part of the Colonial Authorities for evils which ought not to exist, the Republic of Venezuela cultivating, as it does, the most cordial relations with Your Excellency's Government, and finally, I have received instructions to ask for Your Excellency's efficient cooperation, in order that the venezuelan boat Rosita and the venezuelan Angel Petit, if they are still in said island, should be placed by the Authorities of the island of Curaçao at the disposal of the Government of Venezuela, so that they may be submitted to the respective trial before the tribunals of Venezuela for infraction of its laws.

I avail myself of this opportunity to reiterate to Your Excellency the assurances of my high consideration.

J. DE J. PAÚL.

To His Excellency J. H. de Reús, Minister Resident of the Netherlands.

(TRANSLATION)

Legation of the Netherlands.-No 31.-Caracas: the 28th May 1908.

Mister Minister:

I have had the honour to receive your Excellency's note of the 22nd of this month, D. P. E. No 619, the contents of which I have communicated with the Royal Government at The Hague as well as with His Excellency the Governor of the Colony of Curaçao and I will in due time let Your Excellency know the Central Government's reply.

As to me, I must bring to the knowledge of Your Excellency, that the extradition of certain Venezuelan political refugees that are in Curaçao to the Government of the Republic cannot, in my opinion, be acomplished, and that, according to the principles of international law accepted in all countries, an extradition only takes effect for infractions of the common law, and even then it is not obligatory, but is made either for the sake of courtesy or conformably to an existing treaty of extradition, and the provisions of the laws of the country of wich it is requested being taken into consideration.

To the expulsion of those political refugees it would only be possible to proceed, if there existed conclusive evidence that those persons are engaged in promoting disorders or disturbances in a friendly country, that is to say: that they are on that account notoriously noxious to the tranquillity and the interests of the country of asylum; a tranquil stay could never be considered as a motive for such a measure.

The Colonial Government of Curaçao, conformably to the engagements contracted in the Protocol of the 20th of August 1894, will undoubtedly accomplish as its duty the care of having the persons mentioned in Your Excellency's letter strictly watched and will attend thereto with so much more pleasure in view of the most cordial relations existing between our two countries and to which allusion is also made in your above mentioned letter.

It will be exceedingly agreeable for me to be able to give the Government of the Republic every proof showing what a great interest I take in the relations of perfect friendship which, thanks to numerous efforts, have been reestablished, and I feel happy because I shall be able to ask in that sense the Government of Curaçao to exercise a strict watch over the above mentioned persons and I am sure that that Administration will accept even with satisfaction all the indications which the Government of Venezuela has in his posession to convince itself that the persons in question do not behave themselves as there is a right to demand in when granting an asylum to political refugees of any nationality whatever.

In requesting Your Excellency to kindly communicate the foregoing to His Excellency the President of the Republic, I avail myself of this occasion, Mister Minister, to present to you the assurances of my high consideration.

DE REUS.

To His Excellency Doctor J. de J. Paúl, Minister for Foreign Affairs of the United States of Venezuela.

(TRANSLATION)

Legation of the Netherlands.-No 26.-Caracas: the 9th of May 1908.

Mister Minister:

In the interest of the commerce and navigation of those ports of the Republic where no consular officers of the Netherlands are established, I have the honour, conformably to a request of the Governor of the Colony of Curaçao, in which he views the epidemic disease prevailing at La Guayra, to submit to Your Excellency's consideration to kindly procure that the Venezuelan Government should apprise the local authorities in said ports upon whom it is incumbent to issue bills of health, of the desirability that it should only be proceeded to issue clean bills to the vessels leaving those ports with passengers for the islands of the Dutch west Indies, if the authorities possess the conviction that on board those vessels only passengers are transported who have no been in an infected place within the last ten days.

The above indicated idea has been expressed by the Governor of Curaçao with the purpose to detain the shortest time possible under observation the vessels going from Venezuela to the Colony of Curacao, and the measure is therefore much in the interest of the commerce and navigation of the Republic.

I will with pleasure know from Your Excellency for further information, how far you have thougth it to be your duty to give effect to the idea of the Governor and avail myself of this occasion to offer to Your Excellency the assurance of my high consideration.

DE REÚS.

To His Excellency Doctor J. de J. Paúl, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the United States of Venezuela.

United States of Venezuela.-Ministry of Foreign Affairs. -Direction of Foreign Public Law.-N° 566.-Caracas: the 13 of May 1908.

Mister Minister:

I have had the honour to receive Your Excellency's corteous note dated the 9th of the present month, having for its object to state that, conformably to a request of the Governor of Curaçao occasioned by the epidemic disease existing at La Guayra, Your Excellency submits to my consideration a measure tending to the fact that the Venezuelan Government should apprise the local authorities of the ports where, in default of consular officer's of the Netherlands, it should be incumbent upon them to issue bill's of health, of the fact that they should only issue clean bills to the vessels leaving those ports with passengers for the islands of the Dutch West Indies, if the said authorities possess the conviction that on board those vessels only passengers are transported who have not been in an infected place within the last ten days.

I must advertise Your Excellency of the fact that the issue of bills of health, whether by consular officers or by local authorities, to vessels leaving for other foreign ports, is subjected only, in case that a foul bill should be issued, to the fact officially declared, that some epidemic disease prevails in the port of departure, which is apt to transmit contagion to the vessel in question by her contact with the infected port. The limitation indicated by Your Excellency, grounded on a very difficult and in many cases unnecessary comprobation, has no reason to be, since, as it happens at present with the port of La Guayra and as is officially known to Your Excellency, all communication has been suspenedd between said port, the only one infected in the Republic, and the other towns.

The measure, therefore, indicated by Your Excellency, tending to the fact that the local authorities should possess the conviction that on the vessels bound for the islands of the Dutch West Indies only passengers are transported who within the last ten days have not been in the port of La Guayra, is absolutely unnecessary, since the Decree closing said port was issued more than ten days ago.

I avail myself of the present opportunity to renew to Your Excellency the assurances of my high consideration.

J. DE J. PAÚL.

To His Excellency J. H. de Reús, Minister Resident of the Netherlands.

(TRANSLATION)

Legation of the Netherlands.-No 27.--An enclosure.-Caracas: the 15th of May 1908.

Mister Minister:

I have with a very great surprise taken notice of the Presidential Decree of yesterday, whereby it is disposed by the Government of the Republic, because vessels arriving from uninfected Venezuelan ports and provided with a clean bill of health are to be submitted to a quarantine in the Colony of Curaçao, that the importation and exportation from Maracaibo and other ports of the western part of the Republic are exclusively to be made until further order through the Customhouse of Puerto-Cabello.

I have to communicate now to Your Excellency that I have no knowledge at all of such a measure in Curaçao; all that has been disposed in the Dutch Colony relating to quarantine against ships or persons on account of the appearance of an infectious disease in La Guayra appears in the Resolution published in the Curaçao Gazette of the 24 th. April last, of which I take the liberty to send to Your Excellency one copy herewith.

The provision in the second paragraph of the Order was in time necessary, because in the first few days after the isolation of La Guayra ordered by the Venezuelan Government there arrived in Curaçao several passengers that the day before the ordered isolation had been still at La Guayra.

All those persons had to go to quarantine and the representative in the West Indies of the West Indies Royal Postal Service, whose isolation was a great desappointment for the Company, was the principal victim thereof, to the great damage of the Company. The measure was therefore executed in an absolutely impartial manner and was groun