Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 8.djvu/344

339 CONVENTION WITH CEN IRAL AMERICA. 1825. or invested, by the other, be restrained from quitting such place, witlher cargo, nor, if found therein, after the reduction and surrender, shall such vessel or her cargo be liable to confiscation, but they shall be restored to the owners thereofi ARTICLE 20th. R,,g,,,,,,,0,, 0, In order to prevent all kind of disorder in the visiting and examivisits at sea. nation of the ships and cargoes of both the contracting parties on the high seas, they have agreed, mutually, that whenever a vessel of war, public or private, shall meet with a neutral of the other contracting party, the first shall remain out of cannon shot, and may send its boat, with two or three men only, in order to execute the said examination of the papers concerning the ownership and cargo of the vessel, without causing the least extortion, violence, or ill treatment, for which the commanders of the said armed ships shall be responsible with their persons and property, for which purpose the commanders of said private armed vessels shall, before receiving their commissions, give sufficient security to answer for all the damages they may commit. And, it is expressly agreed, that the neutral party shall in no case be required to go on board the examining vessel, for the purpose of exhibiting her papers, or for any other purpose whatever. ARTICLE 21st. U0,,,S,,,0 be To avoid all kind of vexation and abuse in the examination of the pursuedtp avoid papers relating to the ownership of the vessels belonging to the citizens '°X“‘!°¤ !“fl'° of the two contracting parties, they have agreed, and do agree, that in ?,§?,:;:lm°n °f case one of them should be engaged in war, the ships and vessels belonging to the citizens of the other must be furnished with sea-letters or passports, expressing the name, property, and bulk of the ship, as also the name and place of habitation of the master or commander of said vessel, in order that it may thereby appear that the ship really and truly belongs to the citizens of one of the parties; they have likewise agreed that, such ships, being laden, besides the said sea-letters or passports, shall also be provided with certificates, containing the several particulars of the cargo, and the place whence the ship sailed, so that it may be known whether any forbidden or contraband goods be on board the same; which certificates shall be made out by the cflicers of the place whence the ship sailed, in the accustomed form; without which requisites, said vessel may be detained to be adjudged by the competent tribunal, and may be declared legal prize, unless the said defects shall be satisfied or supplied by testimony entirely equivalent. ARTICLE 22d. Further agree It is further agreed, that the stipulations above expressed, relative to ¤‘°¤*· the visiting and examination of vessels, shall apply only to those which sail without convoy; and when said vessels shall be under convoy, the verbal declaration of the commander of the convoy, on his word of honour, that the vessels under his protection belong to the nation whose flag he carries-and when they are bound to an eneiny’s port, that they have no contraband goods on board, shall be sufficient. ARTICLE 23d. Frm muses_ It is further agreed, that in all cases the established courts for prize causes, in the country to which the prizes may be conducted, shall alone take cognizance of them. And whenever such tribunal of either party shall pronounce judgment against any vessel or goods, or property claimed by the citizens of the other party, the sentence or decree shall mention the reasons or motives on which the same shall have been