The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1896-04-17
SALISBURY WRONG.
The Venezuelan Government
Finds Documents Dis
proving His State
ments.
BRITISH CUT OUT VALUABLE MATTER
The New Evidence Includes a Re-
port From schomburgk
Made in 1887.

1ldut III lO0h
WASHINGTON. April II. 1896 The ycn>'
ezuelan Government has laid before the
High Commission an authenticated docu-
nlepts secured recently among the official
records Of the Colony Of British Guiana,
which throws grave suspicion upon the
accuracy of the Salisbury Blue Book,
upon which England expressed a willing
ness to rest her claim to the disputed
territory. This newly found document,
in the opinion of these impartially study
ing the merits of the controversy, calls
for a full and explicit explanation from
Great Britain to the Parliament for
whose accurate information the Blue Book
was ostensibly prepared. The inaccura-
cies do not appear in Prof. Pollock's
argument accompanying the case where
in all the errors have so far been dis
covered and in a few instances corrected,
but in what purports to be the presenta-
ton Of all the evidence in the case. The
disclosure relates to Document No. H.
which commences on page ISL Of the Off
eial pnblicat tion, continuing over four
pages and amounting to considerably
more than a full newspaper column. The
document in question: is the letter from
Governor Light of the Colony to the
Marques Of Normandy, dated July Is,
1889, transmitting report from Schom-
burgk regarding his travels under the
auspices of the Royal Geographical So.
ciety before the distinguished botanist
had been employed by the Government
to devise a provisional boundary line.
AS presented in the Blue Book this let
ter opens as follows
Mr. Schomburgk, employed by the
Geographical Society to obtain informa-
tion in the interior of British Guiana
and adjoining countries, who has lately
arrived at Georgetown, having furnished
am enabled to reply to your lordshfp S
despatch No. IL, dated Z March, and
to that Of your Lordship's predecessor.
point in the middle of the opening para
graph the British official editors of the
evidence have cut out the only matter
of the dispute, and have laid themselves
open to charge of garbling an official
paper. In. the Blue Book the documen:
gees on from Stnis point to speak of
other matters irrelevan o the dispute
and immaterial to a consideration of the
case. The remainder, Of the paragraph,
as well as the second paragraph Of the
letter, both of which were suppressed
without the tornialty of the usual marks
showing that any omission was made
Venezuelan channels, were as follows
shall observe, there are no docu-
ments in the archives of the colony re-
specting the western or southern limits
Of British Guiana, the memoir of Mr..
Scho1nburgk is therefore valuable; it
confirms the opinions of the superintend-
limits and points out what may be fit
subjects for discussion with the different
governments whose territories border on
ment is desirous of ascertaining theirs.
i have had the honor of mentioning in
my despatch, No. 1o5, dated December II,
ians near Fort St. Joachim. Mr.. You'd,
the missionary, has been warned to leave
Pirara; the Brazilian authorities have
claimed it, and having sent an officer to
In that limit it appears ne assumed the
identity of an isolated stump of tree
with the landmark sought The limits of
by rivers and chains of mountains more
conveniently than by parallels, which
may be proved by Mr.. Schomburgk's
memoir. Under the impression that, as
civilization has begun amongst the Abor-
tgines that the British nation alone can
protect them, / cannot too strongly urge
the immediate decision of the limits of
British Guiana.
Mr.. Schomburgk's merits as a geog-
rapher will naturally point him out as
fit person to he employed in any commits
sion for the question of boundary
We're no documents in the archives of the
colony respecting the western or southern
limits of British Guiana at that critical
period when both Brazil and Colombia
were resisting the first encroachments Of
England, in the opinion of those now
studying the question seriously weakens
the British contention, and for that rea-
SON apparently there was no hesitation
in suppressing it,
The duty of the Venezuelan High Com
mission Is practically to find out whether
extended since the Monroe doctrine was
enunciated in 1928 British Guiana hav-
ing been ceaed to the English by the
1889 the Colony was without a document
bearing upon its southern or western
boundary transfers the entire burden Of
to invalidate all the British claims which
cannot be fully substantiated by Dutch
and Spanish records Under ordinary
archives quoted in the Blue Book might
have had great weight with the High
Commission, but the discovery of falsi-
thrown cloud over all the other pages
of the book and today the entire publi-
cation is regarded with distrust.
lister here,s is also having translated for
the Commission the report of Don Jose
DigarJa, the Spanish Colonial Governor
sented to the Commission in a week or
two. The Blue Book gave tive and a
half pages to this document, which is
considered by all concerned the most i'm
portant extant on the relative limit of
Dutch and Spanish territory before Eng
land appeared on the scene In South
America The closely written manuscript
copy of this authenticated report, which
is now being translated, covers 1896 pages,
and the Commission will be enabled to
neglect. the British extracts of it and
study the complete report
MADRID ELECTION FINES