rivalry in his commercial transactions, which embrace all branches. North American industry and energy ought, then, to be the first sacrificed.

EUG. GUILLEMOT, Chargé des Interets Français au Paraguay.

E.

The United States and Paraguay Navigation Company, composed of citizens of different States of the Union, acting under a charter granted by the general assembly of Rhode Island, respectfully submit the following statement of their claim upon the Government of Paraguay, and the grounds thereof.

Many of the members of said company having been heretofore largely engaged in foreign commerce, and being desirous of opening the interior waters of South America to American trade and industry, trusted to the favorable disposition of the Government of Paraguay to such enterprises, as declared by the public decree of that Government of 20th May, 1845. These decrees set forth that "the supreme National Government, desiring to develop and stimulate the industry of the great body of the people of the Republic, and considering that one of the means most adequate to this result is to define and secure the conditions and rights of all who shali unite for such useful ends, decree," among other things, "article third, that whoever shall introduce into the Republic any foreign discovery shall enjoy the same advantages as if he was the inventor; " among which advantages, in article fifth, is "the exclusive enjoyment of the patent for from five to ten years;" and that law was applied by the secretary of state of that country to an enterprise such as was undertaken by this company, as appears in a letter from that gentleman, then engaged in a special mission to the court of Brazil, addressed to the then late special agent from the Government of the United States to Paraguay, dated Rio Janeiro, December 15, 1848, from which the following extract is submitted:

"In the said decree President Lopez has resolved all questions which could arise in regard to privileges and premiums. If you introduce into the country machines or new means of industry which the country does not now possess, this decree gives you the monopoly for ten years at least, and you do not require a special concession."

The official gazette contains decrees securing to foreigners further benefits of naturalization, but the members of this company preferred that their agents and employees, whether engaged in manufactures or commerce, should at all times have the protection of American citizenship, and in the prosecution of the entire enterprise they relied with the fullest confidence upon the power and the disposition of their own Government to protect from outrage and spoliation the persons and property of American citizens.

The company being prepared by the long commercial experience of some of its members, by the researches of others into all the published sources of information as to the productions of the interior of South America, and also by the personal observation of its president and of its general agent in that region, invested in the two expeditions to Paraguay a capital of some $300,000 in the purchase of sail and steam vessels, in articles of American manufacture, and in a great variety of machines and implements, such as steam engines, sawmills, cotton gins, planing machines, sugar milis, brick machines, rice mills, agricultural tools, etc., a particular inventory of which was attached to the memorial now on file in the Department of State; and sent out a large corps of mechanics and others skilled in the use of such machinery and in the care of such vessels and in the conduct of the various departments of business in which they were to be employed.

A complete account of the amount and mode of this expenditure, and of the persons and articles sent to said country, has been presented under the oath of the officers of the company. The company are ready to exhibit vouchers or any further verification thereof that the Department may require.

Notwithstanding unforeseen delays, upon the arrival of the expedition at Asuncion, the capital of Paraguay, in October, 1853, the agents of the company were received with the greatest favor. Permission to purchase land was conceded by the President; the use of Government barracks was granted to the company, free of expense, for the use of their employees; a loan of money was made upon the credit of the company for a term of two years; a large number of persons were impressed by the Government and paid by the company to work in their cigar factory and other establishments.

The President, Lopez, accepted in his official capacity the presents sent him by the company. and granted many other extraordinary facilities for their operations.

In verification of these statements we refer to the affidavit of W. E. Hines, general cashier of the company in Paraguay, hereunto annexed.

The Government of Paraguay has never denied, but makes a boast of these facts. We give an instance of its decrees for our benefit and also the letter accepting and returning presents.

The justice of peace of Ipiané will select from the natives of the suppressed community 10 men, bachelors or married, of good conduct and assiduous in labor, and will deliver them to the citizen of the United States, Mr. Edward Augustus Hopkins, to be destined to work for him during one year in his establishment at San Antonio, with the monthly wages of $3, which he offers to pay, and providing victuals, upon the condition that every Saturday, after concluding the labors of the day, they can retire to their lodgings, and will present themselves the following Monday at daybreak; and that they will receive said salary every two months, on condition, also, that if any one of the 10 individuals should happen not to be of good character required, they will be withdrawn with less wages for the days they have had hire in proportion to that assigned to men of labor, and will be supplied by men capable of performing the labors of the contract, it being recommended to said justice of peace to make the best choice of workmen. The same order will be understood on the same terms by the justice of peace of Guarambaré."

Letter of President Lopez, accepting presents.

ASUNCION, November 11, 1853.

MY ESTEEMED SIR: I had the pleasure of receiving your estimable note of the 9th instant in which, pursuant to instruction, the president and directors of the navigation company present the governor of the Republic with a flag, worked in silk by the ladies of the shareholders of the company."

I have also received another letter of the same date, in which your honor offers for my acceptance a carriage, as a gift offered to my person. You will allow me to answer you on these two referred favors, accepting as I do with due appreciation in the name of the Government of the Republic the two mentioned presents, although your honor was pleased to express that the carriage was a particular offer to my person, because, appreciating as I do this declaration, I could not help remarking an inscription on a plate adhered to said carriage, Presented to His Excellency the President of the Republic," without expressing my name--a circumstance which does not allow my delicacy to accept it as made to my person, but to the governor, who, it is notorious, bears the title of the President of the Republic.

With this friendly explanation I am much obliged to your honor and to the company which you represent, and beg you will have the goodness to accept what the collector-general has orders to offer you as a small demonstration of the esteem and gratitude of this Government.

I have the pleasure of renewing to your honor the security of my sincere and friendly regards.

Your most obedient,

Mr. EDWARD A. HOPKINS.

Consul of the United States.

CARLO ANTONIO LOPEZ.

Encouraged by this reception, and yet more by our knowledge of the products of the country, consisting among other things of valuable woods, of which twenty varieties were sent us, of a large collection of gums and resins, including india rubber, many of which were analyzed by Dr. A. J. Hayes, a copy of which analy sis was presented with the original memorial to the Department of State, and which furnished every encouragement to prosecute the enterprise with renewed zeal and, still further, by the great profit of some 400 per cent realized upon the manufactured tobacco of Paraguay, the company equipped a second expedition, which sailed in June, 1854, destined directly for Paraguay.

While the company were thus engaged at home their agents had purchased a large building in Asuncion for a cigar factory, and had instructed for many months more than 100 operatives in that business; they had selected and purchased a mill site at San Antonio, 4 leagues from the capital, where their steam engine and sawmills were already in most profitable employ, and were engaged in setting up their other machinery, and had organized a system of trade with the people in the natural products of the country.

San Antonio is situated 12 miles south of the city of Asuncion, in one of the most densely populated districts of Paraguay.

Vessels of 2 feet greater draft of water can be taken alongside of the shore than can ever go to Asuncion all the year round on account of the intervening bar of Lambaré. During our possession of it its business greatly increased, and 11 vessels were there at one time loading fruits, vegetables, etc., of the country for exportation to the lower provinces. The advantage of the locality is seen at once when we remember that it is exactly opposite the southern mouth of the Pilcomayo River, which comes down from the silver mines of Potosi in Bolivia, and in full sight of inexhaustible forests in the Chaco of the finest timber in the world to be had for the cutting, and situated upon the immediate banks of the Pilcomayo which would float it to the door of our mills. The sawmill was upon the immediate bank of the river Paraguay, which presented there a natural wharf of stone sufficient for vessels drawing 15 feet of water. On the north side of the mill the Paraguay River received the permanent stream of San Antonio, the only one furnishing any water power within 1,500 miles of navigation from the ocean on either bank of the rivers Parana and Paraguay, which rivers, as d'Azara has long since published, offer no mill sites, nor sufficient declinations of stream or altitude of banks to permit the construction of dams. The sawmill in operation at San Antonio, running ten hours in the day, cut over 700 feet of timber. (See depositions of Ferguson and Boyd.) The price currents of Buenos Ayres show that the price of lumber in that market varies from 50 to 62 cents per running vara of 34 inches. The company had sent out in the second expedition eight additional saws, knowing that Buenos Ayres is one of the largest lumber markets in the world, and the supply of timber in the forests adjacent to San Antonio was inexhaustible, and that there was no other sawmill south of the equator east of the Andes and no mill site for 1,500 miles on these rivers but our own. These saws alone would bring us $275,000 per annum. In reference to the cigar factory, the refuse or badly made cigars from the apprentices' hands, were sold at the door of the factory for $10 per thousand. (See company books.) Cigars sold in Providence at $20 and $30 per thousand (see books of the agents in Providence). cost $2.50 to $3 per thousand. (See books of the company.) Hence the net profits were 400 to 500 per cent. At the time of stoppage we were inaking 250,000 per month and should have been making long ere this, if unmolested, at least 1,000,000 per month. For 115 operatives (the number at work when closed), when another six months or a year had made them skillful, would make 300 per day each, or in twenty-six days, 7,800 per month, which, multiplied by 115 equals 897,000, for which estimate we refer with entire confidence to our own apprentice books now under seal and also to any cigar makers in the United States or Cuba. We had, as proved by our books, 140 people in our employ at the time in which Lopez shut up our factories, who were gaining from $3 to $10 per month-fabulous prices to be gained by Paraguayans and never equaled before or since. What, then, would have been our gains if we had been allowed to place in operation our sugar mills, flour mill, brick machine, planing mill, cotton gins, rice mills, etc., only awaiting their turns to be put up?

The price of common brown sugar was 25 cents per pound-cost of manufacture to us, 2 cents; of bricks, $24 per thousand-to us. $3; of lumber, the running vara of 34 inches, 50 to 624 cents-to us the manufacture, 10 cents; and all other things of first necessity in equal ratio. We should have had to-day in our employ 1,500 persons enriching and civilizing the country.

The second expedition took out some 22 additional artisans, among them machinists and engineers, sawmill men, coopers and packers, carpenters, joiners, and steamboat men for two steamers, all with their implements of industryworthless in a country like Buenos Ayres, devoid of streains and trees. By the cooper establishment alone we expected to make many thousands of dollars per annum in saving the enormous quantity of hides wasted in Paraguay by packing in them the exports of the country, such as yerba, tobacco, sugar, molasses (far better preserved in wood), as well as in supplying the lower provinces and the cities of Buenos Ayres and Montevideo with pipes and barrels now and always worth enormous prices.

On all this machinery, by the organic law of the country, we were, and still are, entitled to from five to ten years' patent right. (See decree of May, 1845.)

Imagine such an interest in the lumber trade of the whole valley of the Parana and La Plata, to say nothing of any other branch of industry! These are the thoughts and inducements which caused us to place our capital in that distant country. We have no hesitation in saying that, to the best of our belief, the full amount of indemnity claimed by us is far below what our attention, energies, and capital would have most surely given to us. California and Australia have done much more than we claim here for men who never meddled with the mines, whereas Paraguay and adjoining countries are Californias in wealth, with as much or more to offer to the enterprising man under any government save that of Lopez. (See affidavit of Hale.)

In verification of these statements we refer to the affidavit of W. E. Hines, general. cashier of the company in Paraguay, hereunto annexed.

The Government of Paraguay has never denied, but makes a boast of these facts. We give an instance of its decrees for our benefit and also the letter accepting and returning presents.

"The justice of peace of Ipiané will select from the natives of the suppressed community 10 men, bachelors or married, of good conduct and assiduous in labor. and will deliver them to the citizen of the United States, Mr. Edward Augustus Hopkins, to be destined to work for him during one year in his establishment at San Antonio, with the monthly wages of $3, which he offers to pay, and providing victuals, upon the condition that every Saturday, after concluding the labors of the day, they can retire to their lodgings, and will present themselves the following Monday at daybreak; and that they will receive said salary every two months, on condition, also, that if any one of the 10 individuals should happen not to be of good character required, they will be withdrawn with less wages for the days they have had hire in proportion to that assigned to men of labor, and will be supplied by men capable of performing the labors of the contract, it being recommended to said justice of peace to make the best choice of workmen. The same order will be understood on the same terms by the justice of peace of Guarambaré."

Letter of President Lopez, accepting presents.

ASUNCION, November 11, 1853.

MY ESTEEMED SIR: I had the pleasure of receiving your estimable note of the 9th instant in which, pursuant to instruction, the president and directors of the navigation company present the governor of the Republic with a flag, worked in silk by the ladies of the shareholders of the company."

I have also received another letter of the same date, in which your honor offers for my acceptance a carriage, as a gift offered to my person. You will allow me to answer you on these two referred favors, accepting as I do with due appreciation in the name of the Government of the Republic the two mentioned presents, although your honor was pleased to express that the carriage was a particular offer to my person, because, appreciating as I do this declaration, I could not help remarking an inscription on a plate adhered to said carriage, “Presented to His Excellency the President of the Republic," without expressing my name-a circumstance which does not allow my delicacy to accept it as made to my person, but to the governor, who, it is notorious, bears the title of the President of the Republic.

With this friendly explanation I am much obliged to your honor and to the company which you represent, and beg you will have the goodness to accept what the collector-general has orders to offer you as a small demonstration of the esteem and gratitude of this Government.

I have the pleasure of renewing to your honor the security of my sincere and friendly regards.

Your most obedient,

Mr. EDWARD A. HOPKINS.

Consul of the United States.

CARLO ANTONIO LOPEZ.

Encouraged by this reception, and yet more by our knowledge of the products of the country, consisting among other things of valuable woods, of which twenty varieties were sent us, of a large collection of gums and resins, including india rubber, many of which were analyzed by Dr. A. J. Hayes, a copy of which analysis was presented with the original memorial to the Department of State, and which furnished every encouragement to prosecute the enterprise with renewed zeal and, still further, by the great profit of some 400 per cent realized upon the manufactured tobacco of Paraguay, the company equipped a second expedition, which sailed in June, 1854, destined directly for Paraguay.

While the company were thus engaged at home their agents had purchased a large building in Asuncion for a cigar factory, and had instructed for many months more than 100 operatives in that business; they had selected and purchased a mill site at San Antonio, 4 leagues from the capital, where their steam engine and sawmills were already in most profitable employ, and were engaged in setting up their other machinery, and had organized a system of trade with the people in the natural products of the country.

San Antonio is situated 12 miles south of the city of Asuncion, in one of the most densely populated districts of Paraguay.

Vessels of 2 feet greater draft of water can be taken alongside of the shore than can ever go to Asuncion all the year round on account of the intervening bar of Lambare. During our possession of it its business greatly increased. and 11 vessels were there at one time loading fruits, vegetables, etc., of the country for exportation to the lower provinces. The advantage of the locality is seen at once when we remember that it is exactly opposite the southern mouth of the Pilcomayo River, which comes down from the silver mines of Potosi in Bolivia, and in full sight of inexhaustible forests in the Chaco of the finest timber in the world to be had for the cutting, and situated upon the immediate banks of the Pilcomayo which would float it to the door of our mills. The sawmill was upon the immediate bank of the river Paraguay, which presented there a natural wharf of stone sufficient for vessels drawing 15 feet of water. On the north side of the mill the Paraguay River received the permanent stream of San Antonio. the only one furnishing any water power within 1,500 miles of navigation from the ocean on either bank of the rivers Parana and Paraguay, which rivers, as d'Azara has long since published, offer no mill sites, nor sufficient declinations of stream or altitude of banks to permit the construction of dams. The sawmill in operation at San Antonio, running ten hours in the day, cut over 700 feet of timber. (See depositions of Ferguson and Boyd.) The price currents of Buenos Ayres show that the price of lumber in that market varies from 50 to 62 cents per running vara of 34 inches. The company had sent out in the second expedition eight additional saws, knowing that Buenos Ayres is one of the largest lumber markets in the world, and the supply of timber in the forests adjacent to San Antonio was inexhaustible, and that there was no other sawmill south of the equator east of the Andes and no mill site for 1,500 miles on these rivers but our own. These saws alone would bring us $275,000 per annum. In reference to the cigar factory, the refuse or badly made cigars from the apprentices' hands, were sold at the door of the factory for $10 per thousand. (See company books.) Cigars sold in Providence at $20 and $30 per thousand (see books of the agents in Providence). cost $2.50 to $3 per thousand. (See books of the company.) Hence the net profits were 400 to 500 per cent. At the time of stoppage we were inaking 250,000 per month and should have been making long ere this, if unmolested, at least 1.000,000 per month. For 115 operatives (the number at work when closed), when another six months or a year had made them skillful, would make 300 per day each, or in twenty-six days, 7,800 per month, which, multiplied by 115 equals 897.000, for which estimate we refer with entire confidence to our own apprentice books now under seal and also to any cigar makers in the United States or Cuba. We had, as proved by our books, 140 people in our employ at the time in which Lopez shut up our factories, who were gaining from $3 to $10 per month-fabulous prices to be gained by Paraguayans and never equaled before or since. What, then, would have been our gains if we had been allowed to place in operation our sugar mills, flour mill, brick machine, planing mill, cotton gins, rice mills, etc., only awaiting their turns to be put up?

The price of common brown sugar was 25 cents per pound-cost of manufacture to us, 2 cents; of bricks, $24 per thousand-to us. $3; of lumber, the running vara of 34 inches, 50 to 624 cents-to us the manufacture, 10 cents; and all other things of first necessity in equal ratio. We should have had to-day in our employ 1,500 persons enriching and civilizing the country.

The second expedition took out some 22 additional artisans, among them machinists and engineers, sawmill men, coopers and packers, carpenters, joiners, and steamboat men for two steamers, all with their implements of industryworthless in a country like Buenos Ayres, devoid of streams and trees. By the cooper establishment alone we expected to make many thousands of dollars per annum in saving the enormous quantity of hides wasted in Paraguay by packing in them the exports of the country, such as yerba, tobacco, sugar, molasses (far better preserved in wood), as well as in supplying the lower provinces and the cities of Buenos Ayres and Montevideo with pipes and barrels now and always worth enormous prices.

On all this machinery, by the organic law of the country, we were, and still are, entitled to from five to ten years' patent right. (See decree of May, 1845.)

Imagine such an interest in the lumber trade of the whole valley of the Parana and La Plata, to say nothing of any other branch of industry! These are the thoughts and inducements which caused us to place our capital in that distant country. We have no hesitation in saying that, to the best of our belief, the full amount of indemnity claimed by us is far below what our attention, energies, and capital would have most surely given to us. California and Australia have done much more than we claim here for men who never meddled with the mines, whereas Paraguay and adjoining countries are Californias in wealth, with as much or more to offer to the enterprising man under any government save that of Lopez. (See affidavit of Hale.)