In the final arrangement Great Britain admitted that the American goods had not been liable to seizure except as a result of the libel attaching to the ships.  But any claims for damages due to the owners of the cargoes on account of the failure of the vessels to deliver at the port mentioned in the freight contract, it was asserted, should be made against those who entered into or became responsible for the execution of the contract for the delivery which they failed to perform, and the assumption that such damages could be sustained at law would depend on the terms of the contract of carriage.  The English Government, however, did not admit that it was in any way liable for damages to the owners of the flour and other goods, since their detention was due entirely to the circumstance that the ships were not able to complete their voyages, and the fact that they could not complete their voyages was due to the circumstance that such voyages were illegal by the law of the flag under which they were sailing.[57]

[Footnote 57:  For.  Rel., 1900, pp. 604-605; Salisbury to Choate, March 3, 1900.]

Although the financial settlement which Great Britain was willing to make was accepted by the United States, this acceptance did not imply an acquiescence in the view expressed by the English Government with reference to the conditions under which flour and other foodstuffs might become contraband of war, nor in the doctrine of continuous voyages as applied by Great Britain to trading with the enemy.  It was preferred at Washington to follow the usual rule and avoid passing upon hypothetical cases until occasion had called them into actual existence.  The problem which had been before the Department of State was, not to force Great Britain to declare herself finally upon broad questions of international law, nor to express the final attitude of the United States upon questions which were not immediately at issue, but to meet the demands of American shippers and secure their immediate interests by some equitable agreement with Great Britain.  The arrangement agreed upon, therefore, met only the necessity of the case immediately in view.  The United States Consul-General at Cape Town was to arrange with Sir Alfred Milner, the British High Commissioner in South Africa, for the release or purchase by the British Government of any goods owned by citizens of the United States, which, if purchased, were to be paid for at the price they would have brought at the port of destination at the time they would have arrived there had the voyage not been interrupted.

Against certain articles, especially the oil consigned to the Netherlands South African Railway, an allegation of enemy’s property was justly made and the oil confiscated.