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rticles of the lading, and the conditions of the intended voyage, and a bill of health, where the same is necessary. If the voyage be merely to the ports of the Baltic, or the Sound, the Turkish and Latin passes are not necessary; but the captain must have all the other papers enumerated, without exception..

3. All these documents must be made out and delivered in a Swedish port, unless when a ship has lost her papers by accident, or where they have been forcibly taken away; in which case these documents may be renewed in a foreign port, if the captain, immediately on his arrival, takes the precaution to exhibit an authentic and properly certified declaration by which the accident is proved, or the grounds stated on which he desires the renewal.

4. The captain is prohibited to have false acts or certificates, or duplicates thereof. He is likewise prohibited to make use of a foreign flag. 5. It is required that the captain and half of the crew shall be Swedish subjects.

6. Captains going to the main ocean shall be bound to follow the course pointed out in their instructions, and agreeable to the contents of their certification.

7. Ships destined for the ports of a belligerent power must, with the utmost care, and under the severest penalties, avoid carrying any contraband commodities. To prevent all doubt or misunderstanding re ́specting what is contraband, it is agreed that the following goods shall be considered contraband*.

8. All Swedish subjects are prohibited to fit out privateers against the belligerents, their subjects and property.

9. A Swedish ship cannot be employed by a belligerent power to transport troops, arms, or any war like implements. Should any captain be compelled to do so by superior force, he is bound at least to exhibit a formal protest against such violence.

10. When a merchant ship is not under convoy, and happens to be brought-to by a ship of war or privateer belonging to any of the belligerents, the captain shall not, in that case, oppose the searching of his vessel, but be bound faithfully to show all acts and documents which relate to her cargo. The captain and his people are strictly prohibited to keep back or destroy any of their papers.

11. If, however, such ship makes part of a convoy, the foregoing article shall not serve as the rule, but the captain's duty consists in punctually obeying the signals of the commodore of the convoy; for which purpose, therefore, he shall separate as little as possible from the convoy.

12. All captains are expressly forbidden to attempt going into a blockaded port as soon as they are formally apprised by the officer commanding the blockade. In order to ascertain what a blockaded harbour is, this appellation is confined to those to which, by the exertions of the blockading power, with ships destined and adequate to, the object, it is evidently dangerous to attempt running in.

13. In case a Swedish merchant ship is captured by a ship of war or privateer of any of the belligerents, the captain shall immediately transmit a circumstantial account, and duly explained, to the Swedish

The remainder is a transcript of the 2d article of the Convention of the Northern Powers-Seg p. (127)

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consul or vice consul of the place to which the ship is taken; and should there be. no consul or viceconsul there, he shall transmit a memorial to the Swedish consul of the district to which the place into which his ship is taken belongs.

14. Every captain of a Swedish merchantman, who strictly observes the above regulations and orders, shall enjoy a free voyage, protected by the laws of nations and the provisions of treaties; and to this end, all public agents and Swedish consuls are required, in case of attack or insult, to give their support to the just and well founded complaints on the subject. But those who in an point whatever neglect or violate their orders, must answer for the consequences of their conduct, without relying upon the protection of his majesty.

15. By the contents of a recent order, his majesty has prohibited the privateers of a foreign nation to enter, or bring their prizes into the ports of his kingdom, except in case of their being driven in by stress of weather. In this case it is expressly prohibited to all whatsoever to buy the prizes, or any of the effects which the privateers have taken.

To which end, publication, &c. Given at St. Petersburg, 23d December, 1800.

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haven, and that the reason which the public thought proper to assign for that measure was the refusal given by the government of Hamburg to cause a vessel to be released, which, taken by one of the ships of war of his Britannic majesty, had been compelled, in order to avoid the dangers of the sea, to enter that port, he thought it his duty to demand an audience of his excellency count Haugwitz, minister of state and of the cabinet, for the purpose of obtaining information with respect to that affair.

He received from his excellency the assurance that the intentions of his Prussian majesty were in no view hostile or contrary to the interests of Great Britain; but that the occupation of Cuxhaven had for its principal object the maintenance of the authority of his Prussian majesty, in his character of chief and protector of the neutrality of the north of Germany, and that it was conducted with the consent of the city of Hamburg itself.

Lord Carysfort, not being exactly acquainted with the circumstances under which the vessel in question found itself, deferred, to another occasion, the observations which he might have wished to submit to his excellency. He has now grounds to believe, that, laden with contraband goods, it was captured by one his Britannic majesty's ships as it was entering into the Texel; that is to say, into a port belonging to the enemies of his majesty; and that it was restored as soon as the officer who had the charge of it could be informed of the orders of his superiors.

With respect to the occupation' of the town of Cuxhaven by the Prussian troops, which must have' (I 3)

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been founded upon particular conventions between his Prussian majesty and the senate of Hamburg, he does not think himself called upon to take part in that discussion'; but he feels himself authorised to claim, in favour of the subjects and vessels of the king his master, all the rights to which they have a just pretension in a neutral port belong ing to a republic, whose connexions with the states of his majesty are very ancient, and generally known no convention made between the city of Hamburg and his Prussian majesty being capable of invalidating or altering his rights.

In consequence of these considerations he dares hope that his Prussian majesty may still suspend the accupation of Cuxhaven, until the two courts shall have the means of entering into mutual explanations, more particularly since such an occupation, in the actual circumstances, might give room to ill-disposed minds to attribute to his Prussian majesty views not less op. posite to the sentiments of justice and moderation which govern all his measures, than to the friendship and the good harmony which subsist between him and his Britannic majesty.

At all events it will not escape the wisdom and humanity of his majesty, that the entrance of a numerous corps of troops into a village, both poor and with a small extent of territory, would probably augment the misery of the inhabitants; and that the city of Hamburg hav. ing always possessed that place, so indispensably necessary to the navigation of the Elbe, all which may trouble that possession, derange ancient customs, and influence the pilots there at present to seek a refuge elsewhere, would strike a sensible blow at the commerce of

all the countries of the north of Germany, and even at that of the states of his Prussian majesty.

(Signed) CARYSFORT,

Second Note, from the same. Berlin, Nov. 18, 1800.

The undersigned, extraordinary envoy and minister plenipotentiary of his Britannic majesty, thinks himself obliged again to address himself to his excellency count Haugwitz, relative to the inten tion of his Prussian majesty in tak ing military possession of Cuxhaven, When the undersigned had the ho nour of transmitting to his excel lency the verbal note of the 16th, it was not exactly known" that the Prussian vessel brought into that port had been restored." The fact being now certain, as well as the zeal manifested by the senate of Hamburg to fulfil the wishes of the king; the surprise and con, sternation excited from the moment when the orders for marching a de tachment of troops were known would be raised to their utmost height if it were ascertained, that notwithstanding the complete satisfaction given to his Prussian majesty on all the points respecting which he thought proper to complain, he should not appear less at tached to his determination of cause ing Cuxhaven to be occupied by his troops. In fact, it appears at first sight that this occupation would be so calculated to give the most serious alarms to all commercial nations, that, without alluding to the interpretations, which calumny might be desirous of giving to the measure, strong hopes are enter tained from the justice and moderation of his Prussian majesty, for that reason only, that he will come to the resolution of not carrying it into effect,

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The undersigned would not, however, think he had executed his duty, should he neglect to represent to his excellency the lively alarms which necessarily result from the uncertainty in which the affair remains. The reiterated assurances which the undersigned has received from his excellency of the friendship and good wishes of his Prussian majesty towards the king of Great Britain, do not allow him to believe that any misunderstanding can arise between the two courts; but he cannot avoid think ing that the enemies of humanity and of public tranquillity will endeavour to turn to their purposes the alarm which is generally diffused, in order to scatter discord among the powers, which should all unite and maintain the safety and independence of Europe at large.

(Signed) CARYSFORT. Answer of Count Haugwitz. The undersigned minister of state, and of the cabinet, is authorised by the orders of the king to completely tranquillise the anxieties and apprehensions which my lord Carysfort, envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary of his Britannic majesty, expressed to him in his two notes of the 16th and 18th November. The Prussian vessel, the Triton, has, it is true, been restored to its owner; but the mode of release was, in every respect, as irregular as the proceedings which had previously taken place with respect to it; and after an examination of all the circumstances relative to the incident which forms the subject of complaint, there appears throughout the whole a manifest infraction of the principles of the neutrality of the north of Germany. It is this superior consideration,

added to the unjust refusal of the magistracy of Hamburg, which dictated to the king the resolution of causing a body of his troops to occupy the port of Cuxhaven, and the bailiwick of Ritzebuttle. This measure has executed the moment it was determined ugon, and it is no longer capable of being revoked, the example of what has taken place imposing on his majesty the necessity of effectually watching over the maintenance of that neutrality which he has guarantied to his co-estates. The king cannot imagine that his Britannic majesty, after participating, in his character of elector of Hanover, in the advantages and benefits of this happy neutrality, can conceive the smallest alarm at seeing a Prussian garrison enter into the port which England has fixed on as her point of communication with the north of Germany. Being thus placed under the immediate guarantee of the king, it will be the more effectually put out of the reach of all violation, and the troops, of his majesty will have no other duty to perform than than that of causing the laws of good order and equity to be respected. The utmost confidence may be placed in the prudent disposition of the reigning duke of Brunswick, who is invested with the command of the line of demarcation.

But, if more particular assurances be requisite upon this subject, the king feels a pleasure in giving them by the present communication to his Britannic majesty, and in de claring to him, in express and positive terms, that the present order of things will in no respect interrupt the freedom of commerce and navigation in the port of Cuxhaven; nor, above all, the continuation of the correspondence with England. On the contrary, the (I 4)

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officer commanding the troops of the king garrisoned in the bailiwick of Ritzebuttle, will make it his duty to give it every possible facility.

On the whole, the proceeding which the king has from necessity, been obliged to follow, does not admit of any equivocal interpretation. It has no other object than the maintenance of the system of which he is the author and defender; and this object shall not be exceeded. His views and conduct have procured him the confidence of all Europe, and they never will be found inconsistent; and though it is not to be anticipated that the other powers will be disposed to misconceive the purity of his views in the present case, yet his majesty reserves to himself the privilege of explaining himself further and in a suitable manner to those who may be intitled to such explanation.

(Signed)

HAUGWITZ.

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As the undersigned ambassador extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary has been directed by his court to communicate to the Prussian ministry his majesty's note, which, by command of his majesty the king of Great-Britain and Ireland, was presented to the ministers of Denmark and Sweden, he cannot discharge this commission, without likewise expressing his sincere satisfaction in being authorised to declare, how thoroughly his majesty is convinced that Prussia can never have sanctioned the measures which have given rise to the above recited note. Those measures openly disclose an intention to pre

scribe rules to the British empire on a subject of the greatest importance; to force those rules upon Great-Britain; and, for that end, before any of the powers who have concurred in it have given the smallest intimation to his majesty to enter into a league, the object of which is, to renew pretensions which Great-Britain at every time has considered hostile to its rights and interests, and so declared whenever an opportunity presentedpretensions which the Russian court has abandoned, not only in fact, but which, by a treaty actually in force, Russia is bound to oppose, and the execution of which treaty his majesty is entitled to insist upon.

When a ship of war belonging to his Danish majesty resisted by force the execution of a right which the king of Great-Britain and Ireland, by virtue of the clearest and most express stipulations of his treaties with the court of Denmark, had demanded, his majesty on that occasion confined himself to the adoption of such measures as the protection of the trade of his subjects required to be given against that measure of hostility which this conduct on the part of an officer bearing his Danish majesty's com mission seemed to show. An amicable arrangement put an end to this dispute; and the king flattered himself, not only that all misunder▾ standing on that subject was re moved, but amity between the two courts was anew strengthened and confirmed.

In this situation of affairs his majesty must have learnt with no less astonishment than concern that the court of Copenhagen was em ployed in negotiations to renew the hostile confederacy against Great, Britain which took place in 1780,

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