Mr. Hay to Mr. M. Garcia Mérou.
Washington , December 16, 1898 .
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your note of the 15th instant, handed to me in person the same day, in which you inform me officially, and in confirmation of oral statements heretofore made by you, of the choice of the United States minister at Buenos Ayres, Mr. William I. Buchanan, as a member of the commission to definitely determine the boundary line in the region known as Puna de Atacama, with a view to his acting as arbitrator if the conference of the delegates of the two nations which is to meet on the 10th of March next shall not reach an accord respecting the demarcation of that line.
As I had the pleasure to inform you orally, the Chilean representative in this capital had already informally acquainted the President with the choice of Minister Buchanan as a member of the commission in question, and Señor Morla Vicuña has been informed of the provisional assent of this Government to such choice in case the two Governments should ask it.
If in accordance with the understanding of your Government Mr. Buchanan should advise me of the request concurrently made of him by your Government and by the Government of Chile to act as a member of the arbitral commission to which your note refers and shall request the permission of this Government to accept the same, it will afford me pleasure to communicate to him the consent of the President for the personal performance of the mission with which he has thus been honored.
Be pleased to accept, etc.