The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-05-27
BOUNDED BY THE FRENCH,
Paul Bray's Story of the In
generation of Ex-ConSul
Waller.
Residences OF the Two Americans
Rahsaoked and Their Private
Papers Stolen.

WASHINGTON, D. c., May 26.-Paul
Bray, the stepson of ex-Consul Waller, was
interviewed to-day regarding his and his
stepfather's trouble in Madagascar.
"The French" he said, "claim authority
over the foreign affairs of the island under
the treaty of 1885, which gave them the
right to represent Madagascar in its for
eign relations, but not in any way to inter
fere with the management of internal af-
fairs of the country. They have since
maintained French resident at Antanana-
rive, which is the capital, while the Euro
pean nations and the United States have
kept only Censuls there. The French rep
resentative has claimed that under this
treaty France was entitled to exercise a
protectorate over the island, and among
other prerogatives has demanded that he
be allowed to issue exequaturs to the rep
resentatives of foreign Governments. Mr..
Waller was appointed Consul by President
Harrison, and when he arrived at the capt.
tai the French representative made the
demand that Waller receive this badge of
authority from him. Knowing that the
natives, or Hovas, resisted this claim of
French and placed different interpreta-
ton upon the treaty, Mr.. Waller resisted
this demand and accepted his exeaua-
tur from the natives.
"When Mr.. Walters term of Office ex-
pired and he sought to secure concession
of lands from the native Government, the
French opposed him in every way.
"Mr. Walters home is Antananarivo
which is about 225 miles inland from
Tamatav, but he was at the latter place ON
business connected with his concession
when he was placed under arrest as L was
also at the same time. Being interested
with him in the concession, I went to
Mauritius in May, 1894, but was followed
by written and printed representations of
the situation, sent out by the French
authorities, characterizing the grant as
fraudulent and in every way calculated to
prejudice our enterprise"
Mr.. Bray says that when Mr.. Waller
was arrested on March he (Bray) was
sitting in Mr.. Wallsr's house engaged in
game of draughts, when the building
was surrounded by half dozen French
gendarmes. Waller was not in, but BRAY
undertook to find him and succeeded in
doing so. Waller was then told by the
officers in charge of the squad that he had
an order from the military commander of
the post for his arrest and the confiscation
of his papers, but upon his request that he
be allowed to see the order this was re-
fused and he was taken to prison; not,
however, until the house had been ram
sacked and not only Mr.. Walters papers
but Bray's, also, taken possession of by
the French officials.
Bray then reported the entire proceed
ings to United States Consul Wetter. The
latter Immediately asked an explanation,
which, according to Bray. was very vague.
1t was to the effect that Mr.. Waller had
violated the French treaty in attempting
to conduct correspondence outside of Ia
matav without permitting it to pass
through French hands. Waller was kept
In prison fifteen days, without being per-
mitted to see any one, and when his trial,
which was before a court-martial, was at
last concluded, in three hours, only twen-
ty-flve minutes was taken for the prepare
ton Of the verdict. Seeing that instru-
ment covered ten or fifteen pages of manu-
script, Bray thinks the evidence was made
out in advance.
| Explaining the letter on which the