Sidney Locock to Don A. Zuringa, December 31, 1875

Sir: In consequence of instructions I have received from Her Majesty’s secretary of state for foreign affairs, I have the honor to inform you that Mr. Alexander Gollan, who holds the office of Her Majesty’s consul at Grey Town, has been formally appointed agent for the chief of the Mosquito territory, to receive on his behalf the arrears due to him by the government of Honduras under the treaty of Comayagua, and has been authorized by Her Majesty’s government to undertake the agency.

It is not my intention at the present moment to renew, through your excellency, to the governor of Honduras applications which have hitherto not only proved useless, but which have on the most recent occasions met with a disregard from which Her Majesty’s government had a right to expect that courtesy alone would have protected them.

It should, however, be borne in mind that the payments to the Mosquito chief were promised by the Honduras government, in formal treaty engagement, as one of the conditions on which Great Britain relinquished her protectorate over the Mosquito territory. It is the unquestionable right of Her Majesty’s government to see that those treaty stipulations are not so lightly disregarded by the government of Honduras as they hitherto have been; and although it is not the intention of Her Majesty’s government at this moment to take any action in the matter, the time may come when they may feel themselves compelled, however reluctantly, to interfere, in order to obtain the fulfillment of those treaty engagements which Honduras contracted toward them.

I avail, &c.,