was under his jurisdiction, was not used for residence by other than Indians.

Venezuelan Case,

p. 167.

In the passage omitted from the middle of the Venezuelan citation, Mr. Crichton further reports 5 that there was no exercise of Colombian juris- British App. VI,

diction to the east of the Amakuru, and that all the Indian Captains on the Waini and Barima and tributaries had received their insignia of command from the Colony, and looked to it for 10 protection.

The affirmative evidence adduced by Venezuela as to the British limits during this period in the coast region having now been dealt with, it is not proposed to restate the evidence adduced on the 15 same point in the British Case. It is only necessary

to point out that, though beyond the Moruka there were no residents on British grants, that territory was at this time, as proved in the British Case, comprised within the jurisdiction of a British 20 Magistrate, traversed by him on his circuits, and inhabited by aborigines owning the supremacy and claiming the protection of the British Crown.

p. 76.

British Case,

p. 117.

p. 33.

With regard to British occupation in the in25 terior during this period, the Venezuelan Case makes the same point as with regard to the coast. The whole contention is that there were no residents other than Indians above the falls in the three rivers. The Dutch plantations above the 30 falls had been found in the eighteenth century British App. VI, to be unproductive in comparison with the land lower down; this circumstance fully explains the absence of settlers; but the Colonial Government never relaxed its hold of the upper rivers. 35 In the days when military support against the blacks was required from the Indians the lists of those ready to serve included Indians living eighteen days up the Massaruni and ten days up the Essequibo and Cuyuni.

40

45

The Caribs of the Essequibo received the presents of the Government and bound themselves to keep the peace. A mission was planted on the Rupununi in 1839, and Pirara was occupied by British troops in 1840.

In the Massaruni the Government in 1826 interfered to put down a native conflict, and in the same year ejected Mr. Hilhouse from land upon which he had squatted among the Indians in that river. In the Cuyuni during this period no 50 disturbance is recorded. That river was occupied by Indians who had fled from the savannahs on the

British App. VI,

p. 13.

The Interior.

p. 49.

strong, the missionary at Bartika, met Indians at a point five days up the Cuyuni, who stated that British App. VI, they came from a settlement of 200 Indians five days higher up under a Chief who had emigrated 5 from Venezuela; and in 1841 Schomburgk found at the mouth of the Acarabisi that the Indians were refugees from the Missions, who had British App. VII, escaped to the Cuyuni from the Venezuelan p. 28. forces. The Indians were fully aware of the 10 former occupation of the Cuyuni by the Dutch, and that the Spaniards had never come beyond Airékuni (8 miles above the Acarabisi), to which they had penetrated during the Patriot War.

The condition of the Colony.

Venezuelan Case,

pp. 173-178.

Venezuelan Case,
p. 173.

British App. V,
pp, 189, 190.

In the absence of trouble among the Indians, 15 and in view of the decay, after the suppression of the Missions, of Spanish or Venezuelan influence in the savannahs, occasions for the active exercise of British dominion on the Cuyuni during this period were infrequent. It will be seen from the 20 history of the next period, that is to say the period since 1850, that the moment the active assertion of the British right to the Cuyuni Valley, or at any rate to the south bank of that river became important, such assertion was 25 effectively made.

The considerations advanced in the Venezuelan Case with reference to the condition of the Colony, may be dealt with very briefly. It is pointed out that during the first half of the cen- 30 tury, agriculture in British Guiana underwent, as an industry, a serious relapse from its former state of prosperity, and land went out of cultivation. So far as this may have been due to economic causes, it is submitted that it can have 35 no sort of bearing on the questions at issue in this Arbitration, unless it resulted, which it can be shown it did not, in the contraction of the territory in any way occupied or governed by the Colony. It is suggested, however, that the 40 enterprise of the British planters to the west of the Essequibo was checked by the Spaniards. The authority upon which this suggestion is made, is a representation made in 1808, that is to say in time of war, by seventeen planters upon 45 the Arabian coast, that the situation of their estates rendered them particularly liable to the ravages of hostile privateers; wherefore they prayed that a road should be constructed to facilitate their relief in case of attack, that 50 further troops should be sent to the district, and

that an armed schooner should be stationed off the Moruka Post. It cannot be shown that Spanish attacks ever caused the abandonment of a single plantation; and the Moruka Post was

5 always maintained. It is not the case, as stated Venezuelan Case, on p. 174 of the Venezuelan Case, that the Colony P. 174. itself had gradually shrunk, and the circumstance that it was found convenient to merge it with Demerara can have no bearing upon the 10 question of boundary. It was at one time proposed to place the capital of the now united Case, App., 200, Colony on the west bank of the Essequibo on the Ituribisi Creek, but ultimately the present site of Georgetown was adopted.

15

British Counter

262.

Venezuelan Case,

With regard to the social and economic revolution involved in the abolition of the slave trade the subsequent emancipation of the negroes, and the resulting loss to the planters, this had no effect upon the area which Great Britain con20 tinued to occupy. If, as the passage cited from Rodway indicates, plantations were replaced by p. 176. villages of emancipated negroes, living in comparative idleness, this, however financially disastrous, did not curtail the extent of the British 25 territory. The negro villages were villages of British subjects, living under the laws of the Colony; and the changes introduced by emancipation in the British Colony had no such effect as that which followed the suppression of the 30 Capuchin Missions in the Spanish territory, whereby there was swept away and utterly destroyed all vestige of Spanish influence, or of Spanish organization, in the territory cast of the Orinoco. It must be pointed out, however, 35 that Great Britain is not bound by the statements of Mr. Rodway, which are in many cases inaccurate.

British Case,

It is clear from the evidence adduced in the British Case, and again referred to in the present pp. 98-118. 40 chapter of this Counter-Case, that whatever the

fate of the planters, British occupation and British government, so far from becoming weaker, became more firmly consolidated during this period.

belonged by right to Venezuela. But no question of adverse holding or prescription can arise except where one Power has occupied territory by right belonging to the other; and, 5 except in such cases, present possession, however recent, cannot be disturbed. Great Britain denies that her present occupation (extending to the Schomburgk line) does in fact include any greater extent of territory than was 10 occupied or politically controlled by the Dutch

and by Great Britain since her succession to the Dutch title. The only change has been that in the last fifteen or twenty years her occupation of the outlying districts has been marked by more 15 complete political administration. But even if that were not so Her Majesty's Government would be entitled to retain the whole territory up to the Schomburgk line, on the simple ground that at the date of the Treaty of Arbitration they 20 were in possession, and that the territory in question cannot be shown to have ever belonged either to Spain or Venezuela.

There is no ground for the contention (if it becomes material to consider it) that settlers 25 who have ventured into the disputed territory since 1880 in the interior, and 1884 on the coast, are entitled to no consideration, because they went there in the face of distinct warning from both Governments, and with open eyes assumed 30 all the risks involved. In 1863 and 1867, that is to say, while the Arrangement of 1850 was subsisting, the Colonial Government refused to grant land or to promise protection to certain prospectors in the Cuyuni. But if the instruc35 tions for the guidance of the Governor in the

matter of this Arrangement are referred to, it will be seen that he was to act, on any occasion on which action might be necessary and could not be avoided, as if the territory within Sir 40 Robert Schomburgk's boundary were British, and he was further instructed to prevent any lodgment by the Venezuelans. Since the time when Venezuela herself ceased to observe the Arrangement of 1850, the British Government has 45 given both landed title and protection to the settlers up to the Schomburgk line. The speech

of the Lieutenant Governor in 1887, which

The Position of Settlers in Disputed
Territory.

Venezuelan App.
III, pp. 339, 340.

British Counter-
Case, App., p. 305.

is referred to in the Case for Venezuela, Venezuelan Case, merely pointed out that, in the event of any r. 183.

50 part of the territory on which grants were

being made becoming Venezuelan, no claim for