assembled in accordance with Articles IX.-XIV. of The Hague Convention of July 29 (17), 1899, for the pacific settlement of International conflicts, the care of elucidating by an impartial and conscientious examination the questions of fact relating to the incident which took place during the night of October 21-22 (8-9), 1904, in the North Sea-in the course of which the firing of cannon of the Russian Fleet occasioned the loss of a boat and the death of two persons belonging to a flotilla of British fishermen, and also damages to other boats of the said flotilla, and wounds to the crew of some of these boats.-The undersigned, duly authorised to this effect, are agreed upon the following provisions :

Art. I.-The International Commission of Inquiry shall be composed of five members (Commissioners), two of whom shall be officers of high rank in the British and Imperial Russian Navies respectively. The French and United States Governments shall each be requested to choose one of their naval officers of high rank to be a member of the Commission. The fifth member shall be elected by the four above-mentioned members. In case the four Commissioners should not agree as to the choice of a fifth member of the Commission, His Majesty the Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, shall be invited to make the appointment.1 Each of the two High Contracting Powers shall also appoint a jurist as assessor with voix consultative and an Agent officially charged to take part in the work of the Commission.

3

1 This provision emanated from Lord Lansdowne (Nov. 11, 1904).

2 "Voix consultative" means without voting power. The legal Assessors were a sugges tion of Lord Lansdowne's, formulated as follows:-" Each of the High Contracting Parties shall appoint a legal Assessor, who shall sit with the Commissioners and assist them in their deliberations. The legal Assessor shall have no vote in determining the findings of the Commission."-(For. Office, Nov. 5, 1904.)

3 Lord Lansdowne explained as regards the Agents, that they would not perform duties of any very special character, merely acting as intermediaries between the Commission and the Governments concerned, and that the British Government would be quite content for them to be selected from among the members of the Russian and British Embassies in Paris.

This is an extension of the character of Commissions of Inquiry, as defined in Art. 14 of the Hague Convention. Thus the Commission in question had, to some extent, the character of a Court of Arbitration. See pp. 13, 14.

5 The object of this phrase is not apparent. The sense of the article seems perfectly clear without it.

In accordance with Art. I., Admirals were appointed by the British, Russian, United States, and French Governments.

A. Composition of the General Secretariat.

The President of the Commission shall be assisted by a General Secretary, invested with the following functions:

To see that shorthand reports of the meetings are taken; To superintend the execution of all necessary translations; To collect and file all documents handed to the Commission; To enter into relations with the Embassies, in all matters of interest to the Commission;

To communicate to the newspapers reports drawn up in manner indicated in Art. 9 of title B; and,

Generally to insure under the direction of the President all the auxiliary working departments of the Commission.

A person authorised by each of the Embassies of the High Contracting Parties, if possible, shall give his assistance to the General Secretary.

? The decisions on the points, upon which the representatives of the Parties intervened were as follows:(a) Decided that the witnesses may at their option

1. Take an oath ;

2. Make a declaration on their honour; or

3. Make a solemn declaration.

(Decided by the majority.)

(6) Agreed that written depositions of witnesses, whose presence cannot be obtained within a short time, be accepted à titre de documents.

(c) Decided that every witness shall, before being heard, declare his name, age, nationality, residence, and profession, and whether he is in the service of either of the Parties.

(d) Agreed that a witness, who may have declined or be unable to appear, may depose before the competent authorities of his place of residence on any question addressed to him by the Commission.

(e) Decided that, whereas Assessors and Agents may examine witnesses in all freedom, Counsel of the Parties shall not put questions to witnesses direct without having made known the terms of such questions to the President.

Agreed that the shorthand writer's report of every deposition be accepted as the official report.

(g) Agreed that no witness shall be heard more than once on the same facts, unless by consent of the Commission, or in order to be confronted with another witness whose deposition is in contradiction with his.

(h) Decided that witnesses shall give their evidence without interruption (d'un seul trait), and without the assistance of documents, unless the employment thereof be justified by the nature of the facts in question.

All the above decisions were adopted at the sitting of January 11, 1905.

3 The following text is an unofficial translation.

B. Meetings of the Commission.

1. The sittings of the Commission shall be public or not public, according to their object.

2. The sittings shall be public (1) when the statements of facts are made by the Agents of the Contracting Parties and the examination of the witnesses takes place; (2) when the Agents make known their conclusions; (3) and when at the last sitting the Commission delivers the result of its deliberations.

3. No other sittings of the Commission entailing deliberations shall be public.

4. The following will be allowed to attend the private sittings of the Commission: Assessors of the Commissioners; the Agents appointed by the Powers who have signed the Declaration and their Counsel; Persons authorised or convened by the Commission; Members of the General Secretary's staff; Assistants and Secretaries of the Commissioners.

5. The Commissioners and all the persons mentioned in Art. 4 shall, when the Commission is sitting, occupy the places indicated in the plan annexed hereto.1

6. The Publicity of the sittings shall be regulated as follows: An equal number of places will be reserved for the Press of each of the Commissioners' countries. A number at least equivalent to that above mentioned will be reserved for the whole Press of other countries. A certain number of entrance tickets will, through the secretariat, be placed at the disposal of each of the Commissioners for each public sitting.

7. The General Secretary's staff will attend to shorthand reports of the sittings being taken. They will only be filed with. the documents of the Commission after having been read over and approved by each of the persons who shall have spoken, except evidence of witnesses, which will be filed with the Commission's documents in manner specified in Art. 7 of title E.

8. After each sitting, the President, assisted by the staff of the General Secretary, will draw up a minute stating briefly the work done. If necessary, this minute shall be read and corrected at the beginning of the next sitting. It shall be signed by the President, the two Agents, and by the General Secretary, and set up in ten copies, one of which will be filed with the Commission's documents, and the others handed to each of the Commissioners, Assistants, and Agents.

9. Lastly, a short report of the public sittings for the use of the Press shall be drawn up in accordance with the instructions given by the President of the Commission with the approval of the Commissioners.

10. The Official language of the Commission is French. However, the witnesses will be allowed to give their evidence in their own language. Every document handed to the Commission drawn up in any language but French, shall be accompanied by a French translation.

1 A plan of the distribution of the space of the Hall was appended to the Rules.

C.-Sittings of the Commission in the Council Chamber. 1. During the sittings, the Commissioners will retire into their Council Chamber as often as they deem fit.

2. In principle, no persons other than the Assessors shall be allowed to be present at the Commissioners' deliberations, when held in the Council Chamber. Nevertheless, the Commissioners may call in, incidentally, any person entitled to attend the