Narrative of the surveying voyages of his majesty's ships Adventure and Beagle (vol.2- Appendix): between the years 1826 and 1836 : describing their examination of the southern shores of South America, and the Beagles's circumnavigation of the globe

APPENDIX. 161 cially to the Spanish ministers, since it is only a private regulation with regard to our owti convenience ; yet, as I am inclined to think, from what passed formerly upon this subject, that they will rather be pleased at this event, your Excellency may, if they mention it to you, freely avow it, without entering into any other reasonings thereon. It must strike your Excellency that this is Ukely to dis- courage them from suspecting designs, which they must now plainly see never entered into our minds. I hope they will not suspect, or suffer themselves to be made believe, that this was done at the re- quest, or to gratify the most distant wish, of the French court ; for the truth is, that it is neither more nor less than a small part of an economical naval regulation." M. Moreno will perceive that the above authentic papers, which have been faithfully extracted from the Volumes of Correspondence with Spain, deposited in the State Paper Office, contain no allusion whatever to any secret understanding between the two Governments, at the period of the restoration of Port Egmont and its dependencies to Great Britain, in 1771, nor to the evacuation of Falkland's Islands, in 1774, as having taken place for the purpose of fulfilling any such understanding. On the contrary, it will be evident to M. Moreno, that their contents afford conclusive inference that no such secret understanding could have existed. The undersigned need scarcely assure M. Moreno, that the cor- respondence which has been referred to, does not contain the least particle of evidence in support of the contrary supposition, enter- tEiined by the Government of the United Provinces of the Rio de la Plata, nor any confirmation of the several particulars related in M. Moreno's note. The imdersigned trusts, that a perusal of these details will satisfy M. Moreno, that the protest which he has been directed to deliver to the undersigned, against the re-assumption of the sovereignty of the Falkland Islands by his Majesty, has been dravra up under an erroneous impression, as well of the understanding under which the declaration and counter-declaration relative to the restoration of Port Egmont and its dependencies were signed and exchanged between the two courts, as of the motives which led to the temporary i-ehn- quishment of those islands by the British Government; and the