No. 176.
Mr. Fish to General Schenck.
Washington, August 12, 1873.
Sir: Your dispatch No. 440, of the 5th ultimo, has been received. The Department has been surprised at the statement of Lord Granville, to which it refers, that the communication by Sir Edward Thornton of a copy of his instructions upon the subject of the joint note to the maritime Powers, provided for by the Treaty of Washington, should be regarded as a reply to my note to Sir Edward on that subject. With due deference to the larger experience of Her Majesty’s foreign office on such subjects, it had here been supposed that a reply to a note, to entitle it to be regarded as official or binding on the party which makes it, should be in the same form as the note to which it may purport to be an answer.
Awaiting a reply of that character, the subject has remained in suspense.
I am, &c.,