ccupied in dealing with a
point foreign to the matter in hand, and in itself surprising to the
signatories. Their address was an appeal for information on specific
points and an appeal from specific persons, who correctly described
themselves as "white residents," "the undersigned," and in the
accompanying letter as the "signatories." They were so far from seeking
to collect evidence in private that they applied frankly and directly to
the person accused for explanation; and so far from seeking to multiply
signatures or promote scandal that they kept the paper strictly to
themselves. They see with regret that the President has failed to
appreciate this delicacy. They see with sorrow and surprise that, in
answer to a communication which they believe to have been temperately
and courteously worded, the President has thought fit to make an
imputation on their honesty. The trick of which he would seem to accuse
them would have been useless, and even silly, if attempted; and on a
candid re-examination of the address and the accompanying letter, the
President will doubtless see fit to recall the imputation.

By way of answer to the questions asked the signatories can find nothing
but what seems to be a recommendation to them to apply to their Consuls
for "protection." It was not protection they asked, but information. It
was not a sense of fear that moved them, but a sense of shame. It is
their misfortune that they cannot address the President in his own
language, or they would not now require to explain that the words "tend
to damage the white races in the native mind," quoted and misapplied by
the President, do not express any fear of suffering by the hands of the
Samoans, but in their good opinion, and were not the expression of any
concern for the duration of peace, but of a sense of shame under what
they conceived to be disgraceful imputations. While agreeing generally
with the President's expressed sentiment as to "anonymous rumours," they
feel that a line has to be drawn. Certain rumours they would not suffer
to remain uncontradicted for an hour. It was natural, therefore, that
when they heard a man of their own white race accused of conspiring to
blow up the gaol and the prisoners who were there under the safeguard of
his honour, they should attribute to the accused a similar impatience to
be justified; and it is with a sense of painful surprise that they find
themselves to have been mistaken.

(_Signatures as to N