MR. GIBSON BOWLESI beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether, in view of the passage, in recent times, of the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles by Russian vessels of war and Russian Volunteer cruisers equipped to act as vessels of war, His Majesty's Government will propose to submit to the Hague tribunal the question whether such passages are. or are not, consistent with the terms of the treaties embodying the public law of Europe with regard to those straits.
§ MR. A. J. BALFOURThis question does touch on what I must, at all events at present, regard as forbidden ground. It does raise a controversy which I think 1064 will be better settled if the House will, for the moment at all events, content itself with what I have said.
MR. GIBSON BOWLESI quite recognise the necessity for that Answer. I think I may forbear from putting the next Question on the Paper—"To ask the First Lord of the Treasury whether the Russian volunteer cruiser "Smolensk," after taking by force from the German mail steamboat "Prinz Heinrich" thirty-one sacks of letters and twenty-four sacks and boxes of parcels said to be intended for Japan, subsequently detained by force the British steamship "Persia," and insisted on transferring to her the greater portion of the letters and parcels taken from the "Prinz Heinrich"; and, if so, what steps do His Majesty's Government intend to take in the matter"—unless my right hon. friend desires to say something on it.
§ MR. A. J. BALFOURNo; I do not.
§ GENERAL LAURIEDo I understand that the right hon. Gentleman does not desire to answer now the two latter inquiries in my Question — namely, "whether it is in conformity with international law that the same vessel can at one time fly the commercial flag and at another time assert the authority of a warship; and whether this transformation can take place on the high seas, or whether it is obligatory that a vessel holding a commission as a warship should be commissioned as such in a port of the nation to which she belongs?"
§ MR. A. J. BALFOUR; This is a Question of general law which my hon. and gallant friend asks rue, and I am not sure that anything would be gained by any attempt on my part to reply to it. I would point out to him that in this Question he has travelled a little wide of what is the somewhat narrower question of the relation between the action of the "Smolensk" and the Petersburg" and the Treaty of Paris as modified by the Treaty of London.