Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Ill THE SILESIAN LOAN, 1752-3 The history of the Silesian Loan, of its guarantee by Frederick the Great, of his refusal to pay the final instalment in order to recoup his subjects for losses sustained by them on account of the seizure of some Prussian neutral ships by English privateers during the war with France (1744-1748), together with the full text of the documents and despatches, will be found in Sir Ernest Satow's monograph, " The Silesian Loan and Frederick the Great."1 The documents are (1) The "Exposition des Motifs," prepared by Frederick's lawyers ; (2) the Report of George II of the English Law Officers, commonly known as the " Reponse sans Replique"; (3) A Memorandum prepared by the French Government. The English Law Officers were Sir George Lee, Dean of Arches; Dr. G. Paul, Ad vocate- General ; Sir Dudley Ryder, Attorney- General; and Mr. William Murray, afterwards Lord Mansfield, Solicitor-General. The Prussian Exposition is of great importance, because it was the first public challenge to established practice, and claimed that free ships as of right make free goods. It recognised the fact that, up to that time, the maxim was only to be found in treaties ; but it deduced from this fact its general acceptance by the nations as a principle of the Law of Nations. The chain of reasoning was this. Belligerent rights as asrainst neutrals are limited to search for and seizure of contraband and seizure for breach of blockade. This established, it followed that enemy property could not be seized on board neutral ships, and therefore that free ships must make free goods.. 1 Oxford, 1915. Of the ships seized some had been simply returned; but (1) some were restored by the Prize Court with freight and the enemy goods on board only condemned; and (2) some were re...