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country, to obtain the restitution of the vessel and cargo. T h a t claim, however, was fruitless ; and the vessel and cargo were both condemned— for no other reason, your memorialist verily believes, than that the schooner was fast-sailing, and in every other respect adapted for a cruiser. T h i s consideration was frequently urged upon, and such a motive was also expressed by the court, and, after condemnation, the schooner was not sold, but was ; within two days thereafter, equipped as a national armed vessel of the republic of Hayti, and despatched on a cruise. T r u e it is, that they w e r e ostensibly condemned for an imputed infraction of the procla mation of the President of Hayti prohibiting the visits to that republic of vessels sailing from another island in the West Indies ; but that pro clamation could have been intended to apply to voluntary and not to in voluntary voyages, and must have been designed to affect the wanton and not the unfortunate. T h e duty of extending protection to the unfortunate, as it is enjoined by humanity, has also been consecrated by the decisions of the tribunals and enforced by the practice of all civilized governments. It was not from design, but necessity—it was from the effect of a calamity which could not be avoided, and against which your memorialist despe rately struggled, and for the purpose of obtaining repairs essential to the existence of the vessel and supplies necessary to the lives of those on board—that your memorialist sought hospitality and succor in Fort Liberty. T h e circumstance attending her voyage sufficiently evince and fully establish this. H e r cargo was not adapted to the market of St. Domingo ; she first sought succor in a haven where there could be no demand nor disposal of it ; and the reduced and inadequate state of the provisions, and the perilous condition of the vessel, make it as unreasonable as it was foreign from truth that they would thus seek the sale of their cargo at the hazard of the safety of the vessel and of their own lives. Your memorialists, however, furthermore solemnly disavows such in tention ; he protests against any view to gain or the purposes of con v e n i e n c e in his visit, and as sincerely avers that the single object for which he put into a port of the island of St. Domingo was to seek a re fuge and beseech hospitality, to refit his shattered vessel, and to procure succor and necessary refreshments for the suffering crew and passengers of his vessel. For this wanton, and your memorialist believes mercenary, outrage on the laws of humanity, the principles that pervade all law, the customs of all civilized nations, and the observances he had hitherto trusted even of the barbarous, your memorialist can have no redress except through the interposition of his own Government. H e solicits her protection, and appeals with confidence to her justice for aid and succor, with the entire conviction that nothing is wanting to obtain the restoration of the rights of an American citizen, thus violated, and to heal the honor of his country, thus wounded and insulted, but a demand properly enforced. N o r is the loss which your memorialist has sustained by this act of ra pine small in amount, at least as regards himself, or unworthy the notice of his Government ; the vessel which was thus unjustifiably wrested from him being worth, at a reasonable valuation, not less than the sum of four