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sufficient, is so great, that the Courts have laid down as a "general rule that such transfers, without actual delivery, shall "be insufficient; that in order to defeat the captors, the pos"session as well as the property must be changed before the "seizure. It is true that in one sense the ship and goods may "be said to be in transitu till they have reached their original "port of destination; but their Lordships have found no case "where the transfer was held to be inoperative after the actual delivery of the property to the owner."

The cases of the “Danckebaar Africaan,"1 the “Negotie en Zeevart," the "Vrow Margaretha," and Mr. Justice Story's Notes on the Principles and Practice of Prize Courts, p. 64, were then cited, and their Lordships continued:

"Applying these rules to the facts of this case, their Lordships "can have no doubt as to the result.

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"The 'Baltica' sailed from Libau on some day before the "17th of March, 1854 (N.S.), with a cargo of linseed bound for "Leith. On the 17th of March she was transferred by bill of “sale (as far as, under the circumstances, such transfer could be effectual) to Sorensen, junior. She was described as then on a "voyage from Libau to Copenhagen. Probably she was intended "to call at Copenhagen in the prosecution of her voyage to Leith. "There does not seem to have been any motive for misrepresent"ing her voyage, for her ultimate destination was an English "port. She arrived at Copenhagen before the end of March, "and possession of her was then taken by Sorensen, junior, the "purchaser. He had her registered as a Danish ship, and she was marked as such by the proper Danish authorities. He "detained the ship at Copenhagen till the middle of May. He "changed the captain and the crew and the flag, and transferred "the command to a Danish master; and under a Danish com

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mander and with a Danish crew, and under the Danish flag, "the vessel sailed from Copenhagen for Leith, on the 21st of "May.

"There can be no manner of doubt, therefore, that at this time "the ship had come fully into the possession of the purchaser, "and thereupon, according to the principles already referred to, "the transitus, in the sense in which, for this purpose, the word "is used, had ceased.

"But if it could be held that the transitus continued till the

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"arrival of the ship at Leith, the result in this case would be the "same, for the ship actually arrived in Leith roads on the 29th "of May. On the 31st of May she was towed into Morison's "Haven in that port, where her cargo was discharged, which, it seems, has since been given up to the consignee with the con"sent of the Custom-House officers.

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"A seizure, however, was made of the ship, on what particular "day does not very distinctly appear, but clearly after she had "arrived at her port of destination.

"No distinction, therefore, can be made between the 'Baltica' "and the other ships which have already been restored. Their "Lordships will report to Her Majesty their opinion that the

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same order should be made in this case as was made in the "Ariel': an order for restitution, but without damages or costs "either in the Court below or in the Court of Appeal."

CHAPTER XV.

THE DECLARATION OF PARIS NOT IRREVOCABLE.

It is held by some that, whatever may be the vices of the Declaration of Paris, it is immutable and irrevocable under any circumstances; and by others, that it is not revocable unless with the consent of all the signatory Powers.

This is to make a claim for a Declaration having none of the solemn marks of authority that distinguish treaties, wider than is made even for Treaties themselves. There is not an important Treaty of modern Europe, from that of Utrecht of 1713 downward, but has been partially denounced, revoked and altered. The Treaties of Vienna of 1814, the Treaties of Paris of 1856, the Treaty of Prague of 1866, the Treaty of Berlin of 1878, have all been in part or in whole denounced; and acts have been done or forborne by parties to them-even though such acts were at first denounced and opposed by other parties to them-in flagrant derogation of their provisions. It is only necessary to instance in illustration the Black Sea Clauses of the Treaty of Paris and the Batoum Clause of the Treaty of Berlin, both which were openly and frankly denounced and repudiated by Russia, in her own sole interest, with the result that the denunciation and repudiation were accepted by all Europe. That so much less solemn a document as the Declaration might be, with due

warning and in time of peace, repudiated, seems to admit of no question. It has never been, and is not now a uniform doctrine, it has never been universally accepted, and it is therefore to this day no part of the Law of Nations, but only a new and exclusively conventional view of a portion of that law as "declared" by certain States. Thus Hall says, "the provisions of "the Declaration of Paris cannot in strictness be said "to be at present part of international law, because they have not received the adherence of the United "States." And again he says, "the terms of the "Declaration are not authoritative law," and yet again: "the freedom of enemy's goods in neutral vessels is "not yet secured by an unanimous act, or by a usage "which is in strictness binding on all nations."1

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We have seen Russia tear up, in 1870, the Black Sea clause of that very Treaty of Paris, the Conference on which led to this very Declaration; and had the Declaration formed part of the Treaty it must have disappeared with the infraction of that part of it. For assuredly if the principal clause of a solemn Treaty, made with full powers and duly ratified, may be repudiated, much more may a Declaration thereto appended, made without powers and never ratified. We have seen that same Russia, which was a party to the Treaty of Berlin in 1878, repudiate in 1886 Article LIX. of that Treaty, which stipulated that Batoum should be a "free port essentially com"mercial," and repudiate it with a cynicism and under circumstances which caused Lord Rosebery to stigmatize the repudiation as "an infraction of the 66 Treaty of Berlin of which indeed it obliterates a "distinct stipulation," and to protest against it in

1 Rights and Duties of Neutrals, by W. E. Hall, M.A. London, 1874, pp. 13, 135, 143.

these words: "H.M. Government cannot consent to "recognize or associate themselves in any shape or "form with this proceeding of the Russian Govern"ment. They are compelled to place on record their "view that it constitutes a violation of the Treaty of "Berlin unsanctioned by the Signatory Powers, that "it tends to make future conventions of the kind "difficult, if not impossible, and to cast doubt at "least on those already concluded."1

There is indeed not one of the great modern treaties of Europe but has been openly repudiated in some essential parts by some interested Power. They have all suffered violation in some of their essential features. And if treaties may be and have been thus repudiated, much more may a Declaration be repudiated which is no Treaty at all, nor part of a treaty, which is self-contradictory on the face of it, and of which the proposed partial repudiation has already been repeatedly announced by other Powers than Great Britain who were parties to it.

Moreover this was not the only Declaration made at Paris in 1856. There was another, to the full as important and to the full as binding, which has been persistently despised and violated ever since it was made. At the sitting of the Conference of 14th April, 1856, the Plenipotentiaries "do not hesitate "to express in the name of their Governments, the "desire that States between which serious discussions may have arisen, shall, before appealing to แ arms, have recourse, so far as the circumstances "admit, to the good offices of a friendly Power." This declaration, which was adopted immediately before the Declaration of Paris usually so called, has

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1 Parliamentary Papers. Russia I., 1886.

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