cotton
trade.

There has never been any foundation for this allegation. His Majesty's
Government have never put cotton on the list of contraband; they have
throughout the war kept it on the free list, and on every occasion
when questioned on the point they have stated their intention of
adhering to this practice. But information has reached us that,
precisely because we have declared our intention of not interfering
with cotton, ships carrying cotton will be specially selected to carry
concealed contraband, and we have been warned that copper will be
concealed in bales of cotton.

Whatever suspicions we have entertained we have not so far made these
a ground for detaining any ship carrying cotton, but should we have
information giving us real reason to believe in the case of a
particular ship that the bales of cotton concealed copper or other
contraband the only way to prove our case would be to examine and
weigh the bales, a process that could be carried out only by bringing
the vessel into a port. In such a case, if examination justifies the
action of his Majesty's Government, the case shall be brought before a
prize court and dealt with in the ordinary way.

That the decisions of British prize courts hitherto have not been
unfavorable to neutrals is evidenced by the decision in the Miramichi
case. This case, which was decided against the Crown, laid down that
the American shipper was to be paid even when he had sold a cargo,
cost, insurance, and freight, and when the risk of loss after the
cargo had been shipped did not apply to him at all.

It has further been represented to his Majesty's Government, though
this subject is not dealt with in your Excellency's note, that our
embargoes on the export of some articles, more especially rubber, have
interfered with commercial interests in the United States. It is, of
course, difficult for his Majesty's Government to permit the export of
rubber from British dominions to the United States at a time when
rubber is essential to belligerent countries for carrying on the war,
and when a new trade in exporting rubber from the United States in
suspiciously large quantities to neutral countries has actually sprung
up since the war.

It would be impossible to permit the export of rubber from Great
Britain unless the right of his Majesty's Government were admitted to
submit to a prize court cargoes of rubber exported from the United
States which they believed to be destined fo