files of the legation at
Honolulu, addressed by the declared head of the Provisional Government
to Minister Stevens, dated January 17, 1893, in which he acknowledges
with expressions of appreciation the minister's recognition of the
Provisional Government, and states that it is not yet in the possession
of the station house (the place where a large number of the Queen's
troops were quartered), though the same had been demanded of the Queen's
officers in charge. Nevertheless, this wrongful recognition by our
minister placed the Government of the Queen in a position of most
perilous perplexity. On the one hand she had possession of the palace,
of the barracks, and of the police station, and had at her command at
least 500 fully armed men and several pieces of artillery. Indeed, the
whole military force of her Kingdom was on her side and at her disposal,
while the committee of safety, by actual search, had discovered that
there were but very few arms in Honolulu that were not in the service of
the Government.

In this state of things, if the Queen could have dealt with the
insurgents alone, her course would have been plain and the result
unmistakable. But the United States had allied itself with her enemies,
had recognized them as the true Government of Hawaii, and had put
her and her adherents in the position of opposition against lawful
authority. She knew that she could not withstand the power of the United
States, but she believed that she might safely trust to its justice.
Accordingly, some hours after the recognition of the Provisional
Government by the United States minister, the palace, the barracks, and
the police station, with all the military resources of the country, were
delivered up by the Queen upon the representation made to her that her
cause would thereafter be reviewed at Washington, and while protesting
that she surrendered to the superior force of the United States, whose
minister had caused United States troops to be landed at Honolulu and
declared that he would support the Provisional Government, and that she
yielded her authority to prevent collision of armed forces and loss of
life, and only until such time as the United States, upon the facts
being presented to it, should undo the action of its representative and
reinstate her in the authority she claimed as the constitutional
sovereign of the Hawaiian Islands.

This protest was delivered to the chief of the Provisional Government,
who indorsed