of the Shenandoah, the Arbitrators expressed a wish to hear the point elucidated as to the enlistment of men at Melbourne. Sir Roundell Palmer prepared an argument.' He did not confine himself to the question of fact as to the number of men enlisted. He submitted his argument with some verbal observations. Of this argument Mr. Davis says it was "long, able, and at times eloquent." When he had concluded, Mr. Cushing said to the Tribunal that the Counsel for the United States had drawn up a memorandum, and he submitted it with a few pertinent remarks. He closed with a request to be informed if the new questions raised by the Counsel for Great Britain remained open before the Tribunal. After deliberation, the Tribunal, by a vote of four to one, significantly declared that they had been sufficiently enlightened."

Another request from the British Arbitrator for further elucidation concerned the entry of the Florida into Mobile (September, 1863), a port of the Confederate States, where she stayed for about four months, and where she shipped a crew. The depredations of the Florida were committed only after a second evasion of the blockading fleet off Mobile, by escaping from that port. The Tribunal adopted the proposal of Sir Alexander Cockburn. Sir Roundell

1 "On very short notice, while I was suffering from gout." Memorials, vol. i, p. 259.

Letter, Davis to Fish, MS. Archives, Dept. of State. 3 Gen. Arb., vol. iv, p. 35.

Palmer prepared an argument, of no great length. One of the English secretaries read it to the Tribunal on the 23d of August. It maintained that any responsibility that Great Britain may have been under came to an end when the Florida once was at home in a Confederate port. It was a novel point to raise. The Counsel for the United States did not take Sir Roundell's view. Their reply (which was brief), though signed by all three of the Counsel, was drawn up by Mr. Evarts, and by him read to the Tribunal.1

Besides the cases of the Florida and the Alabama the Tribunal found Great Britain responsible for all acts committed by the Shenandoah after her departure from Melbourne on the 18th day of February, 1865, because of an augmentation of force at that port. As to all the other vessels, there was no finding against Great Britain, except that tenders, such as the Tuscaloosa (tender to the Alabama), the Clarence, the Tacony, and the Archer (tenders to the Florida), being auxiliary vessels, were treated as following the lot of their principals, so that Great Britain was held to be responsible for their depredations.

1 Gen. Arb., vol. iii, pp. 546–549.

CHAPTER IX

THE DAMAGES

JOHN BULL, as the world has reason to know, is eminently practical. Whenever a situation begins to take on a look of touching his pocket, he can be depended upon to view with an extremely lively concern what is going forward. A French writer, who travelled through England in the early part of the last century, thus speaks of a trait he observed in Englishmen: "They love money so much that their first question in an enquiry concerning the character of any man is as to his degree of fortune." Nearly fifty years later a shrewd yet kindly visitor accomplished a like journey, taking notes here and there; and when he returned home, he found it convenient to devote an entire chapter, "Wealth," to what he had to say in "English Traits" of this national characteristic.

It is well understood that the British taxpayer, in his day and generation, regularly presents himself as a personage with whom the British Government have seriously to deal. He insists on being told in advance for what ends the money is going to be used that he is called upon at stated periods to hand over to a tax-collector. He finds little joy in the

1 Fievée, 1803.

ceremony of paying taxes; but he means to get at least the satisfaction out of it of seeing that, down to the very last penny, there is sufficient warrant for the expenditure; or, else, his grumbling will break the bounds of mere habit, and assume threatening proportions. The course taken by the Government is sure to be determined largely by a wholesome dread of the taxpayer. A bold act was it, therefore, in Mr. Gladstone to commit his country to the risk of being condemned at Geneva, to pay a bill of indemnity. Taxpayers had to be reckoned with. They were bound to make a great ado about it. But Mr. Gladstone had the courage to take the step, and to-day the historian praises him therefor.

We may conceive that Great Britain sent to Geneva her Agent and her Counsel charged with the duty, first, of satisfying the neutral Arbitrators that no responsibility whatever for the escape of the Confederate cruisers could be fastened upon the Government; and (in case the Arbitrators should prove to be obstinate in respect to England's alleged good behavior), secondly, of reducing the damages just as much as possible, even down to

1 The Annual Register for 1872 (p. 89), speaking of the difficulties attending the reception in England of the "Three Rules" of the Treaty of Washington, says: 'Although these difficulties were serious enough and tended greatly to increase the unpopularity of the entire arbitration scheme, not only with a large political party but with the public în general, another cause of dissension which very nearly led to the total failure of the negotiations was as yet undeveloped [the 'indirect claims ']."

figures merely nominal. Her Counsel made a determined fight. The cause indeed could not have been argued better; but notwithstanding their specious reasoning, their earnest and emphatic protestations, they utterly failed in their endeavors. England was neglectful, said the Arbitrators. Now came the question, and it was by no means an easy question,- What ought England to be adjudged to pay for her neglect?

So long as the argument of Counsel confined itself to a disquisition upon the law of nations, and a recital of what theretofore had been the practice of neutral Governments in time of war, the largeness of the topic lent dignity to the mode in which the hearing proceeded. A liability once established, however, and the controversy resolving itself into a procedure where one party is casting up column after column of figures, and the other discrediting them, there ensued a slight, yet visible, lowering of the standard of discussion. It was a turning from the studied harangue of the Senate Chamber to the bustle of the market-place. But the defenders of Great Britain were seen to be not a whit less doughty and alert in resisting the claims set forth in tables of figures, than they had been in denying the principles which affected to hold a neutral Government to a strict measure of international obligation. Indeed, the British Agent and Counsel, when decrying the amounts insisted upon by the United States, seemed to feel themselves planted on firmer ground than