of a Legislative Assembly, of which he shall direct the proceedings, in order to draw up a New Constitutional Charter for the States, which His Majesty the King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland shall be requested to ratify.

Until such Constitutional Charter shall have been so drawn up, and duly ratified, the existing Constitutions shall remain in force in the different Islands, and no alteration shall be made in them, except by His Britannick Majesty in Council.

Art. 5. In order to ensure, without restriction, to the inhabitants of the United States of the Ionian Islands, the advantages resulting from the high protection under which these States are placed, as well as for the exercise of the rights inherent in the said protection, His Britannick Majesty shall have the right to occupy the fortresses and places of those States, and to maintain garrisons in the same. The military force of the said United States shall also be under the orders of the Commander in Chief of the troops of His Britannick Majesty.

Art. 6. His Britannick Majesty consents, that a particular Convention with the Government of the said United States shall regulate, according to the revenues of these States, every thing which may relate to the maintenance of the fortresses already existing, as well as to the subsistence and payment of the British garrisons, and to the number of men of which they shall be composed in time of peace.

The same Convention shall likewise fix the relations which are to exist between the said armed force and the Ionian Gevernment.

Art. 7. The trading flag of the United States of the Ionian Islands shall be acknowledged by all the Contracting Parties as the Flag of a free and independent State. It shall carry with the colours and above the armorial bearings thereon displayed before the year 1807, such other as His Britannick Majesty may think proper to grant, as a mark of the protection under which the said Ionian States are placed ; and for the more effectual furtherance of this protection, all the ports and harbours of the said States are hereby declared to be, with respect to honorary and military rights, within British jurisdiction. The commerce between the United Ionian States and the dominions of His Imperial and Royal Apostolick Majesty shall enjoy the same advantages and facilities as that of Great Britain with the said United States. None but commercial agents, or Consuls, charged solely with the carrying on commercial relations, and subject to the regulations to which commercial agents or consuls are subject in other Independent States, shall be accredited to the United States of the Ionian Islands.

Art. 8. All the Powers which signed the Treaty of Paris of the 30th of May 1814, and the Act of the Congress of Vienna of the 9th of June 1815; and also His Majesty the King of the Two Sicilies, and the Ottoman Porte, shall be invited to accede to the present Convention.

Art. 9. The present Act shall be ratified, and the ratifications shall be exchanged in two months, or sooner, if possible.

In witness whereof, the respective Plenipotentiaries have signed it, and have affixed thereunto the seals of their arms.

Done at Paris the fifth day of November in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and fifteen.

(Signed)

(L. S.) CASTLEREAGH.

(L.S.) WELLINGTON.

(L. S.) Le Prince de HARDENBERG. (L. S.) Le Baron de HUMBOLDT.

NOTE. Similar Treaties were signed on the same day by the Plenipotentiaries of His Majesty, with those of the Emperor of Austria, and the Emperor of Russia, respectively.

No. 15.

ΝΟΤΕ

Delivered in by Viscount Castlereagh_to_the Allied Ministers, and placed upon their Protocol.-Paris, September 11th, 1815.

REPRESENTATIONS having been laid before the Ministers of the Allied Powers from the Pope, the Grand Duke of Tuscany, the King of the Netherlands, and other Sovereigns, claiming, through the intervention of the High Allied Powers, the restoration of the Statues, Pictures, and other Works of Art, of which their respective States have been successively and systematically stripped by the late Revolutionary Government of France, contrary to every principle of justice, and to the usages of modern warfare, and the same having been referred for the consideration of his Court, the undersigned has received the commands of the Prince Regent to submit, for the consideration of His Allies, the following remarks upon this interesting subject:

It is now the second time, that the Powers of Europe have been compelled, in vindication of their own liberties, and for the settlement of the world, to invade France, and twice their armies have possessed themselves of the Capital of the State, in which these, the spoils of the greater part of Europe, are accumulated.

The legitimate Sovereign of France has, as often, under the protection of those armies, been enabled to resume His Throne, and to mediate for His people a peace with the Allies, to the marked indulgencies of which neither their conduct to their own Monarch, nor towards other States, had given them just pretensions to aspire.

That the purest sentiments of regard for Lewis XVIII, deference for His ancient and illustrious House, and respect for His misfortunes, have guided invariably the Allied Councils, has been proved beyond a question by their having, last year, framed the Treaty of Paris expressly on the basis of preserving to France its complete integrity, and still more, after their late disappointment, by the endeavours they are again making, ultimately to combine the substantial integrity of France, with such an adequate system of temporary precaution as may satisfy what they owe to the security of Their own subjects.

But it would be the height of weakness, as well as of injustice, and in its effects much more likely to mislead than to bring back the people of France to moral and peaceful habits, if the Allied Sovereigns, to whom the world is anxiously looking up for protection and repose, were to deny that principle of integrity in its just and liberal application to other nations, their Allies (more especially to the feeble and to the helpless), which They are about, for the second time, to concede to a nation against whom they have had occasion so long to contend in war.

Upon what principle can France, at the close of such a war, expect to sit down with the same