Great Britain, and on the 5th day of November, 1848, while
at Washington on his way to London, addressed a letter to the Secretary
of State, a translation of which is herewith submitted, asking this
Government to instruct its minister plenipotentiary residing in London
to sustain the right of Nicaragua to her territory claimed by Mosquito,
and especially to the port of San Juan, expressing the hope of Nicaragua
"that the Government of the Union, firmly adhering to its principle of
resisting all foreign intervention in America, would not hesitate to
order such steps to be taken as might be effective before things reached
a point in which the intervention of the United States would prove of no
avail."

To this letter also no answer appears to have been returned, and no
instructions were given to our minister in London in pursuance of the
request contained in it.

On the 3d day of March, 1847, Christopher Hempstead was appointed consul
at Belize, and an application was then made for his exequatur through
our minister in London, Mr. Bancroft. Lord Palmerston referred Mr.
Bancroft's application for an exequatur for Mr. Hempstead to the
colonial office. The exequatur was granted, and Mr. Hempstead, in a
letter to the Department of State bearing date the 12th day of February,
1848, a copy of which is herewith submitted, acknowledged the receipt of
his exequatur from Her Britannic Majesty, by virtue of which he has
discharged his consular functions. Thus far this Government has
recognized the existence of a British colony at Belize, within the
territory of Honduras. I have recalled the consul, and have appointed no
one to supply his place.

On the 26th day of May, 1848, Mr. Hempstead represented in a letter to
the Department of State that the Indians had "applied to Her Majesty's
superintendent at Belize for protection, and had desired him to take
possession of the territory which they occupied and take them under his
protection as British subjects;" and he added that in the event of the
success of their application "the British Government would then have
possession of the entire coast from Cape Conte to San Juan de
Nicaragua." In another letter, dated the 29th day of July, 1848, he
wrote:

I have not a doubt but the designs of Her Majesty's officers here and
on the Mosquito shore are to obtain territory on this continent.

The receipt of this letter was regularly acknowledged on the 29th day of
August, 1848.

When