is witnessed by Richard Williams, the assistant secretary. The substance of them is given above, in the summary of the commissioners' arguments for the routes for which they respectively contended.

Webster and Lord
Ashburton.

After the exchange of the reports of the Negotiations of Mr. commissioners in New York, no discussion as to the boundary under Article VII. seems to have taken place between the two governments for a period of ten years.2 The dispute as to the northeastern boundary question overshadowed the differences as to the line under Article VII. In 1839 and 1840 those differences formed the subject of a correspondence, but it was not till 1842 that they were settled. In a note to Lord Ashburton of the 15th of July in that year Mr. Webster, after describing a line for the northeastern boundary, observed: "It is probable, also, that the disputed line of boundary in Lake Superior might be so adjusted as to leave a disputed island within the United States." In his reply of the next day Lord Ashburton said he was prepared to give up the "first point," as to the Island of St. George, which was "the only object of real value in this controversy." As to the second difference, he proposed a line "from a point about six miles south of Pigeon River, where the Grand Portage commences on the lake, and continued along the line of said portage, alternately by land and water, to Lac la Pluie, the existing route by land and by water remaining common to both parties." Lord Ashburton added, however, that in making the important concession of the island of St. George he must attach to it a condition of accommodation in two points. He said:

"The first of these two cases is, at the head of Lake St. Clair, where the river of that name empties into it from Lake Huron. It is represented that the channel bordering the United States coast in this part is not only the best for navigation, but, with some winds, is the only serviceable passage. I do not know that, under such circumstances, the passage of

H. Ex. Doc. 451, 25 Cong. 2 sess.

2 In response to a resolution of the House of Representatives of May 28, 1838, calling for any information and correspondence relating to Article VII., President Van Buren on the 2nd of the following July transmitted to the House a report of the Secretary of State, accompanied with the separate reports of the commissioners, and stating that they contained "all the information on the subject on the files of the Department." (H. Ex. Doc. 451, 25 Cong. 2 sess.)

a British vessel would be refused; but, on a final settlement of the boundaries, it is desirable to stipulate for what the commissioners would probably have settled, had the facts been known to them.

"The other case, of nearly the same description, occurs on the St. Lawrence, some miles above the boundary at St. Regis. In distributing the islands of the river, by the commissioners, Barnhart's Island and the Long Sault Islands were assigned to America. This part of the river has very formidable rapids, and the only safe passage is on the southern or American side, between those islands and the mainland. We want a clause in our present treaty to say that, for a short distance, namely, from the upper end of Upper Long Sault Island to the lower end of Barnhart's Island, the several channels of the river shall be used in common by the boatmen of the two countries.”1

Mr. Webster readily conceded that the channels on either side of the Long Sault Islands in the St. Lawrence, and the passages between the islands lying at or near the junction of the River St. Clair with the lake of that name, should each be free and open to the vessels of both countries, and asked that, reciprocally, American vessels should, in proceeding from Lake Erie into the Detroit River, have the privilege of passing between the Bois Blanc, an island belonging to Great Britain, and the Canadian shore, the deeper and better channel being on that side. In respect of the line northward of the Isle Royale, he proposed that it should run to the mouth of Pigeon River. There was, he said, reason to think that "Long Lake," in the treaty of 1783, meant merely the estuary of the Pigeon River; and this opinion was strengthened by the fact that the words of the treaty seemed to imply that the water intended as "Long Lake" was immediately joining Lake Superior. But he thought it right that the water communications and portages between this point and the Lake of the Woods should make a common highway, where necessary, for the use of the subjects and citizens of both governments. These terms Lord Ashburton accepted, at the same time observing that provision for the greater facility of the navigation of the St. Lawrence, of the two passages between the upper lakes, and of the passage from Lake Erie into the Detroit River, must be secured by declaring the several passages in those parts free to both parties, and that the free use of

Webster's Works, VI. 281.

2 Webster's Private Correspondence, II. 140; Webster's Works, VI. 284.

the navigation of the Long Sault passage in the St. Lawrence must be extended to below Barnhart's Island for the purpose of clearing the rapids.

Webster-Ashburton
Treaty.

These suggestions were incorporated in the treaty which was signed on the 9th of August 1842. The provisions relating to the boundary in question are comprised in the second and seventh articles, the former of which adopts the line of the commissioners under Article VII. of the Treaty of Ghent, so far as they agreed upon it,' and for the rest fixes the boundary as it has just been described. The text of the articles is as follows:

"ARTICLE II.

"It is moreover agreed, that from the place where the joint commissioners terminated their labors under the sixth article of the treaty of Ghent, to wit, at a point in the Neebish Channel, near Muddy Lake, the line shall run into and along the shipchannel between St. Joseph and St. Tammany Islands, to the division of the channel at or near the head of St. Joseph's Island; thence, turning eastwardly and northwardly around the lower end of St. George's or Sugar Island, and following the middle of the channel which divides St. George's from St. Joseph's Island; thence up the east Neebish Channel, nearest to St. George's Island, through the middle of Lake George; thence, west of Jonas' Island, into St. Mary's River, to a point in the middle of that river, about one mile above St. George's or Sugar Island, so as to appropriate and assign the said island to the United States; thence, adopting the line traced on the maps by the commissioners, thro' the river St. Mary and Lake Superior, to a point north of Ile Royale, in said lake, one hundred yards to the north and east of Ile Chapeau, which lastmentioned island lies near the northeastern point of Ile Royale, where the line marked by the commissioners terminates; and from the last mentioned point, southwesterly, through the middle of the sound between le Royale and the northwestern main land, to the mouth of Pigeon River, and up the said river, to and through the north and south Fowl Lakes, to the

1 Mr. Fish, in an instruction to Mr. Moran, at London, of May 21, 1869, acknowledges the receipt of a dispatch from Mr. Reverdy Johnson of April 23, with copies of five maps, the originals and duplicates of which were prepared by the commission under Articles VI. and VII. of the Treaty of Ghent, and says: "That commission having failed to come to an agreement as to a part of the line intended by the 7th article of the Treaty of Ghent, these maps of survey which they prepared were referred to by the negotiators of the Treaty of Washington, as the means of indicating the boundary agreed upon in the 2nd article of that Treaty." (MSS. Dept. of State.)

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lakes of the height of land between Lake Superior and the Lake of the Woods; thence, along the water communication to Lake Saisaginaga, and through that lake; thence, to and through Cypress Lake, Lac du Bois Blanc, Lac la Croix, Little Vermillion Lake, and Lake Namecan and through the several smaller lakes, straits, or streams, connecting the lakes here mentioned, to that point in Lac la Pluie, or Rainy Lake, at the Chaudière Falls, from which the commissioners traced the line to the most northwestern point of the Lake of the Woods; thence, along the said line, to the said most northwestern point, being in latitude 49° 23′ 55′′ north, and in longitude 95° 14′ 38′′ west from the observatory at Greenwich; thence, according to existing treaties, due south to its intersection with the 49th parallel of north latitude, and along that parallel to the Rocky Mountains. It being understood that all the water communications and all the usual portages along the line from Lake Superior to the Lake of the Woods, and also Grand Portage, from the shore of Lake Superior to the Pigeon River, as now actually used, shall be free and open to the use of the citizens and subjects of both countries.

"ARTICLE VII.

"It is further agreed that the channels in the river St. Lawrence on both sides of the Long Sault Islands and of Barnhart Island, the channels in the River Detroit on both sides of the island Bois Blane, and between that island and both the American and Canadian shores, and all the several channels and passages between the various islands lying near the junction of the river St. Clair with the lake of that name, shall be equally free and open to the ships, vessels, and boats of both parties."

Comments on the
Settlement.

In the message with which the treaty was submitted to the Senate it was observed that the region of country on and near the shore of Lake Superior, between Pigeon River on the north and Fond du Lac and the River St. Louis on the south and west, embraced, northward of the claim set up by the British commissioner under the Treaty of Ghent, a territory of 4,000,000 acres, considered valuable as a mineral region, while from the height of land at the head of Pigeon River westerly to the Rainy Lake the country was understood to be of little value, being described as a region of rock and water. The message also explained the provisions of the treaty relating to the common navigation of certain channels-a measure rendered necessary in order to secure the use of the water communication through the Great Lakes to both parties.

Treaties of 1854 and 1871.

By Article IV. of the reciprocity treaty of 1854 the right to navigate both the River St. Lawrence above the point where it ceases to be the boundary and the canals in Canada used as part of the water communication between the Great Lakes and the Atlantic Ocean was temporarily secured to the citizens and inhabitants of the United States. By Article XXVI. of the Treaty of Washington of May 8, 1871, the same right as to the St. Lawrence is secured in perpetuity. By Article XXVII. the British Government engaged to urge upon the government of the Dominion of Canada to secure to the citizens of the United States the use of the St. Lawrence, Welland, and other canals in the Dominion on terms of equality with its inhabitants; and the United States engaged to permit British subjects to use the St. Clair Flats Canal on terms of equality with the inhabitants of the United States, and also to urge upon the State governments to secure to British subjects in the same manner the use of the several State canals connected with the navigation of the lakes or rivers traversed by or contiguous to the boundary. By Article XXVIII. the right to navigate Lake Michigan for commercial purposes was secured to British subjects for a limited term.'

See, in relation to the subject of this chapter, the International Boundary of Michigan, by Annah May Soule. (Reprinted from Michigan Pioneer aud Historical Collections, XXVI.)