One can easily conceive how this sort of proceeding, in every possible case, must be vexatious to the neutral. If, in point of fact, the whole, or a part of the ship’s cargo, really belong to that ship’s belligerent party, whose enemy is investigating the case, and this be clearly made out, it is still mortifying to the neutral to see the property taken away which he has undertaken to cover so effectually as to guard it from capture. If, on the other hand, the cargo be all the while, bonâ fide, the property of the neutral whose flag it is sailing under, the vexation caused by this interruption to the voyage is excessive. In the event of restoration or acquittal, the owner’s loss, it is said, is seldom, if ever, adequately compensated for by the awarded damages. In most cases there are found a number of suspicious circumstances sufficient to justify the detention, but not enough to lead to a condemnation; and in these instances the remuneration is not great. If the case, then, be annoying, in any view of it, supposing the neutral ship to have been met with on the wide ocean, what must be the aggravation when the vessel is laid hold of at the instant she has all but reached her own home? when half an hour’s further sailing would have ended the voyage successfully, and put it beyond the power of either of the belligerents to have asked any questions about the nature of her objects, or the ownership of her cargo? We detained, at that period, a good many American vessels, on the ground of having French or Spanish property on board. One of these, a very large ship from Lima, filled with cocoa, was clearly made out to be a good prize, and was condemned accordingly. Three or four others, I remember, were restored to their owners by the decision of the Admiralty Court; and two of them were forcibly recaptured by the Americans, on their way to Halifax. On board one of these ships, the master, and the few hands left in her to give evidence at the trial, rose in the night, overpowered the prize-master and his crew, nailed down the hatches, and having put the helm up, with the wind on land, gained the coast before the scale of authority could be turned. In the other ship, the English officer in charge imprudently allowed himself to be drifted so near the land, that the people on the beach, suspecting what had happened, sent off armed boats in sufficient number to repossess themselves of the property. Possession in such cases being not nine, but ten points of the law, we were left to whistle for our prizes!