after the circumstances which preceded the incident and those which produced it, there was, at the cessation of fire, sufficient uncertainty with regard to the danger to which the division of vessels was exposed to induce the Admiral to proceed on his way. Nevertheless, the majority of the commissioners regret that Admiral Rojdestvensky, in passing the Straits of Dover, did not take care to inform the authorities of the neighboring maritime Powers, that, as he had been led to open fire near a group of trawlers, these boats, of unknown nationality, stood in need of assistance. 17. In concluding this report, the commissioners declare that their findings, which are therein formulated, are not, in their opinion, of a nature to cast any discredit upon the military qualities or the humanity of Admiral Rojdestvensky, or of the personnel of his squadron. SPAUN DoubassOff LEWIS BEAUMONT AGREEMENT FOR INQUIRY Declaration between Great Britain and Russia, relating to the constitution of an international commission of inquiry on the subject of the North Sea incident.-Signed at St. Petersburg, November 12/25, 1904.1 His Britannic Majesty's Government and the Imperial Russian Government having agreed to entrust to an international commission of inquiry, assembled conformably to Articles 9 to 14 of the Hague Convention of the 29th (17th) July, 1899, for the pacific settlement of international disputes, the task of elucidating by means of an impartial and conscientious investigation the questions of fact connected with the incident which occurred during the night of the 21st-22d (8th-9th) October, 1904, in the North Sea (on which occasion the firing of the guns of the Russian fleet caused the loss of a boat and the death of two persons belonging to a British fishing fleet, as well as damages to 1American Journal of International Law, vol. 2, p. 929. For the original French text, see Appendix, p. 614. other boats of that fleet and injuries to the crews of some of those boats), the undersigned, being duly authorized thereto, have agreed upon the following provisions: ARTICLE 1 The international commission of inquiry shall be composed of five members (commissioners), of whom two shall be officers of high rank in the British and Imperial Russian navies, respectively. The Governments of France and of the United States of America shall each be requested to select one of their naval officers of high rank as a member of the commission. The fifth member shall be chosen by agreement between the four members above-mentioned. In the event of no agreement being arrived at between the four commissioners as to the selection of the fifth member of the commission, His Imperial and Royal Majesty the Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, shall be invited to select him. Each of the two high contracting parties shall likewise appoint a legal assessor to advise the commissioners, and an agent officially enpowered to take part in the labors of the commission. ARTICLE 2 The commission shall inquire into and report on all the circumstances relative to the North Sea incident, and particularly on the question as to where the responsibility lies and the degree of blame attaching to the subjects of the two high contracting Parties or to the subjects of other countries in the event of their responsibility being established by the inquiry. ARTICLE 3 The commission shall settle the details of the procedure which it will follow for the purpose of accomplishing the task with which it has been entrusted. ARTICLE 4 The two high contracting Parties undertake to supply the international commission of inquiry, to the greatest possible extent, with all the means and facilities necessary to enable it to thoroughly investigate and correctly estimate the matters in dispute. ARTICLE 5 The commission shall assemble at Paris as soon as possible after the signature of this agreement. ARTICLE 6 The commission shall present its report to the two high contracting Parties signed by all the members of the commission. ARTICLE 7 The commission shall arrive at all its decisions by a majority vote of the five commissioners. ARTICLE 8 The two high contracting Parties undertake to bear, each on its part, the expenses of the inquiry made by it previously to the assembly of the commission. The expenses incurred by the international commission, after the date of its assembly, in organizing its staff and in conducting the investigations which it will have to make, shall be shared equally by the two Governments. In witness whereof the undersigned have signed the present declaration and have affixed their seals thereto. Done in duplicate at St. Petersburg, November 25 (12), 1904. (Signed) CHARLES HARDINGE (Signed) COUNT LAMSDORFF ADDITIONAL DOCUMENT Supplementary protocol to the Declaration between Great Britain and Russia relative to the constitution of an international commission of inquiry on the subject of the North Sea incident.-Signed at St. Petersburg, November 12/25, 1904.1 The undersigned have met to-day in the building of the Imperial Ministry of Foreign Affairs to proceed to the signature of the declaration between the Government of His Britannic Majesty and the Imperial Russian Government, concerning the institution of a commission of inquiry on the subject of the North Sea incident. After the reading of the respective instruments, found in good and due form, the signature of the said declaration took place in the usual manner. In faith of which the undersigned have drawn up the present protocol and attached the seals of their arms. Done in duplicate at St. Petersburg, November 12 (25), 1904. (L. S.) CHARLES HARDINGE (L. S.) COUNT LAMSDORFF Translation. For the original French text, see Appendix, p. 615. THE TAVIGNANO, CAMOUNA AND GAULOIS CASES between FRANCE and ITALY Findings Reported May 2, 1913 Syllabus On January 25, 1912, during the Turco-Italian war, the French mail steamer Tavignano was seized by the Italian torpedo boat Fulmine off the coast of Tunis and conducted to Tripoli under suspicion of having on board contraband of war. The suspicion proved to be unwarranted and the vessel was released on the following day. On the same date, in the same waters, the two Tunisian mahones, Camouna and Gaulois, were fired upon by the Italian torpedo boat Canopo. The French Government claimed indemnity for these acts from the Italian Government on the ground that the vessels when encountered were within the territorial waters of Tunis and were not, according to international law, subject to either attack or capture. On the other hand, Italy maintained that the acts complained of took place on the high seas and that no rule of international law had been violated. 3 The cases were submitted to a commission of inquiry by agreements signed April 15 and May 20, 1912.1 The commission made its report on July 23d, but as no definite conclusion was reached a compromis was signed on November 8th2 submitting the case for arbitration to the tribunal in charge of the Carthage and Manouba cases. No decision was rendered by the tribunal, the matter being finally settled out of court by a special agreement dated May 2, 1913, according to the terms of which Italy agreed to pay an indemnity to the French Government of five thousand francs for distribution among the various individuals who had sustained losses. REPORT OF THE COMMISSION Report of the commission of inquiry constituted in virtue of the agreement for inquiry signed at Rome between France and Italy, May 20, 1912-Malte, July 23, 1912.5 The commissioners, after having examined and compared all data gathered both from the documents presented by the two parties 1Post, pp. 417, 419. *Post, p. 421. 5Translation. For the original French text, see Appendix, p. 616. and from the evidence in the case; after having done the important part, which was the weighing of all this evidence; and after having taken into consideration the degree of uncertainty appertaining thereto, has reached the following conclusions: I The evidence and documents presented are not of a nature to permit of determination of the exact geographical points where occurred the various acts which have been submitted to inquiry, but simply of the zones in which they occurred, it being impossible to decide upon an exact point in the zones. 1. Regarding the point where the Tavignano stopped. This point is within the area of a rectilinear quadrilateral set off by the following four apexes: The Fulmine, setting out from an indeterminate point in the zone above defined, pursued the mahones, perhaps going out of that zone, in a direction impossible to determine definitely but which was either southeast or southwest by south. The pursued mahones were located at the following points, which are the centers of inexact circles of half-mile radii: |