west. Any question in respect to the Oregon country seems not at first to have been present to the thought of either party. Negotiations were begun in 1804, and were continued, with intervals of interruption, until February 22, 1819, when, by a convention of that date, the Floridas were ceded by Spain to the United States, and a boundary line west of the Mississippi agreed upon. This western boundary line, after striking latitude 42° near the supposed source of the Arkansas River, was to run west on this parallel to the Pacific Ocean. Article III of this convention, after particularly describing this line, concludes: "The two high contracting parties agree to cede and renounce all their rights, claims, and pretensions to the territories described by said line: That is to say, the United States hereby cede to his Catholic Majesty, and renounce forever all their rights, claims, and pretensions to the territories lying west and south of the above described line; and, in like manner, his Catholic Majesty cedes to the United States all his rights, claims, and pretensions to any territories east and north of the said line; and for himself, his heirs, and successors renounces all claim to the said territories forever." Thus the Florida treaty, though making no mention of the Oregon Territory, incidentally carried with it the final delimitation of that territory on the south, and the transfer to the United States of the Spanish claim to Oregon. By this treaty the earliest claimant to the Oregon Territory ceased longer to be a party to the question of its sovereignty.
The question of sovereignty was not left to Great Britain and the United States alone, on the withdrawal of Spain. More than two decades before, Russia had entered this region with an assertion of her right to make settlement on unoccupied territory, and recently had
