and he suggested that a joint Commission should determine the line between the Alaska territory and the conterminous possessions of Great Britain, on the hypothesis that here there was no ground of dispute and that all that was required was the actual delimitation of an already admitted boundary line. The matter proved to be more complex than the President’s words implied. [Sidenote: Russian America ceded to the United States.] [Sidenote: Line of demarcation between British and Russian possessions in North America drawn in 1825.] By a Treaty signed on the 30th of March, 1867, the territory now known as Alaska was ceded by Russia to the United States. It was the year in which the Dominion Act was passed; and, when British Columbia[245] in 1871 joined the Dominion, Canada became, in respect of that province, as well as in regard to the Yukon Territory, a party to the Alaska boundary question. The limits of Russian America, as it was then called, had been fixed as far back as 1825, when, by a treaty between Great Britain and Russia, dated the 28th of February in that year, a line of demarcation was fixed between British and Russian possessions ‘upon the coast of the continent and the islands of America to the North-West’. The line started from the Southernmost point of Prince of Wales Island, which point was defined as lying in the parallel of 54° 40′ North latitude and between the 131st and 133rd degrees of West longitude. It was carried thence to the North, along the channel called Portland Channel, up to that point of the continent where it intersected the 56th parallel of North latitude. From this point it followed the summit of the mountains parallel to the coast until it intersected the 141st degree of West longitude, and was carried along that meridian to the Arctic Ocean. The Treaty provided that the whole of Prince of Wales Island should belong to Russia, and that wherever the summit of the mountains running parallel to the coast between the 56th parallel of North latitude and the point where the boundary line intersected the 141st meridian was proved to be at a distance of more than 10 marine leagues from the ocean, the line should be drawn parallel to the windings of the coast at a distance from it never exceeding 10 marine leagues. [Sidenote: Free navigation of rivers.] Free navigation of the rivers which flowed into the Pacific Ocean across the strip of coast assigned to Russia was conceded in perpetuity to British subjects; and, after the transfer of Russian America to the United States, the Twenty-sixth Article of the Treaty of Washington of 1871 provided that the navigation of the rivers Yukon, Porcupine, and Stikine should for ever remain free and open to both British and American citizens, subject to such laws and regulations of either country within its own territory as were not inconsistent with the privilege of free navigation. [Sidenote: Negotiations for a settlement of the boundary with the United States.]