Office of the Historian

No. 29.
Mr. Hubbard to Mr. Bayard.

United States Legation,
Tokio, Japan, June 23, 1888. (Received July 16.)
No. 483.]

Sir: Respectfully referring to the correspondence between the Department of State and this legation, looking to the conclusion of a convention between Japan and the United States and some other powers for the protection of the fur-seal fisheries in Behring Sea, and the protection of the sea otter, as subsequently suggested by Japan, I have the honor to inform the Department that instruction No. 171, of November 21, 1887, which has heretofore been acknowledged, is the last that has been received by me from the Department on this subject.

I desire to inform the Department that the Japanese foreign office has in a friendly spirit of inquiry asked if I could furnish information as to when my Government would be ready (as Japan had been ready for some time past) to resume the consideration of the proposed convention.

I have, in response to this inquiry, forwarded to the foreign office a copy of your said instruction No. 171, dated November 21, 1887, with the accompanying note, dated June 20, transmitting the same. The Japanese minister for foreign affairs has been recently advised by the Russian minister to Japan that the United States Government and those of Russia and Great Britain had discussed, at London, the matter of a similar convention for the protection ot the fur-seal fisheries and sea-otter in Behring Sea. He also communicated the fact that the Government at [Page 1849] St. Petersburg desired to conclude with Japan a convention for the mutual protection of the seal and otter within their own seas and contiguous waters.

This fact has been the immediate cause of the inquiry submitted to me, to which the inclosure herewith is in response.

I have, etc.,

Richard B. Hubbard.
[Inclosure in No. 483.]

Mr. Hubbard to Count Okuma.

United States Legation,
Tokio, June 20, 1888.
No. 284.]

Sir: Referring to my note to his exellency Count Ito, dated October 6, 1887, and his reply thereto dated November 8, 1887, concerning a proposed arrangement which the United States invited Japan to enter into with the United States and certain other powers, for the protection of the fur seals in Behring Sea from indiscriminate destruction and consequent extermination, I have now the honor to inclose an instruction* from my Government in response to my dispatch to the honorable the Secretary of State, informing him of Japan’s willingness to enter such an arrangement.

It will be observed by your excellency that my Government is awaiting the replies of some other foreign governments to the invitation of the United States to enter into such a convention.

I have not communicated with your excellency’s department since my note of the 6th of October, on account of awaiting further instructions from my Government in the premises, to which the instruction herewith inclosed especially refers. The substance of the inclosed instruction has not been heretofore communicated to your excellency’s Government, hoping that I might, as indicated, ere now have been furnished with final instructions to conclude a convention between our respective governments, embracing all the points of discussion on which a common and friendly concurrence and understanding had been reached and of which my Government was advised in my dispatches to which the inclosed instruction is in response.

I avail myself, etc.,

Richard B. Hubbard.
  1. See supra, No. 28.↩