not designate a range of hills, but a tract of fully lax in carrying this principle into execution. It is the in- elevated country in which there may be many ranges. The direc- terest and duty of the British Government to watch over and pro- tion, therefore, to draw a line "along the highlands," seeing that mote its extension, more especially at a time when it is agreed on they are 100 miles broad, would be too vague to admit of its being all hands that the great want of this country is extended markets complied with. The direction to draw a line along the highlands north from the sources of the St. Croix, is also too vague for prac- MR. WYLD'S SETTLEMENT OF THE NORTH- tical use, seeing such a line must cut the whole breadth of 100 EASTERN BOUNDARY. miles diagonally. But the terms of the treaty are more specific.

chussetts, and Vermont. The proposal ultimately made by the United States and accepted by Great Britain, was the adoption of the boundary which had separated Canada and Nova Scotia from the States when all of them were British dependencies. The line drawn north from the sources of the St. Croix was the boundary assigned by the charter of Massachussetts. The line drawn along the watershed was the Southern boundary assigned to the province of Canada by the Royal Proclamation of 1763. The Report of a Committee, adopted by Congress on the 20th August 1782, shows this—" It is incumbent on us to prove that the territorial rights of the Thirteen United States, while in the character of British colo- nies, were the same as those defined in the instructions given to Mr. J. Adams on the 14th day of August 1779. The boundary between the United States and Nova Scotia, in these instructions, was abandoned, because it did not correspond with that described in the charter of Massachussetts. The boundary between the United States and Canada, in these instructions, was adhered to, because it was sanctioned by the Royal Proclamation of 1763. Let us examine the description of the Southern boundary of' Canada in the Proclamation. "The said line, crossing the river St. Lawrence and Lake Champlain in 45 degrees of North latitude, passes along the highlands which divide the rivers that empty themselves into the said river of St. Lawrence from those which fall into the sea ; and also along the North coast of the Bay de Chaleurs, and the coast of the Gulf of St. Lawrence to Cape Rosiers, and from thence crossing the mouth of the river St. Lawrence by the west end of the island of Anticosti, and terminates at the river St. John." This description corresponds to a line drawn along the real watershed, but cannot be made to apply to a line drawn along either of the hill-ranges claimed by the British and Americans. The American range terminates at Cape Rosiers ; the British at the South-eastern termination of the Bay of Chaleurs. That bay is a deep indentation of the sea between the ranges, to the Western extremity of which the table-land between them sinks down ; and a line drawn along the watershed in that elevated plain, if produced, will strike the Western and innermost extremity of the Bay, and thus join naturally with a line drawn along its North coast. It is also to be remarked, that this boundary-line is said to "divide the rivers that empty themselves into the river St. Lawrence _from those which fall into the sea" ; and that "a line crossing the mouth of the river St. Lawrence by the West end of Anticosti," and terminating at the river St. John, marks where the authors of the definition thought "the river" ended and 'the sea" began. The "highlands" of the proclamation are those which separate the affluents of the river St. Lawrence from all rivers falling into "the sea "; and under the term "sea" is comprehended not only the Atlantic, but its great land-locked indentations, the Bay of Fundy and the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The Americans claimed more than they were entitled to, but not nearly so much more as the British. In halving the territory, we have got more than by a strict interpretation of the terms of the treaty we could claim.

In so far as the boundary is concerned, these considerations are now only matter of history, and have no practical bearing. The arrangement under Lord ASHBURTON'S treaty throws the treaty of 1783, the boundary of Canada, and all such matters, overboard. It draws the boundary line, not as old rights or compacts dictate, but as the present will of both nations determines. John Bull would rather go to war than not have the covered line of communi- cation within his own territory ; Jonathan would rather go to war than give up the valley of the Aroostook ; and they run the boundary accordingly. Yet is it of some importance, although the treaty of 1783 has become a dead letter, to note the temper in which the subject has been discussed ; to mark how simple, bow easy of solution, its difficulties are when the only object is to ascertain an abstract fact, but to what long and angry discussions they gave rise while pride, prejudice, and ava- rice, could be touched by them. Neither country has reason to boast of the manner in which the dispute was conducted. Each predetermined that the watershed must be a range of hills, and that the range which gave it the greatest extent of country was the true one; and both set themselves to make out their cases by lying as if for a wager. We learn from the map of Messrs. MUDGE and FEATHERSTONHAUGH, that an in- genious American surveyor has invented a range of hills where there is nothing but a tract of level swamps. And, not to be be- hmdhand with the Americans, Lord PALMERSTON charged his Commissioners to search, not for the highlands separating the rivers falling into the Atlantic from those falling into the St. Lawrence, which the treaty requires, but to examine " which of three lines presents the best-defined continuity of highland range," about which. the treaty says nothing. And, animated by the same spirit as their employer, his Commissioners took the strangest liberties with treaties and charters. "Versus septentriouem " they made to mean "a line a little to the north of east "; "ad occidentem" they translated "westwardly towards the north "; and they got rid of the words in the Royal Proclamation of 1763, which deter- mine where the river St. Lawrence terminates and the sea begins, by omitting them and clapping an "&c" after Cape B,osiers. It is humiliating to see two great nations ready to go to war to sup- port falsehoods for the sake of a useless tract of barren moorland. And as human nature cannot be expected to change much in the course of a few years, it is rather alarming to reflect, that there is still so much of boundary unsettled between the United States and the British possessions in North America. The wisest course for both Governments would be to seize the present moment of har- Mony and good-humour, and press the immediate running of a

boundary-line and the erection of marks all the way to the Pacific. The expense would be trifling; and even though it were heavy, the gain, in removing doubts which may become the source of future wars, is incalculable.