Morning journal and courier., 1880-12-21
Tuesday Morning. Dec. 21. 1sso.-

THE HALIEAK FISHERY AWARD.
 In hislast message President Hayes refer red to the vexatious disagreement between this country and England concerning fishing in Canadian waters, and expressed the hope that the matter would be made the subject of conference and concurrent arrangement be- tween the United States and England. It is to be hoped that it will be, and that soon, and it is not probable that at the next confer ence the interests of this country will suffer as they did at the one where the enormous award was made to the Canadians.
 If what Professor Hind, who was con- nected with the Halifax Commission on the Canadian side, charges and seems to prove is true, this country has been very badly swindled. He says that the Dominion re- ports of the fisheries on which the award was based had been for years systematically tam- pered with and falsifed. The United States claimed at Halifax that Canada, by the priv iIege she possessed of entering her fish free into this country, received full equivalent for the small use of her fisheries by Ameri- cans. Canada claimed that the American market was of little value to her, and she should be iberally compensated for fishery concessions. It was, therefore, for the in- terest of the Dominion to show that her ex- ports of fish to the United States were but slight, and that, on the contrary, she import
 ed fish quite largely from us. In support of this position figures were freely doctored and other figures boldly imagined and inserted in the official reports. Here are some speci- mems of the frauds as unearthed by Professor Hind. In one instanceean import of fish pro- ducts from the United States was altered from $1 ,051 to $246, 6,535! Other concoc- tions were not less audacious. It was claimed that Nova Scotia in 1874 imported $115,- BPS worth of fish from the United States In order to make out this statement the value of the fish actually imported was enormously overestimated-a large amount priced at Il cents pound, some at IS cents, and 8,619 pounds at $2 pound In making up these statements consistency was not regarded. They caused it to appear that the inland province of Ontario paid for her fresh codfsh imported from the United States about two-thirds less per pound than was paid for the same kind of fish imported from the same country into the fishing provinces of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. It was claimed of the lat ter province in 1874 that she exported fish to the United States at fraction over one cent per pound, and imported the same kind of fish from the United States at 13 cents per pound According to this competent Cana dian witness, it was by Notifications such as these that the Dominion was enabled to make out her case before the Commission and get her huge award of $5, 500, GOO for conces- sions which have proved almost valueless to us.
 The New York Journal of Commerce very properly comments upon these astonishing disclosures as follows: ssThe managers of our claims at Halifax have been justly cen
 sured for carelessness and stupidity in allow | ing the Dominion to overreach us Now that l we are beginning to find out some of the methods by which the result was accom- | plished we must transfer share of the
 blame to the interruptions Canadian officials
 who imposed on our unsophisticated coun- trymen before the tribunal. But yet we can
 not excuse that gross neglect on the part of I our lawyers and agents which permitted such ! frauds to be practiced upon them undiscov-
 cred, when a thorough inquiry into the facts
 and inspection of the figures submitted could
 have proved the deceptive character of the Canadian fishery returns"