Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XIV.djvu/26

 18 PRIVATEER PRIVET neutral is a sort of legalized pirate, and so in- deed he is regarded by those conventions and treaties which, in condemnation of this abuse of the international laws of war, almost all na- tions have entered into. Indeed, by such con- ventions and treaties, and by the municipal statutes by which nations forbid their subjects from equipping privateers or enlisting men for service in any foreign war, this species of pri- vateering seems to be well nigh repressed. Not so the other. For nearly a century the expe- diency of its suppression had been at intervals elaborately discussed ; yet in all that period but little advance had been made toward the settlement of the question. In 1856 the sub- ject was revived at the congress which con- vened at Paris after the Crimean war, and the states there represented made mutual engage- ments to surrender the practice of privateering. The United States had early made an effort to abolish it. In 1785, and while he was negotia- ting with Prussia the treaty which was after- ward concluded, Dr. Franklin wrote : " The United States of America, though better situa- ted than any European nation to make profit by privateering, are, so far as in them lies, endeavoring to abolish the practice, by offer- ing in all their treaties with other powers an article engaging solemnly that in case of future war no privateer shall be commissioned on either side, and that unarmed merchant ships on both sides shall pursue their voyages unmo- lested." Dr. Franklin procured the insertion of both these propositions in the treaty with Prussia. In the subsequent treaty of 1799 with that power, however, all provisions of this character were omitted. In 1792 the legis- lative assembly of France proposed that na- tions should agree by mutual conventions to abolish privateering and the seizure of private property on the ocean. The proposal met but little favor, and these practices were perhaps never more extensively carried on than during the wars which followed the French revolu- tion. Again in 1824 the subject was revived, when, on our part again, it was urged upon the attention of the English government. But the plenipotentiaries, Messrs. Huskisson and Stratford Canning, declined to entertain the propositions of our minister, Mr. Rush, and he reported to government that in his opinion Great Britain was unwilling, under any cir- cumstances, to accede to the abolition of pri- vate war upon the ocean. But a radical change in the sentiments of English publicists upon this question is indicated by the language of Lord Clarendon in 1854. In submitting to our ambassador, Mr. Buchanan, the declara- tion respecting neutrals which France and England afterward issued, the British minis- ter advocated the abandonment of privateer- ing, and expressed his condemnation of the practice as one which was " inconsistent with modern civilization." Mr. Buchanan replied, that under existing circumstances it did not seem possible for the United States to agree to a surrender of the practice, unless the naval powers of the world would go one step further and consent to the abolition of all war against private property upon the ocean, as was al- ready agreed upon as to private property upon the land. In answer to Mr. Buchanan's de- spatches, Secretary Marcy reminded the Brit- ish government that the United States laws go as far as and even further than those of any other nation in prohibiting its subjects from entering into foreign privateer service ; but he added that the country would not enter into any convention whereby it would preclude it- self from resorting to its merchantmen in case of war. Finally the submission to our govern- ment of the declaration which was signed at Paris in 1856, by the plenipotentiaries of the chief states of Europe, called for a new con- sideration of the question. Besides provisions affecting the rights of neutrals, the convention contained an article winch declared that priva- teering was abolished. The four points of the declaration were to be regarded as an entirety ; they were to be binding only between those powers which assented to them ; and the states that signed the convention undertook to in- vite the accession of those powers which were not represented at the congress. Most of the secondary states of Europe and America gave prompt adhesion to the articles of the declara- tion. The answer of our government to the declaration was, through Mr. Mnrcy, that the United States would accept the whole of it " in case the clause abolishing privateering were amended by adding that the private property of the subject or citizen of a belligerent on the high seas should be exempted from seizure by public armed vessels of the other bellige- rent, except it be contraband of war." This was declined, and there the matter was suffered to rest until the breaking out of the civil war in the United States in 1861, when Secretary Seward on behalf of the government, in view of the resolution of the confederate govern- ment to issue letters of marque to privateers, offered to assent to the declaration of Paris without the Marcy amendment ; but this was declined by the governments of England and France if coupled with the condition that it was to be made applicable to the case of the Confederate States. PRIVET (also called in England prim and primprint), a name formerly given to the primrose, and afterward unaccountably trans- ferred to ligtutrurn vulgare, the generic name being the classical Latin one. It is a shrub which has been so much cultivated that in Europe its limits in a wild state are quite lost, but it is thought to be indigenous in England ; it grows 6 or 8 ft. high, with long slender branches and opposite simple leaves, which in mild climates are evergreen, or remain until the new leaves appear. Its small white flowers, in compact panicles at the ends of the branches, have a four-toothed calyx and a four-lobed co- rolla, with a short tube ; the fruit ia a spheri-