Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 18 Part 2c.djvu/562

 NEW GRANADA, 1846. 555 account of having on board articles of contraband, whenever the master, captain, or supercargo of said vessels will deliver up the articles of contraband to the captor, unless the quantity of such articlesrbe so great and of so large a bulk that they cannot be received on board the capturing ship without great inconvenience; but in this and all other cases of just detention, the vessel detained shall be sent to the nearest convenient and safe port for trial and judgment according to law. Aarrorn XX. And whereas it frequently happens that vessels sail for a port or place Blockaded pom. belonging to an enemy, without knowing that the same is besieged, or blockaded, or invested, it is agreed that every vessel so circumstanced may be turned away from such port or place, but shall not be detained, nor shall any part of her cargo, if not contraband, be confiscated unless, ahcer warning of such blockade or investment from the commanding onicer of the blockading forces, she shall again attempt to enter; but she shall be permitted to go to any other port or place she shall think proper. Nor shall any vessel that may have entered into such port before the same was actually besieged, blockaded, or invested by the other, be restrained from quitting that place with her cargo; nor, if found therein after the reduction and surrender, shall such vessel or her czrgo pe liable to confiscation, but they shall be restored to the owners t ereo. Aarrcnn XXI. In order to prevent all kind of disorder in the visiting and examination Visit ¤f ¤¤¤fr•1 of the ships and cargoes of both the contracting parties on the high '°““°1°· seas, they have agreed mutually that whenever a national vessel of war, public or private, shall meet with a neutral of the other contracting party, the first shall remain out of cannon shot, unless in stress of weather, and may send its boat with two or three men only, in order to execute the said examination of the papers concerning the ownership and cargo of the vessel, without causing the least extortion, violence, or ill-treatment, for which the commanders of said armed ships shall be responsible with their persons and property; for which purpose the commanders of private armed vessels shall, before receiving their com missions, give sufficient security to answer for all the damages they may commit. And it is expressly agreed that the neutral party shall in no case be required to go on board the examining vessel for the purpose of exhibiting her papers, or for any other purpose whatever. Aarrcnn XXII. To avoid all kind of vexation and abuse in the examination of the _Sea-letters in papers relating to the ownership of the vessels belonging to the citizens time of W¤·¤‘· of the two contracting parties, they have agreed, and do hereby agree, that in case one of them should be engaged in war, the ships and vessels belonging to the citizens of the other must be furnished with sealetters or passports, expressing the name, property, and bulk of the ship, as also-the name and place of habitation of the master and commander of the said vessel, in order that it may thereby appear_that the ship really and truly belongs to the citizens of one of the parties; they have likewise agreed that when such ships have arcargo, they shall also be provided, besides the said sea-letters or passports, with certincates containing the several particulars of the cargo and the place whence the ship sailed, so that it may be known whether any forbidden or contraband goods are on board the same; which certificates shall be made out by the officers of the place whence the ship sailed, in the accustomed form; without which requisites said vessel may be detained, to beadjudged by the competent tribunal, and may be declared lawful prize, unless the said defect shall be proved to be owing to accident and shall be satisfied or supplied by testimony entirely equivalent.