“All territory, places and possessions whatsoever, taken by either party from the other during the War, or which may be taken after the signing of this Treaty, excepting only the Islands hereinafter mentioned, shall be restored without delay and without causing any destruction or carrying away of any of the artillery or other public property originally captured in the said forts or places, and which shall remain therein upon the exchange of the ratification of this Treaty, or any slaves or other private property; and all archives, records, deeds, and papers, either of a public nature or belonging to private persons, which, in the course of the War, may have fallen into the hands of the officers, of either party shall be, as far as may be practicable, forthwith restored and delivered to the proper authorities and persons to whom they respectively belong. Such of the Islands in the Bay of Passamaquoddy as are claimed by both parties, shall remain in the possession of the party in whose occupation they may be at the time of the exchange of the ratification of this Treaty until the decision respecting the title to said islands shall have been made in conformity with the fourth article of this Treaty. No disposition made by this Treaty as to such possession of such islands and territories claimed by both parties shall, in any manner whatever, be construed to affect the right of either.” The Treaty, from which the clause above is quoted, can of course be found in Washington, but copy may be seen at almost any general public library, in the volume herebefore referred to containing various Treaties of the United States. The reader, who has been following us in our showing of the various stages of the development of the British design to protect, by diplomacy, the Louisiana expedition, will recognize the significance of the word “possessions.” By reason of that word, the British were in position to maintain, after capturing Louisiana, that it was not subject to return under the mutual restoration clause adopted, not being, under English construction, a legal “possession” of the United States, formal notice of that construction having been given in the treaty negotiations. The subtly accomplished insertion of the word in the treaty represented a triumph of ulterior British diplomatic design over the very able, hard-headed, but open and candid American commissioners, who were entirely in the dark as to the Expedition dispatched to seize Louisiana. That word was of course not as exclusive of argument as the Uti Possidetis principle first proposed, and insisted upon almost as a sine qua non; nor was it as clear as the wording subsequently urged, “belonging to either party and taken by the other”; but it was all sufficient, backed by the British conviction that Louisiana was not a legal possession of the United States, and supported by the mighty British martial power, then unleashed from European war.