shall be allowed to employ such advocates, solicitors, notaries, agents and factors as they may judge proper in all their affairs and in all their trials at law in which they may be concerned before the tribunals of the other party, and such agents shall have free access to be present at the proceedings in such cases and at the taking of all examinations and evidence which may be exhibited in the said trials." Americans charged with offenses against the Spanish government should have had the benefits of the rights given them under this treaty, but the government took refuge behind the fact that the Captain-General had no diplomatic functions, and Americans were frequently thrust into prison and allowed to remain there subject to much discomfort and to financial loss until Washington and Madrid got the facts, and took the time to arrange the matter. The Spanish Secretary for Foreign Affairs wrote to Calderon de la Barca, on this matter, as follows: "Your Excellency knows that the government of Her Majesty has always maintained the position with all foreign powers that its colonies are outside of all the promises and obligations undertaken by Spain in international agreements. With regard to Cuba, the discussions with England to this effect are well known, in which the Spanish Government has declared that the treaties which form the positive law of Spain had been adjusted in times when the Spanish colonies were closed to all foreign trade and commerce, and that when in 1824, these colonies were opened to commerce of all other nations, they were not placed on equal footing with the home country, but were kept in the exceptional position of colonies. Of this exceptional position of that part of the Spanish dominions, no one has more proof than the foreign consuls, since it is evident to them that the Spanish government has only endured their presence on the condition that they should not exercise other functions than those of mere commercial agents. Thus in 1845 the English government accepted formally the agreement that its consul should not demand the fulfillment of treaties, not even of those which refer to the slave trade."