1905, January 3, Diary. "The air is still full of rumours of peace by our intervention. I gave the newspapers to understand that we were doing nothing and had no intention of interfering in a matter where our intervention is not wanted."

February 13. "Sternberg [German ambassador] says the British Ambassador in Petersburg has pointed out to Ct. Lamsdorff the advantages to Russia of a speedy conclusion of peace. The Ambassador stated that Lamsdorff seemed to agree with him. Benckendorff [Russian

ambassador in London] has had similar interview with Lansdowne."

February 15. "The President keeps warning Japan not to be exorbitant in her terms of peace."

Ibid., p. 406, June 15. "Hay landed in New York [after a holiday in Europe] and went to Washington, where he learnt that President Roosevelt was on the point of bringing about peace negotiations between Japan and Russia."

June 19, 1905. "The President gave me an interesting account of the peace negotiations-which he undertook at the suggestion of Japan. He was struck with the vacillation and weakness of purpose shown by Russia; and was not well pleased that Japan refused to go to the Hague."

It seems evident that the Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations, and the allusions contained in the Life and Letters of John Hay, do not by any means give the whole story. What is worth noting for the present purpose is the clearness of President Roosevelt's intention to confine himself to "good offices," and not to obtrude his mediation on the belligerents. He knew well where to draw the line.

§ 629. Three cases which occurred in the eighteenth century show that at that period the distinction between

good offices and mediation was well understood. The first of these was with reference to the dispute between Great Britain and Frederick the Great over his sequestration of the remaining instalment of the Silesian loan. The British Government had asked the King of France to interpose his good offices with his ally, the King of Prussia, and the French Ministry tried to convert this request into an application for French mediation.1

During the winter of 1741-2 France offered her mediation between Russia and Sweden. In the spring of 1742 the brothers Bestucheff prevailed on the Empress Elisabeth to decline it, and to inform the French Minister, La Chêtardie, that while appreciating the King's good offices, she preferred to treat with Sweden without any intermediary.2

The third is found in a letter from the Empress Catherine to Frederick the Great, of October 9, 1770. His Envoy at Petersburg had conveyed to her an offer to mediate between herself and the Turks. She wrote: "il faut éviter le mot et la forme de la médiation. Je suis prête à accepter les bons offices de la Cour de Vienne. Je réclame ceux de votre Majesté." The words "et la forme " show that she was perfectly alive to the possible disadvantages of a mediation, in which the negotiations are carried on through the plenipotentiaries of the mediating Powers. It was her intention to treat directly with the Turks. If Austria and Prussia would employ their good offices in the way of persuasion applied to Turkey, she would accept that kind of assistance towards the restoration of peace. She persisted in this view to the end, as is shown by the treaty of July 25, 1772, between the two Empresses' enumerating their respective shares in the partition of Poland (Article 4), in which the Empress Maria-Theresa" promet de continuer à S'employer sincèrement au succès désirable des Négociations du Congrès,

1 Satow, chap. xiv, and app. 64-100; 101-8.

2 A. Vandal, Louis XV et Elisabeth de Russie, 174.

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consequemment aux bons offices auxquels Elle s'est engagée envers les deux Parties belligérantes." 1

§ 630. Finally, let us quote another distinguished international jurist on this matter.

Les anciens auteurs établissaient une distinction nette entre l'interposition des bons offices et la médiation. 'L'interpositeur ou 'pacificateur' était le tiers qui s'interposait sans que son intervention eût été admise expressément par toutes les parties intéressées; le médiateur était celui qui avait reçu un véritable mandat. Actuellement encore les deux institutions diffèrent et c'est même à tort qu'à la conférence de la Haye le project rédigé par la délégation russe a prétendu ramener la distinction à une portée exclusivement théorique.

"Les bons offices, dit Alexandre Mérignac, se traduisent par des conseils, des actes, des négociations ayant pour but d'amener la paix, sans que la puissance de laquelle ils émanent s'engage dans l'examen approfondi du litige."

"Le médiateur, dit Rivier, s'interpose entre les Etats en conflit; il prend part aux négociations et même il les dirige. C'est par son intermédiaire que sont échangées les déclarations des parties. Il s'efforce de moyenner un arrangement amiable; s'il y a guerre, d'amener la paix, sans toutefois avoir qualité pour l'imposer. Les Etats en conflit restent libres de ne pas accepter ses conseils. Son action s'exerce soit par des négociations d'Etat, soit dans des congrès ou conférences où le rôle principal lui est dévolu.' "2

1 F. de Martens, ii. 28.

2 E. Nys, Le Droit International, 1906, iii. 59.

CHAPTER XXXIII

MEDIATION

§ 631. General observations § 632. Great Britain as mediator between Spain and Portugal, 1668—§ 633. France at the Treaty of Nystad, 1721-§ 634. France at the Treaty of Belgrade, 1739-§ 635. Great Britain as mediator between Portugal and Brazil, 1825 mediator § 636. France as between Great Britain and Naples in 1840-1—§ 637. Spain as mediator between Italy and Colombia - § 638. Failure of British mediation between Spain and her American colonies-§ 639. Subsequent attempts to establish mediation § 640. Rejection of British mediation by France between her and Spain in 1822.

§ 631. FOR a definition of mediation, refer to the last paragraph of the immediately preceding chapter.

The procedure in mediation is partly to be gathered from the accounts in chapter xxv of Congresses, such as Westphalia, Oliva, Nijmegen, Rijswijk, Carlowitz, Cambray, Teschen and Prague.

Possibly it might be held that the Great Powers acted as joint mediators in the Conference on the Affairs of Greece, in 1827-32 (§ 470), but if so, it is evident that the formalities consecrated by previous practice were not observed on that occasion. The Conference on the Affairs of Belgium in 1830-3 (§ 471) may be regarded as having ended in the "armed mediation" of Great Britain and France.

It would appear that in 1856 Austria acted the part of a mediator in bringing about the Congress of Paris, but her mediation went no farther.

In 1897 the mediation of the Great Powers, exercised through their Ambassadors at Constantinople, was accepted by Turkey and Greece.

The cases of mediation quoted in § 73 of Wheaton's Elements of International Law (edit. J. B. Atlay, 1904) seem to be of the nature of intervention in the domestic affairs of States, with a view to bringing about a reconciliation between contending political parties. In 1862 France proposed to Great Britain and Russia to offer mediation in the Civil War in America, but both Great Britain and Russia declined to be a party to any such transaction.

During the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, several important treaties of peace, besides those mentioned in the chapter on Congresses, were negotiated with the assistance of mediators.

Vattel, speaking of mediation, says—

"Cette fonction exige autant de droiture, que de prudence et dextérité. Le Médiateur doit garder une exacte impartialité; il doit adoucir les reproches, calmer les ressentimens, raprocher les esprits. Son devoir est bien de favoriser le bon droit, de faire rendre à chacun ce qui lui appartient: Mais il ne doit point insister scrupuleusement sur une justice rigoureuse. Il est Conciliateur, & non pas Juge: Sa vocation est de procurer la paix; et il doit porter celui qui a le droit de son côté, à relâcher quelque chose, s'il est nécessaire, dans la vüe d'un si grand bien."1

Of difficulties which a mediator sometimes encounters in the performance of his task instructive examples are presented by the Repnin Papers, which throw so much light upon the proceedings at the Congress of Teschen,2 and the account of Sir Charles Stuart's negotiations at Rio de Janeiro and Lisbon in connexion with the mediation between Portugal and Brazil. The latter can be studied more in detail in the two volumes of Stuart Papers preserved at the Public Record Office. In such cases it is found that the principal obstacle to a settlement arises from the amour propre of the parties.

1 Le Droit des Gens, etc. Leide, 1758, i. § 328.

2 Sbornik, etc., lxv.

3 Stapleton, Political Life of Geo. Canning, ii. 341-72, esp. 349-58.