Before I left England my anticipations were realised, and suddenly, without any apparent reason, President Harrison broke off the negotiations just as Mr. Blaine and our representatives had come to an agreement, and he gave orders to United States vessels to proceed at once to the Behring's Sea and capture any Canadian vessels found fishing in those waters. This was about the end of May. I sailed for home from Liverpool on the 5th June. On the _Parisian_ I met as a fellow passenger the Rt. Hon. Staveley Hill, M.P., whom I had known before and who had taken a most active part in the House of Commons in favour of the Canadian view of the Behring's Sea difficulty. After we had got out to sea he said to me, "I will tell you something that you must keep strictly to yourself for the present; when we reach the other side it will probably all be out," and he went on to say that the British Government had made up their minds to fight the United States on account of President Harrison's action. I was startled, and asked him if they were going to declare war at once. He replied, "No, not yet, but they have sent a message to the United States Government saying that if they seized another Canadian vessel it would be followed and taken from them by force from any harbour to which it would be taken." I at once said, "That is all right; if that message is delivered in earnest, so that they will know that it is in earnest, it means peace and no further interference." When we arrived at Quebec, to our surprise not a word had come out, and no one seemed to have the slightest suspicion that anything had happened. Some weeks elapsed and yet nothing was said, and I was under the impression that there had been some mistake, although Mr. Staveley Hill told me he had heard it directly from a Cabinet Minister. I saw in the newspapers that large additions were made to the Atlantic and Pacific fleets, the latter being more than doubled in strength. About two months after my return a member of the House of Representatives got up in the United States Congress and drew attention to these extensive preparations, to the increase of the garrison of Bermuda, to the work going on in the fortifications of the West Indies, and asked that the House should be furnished with copies of the despatches between the two Governments. These were brought down, and Lord Salisbury's ultimatum appeared in the following words: Her Britannic Majesty's Government have learned with great concern, from notices which have appeared in the Press, and the general accuracy of which has been confirmed by Mr. Blaine's statements to the undersigned, that the Government of the United States have issued instructions to their revenue cruisers about to be despatched to Behring's Sea, under which vessels of British subjects will again be exposed in the prosecution of their legitimate industry on the high seas to unlawful interference at the hands of American officers.