ARTICLE IV.
Property or absent hiers.In case of the absence of the heirs, the same care shall be taken provisionally, of such real or personal property as would be taken in a like case of property belonging to the natives of the country, until the lawful owner, or a person who has a right to sell the same, according to article 2, may take measures to receive or dispose of the inheritance.
ARTICLE V.
Disputes concerning inheritances.If any dispute should arise between different claimants to the same inheritance, they shall be decided, in the last resort, according to the laws and by the judges of the country where the property is situated.
ARTICLE VI.
Ratifications.This convention shall be ratified by the President of the United States of America, by and with the advice and consent of their Senate, and by His Royal Highness the Grand Duke of Hesse, and the ratifications shall be exchanged at Berlin, within the term of six months from the date of the signature hereof, or sooner if possible.
Signatures. In faith of which the respective Plenipotentiaries have signed the above articles, both in French and English, and have thereto affixed their seals; declaring, nevertheless, that the signing in both languages shall not hereafter be cited as a precedent, nor in any way operate to the prejudice of the contracting parties.
Date. Done in quadruplicata in the city of Berlin, on the twenty-sixth day of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and forty-four, and the sixty-eighth of the Independence of the United States of America.
HENRY WHEATON. [L. S.]
B’ON DE SCHAEFFER-BERNSTEIN. [L. S.]
[For stipulations of June 16, 1852, for the mutual delivery of criminals fugitives from justice in certain cases, between the United States and the Elector of Hesse, the Grand Duke of Hesse and on Rhine, and the Landgrave of Hesse-Homburg, see convention of that date with Prussia and other states of the Germanic Confederation.]
GRAND DUCHY OF HESSE, 1868.
[That portion of the Grand Duchy of Hesse north of the Main was incorporated into the North German Union, by the constitution of the latter, July 1, 1867.]
August 1, 1868
