Mr. Bayard to Mr. West.
Washington, June 22, 1885.
Sir: In compliance with your verbal request of this morning that I should restate part of my note to you of the 19th, I repeat that the arrangement whereby a modus Vivendi on the fishing question has been reached, rests on the memoranda and correspondence exchanged; that your memorandum of the 13th instant expressed the understanding on your side that the “agreement has been arrived at under circumstances affording prospect of negotiation for development and extension of trade between the United States and British North America;” that I not only had no objection to such an understanding, but, in fact regarded it as amply embraced in our proposal to recommend a commission to deal with the whole subject in the interest of good neighborhood and intercourse, and that the recommendation of any measures which the commission might deem necessary to attain those ends would seem to fall within its province, and such recommendations could not fail to have attentive consideration.
Having thus not only admitted the proviso of your memorandum in your own language, but gone still further and pointed out that no limits would be set, so far as I was concerned, to the proposals to be brought forward in the suggested commission on behalf of either party, I do not see how it is possible for me to give any stronger assurance that the understanding has “been reached under circumstances affording a prospect of negotiation for the development and extension of trade between the United States and British America.”
I have, &c.,