by count Von Goltz, ambassador extraordinary of his Prussian majesty, will allow the king no longer to remain silent. The principles which his majesty opposes to those laid before him, are contained in the enclosed memorial. It is not the desire of supporting an opinion once declared, which induces his majesty to abide by his own. The conviction of the most momentous interests, the desire of his subjects of preserving the peace of which they stand in need, have fixed that opinion. His majesty is convinced that he is addressing himself to friends, to just and equitable sovereigns; his majesty speaks there fore with frankness, and without subterfuge.

It is not required here to illustrate rights. The rights of Denmark are not problematical; and the king, sir, appeals in this point to the feelings of the sovereigns his friends, whether it must not be a painful task for him to enter into negociations respecting the performance of his plain, acknowledged, and allowed treaties? His majesty flatters himself, that it will never be adopted as a principle, or be enforced as such in this respect, by the assertion that the different nature of a war can alter the nature of a mutual contract, or that nutual allowances can be considered as favours or privileges, or that any two powers shall make regulations at the expence of a third power, or that belligerent states shall ease the burthen inseparable from war by throwing it upon their innocent neighbours. These objects might furnish matter of explanation: but his majesty thinks he would give offence to the respective courts to

which he appeals, were he to apprehend that those courts, after having heard his counter-representations, would persevere in those principles; and still less that they would employ preponderant violence, and substitute it for arguments and proofs, or for the concessions necessary to the parties interested. His majesty having made no separate agreement with the other neutral powers, he does not know their sentiments on this head; but his majesty is convinced that their opinion and resistance will be unanimous, and that they will also perceive that it is impossible to combine the system of neutrality with measures which wholly destroy it.

The king is not afraid of there being any room of complaint against him. His majesty has demanded nothing but what is strictly conformable to the treaties. His majesty has remained faithful to his stipulations and neutrality. He is the injured party; but he cannot conceive how his majesty the king of Great Britain could, without the consent of his Danish majesty, give fresh instructions to the commanders of the British ships of war, which are absolutely contrary to the former instructions, and to his treaties with Denmark. The king entertained hopes that those instructions would only have extended to those states to which England is not tied by decisive conventions.

But since his majesty can no longer admit of this declaration, he finds himself obliged, against his will, to protest against those instructions, as an open infringement of the treaties, and of the most sacred law which exists between men, to preserve all his rights, and most N 2 urgently

urgently to request his Britannic majesty to do away this recent rupture, by giving only such instructions as are consistent with the spirit of the existing and manifestly binding engagements. This is not done because his majesty feels indifference at the pleasure of manifesting his friendship to the king of Great Britain, and likewise to the king of Prussia, and their allies, by violating his rigorous duties. The king will do every thing which is possible, provided it does not compromise the neutrality and prosperity of the Danish nation. His majesty consents to consider as blockaded, all those French ports, opposite and near which there shall be a superior naval force of England or of her allies. His majesty will neither enter, nor favour the entering, into a contract with the French government, for supplying its marine or its armies. His majesty will not suffer in his dominions the sale of prizes made by French ships; nor will his majesty cease to claim in France the effects of the English subjects, and of the subjects of the allies of England, entrusted to the protection of the Danish flag; and he will exert himself in the recovery thereof, in the same manner as if they were Danish property. In short, his majesty will omit nothing of that which can cement his connexions with the powers whose friendship and esteem he has always requested, or which can manifest his fidelity with regard to his alliances, and his respect of the fundamental principles of society and of the public weal.

(Signed) A. P. VON BERNSTORFF. Foreign Office, Copenhagen, July 28, 1793.

Counter Declaration of the Court of

Denmark, in Reply to the Memorial delivered by the British Minister.

Table.

HE law of nations is unalterIts principles do not depend on circumstances. An enemy engaged in war can exercise vengeance upon those who do not pect it; but in this case, and without violating the rigid law, a fatal reciprocity may take place: but a neutral power which lives in peace, cannot admit of, nor acknowledge, such a compensation; it can only screen itself by its impartiality and by its treaties. It is not pardonable for her to renounce its rights in favour of any belligerent power. The basis of its rights is the universal and public law, before which all authority must vanish; it is neither a party nor a judge; nor do the treaties give room to privileges and favours. All these stipulations constitute the perfect law; they are mutual obligations. That would be a very unnatural agreement, which any of the contracting parties might at pleasure suppress, interpret, or restrain. In this manner all treaties would in general become impracticable, because they would be useless. What becomes of equity, fidelity, and safety? and how much more unjust must become opposition when it sets aside the infringement of sacred duties, the advantages of which have been enjoyed, but only acknowledged as long as they suited self-interest?

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judgment, and her neutrality will not permit her to express her mind on this subject. We only confine ourselves to the lamenting the disasters which have befel that country, and, on its account, all Europe; and to the wishing to see them brought to a speedy termination. But this is not the moment to own or acknowledge a form of government which we have always refused to acknowledge.-The nation is there, and the authority which it acknowledges is that to which application is made in cases concerning single individuals. The commercial connexions subsist likewise in the same manner as they did between England and France, as long as the latter chose to preserve peace. The nation has not ceased to acknowledge her treaties with us; at least she conforms herself agreeable to those treaties. As she appeals to them, so do we appeal to them and frequently with good success, both for ourselves, and in favour of those subjects of the belligerent powers who commit their effects to the protection of our flag. In cases of refusal and delay, we have frequently been obliged to hear often and reluctantly, that they only used to make reprisals, since the nations with whom they were at war shewed as little regard for their treaties with us; and thus the neutral flag becomes the victim of errors which it cannot reproach itself with. The path of justice still continues open in France. The consuls and the mandataries of private individuals are heard. No one is prevented from applying to the tribunals of commerce. This is sufficient in ordinary cases. No fresh negociations are required for

the maintenance of existing treaties. Ministers become quite superfluous in this respect; there are judges, and this is sufficient,

These considerations are already violated by the observation, that our grievances are frequently heard in France, and that there is no possibility of getting them redressed. The municipalities, to whom application must be made, are certainly not alike equitable; the sentences of the tribunals of commerce are not founded upon uniform principles; the extreme means of refuge to a medium of power is totally removed; and these circumstances occasion at times grievous acts of injustice. In this respect none are greater sufferers than the neutral powers; and it would be very unequitable to punish them doubly, and also on the part of those powers who 'cry aloud against those unjust proceedings, and yet seem to justify it by their own imitation.

A negociation between a neutral and a belligerent power, which would have for its object that the latter should not make use of neutrality, to the detriment of the former, cannot be thought of. A neutral power has fulfilled all its duties, if it has never receded from the strictest impartiality, and from the acknowledged sense of its treaties. In case the neutrality should prove more advantageous to one of the belligerent powers than to the other, this becomes foreign to the neutrality, and does not concern it. This depends on local situations and circumstances, and does not remain alike. The detriments and advantages are compensated and balanced by time. All that which does not absolutely depend on a neutral power, ought to have no

influence

influence upon its neutrality; otherwise a partial, and frequently but, momentary, interest would become the interpreter and judge of existing treaties.

The distinction between private speculations and those made by the government and the municipalities, seems to us to be as new as it is totally unknown. As this case cannot at all find place here, it would be superfluous to discuss the question, whether a contract be tween a neutral government and a belligerent power, respecting supplies of provisions for armies, garrison towns, or of ships of war, can be contrary to a treaty in which no such exception has been mentioned? The only question here is respecting speculations which might be made by riivate individualsrespecting the sale of products quite harmless in their nature, the disposal of which is not less important to the vender, than the possession of them is to the purchaserrespecting the use of the ships of the nation which must chiefly seek her subsistence in navigation and the corn trade. Nor is the question here about ports of war, but about ports of commerce; and if it be lawful to reduce by famine blockaded harbours, it would not be quite so just to accumulate the misery upon so many others, where it befalls the innocent, and may even reach provinces in France which have not deserved this increase of wretchedness, either on the part of England or on that of her allies,

The want of grain, as a consequence of the failure of domestic productions, is not something unusual, which might only take place in the present moment, or which

might be occasioned by the grounds which constitute the difference so often alleged between the present and former wars. France is almost constantly able to make imports from abroad -Africa, Italy, America, furnish hier with much more corn than the Baltic. In the year 1709, France was more exposed to famine than it is now and yet England would not then avail herself of the same grounds. On the contrary, when, soon after, Frederick IV. king of Denmark, "on account of his war with Sweden, which required almost constantly importations from abroad like France, could believe that he might adopt the principle that exportation can be lawfully prevented if one has hopes to conquer an enemy by so doing, and he intended to apply, with regard to a whole country, this principle, which is only considered as valid with regard to blockaded ports; all the powers remonstrated, especially Great Britain, and unanimously declared this as new and inadmissible; so that the king, "convinced to the contrary, desisted from it. A war can scarcely differ from others with regard to its occasion, tendency, necessity, justice, or injustice. This can be a most important concern to the belligerent powers. It can and must have influence upon the peace, upon the indemnification and other accessary circumstances. But all this is absolutely of no concern to the neutral powers. They will, upon the whole, give the utmost preference to those on whose side justice seems to be; but they have no right to give way to this sentiment. Where a neutrality is not quite perfect, it ceases to be neutrality.

The

The ships bearing the British Aag, like those which bear that of the allies of England, find in all the harbours of his majesty every possible safety, assistance, and protection; but those cannot be reckoned among their number which have been captured by their enenies. The French privateers cannot be considered as pirates by the neutral powers, as long as England does not consider and treat them as such. In England the prisoners are deemed to be prisoners of war: they are exchanged; and negociations have even been entered into

for this purpose. The usual laws

of war are there observed in all respects; and by this rule alone we ought to go. The tri-coloured flag was acknowledged in Denmark at a period when it was acknowledged every where else. Every alteration in this respect would be impossible, without involving ourselves into a war, or without deserving one.

The admittance of privateers in Norway is a consequence of this neutrality, before which all regard must vanish. It has found place in all the maritime wars which ever befel Europe. All the nations in their turn have availed themselves of and desired it. The local description allows no general prohibition. It would only bring us into dilemmas, because we could not abide by it in a remote country, where there are coasts of immense extent, numberless harbours and anchoring places, and only a small number of inhabitants. The prohibition would therefore be il lusory, and even dangerous, as the French, in virtue of their decrees, would then destroy the ships which they would no longer hope to put in a state of safety. The subject is

otherwise of small importance; and the means against it are numerous, and ea ily to be applied. (Signed)

A P. VON BERNSTORFF.

Answer of the Court of Denmark to the Note delivered on the 10th of August ult. to the same Purport as that delivered to the High Chancellor of Sweden by the Imperial Russian Ambassador.

HEREAS I have given an

account to the king, mymaster, of the note which the ambassador extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary of her majesty the empress of all the Russias, baron de Kruedener, delivered on the 10th of August 1793. I have received his majesty's command to answer, That his majesty sees, with the greatest sorrow, how much the principles contained in the said note militate at this time against his own; that his majesty expected no intimation that manifested doubts which his majesty had not deserved; that it could not but be known to her imperial majesty, that the king had resolved to give no convoys to the Danish ships bound to France, and that his majesty never had pretended to send naval stores into that country; that his majesty could not of course guess the meaning of a declaration which did not concern him, nor of a proceeding which applied the principles and rights of a blockade to situations which precluded every idea of that kind; that the restricted commerce in grain, as it now subsisted, was a quite insignificant circumstance for the cause which

her