The general attitude and course of policy of this Government in the maintenance of its neutrality I am particularly anxious that your Excellency should see in their true light. I had hoped that this Government's position in these respects had been made abundantly clear, but I am, of course, perfectly willing to state it again. This seems to me the more necessary and desirable because, I regret to say, the language, which your Excellency employs in your memorandum, is susceptible of being construed as impugning the good faith of the United States in the performance of its duties as a neutral. I take it for granted that no such implication was intended, but it is so evident that your Excellency is laboring under certain false impressions that I cannot be too explicit in setting forth the facts as they are, when fully reviewed and comprehended. In the first place, this Government has at no time and in no manner yielded any one of its rights as a neutral to any one of the present belligerents. It has acknowledged, as a matter of course, the right of visit and search and the right to apply the rules of contraband of war to articles of commerce. It has, indeed, insisted upon the use of visit and search as an absolutely necessary safeguard against mistaking neutral vessels for vessels owned by any enemy and against mistaking legal cargoes for illegal. It has admitted also the right of blockade if actually exercised and effectively maintained. These are merely the well-known limitations which war places upon neutral commerce on the high seas. But nothing beyond these has it conceded. I call your Excellency's attention to this, notwithstanding it is already known to all the world as a consequence of the publication of our correspondence in regard to these matters with several of the belligerent nations, because I cannot assume that you have official cognizance of it. In the second place, this Government attempted to secure from the German and British Governments mutual concessions with regard to the measures those Governments respectively adopted for the interruption of trade on the high seas. This it did, not of right, but merely as exercising the privileges of a sincere friend of both parties and as indicating its impartial good-will. The attempt was unsuccessful, but I regret that your Excellency did not deem it worthy of mention in modification of the impressions you expressed. We had hoped that this act on our part had shown our spirit in these times of distressing war, as our diplomatic correspondence had shown our steadfast refusal to acknowledge the right of any belligerent to alter the accepted rules of war at sea in so far as they affect the rights and interests of neutrals.