Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 22.djvu/227



LAST PHASE OF OREGON BOUNDARY 217

ground that the Rosario channel was the one intended by the Treaty ; the Americans, on the ground that the Canal de Arro (or Haro) was intended. The British ca^e rested on the wording of the treaty Inn this wording \va~ ambiguous. The channel should have three characfenstTcs to meet tfie terms of the treaty contended the commission: (1) it should sep- arate the continent from Vancouver's Island; (2) it should admit of the boundary line being carried through it in a south- erly direction ; (3) it should be a navigable channel. The Haro channel, while it was with difficulty navigable, did not separate from the continent as it was already separated by another channel, and it made it necessary to run the boundary line west before it could run south. This is about as near to verbal quibbling as makes no difference. The. American commissioner maintained that the Haro strait should be the boundary because it was the widest, deepest, and largest vol- ume of water and was the one usually marked on the maps at the time of the treaty. As it washed the shores of Van- couver Island it was the only one that could be said to sep- arate the continent from the island. The word "southerly" was not used in its strict sense but as opposed to northerly. The general intention to make Haro the line was shown by the report of Mr. McLane, who conducted the negotiations, to Mr. Buchanan, then at the state office; also by the fact that this report was submitted to the Senate along with the treaty. Furthermore, Senator Benton's speech made it clear how the treaty was generally understood. When the Rosario channel had first been mentioned by Mr. Crampton (British Minister) it was not asserted that it was the channel intended but merely that it had been surveyed and used and "it seemed natural to suppose that that was the one intended." Moreover, the Haro channel had also been surveyed and used by Spain and by the United States.

The British commissioner^ had^ secret instructions to com- promise on the middle passage, and in his dispatch