be allowed, and considered as a reasonable expense, only in cases where the ship shall be pronounced to have been unjustly seized and brought in for adjudication, or bulkbroken, and his majesty's instructions disobeyed, or where there has been actual and wilful damage done, and misusage of persons or property by the captor, or when the time of detention for the purpose of unlivery of the cargo, or repairing such damage, shall exceed the time specified in the charter party, or when the neutral master shall not refuse or neglect to take away his ship upon bail offered to be given by the captors for freight, and reasonable expenses. That where the value of corn and naval stores sold to his majesty shall be decreed to be paid to any neutral claimant; the owner, in cases where such corn, provision, and other naval stores, by any treaty or particular stipulation, shall be held to be not contraband, and so not confiscable, the captor who shall have brought in such privileged ships and cargoes, in consequence of his majesty's orders and instructions, and who shall have given bail to be answerable, upon unlivery of the same, for freight and reasonable expenses, in case that any shall be allowed, shall be discharged from his bail, but that the freight, and such reasonable expenses, shall be decreed to be added to the price of the cargo, and to be paid for by his majesty to the neutral owner, in cases of restitution, and in cases of condemnation shall be added in like manner to the price of the cargo, and paid to the captor by his majesty. Freights and reasonable expenses where captors and claimants cannot agree, shall be referred to be settled by the deputy registrar, and merchants appointed by the court; the report nevertheless shall be subject to revisal by order of the court, upon objections made by either party. A true copy of the original, Jan. 22, 1794. GEO. TAYLOR, JR. Chief Clerk in the Department of State. Extract of a Letter from Thomas Pinckney to the Secretary of State, dated London, Nov. 11, 1793. TUSCANY has been obliged to abandon its neutrality. Genoa has been forcibly urged to the same measures by the commanders of a combined Spanish and British fleet, who entered their port and seized a French frigate and some armed vessels lying there. A minister from that Republick was received at the last levee. A proclamation is issued, directing our vessels from Pennsylvania, Jersey, and Delaware, to perform a quarantine of 14 days. Truly extracted from the original, Jan. 22, 1794. GEO. TAYLOR, JR. Chief Clerk in the Department of State. MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES RELATIVE TO LETTERS FROM FRENCH MINISTER. [See Vol x. p. 298.] FEB. 7, 1794. MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES RELATIVE TO GREAT BRITAIN AND SPAIN. FEB. 24, 1794. MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES RELATIVE TO SPAIN AND ALGIERS. MARCH 3, 1794. [See Vol. x. p. 309.] MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES TO CONGRESS. MARCH 5, 1794. THE Secretary of State, having reported to me upon the several complaints which have been lodged in this office against the vexations and spoliations on our commerce since the commencement of the European war, I transmit to you a copy of his statement, together with the documents upon which it is founded. GEO. WASHINGTON. Philadelphia, March 2, 1794. SIR,-In your message to both Houses of Congress, on the 5th of December, 1793, you inform them, that "the vexations and spoliations, understood to have been committed on our vessels and commerce by the cruisers and officers of some of the belligerent powers, appeared to require attention: That the proofs of these, however, not having been brought forward, the description of citizens, supposed to have suffered, were notified, that on furnishing them to the executive, due measures would be taken to obtain redress of the past, and more effectual provisions against the future," and that " should such documents be furnished, proper representations will be made thereon, with a just reliance on a redress proportioned to the exigency of the case." On my succession to the department of state, I found a large volume of complaints, which the notification had collected, against severities on our trade, various in their kind and degree. Having reason to presume, as the fact has proved, that every day would increase the catalogue, I have waited to digest the mass, until time should have been allowed for exhibiting the diversified forms, in which our commerce has hourly suffered. Every information is at length obtained, which may be expected. The sensations excited by the embarrassments, danger, and even ruin, which threaten our trade, cannot be better expressed, than in the words of the committee of Philadelphia. After enumerating particular instances of injury, their representation to government proceeds thus: "On these cases, which are accompanied by the legal proofs, the committee think it unnecessary to enlarge, as the inferences will, of course, occur to the secretary; but they beg leave to be permitted to state other circumstances, which, though not in legal proof, are either of such publick notoriety as to render legal proof unnecessary, or so vouched to the committee as to leave them in no doubt of the truth of them. "It has become a practice for many of the privateers of the belligerent powers to send into port all American vessels they meet with, bound from any of the French ports in the West Indies to the United States; and it is positively asserted, that the owners of some of them have given general instructions to their captains to that effect-And though many of those vessels have been afterwards liberated, yet the loss by plunder, detention and expense, is so great as to render it ruinous to the American owner:-In many cases, where the cargoes have been valuable, the owners of the privateers, after acquittal, have lodged appeals which they never intended to prosecute, but merely with a view of getting the property into their hands upon a valuation made so unfairly, as to ensure them a considerable profit, even if they should be finally made liable. "Fourteen days only are allowed to an American owner to make his claim, which renders it impossible for him, except he is on the spot, and every difficulty which a combination of interested persons can devise, is thrown in the way, to prevent his getting security; and in a few instances can it be done, but by making over his vessel and cargo to the securities, and thereby subjecting himself to the heavy additional charge of commission, insurance, &c.It may be added, that the most barefaced bribery is sometimes practised to prevail on unwary boys, or those who know little of the obligation of an oath, to induce them to give testimony in favour of the captors. "Beside the cases here enumerated, the committee have information of a number of vessels belonging to this port, being captured and carried into different ports; but as the legal proofs are not come forward, they forbear to men tion them. "It is proper, however, for them to add, that, besides the loss of property occasioned by those unjust captures and detentions, the masters and crews of the vessels are frequently subjected to insults and outrages, that must be shocking to Americans. Of this the case of captain Wallace is an instance.-There are others within the knowledge of the committee, of which they only wait the legal proof to lay them before the Secretary. "To this last list of grievances the committee are sorry to find it their duty to add, that by reason of the vexation, loss, and outrages, suffered by the merchants of the United States, its commerce already begins to languish, and its products are likely to be left upon the hands of those who raise them. Prudent men doubt the propriety of hazarding their property, when they find that the strictest conformity with the laws of nations, or of their own country, will not protect them from the rapacity of men who are neither restrained by the principles of honour, nor by laws sufficiently coercive to give security to those, who are not subjects of the same government. The committee conclude this representation with an assurance, that they have, in no degree, exaggerated in the statement they have made, and that they will continue to communicate all such information, as they may further receive; of which nature, before the closing of this report, they are sorry to add, is that of the irruptions of the Algerines from the Mediterranean, in consequence of a truce concluded with that regency, it is said, by the British minister, on behalf of Portugal and Holland. This alarming event, to which some American ships, we hear, have already become victims, is of so distressing a nature, as must soon deprive us of some of the most lucrative branches of our commerce, if not speedily checked or prevented. The immediate rise it has produced in insurance, and the fears it may instil into our seamen and commanders, are of a nature highly deserving the serious consideration of government, on whose protection and zeal for the interests, commercial and agricultural, of the country, the committee implicitly rely." In a supplementary letter the committee of Philadelphia make this conclusion, "that the cases which they recite, and others less formally announced, serve to show, that there are frequent instances of suppression of papers, registers, &c. very prejudicial to our shipping on their trials, and of injuries by the destruction of letters, to the |