h constitutes the
only independently sovereign state on the west coast of Africa, this
Government has suggested to the French Government its earnest concern
lest territorial impairment in Liberia should take place without her
unconstrained consent.

Our relations with Mexico continue to be of that close and friendly
nature which should always characterize the intercourse of two
neighboring republics.

The work of relocating the monuments marking the boundary between the
two countries from Paso del Norte to the Pacific is now nearly
completed.

The commission recently organized under the conventions of 1884 and 1889
it is expected will speedily settle disputes growing out of the shifting
currents of the Rio Grande River east of El Paso.

Nicaragua has recently passed through two revolutions, the party at
first successful having in turn been displaced by another. Our newly
appointed minister by his timely good offices aided in a peaceful
adjustment of the controversy involved in the first conflict. The large
American interests established in that country in connection with the
Nicaragua Canal were not molested.

The canal company has unfortunately become financially seriously
embarrassed, but a generous treatment had been extended to it by the
Government of Nicaragua. The United States are especially interested
in the successful achievement of the vast undertaking this company
has in charge. That it should be accomplished under distinctively
American auspices, and its enjoyment assured not only to the vessels
of this country as a channel of communication between our Atlantic and
Pacific seaboards, but to the ships of the world in the interests of
civilization, is a proposition which, in my judgment, does not admit
of question.

Guatemala has also been visited by the political vicissitudes which
have afflicted her Central American neighbors, but the dissolution of
its Legislature and the proclamation of a dictatorship have been
unattended with civil war.

An extradition treaty with Norway has recently been exchanged and
proclaimed.

The extradition treaty with Russia signed in March, 1887, and amended
and confirmed by the Senate in February last, was duly proclaimed last
June.

Led by a desire to compose differences and contribute to the restoration
of order in Samoa, which for some years previous had been the scene of
conflicting foreign pretensions and native strife, the United States,
departing from its po