Page:Alaskan boundary tribunal (IA alaskanboundaryt01unit).pdf/135

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ARGUMENT OF THE UNITED STATES.
125

ther says that ‘the ultimate object of the expedition was to form it settlement within the Boitish Territory.[1]

Other articles of the Treaty were referred to in the correspondence, but they are not material to the present disenssion. [tis made clear that. Russia and Cireat Britain both understood that. the purpose of the expedition was to vo ten murive Jeawues ap the Stikine, in order to vet tu British Territory. This shows that both governments under stood that. the monntains near the sen were not meant by the ‘Treaty, for everybody with even the slightest kKnowledye about that country knew that the mountains nearest the sea were not ten marine leagues from the sen. Russin disavowed the aets of its representatives. but the ailair hung on, until it was merged in the lease of the diséve to the Tndson’< Bay Company.

SURVEYS OF THE STIKINE.

The Stikine River was surveyed hy Russia in LsoT and the boundary was located on amp ata point where it was regarded that under the Treaty the line would ron, and this point was about ten marine leagues from the coast. certainly fir east of the summit of the mounttins nearest to the sea.[2] This line was located atter actnal knowledee had heen wained of the mountains within ten marine leawnes of the sea, and in the light of this knowledwe. taken in connection with the provisions of the Treaty, the mountains next to the seq were disre- garded, ‘This was an explicit and deliberate interpretation put by Russia upou the Treaty. <0 faras the summit of the mountains next te the sea, and the summits of mountains within ten marine leagues from the ocveah were concerned.

The Russian Government in 1868. ou account of a report that gold had been discovered on the Stikine about the boundary line. had the river surveved, A report and map of this expedition was tmade hy Professor Blake of Yale University, both of which were pmblished by the United States in 1868.[3] This map shows mountains on both sides of the Stikine River from the yery mouth of the river all the way up, above the boundary Tine as chained by the United States.

In 1868 Professor Leach, formerly of the English Sappers and Miners, was employed by the Hudson’s Bay Company, to survey

thirty miles inland from the coast on a salt writer line. that the Com-


  1. U. S. C. App., 285, 286.
  2. U. S. C. App., 514, No. 28.
  3. U. S. Atlas, No. 29.