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respect to a contiguous island which could be fairly deemed
of military importance to it.”

1 Moore, 265, however, cites the Navasa Island dispute
between the United States and Hayti, the Aves Island case
between the United States and Venezuela, and the Lobos Island
case between the United states and Peru. The digest makes
no comment. All the cases, however, contain the argument
of the United States that the principle of contiguity does
not apply, even when, as in the Lobos Island case, the island
was but six miles from the mainland.

Before turning to the instances of dispute over
territories between two powers, the three following quot-
ations are given, the first as showing the difficulty of
deciding as to the force of rights gained through discovery
and occupation; the last two as showing methods by which
it has been sought to obviate the difficulty.

In U.S. Foreign Relations, 1896, at page 230 , a
letter from Lord Salisbury to Sir Julian Pauncefote, dated
May 18, 1896, in discussing the question of arbitration of
territorial rights, says: "Whatever the primary origin
of his rights, the national owner, like the individual owner,
relies usually on effective control by himself or through
his predecessor in title for a sufficient length of time.
But in the case of a nation, what is a sufficient length of
time, and in what does effective control consist? In the
case of a private individual, the interval adequate to make
a valid title is defined by positive law. There is no en-
actment or usage or accepted doctrine which lays down the
length of time required for international prescription;
and no full definition of the degree of control which will
confer territorial property on a nation has been attempted.
It certainly does not depend solely on occupation or the
exercise of any clearly defined acts. All the great nations
in both hemispheres claim, and are prepared to defend, their
right to vast tracts of territory which they have in no
sense occupied, and often have not fully explored. The mod-
ern doctrine of ’’Hinterland,” with its inevitable contra-
dictions , indicates the unformed and unstable condition of
international law as applied to territorial claims resting