4.  When war comes it is necessary to shut some of the avenues of commerce, otherwise the belligerent rights could not be protected.

5.  That the neutral ought not to have through and by means of the war, which is not his affair, that he has not in time of peace; and by natural justice he is only entitled to his accustomed trade.  That any inconveniences he may suffer are quite balanced by the enlargement of his commerce; the trade of the belligerents is usually interrupted to a great degree, and falls into the lap of the neutral.[205]

6.  That it is a direct assistance to the enemy, and an injury to the belligerent interests of the other country, to carry on for the enemy the commerce that she has lost by the pressure of the war,—­rendering the efforts of the successful power nugatory.

NOTE D.—­Articles that have been declared Contraband at various times.

Gunpowder, arms, military equipments, and other things peculiarly adapted to military purposes.

Sail cloths, masts, anchors, pitch, tar, and hemp, universally contraband, even when destined to ports not of military equipment.

Cheeses, fit for naval use; such as Dutch cheeses, when exclusively used in French ships of war.

Rosin, tallow, and ship biscuits, if destined to ports of military or naval equipment.

Similarly, of Wines.

And ship timber, when so destined.

Ships of war, or ships adapted for such service, going to a port of the enemy for sale.

Copper in sheets, certified by government dockyard officers as fit for the sheathing of ships.

Brimstone, destined to a port of warlike equipment.

NOTE E.—­The Late Declarations.

The first manifesto or declaration of war issued by the Queen, so far follows the ancient form, that it gives a justification of the war, but differs from it in the omission of a general command to all her subjects to commit hostilities on the enemy.  By this command (in the ancient form), the subjects were in general ordered, not only to break off all intercourse with the enemy, but also to attack him.  Custom interpreted this general order.  It authorized, and even obliged every subject, of whatever rank, to secure the person and things belonging to the enemy when they fell into his hands; but it did not invite the subjects to undertake any offensive expedition without a commission or particular order.  The present manifesto simply proclaims that the Queen of England has taken up arms against Russia, that is, has declared “a state of war.”  The omission of an injunction to break off intercourse, and to exercise hostility, does not relieve the subject from his duty in that respect; for war may commence without any manifesto, and any official recognition of the “state of war” casts upon the subject his full duties under that condition of things.  The ancient form has been judiciously allowed to drop, leading, as it might have done, to misconception on the part of her majesty’s lieges.