The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1895-12-30

recognize that forcible occupation gives
Great Britain any title to territory claimed
by Venezuela, whether west or east of the
arbitrary Schomburgk line, and insists
that the legitimate ownership of the terri
tory, ''in its entirety can be decided only
by arbitration on the basis of Historical
fact
All considerations of historical fact in
the Venezuelan controversy hinge upon
one simple question, What were, respec-
lively, the geographical limits of the Vene-
zueIan republic when it declared its indie
pendence OF Spain in 1910 and of British
Guiana when England acquired that col
ony by treaty from Holland in 1914?
There is no other question involved, for
England has not since 1914 added one foot
of territory to her original British Guiana
colony by any process which can come
within the cognizance of the laws of ma
tons.
From 1914 to 1S41 England never init
mated in the slightest manner that she
deemed herself entitled to any important
portion of the Atlantic coast west of the
Essequibo river. Most interesting and
valuable evidence is afforded by long
note written on May 80, 1885, by Sir Rob
ert Ker Porter, British charge d affaires at
Caracas, to the Venezuelan authorities,
petitioning them with great earnestness
to erect a lighthouse at Point Barima and
otherwise provide for safer navigation at
the grand mouth of the Orinoco. Mr..
Porter thus conceded that Point Barima
and the Orinoco mouth were exclusively
within the jurisdiction of the Venezuelan
government, and the British foreign office
never took occasion to repudiate his action
in that matter until some so years later,
after it had become the fixed policy of the
London cabinet to hold Point Barima and
the mouth of the Orinoco by forco Of arms
and without admitting arbitration.
Origin of the schomburgk Line.
The Schomburgk line, with its initial
point at the center of the Orinoco mouth,
was traced in 1S41 by Sir Robert Schom-
burgk, an English engineer. In surveying
it he acted entirely in the interests of the
British government and without the con-
sent or even the knowledge of Venezuela.
Great excitement was occaSioned in the re-
public when it became known what
Schomburgk had done, and that he had
set up posts to indicate British dominion.
A prompt remonstrance was made, and
Lord Aberdeen, who was then prime min
lister of England, answered, on Dec. II,
1871, that the marks placed by Mr.. Schom-
burgk at some points of the country which
he had surveyed were simply preliminary
STEP subject to future discussion between
the two governments; that they were the
only tangible means OF preparing to dis
cuss the question of limits with the gov
ernment of Venezuela; that they were
placed with that express object and not,
as the government of Venezuela seemed
to fear it, with the intention of indicating
dominion or empire on the part of Great
Britain. Soon afterward Lord Aberdeen
ordered that all of Schomburgk's posts
should be removed.
Three years later (1S44) Lord Aberdeen
voluntarily proposed to Senior Forteque,
Venezuelan plenipotentiary in England, c
boundary line beginning on the coast at
the mouth of the river Morocco, which
empties into the ocean some distance to
the westward of the Essequibo.
On Nov. II, 1850, Mr.. Bedford Hinton
Wilson, charge d affairos of Great Britain
in Venezuela, sent to the Venezuelan gov
ernment a note specifically contradicting
a rumor that England intended claiming
Venezuelan Guiana and adding: "The
Venezuelan government in justice to Great
Britain cannot mistrust for a moment the
sincerity of the formal declaration which
is now made in the name and by the e7-
press order of her majssty's government
that Great Britain has no intention to o.
cupy or encroach upon the territory in dis
pute. Therefore the Venezuelan govern
ment, in an equal spirit of good faith and
friendship, cannot refuse to make a SINH