*No. 38. [44]
Mr. McLane to Mr. Buchanan.
Sir: * * * * * *
I sought and obtained an interview with Lord Aberdeen on the 25th February. * * *Mr. McLane reports that Great Britain will assent to no better partition than the line of 49° and Fuca’s Straits.
I have little or no expectation that this government will offer or assent to a better partition than the extension of a line on the forty-ninth parallel to the Straits of Fuca, and thence down the middle of the strait to the Pacific; and if the line of the forty-ninth parallel should intersect the Columbia, according to Mr. Gallatin’s proposition, at a point from which it is navigable to the ocean, with the free navigation of that river, at least for such a period as may be necessary for the trade of the Hudson’s Bay Company, they will also, I am quite sure, expect some arrangements for the protection of the present agricultural settlements of British subjects south of the forty-ninth degree of latitude, and north of the Columbia. If the Columbia River be not navigable from the point at which it would be intersected by the extension of a line along the forty-ninth parallel, I believe it quite certain that the navigation of the river would not be insisted on.
* * * * * *
I must, however, repeat the opinion that, whatever may be the result of any present expectation, and according to any view it may take of the question, this government will not be likely to propose or assent to a basis of partition different from that I have already stated in the foregoing part of this dispatch. If there be a disposition on the part of our Government to treat upon that basis, I have great confidence that the negotiation would result in an amicable settlement of the question.
* * * * * * *
Hon. James Buchanan, Secretary of State.