Lord Salisbury's government, from the beginning to the end
of the controversy, sustained the rights of Canada as a portion of the
British empire. After very protracted and troublesome negotiations it
was agreed to refer the international question in dispute to a court of
arbitration, in which Sir John Thompson, prime minister of Canada, was
one of the British arbitrators. The arbitrators decided in favour of the
British contention that the United States had no jurisdiction in Bering
Sea outside of the three miles limit, and at the same time made certain
regulations to restrict the wholesale slaughter of fur-bearing seals in
the North Pacific Ocean. In 1897 two commissioners, appointed by the
governments of the United States and Canada, awarded the sum of $463,454
as compensation to Canada for the damages sustained by the fishermen of
British Columbia, while engaged in the lawful prosecution of their
industry on that portion of the Bering Sea declared to be open to all
nations. This sum was paid in the summer of 1898 by the United States.

In 1897 the Canadian government succeeded in obtaining the consent of
the governments of Great Britain and the United States to the
appointment of a joint high commission to settle various questions in
dispute between Canada and the United States. Canada was represented on
this commission by Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Sir Richard Cartwright, Sir
Louis Davies, and Mr. John Charlton, M.P., Newfoundland by Sir James
Winter; the United States by Messieurs C.W. Fairbanks, George Gray, J.W.
Foster, Nelson Dingley Jr., J.A. Kasson, and T. Jefferson Coolidge. The
eminent jurist, Baron Herschell, who had been lord chancellor in the
last Gladstone ministry, was chosen chairman of this commission, which
met in the historic city of Quebec on several occasions from the 23rd
August until the 10th October, 1898, and subsequently at Washington from
November until the 20th February, 1899, when it adjourned. Mr. Dingley
died in January and was replaced by Mr. Payne, and Lord Herschell also
unhappily succumbed to the effects of an accident soon after the close
of the sittings of the commission. In an eulogy of this eminent man in
the Canadian house of commons, the Canadian prime minister stated that
during the sittings of the commission "he fought for Canada not only
with enthusiasm, but with conviction and devotion." England happily in
these modern times has felt the necessity of giving to the consideration
of