the sincerity of the British
Government in their construction of the treaty, it is at the same time
my deliberate conviction that this construction is in opposition both
to its letter and its spirit.

Under the late Administration negotiations were instituted between
the two Governments for the purpose, if possible, of removing these
difficulties, and a treaty having this laudable object in view was
signed at London on the 17th October, 1856, and was submitted by the
President to the Senate on the following 10th of December. Whether
this treaty, either in its original or amended form, would have
accomplished the object intended without giving birth to new and
embarrassing complications between the two Governments, may perhaps
be well questioned. Certain it is, however, it was rendered much less
objectionable by the different amendments made to it by the Senate. The
treaty as amended was ratified by me on the 12th March, 1857, and was
transmitted to London for ratification by the British Government. That
Government expressed its willingness to concur in all the amendments
made by the Senate with the single exception of the clause relating to
Ruatan and the other islands in the Bay of Honduras. The article in the
original treaty as submitted to the Senate, after reciting that these
islands and their inhabitants "having been, by a convention bearing date
the 27th day of August, 1856, between Her Britannic Majesty and the
Republic of Honduras, constituted and declared a free territory under
the sovereignty of the said Republic of Honduras," stipulated that
"the two contracting parties do hereby mutually engage to recognize
and respect in all future time the independence and rights of the said
free territory as a part of the Republic of Honduras."

Upon an examination of this convention between Great Britain and
Honduras of the 27th August, 1856, it was found that whilst declaring
the Bay Islands to be "a free territory under the sovereignty of the
Republic of Honduras" it deprived that Republic of rights without which
its sovereignty over them could scarcely be said to exist. It divided
them from the remainder of Honduras and gave to their inhabitants a
separate government of their own, with legislative, executive, and
judicial officers elected by themselves. It deprived the Government of
Honduras of the taxing power in every form and exempted the people of
the islands from the performance of military duty except for their