SURPLICE FEES OF THE ENGLISH SETTLEMENT.

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to the Clerk of St. John's Church. Items three and four, under head of Baptisms. Slaves, if ten in number, or under, at one time, each three shillings and four pence; above ten, at one time, and if owned by one person, each two shillings and six pence. Under the head of Marriages, we find-Of slaves, gratis-Burials. Of slaves above ten years old, five shillings; under ten, three shillings and four pence. The above are classed in Table of Surplice Fees. Confirmed June 27, 1817. "The Law requires that these Fees be paid at the time of service, and in default of which, they are recoverable by Warrants of Distress. Slave Fees are invariably de

frayed by the owners."

CHAPTER XXV.

THE MOSQUITO COAST AGAIN-USURPATIONS OF ENGLAND-CLAIMS OF SPAININDEPENDENCE OF GUATEMALA-ENGLAND'S ACKNOWLEDGMENTS—THE COLONY OF BAY ISLANDS-CONFLICTING CLAIMS-AN ACT OF THE ENGLISH PARLIAMENT THE TREATY OF 1850-THE PROTECTORATE FICTION AND LORD JOHN RUSSEL THE UNITED STATES AND GREAT BRITAIN-LORD CLARENDON'S ARGUMENT-MR. CLAYTON AS RENDERED BY MR. LAWRENCE-LORD CLAREN

DON AGAIN-MR. WEBSTER
POINT.

MISCONSTRUED-LORD JOHN RUSSEL TO THE

WE shall pursue the history of the Colonization of Great Britain on this coast, and shall prove her desire to act in badfaith with Spain prior to meeting her demands upon the United States, and upholding the position the latter assumed, predicated upon the Clayton and Bulwer Treaty.

The frequent and continued breaches of the Treaty of 1786, and consequent usurpations upon the part of England, were sustained by Lord Clarendon, who alleged "that the Treaty of 1786 was abrogated in 1814 by the war between the

INDEPENDENCE OF GUATEMALA.

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contracting parties, at which time the Belize Settlement extended to the Sarstoun River, which is far South of the Sibun the prescribed boundary. In 1812 Spain adopted a new and written Constitution, in defiance of the despotic powers of Europe; said Constitution contained this Article: "Guatemala, with the internal Provinces of the East and West, and the adjacent Ialands in both Seas form part of the Spanish dominion." Under this Constitution, Spain was recognized by England, who guarantied her sovereignty.

Guatemala in 1823 discarded the Spanish yoke, and became a Confederated Republic, and its Constitution thus described the domain claimed: "The Territory of the Republic is the same which formerly comprised the ancient Kingdom of Guatemala, with the exception for the present of Chiapas." This territory included the whole of the Mosquito Coast. The British settlement between the Silver and the Rio Hondo, called Belize, belonging within the Spanish Province of Yucatan, by the revolution came under the sway of Mexico. England acknowledged the latter's independence, stipulating that British subjects, dwelling in its territories, "should enjoy the rights which had been granted to them by Spain in the Treaty of 1786."

Did not England herein reaffirm her own exclusion from Central America? Where then was in fact, any Mosquito Kingdom, as a distinct and independent territory? If such had existence,

they were heathens, having neither king, churches, ministry, parliament, schools, or council; no army, navy; no treasury, customs, taxes, revenue, police, industry, trade, and no intercourse diplomatic with any other people. True, the English authorities were present; and from Great Britain did they derive their powers and salaries.

On the 17th of July, fourteen days subsequent to the negotiation of the "Clayton and Bulwer Treaty," a proclamation was issued by the Government of Great Britain, constituting the Islands of Ruatan, in the Caribbean Sea-in Central America, and not in British Honduras, four hundred miles distant from Belize-Bonacca, Utilla, Barbaret, Helene, and Mocrat, a colony under the Colony of the Bay Islands. Ruatan and Bonacca are said to be, on account of their fine harbors, good soils, fine air, abundant animals, and their commanding sites, "the Gardens of the West Indies, the Key to Spanish America, and a new Gibraltar."

The United States insist upon England's discontinuing this new Colony. The latter refuses, alleging that the Colony is within the Belize Settlements, or British Honduras, and being so, is excepted from the Treaty. The Islands excepted are only small ones in the neighborhood of and assigned to the Belize in the Treaty of 1786, while the Bay Islands are neither small, nor in the vicinity of the Belize; they are certainly of vast importance as to location and wealth.

THE COLONY OF BAY ISLANDS.

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The Treaty of 1786 assigned them to the "Spanish Continent," and expressly excludes Great Britain from them. Spain held them until the Revolution in Central America. In 1829 the State of Honduras assumed possession, and their ensign was planted on Ruatan. In 1839, England supplanted it with her own, yet this was soon lowered, and that of Honduras was restored.

In 1817 the English Parliament passed a law, entitled “An Act for the more effectual punishment of murders and manslaughters committed in places not within His Majesty's dominions." The preamble runs thus: "Whereas grievous murders and manslaughters have been committed at the settlement in the Bay of Honduras, in South America, the same Bay or settlement being for certain purposes in the possession of and within the protection of His Majesty, by persons residing within that settlement, &c." Parliament amended this statute, in 1819, and reaffirmed that "Belize was not within the territories and dominions of Great Britain."

I have now proven that England never occupied the Belize, save in subordination to the Spanish title. That in 1826, Great Britain, in recognizing the Independence of Mexico, expressly stipulated "for her settlement at the Belize, the privileges granted by the Treaty with Spain of 1786." And again, I have shown that England, although in 1819 reaffirm.. ing that this settlement "was not within her territories and