The Sun.
London, England, 1864-03-31 00:00:00

Portugal against the United States are, however, so
nearly the same as those which Mr. Seward has
avowed his determination, when it suits him, to
prefer against Great Britain, under the penalty of
war if they be not conceded, as to merit not only
Mr. Seward's particular notice, but that of the Bri-
tish Government. Letter No. 5 of the series, or page

65 of the Congressional Report, contains the pith

of the Portuguese claim. In the year 1816 Portugal

was at war with the insurrectionary Government

established in Buenos Ayres, and certain persons in

Baltimore and New York, all of them American
citizens, fitted out privateers, manned them with
American seamen, and hoisting the flag of Buenos
Ayres, scoured the seas in search of Portuguese
merchant vessels. M. Joseph Correa de Serra, Am-
bassador of Portugal to the Federal Government,
writing under date of March 18, 1818, to Mr. John
Quincy Adams, then Secretary of State, gave a list
of three Portuguese vessels—the Senhor de Olivio,
the Marquis of Pombal, and the St. John Pro-

ector—that had been captured in 1816 and 1817 by
hese Baltimorean and New York privateers, and

expressed the hope of the King his master that the
Federal Government " would be willing to give
satisfaction and indemnity for the injury done to his
subjects, and the insult offered to his flag by these
unworthy American citizens." Mr. Adams replied
two days afterwards, stating that " The Govern-
ment of the United States, having used all the

means in its power to prevent the fitting out and
arming of vessels in their ports, to cruise against
any nation with whom they are at peace, and hav-
ing faithfully carried into execution the laws en-
acted to preserve inviolate the neutral and pacific
obligations of the Union, cannot consider itself
bound to indemnify individual foreigners for losses
by capture over which the United States have neither

control nor jurisdiction." Nothing further appears
to have been said or done on either side until the
15th of October in the same year, when the Portu-

gneae Minister notified Mr. Adams that he had re-
ceived intelligence that a ship was fitting out in
the Patuxent (Maryland) to cruise against Portu-
guese commerce, and that the captain, an American,
had just left Baltimore toltake command of her. In

reply, five days afterwards, Mr. Adams said that ii

the Ambassador would furnish a list of the names o
the persons chargeable with a violation of the laws
of the United States in fitting out and arming a ves-
sel within the United States for the purpose of com-
mitting depredations on Portuguese commerce, and
of the witnesses by whose testimony the charge
could be substantiated, " directions would be given
for their prosecution before the proper tribunal."
This was, it appears, both a slow and ineffectual re-
medy, for on the 14th of November the Ambassador
felt himself compelled to address the Secretary of
State and to say :—" Obliged by my duty to in•
quire into the nature of the armed ships that have
of late insulted the flag of my Sovereign and com-
mitted incalculable depredations on the property of
his subjects, I have foand with sorrow multiplied
proofs that many of them are owned by citizens of
the United States and have been fitted out in ports
of the Union." In another letter, dated March 17,
1819, he says of the Artigan flag, under which these
privateers sailed—" The Artigan flsg,which has not a
footlength of seashore in South America where it
can show itself, is freely and frequently waving in
the port of Baltimore ;" and asks Mr. Adams what
his and the world's astonishment would be "if a
Swiss flag and Swiss privateers made their appear-
ance on the open sea, and began to attack the com-
merce of any other nation." Mr. Adams made no
reply, and as tar as the published correspondence
extends it would appear that thePortugaeseGovern-
ment never obtained any compensation whatever
from that of the United States, for under date of
May 25, 1830, cr 30 years afterwards, we find the
new and present Portuguese Ambassador, the Com-
mander de Figaniere é Morao, reiterating in a letter
to Mr. Clayton the demands made by his predeces-
sor. "As these unlawful depredations, says M. de
Figaniere (letter No. 21, fol. 179) " were committed
by citizens of the United States in vessels owned,
fitted out, commanded, and mostly manned by said
citizens, notwithstanding the flag they hoisted or
the commission they purported to bear of the un-
acknowledged rebel chief Artigas, the Govern-
ment of Portugal has always held that of the
United States bound by well known principles of
the law of nations to redress the scil wrongs
committed by its citizens upon the subjects of a
friendly Power with which the United States have
ever been at peace, and had continued commer-
cial intercourse. The said Government of her
Most Faithful Majesty has consequently directed
the undersigned, Minister resident of Portugal, to
have the honour to address the Hon. John M. Clay-
ton, Secretary of State of the United States. for the
special purpose of renewing these important nego-
tiations, and urging the final settlement of these
claims by the Federal Government." M. de Figa-
niere added that the negotiations had only been in-
terrupted in consequence of the many political vicis-
situdes through which Portugal had unfortunately
passed for many years. Mr. Clayton only took five
days to frame his reply, and dismissed the claim in a
style which it is not likely he would have considered
it prudent to employ towards such Powers as Great
Britain or France. " The undersigned," he said, "is
surprised at the appearance of these obsolete recla.
mations ; accompanied by the renewal of the ancient
proposition to appoint a joint commission to deter-
mine and assess damages—a proposition Aich was
rejected at the time upon substantial grounds, and
without the Minister's personal assurance to that
effect the undersigned would not have supposed it
credible that Portugal seriously cherished any in-
tention to revive them. In reply, therefore, to the
note which the Minister of her Moat Faithful
Majesty has presented in the name of his Govern-
ment, the undersigned must now, by the President's
order, inform him that he declines to reopen the
proffered discussion." Portugal never obtained
redress or apology, or even the scant courtesy of a
friendly reply, and to this day her claims remain
unpaid and unacknowledged.
Mr. Seward may think himself wiser in the
matter of the Alabama and the Florida than
Mr. Quincy Adams and Mr. Clayton were in the
matter of the Baltimore and New York privateers,
and may deem it prudent the first time that
Great Britain is, or seems to be, in a difficulty,
to prefer such claims upon the British Government
as the Portuguese preferred in vain against the
United States. In this not at all improbable case
it is well for the British people and Government to
be supplied with an answer to Mr. Seward out of
the mouths of two such eminent American states-
men as Mr. Adams and Mr. Clayton. Perhaps, how-
ever, under all the circumstances, the present or the
nest Secretary of State may think it wiser to let
the matter rest, and refer American citizens to their
own Treasury for payment of losses incurred in the
progress of a war which Great Britain neither ori-
ginated nor could prevent, if the Federal Govern-
ment cannot more speedily settle the personal side
of the account by the capture of the vessels which
do its citizens so much damage, and the infliction
of such punishment upon the captains and the crews
as the laws of the civilised world will permit.

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