determine if the seizure is valid. The question is compendiously called _Prize or No Prize_. Where the property of neutrals is involved, this requirement becomes of absolute necessity. In conceding belligerence, all customary belligerent rights with regard to neutrals are conceded also, so that neutral rights and interests are put in jeopardy. Here we see at once the wrong done. If nothing is due to Civilization, something is due to neutrals. Without dwelling on this point, I content myself with the authority of two recent French writers. M. Hautefeuille, in his elaborate work, says: “The cruiser is not recognized as the proprietor of the objects seized, he cannot dispose of them, but _it is his duty to present himself before the tribunal and obtain a sentence declaring them to be prize_.”[147] A later writer, M. Eugène Cauchy, whose work has appeared since our war began, says: “A usage which evidently has its source in _natural equity_ requires, that, before proceeding to divide the booty, there should be an inquiry as to the regularity of the prize. _Every prize taken from an enemy should be carried before the judge established by the sovereign of the captor._”[148] But if the power calling itself belligerent cannot comply with this condition,--if it has no port into which it can bring the captured ship, and no court, according to the requirement of the British Admiralty, with “a regular judicial proceeding wherein both parties may be heard,”--it is clearly _not in a situation to dispose of a ship or goods as prize_. Whatever its force in other respects, it lacks a vital element of _ocean_ belligerence. In that _semi_-sovereignty which constitutes belligerence on land there must be provision for the _administration of justice_, without which there is nothing but a mob. In that same _semi_-sovereignty on the ocean there must be similar provision. It is not enough that there are ships duly commissioned to take prizes, there must also be courts to try them; and the latter are not less important than the former. Such is the conclusion of reason, in harmony with acknowledged principles. How, then, acknowledge belligerent rights where this condition is wanting?