t the
supposed reason, namely, that there were articles in the manifest not
accounted for by the captain, certainly did not warrant the seizure,
more especially as the destination of the vessel appeared to have been
_bona fide_ neutral, but that, inasmuch as it was probable that the
vessel had by that time been carried before a Prize Court of the United
States for adjudication, and that the adjudication might shortly follow,
if it had not already taken place, the only instruction that he could at
present give to Lord Lyons was to watch the proceedings and the Judgment
of the Court, and eventually transmit full information as to the course
of the trial and its results." He asserted that the real contention
advanced in the plea of the owners for the intervention of the British
Government had been that "the goods [on board the _Springbok_] were, in
fact, _bona fide_ consigned to a neutral at Nassau;" but that this plea
had been refused by the British Government without "any diplomatic
protest or ... any objection against the decision ... nor did they
ever express any dissent from that decision on the grounds on which it
was based."[25]

[Footnote 25: Ibid., p. 18; Salisbury to Lascelles, Jan. 10, 1900.]

This assertion is fairly based upon the reply of the English Government
to the owners on February 20, 1864. Earl Russell had expressly declared
that his government could not interfere officially. "On the contrary,"
he said, "a careful perusal of the elaborate and able Judgment,
containing the reasons of the Judge, the authorities cited by him in
support of it, and the important evidence properly invoked from the
cases of the _Stephen Hart_ and _Gertrude_ (which her majesty's
government have now seen for the first time) in which the same parties
were concerned," had convinced his Government that the decision was
justifiable under the circumstances.[26] The fact was pointed out that
the evidence had gone "so far to establish that the cargo of the
_Springbok_, containing a considerable portion of contraband, was never
really and _bona fide_ destined for Nassau, but was either destined
merely to call there or to be immediately transhipped after its arrival
there without breaking bulk and without any previous incorporation into
the common stock of that Colony, and then to proceed to its _real
destination_, being a _blockaded port_."[27] The "complicity of the
owners of the ship, with the design of the owners of the cargo," was