national claim. It became, therefore, the right of the United States to do with this fund just as it should see fit. In saying this we are not to be understood as contending that moral considerations were to be held as of no account. We mean that the fund did not bear an impress of money that had been paid over for the benefit of any particular class of persons of the United States. As to the character of money so received, English and American courts agree.

Distribution by Act of Congress was made only after prolonged deliberation where opportunity had been afforded to various classes of claimants to appear and be heard. The Act creating the Court of Commissioners of Alabama Claims allowed four per cent interest. Had six per cent, the usual rate, been allowed, claimants even then would not have recovered the full amount of their losses. This is observed without taking into account the fact that claimants were compelled to employ and pay counsel, to say nothing of the value of their own time and labor expended in obtaining and presenting proof of their losses.

Prolonged discussion took place before the Committees of Congress, and various arguments were brought forward to support the theories of the several classes of claimants who conceived themselves entitled to share in the fund. Congress provided at first for the hearing and adjudicating of claims growing out of the acts of those cruisers for whose

career Great Britain had been found liable. They were termed "inculpated cruisers." Partly by cutting down the rate of interest, and partly because of the inherent difficulty of proving the amount of loss in the respective claims, there remained a portion of the fund for further distribution. A later Act of Congress provided that claims might be prosecuted for damages on the high seas inflicted by the other Confederate cruisers, termed "exculpated," and for the application of any remainder, so far as it would go, to war premium claims. This last-mentioned class of claimants recovered only to the extent of about thirty-seven per cent of loss.

As to whether or not a rightful disposition of the Geneva Award money has been effected, we feel assured that no unprejudiced person, who has learned precisely how the fund originated, and who has consulted the debates in Congress, as well as the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States upon the subject, will be disposed to-day to question the wisdom and the fairness with which the very difficult question of how to distribute this fund was at last determined. The truth is, there was everywhere, and at all times, a purpose evinced on the part of the public men of the United States to apply this money so as to reach the largest number of those American merchants and sailors who had suffered loss through the encouragement afforded by Great Britain to the presence of Confederate cruisers upon the high seas.

CHAPTER XI

AFTERMATH

UPON an occasion where it has become necessary for the representatives of several powers to unite in subscribing a document, such, for example, as a treaty, it is customary, since all the parties to the instrument act in the place of sovereigns, and therefore stand upon an equality, to determine by lot the order of precedence to be observed in the ceremony of affixing their signatures. If this method were adopted at Geneva- as was probably the case it curiously enough happened that the first honor fell to the United States. The text of the decision and award, handsomely engrossed, fills twenty folio pages, and is signed in the following order: Charles Francis Adams (in a clear hand, that may be styled elegant), Frederick Sclopis, Staempfli, Vicomte d'Itajubá. Mr. John Davis, who sailed from Liverpool in the Oceanic, 29 September, 1872, brought the document home. The sheets are bound in heavy covers, and carefully preserved in a morocco case, in the Library of the Department of State.

These pages being devoted to a narrative of events as they from time to time occurred relating to the origin of the Tribunal created for the settlement

of the "Alabama Claims," and the progress of its work, it does not properly come within their province to discuss the opinions filed by the several Arbitrators. The terms of the decision and award have been stated, as a part of the record of what was accomplished by the Tribunal; but space does not suffice for a review of these opinions. Something has been said of the behavior displayed by the Lord Chief Justice in thrusting a bulky document upon his colleagues at literally the last moment, and asking that without reading a word they should assent to making it a part of the record of the proceedings. If the sudden appearance of the document is to be regarded as extraordinary, the nature of its contents when studied will prove to be still more so. It is scarcely to be expected that I should pass it by without a word of comment.

Sir Alexander is prolix in the process of committing his reasons to writing. The paper reads as if the writer had "crammed" for the occasion. He must have dashed off at headlong speed what he had to say, since the "paper" covers no less than three hundred and fifteen (315) closely printed pages of "The Papers Relative to the Treaty of Washington." The four other Arbitrators succeeded in setting forth all they desired to put on record in one hundred and seventy-six (176) pages.

The reader, I fancy, would hardly thank me for giving even a brief résumé of what the Lord Chief Justice has here promulgated. His style is diffuse,

as if his pen had found it easier to run along than to stop. The text of the "Dissenting Opinion" is both argumentative and aggressive. No doubt at the time it pleased many of his countrymen, but 'there were Englishmen who did not like it. A few of the former class, ardent believers in the superiority of the Chief Justice to his colleagues, may have had the courage and perseverance to read it completely through. I doubt, however, whether half a dozen individuals in the United States, other than newspaper writers, or later-day historians, have ever ploughed far enough into it to learn much else than its drift and general character.

The most striking effect that it appears to have wrought was the calling-forth of a scathing reply from the one American who, being conversant with all the facts, was provoked to attack and demolish the "Reasons" of the Chief Justice. Soon after Mr. Cushing had landed in New York, he went to Washington, and there (at Wormley's Hotel) he completed the manuscript of a book that contains probably one of the most savage rejoinders to an adversary that has been seen in political literature since the days of Junius. The manuscript I carried to New York, where I arranged with a publishing-house for an early appearance of "The Treaty of Washington." The book had been written for the hour. Claimants were eager to learn in an authoritative form what had been done for their relief at Geneva. Mr. Cushing undertook to