Manuel Maria Gautier to To His Excellency Julio Thirion de Montauban, August 11, 1873

C.—Mr. Gautier to Mr. Montauban, August 11, 1873.

Dominican republic.—ministry of foreign relations.

Most Excellent Sir: His excellency the President of the republic, who is now absent from this capital, in the commune of San Cristóbal, has to-day received the note which your excellency was pleased to address to him on the 12th of July last, inclosing the preliminary bases of a treaty of peace between the Dominican Republic and that of Hayti.

Both documents have been very carefully examined by the government of the republic, and, in reply, I hasten to write your excellency as follows:

The good intentions and the zeal of your excellency for the welfare of this republic are very laudable, as is your desire to see it sign a treaty of peace with the neighboring state. Your excellency has doubtless thought that a written convention, the terms of which should be executed in good faith, would secure the future prosperity of this country; and it was doubtless in view of this consideration that you consented to sign the preliminaries which you have submitted to this government; but your excellency is doubtless not aware that, at the time when you were signing those preliminaries, events were occurring on our frontiers which go far to disprove the genuineness of the good intentions manifested to your excellency by the chargé d’affaires of Hayti in the republic to whose government you are accredited, and which force the Dominican government to adopt the precaution of eutering into no compromises which could not be reciprocal, in view of the well-known tendencies of the government of Hayti.

I will explain to you what has taken place.

Not long since, being induced by the respect which we entertained for the French agent residing at Port-au-Prince, Hayti, we consented to examine the preliminaries of a treaty of peace unofficially proposed by that government, and transmitted through the consulate-general of France in Hayti to the vice-consulate in Santo Domingo. The same spirit was manifest in that draft as in the preliminaries submitted to your excellency.

At the very time when those preliminaries were being read, the aggressions of a new faction had just been repelled on our northwestern frontier, and in one of the engagements General Andrieux, the second officer in command of the Haytien garrison of Juana Mendez, perished on our soil, he having been in command of the Haytien force that was supporting the movements of the Dominican rebels. His body, those of other Haytiens, a piece of artillery brought from that fort, a number of needle-guns, and a quantity of ammunition which fell into our hands, plainly show the failure of the Haytiens to observe the laws of neutrality, and the disguised hostility whereby our repose is disturbed.

In view of these facts, his excellency President Baez sent to the vice-consul of France, in reply, the written conversation of which I send you a copy.

Until circumstances change, until unmistakable evidences of cordial good faith offer us a prospect of entering into negotiations with success, the Dominican government must adhere to the answer given in the aforesaid conversation, because the disarming of the enemies of the republic, and their withdrawal from its soil, must not be the result of a treaty, but ought, of natural right, to precede the signing of such an instrument.

Deign, your excellency, to accept the assurances of my most distinguished consideration.