ART. 60.-The conditions on which the Powers which have not been represented at the International Peace Conference, may give their adhesion to the present Convention will form the object of a later agreement between the Contracting Powers.

ART. 61.-If it should happen that one of the High Contracting Parties denounce the present Convention, this denunciation would only take effect one year after the notification made by writing to the Government of the Netherlands and communicated by it immediately to all the other contracting Powers.

This denunciation will take effect only with regard to the Power which has given notification of it.

In witness hereof, the Plenipotentiaries have signed the present Convention, and have thereto affixed their seals.

Done at the Hague, the 29th July, 1899, in a single original which shall remain deposited in the Archives of the Government of the Netherlands, and copies of which, certified correct, shall be sent through diplomatic channels to the Contracting Powers.

ART. 60.-Les conditions auxquelles les Puissances, qui n'ont pas été représentées à la Conférence Internationale de la Paix, pourront adhérer à la présente Convention, formeront l'objet d'une entente ultérieure entre les Puissances Contractantes.

ART. 61.-S'il arrivait qu'une des Hautes Parties Contractantes dénonçât la présente Convention, cette dénonciation ne produirait ses effets qu'un an après la notification faite par écrit au Gouvernement des Pays-Bas et communiquée immédiatement par celui-ci à toutes les autres Puissances Contractantes.

Cette dénonciation ne produira ses effets qu'à l'égard de la Puissance qui l'aura notifiée.

En foi de quoi, les Plénipotentiaires ont signé la présente Convention et l'ont revêtue de leurs cachets.

Fait à La Haye, le vingt-neuf juillet mil huit cent quatre vingtdix-neuf, en un seul exemplaire qui restera déposé dans les archives du Gouvernement des Pays-Bas et dont des copies, certifiées conformes, seront remises par la voie diplomatique aux Puissances Contractantes.

HISTORY OF THE PEACE CONFERENCE AT THE

HAGUE.

THE EMPEROR'S MESSAGE.

On the 24th August, 1898, Count Muravieff, Russian Minister for Foreign Affairs, by order of the Emperor, made the following communication to all the foreign representatives accredited to the Court of St. Petersburg :

The maintenance of general Peace, and a possible reduction of the excessive armaments which weigh upon all nations, present themselves in the existing condition of the whole world as the ideal towards which the endeavours of all Governments should be directed.

The humanitarian and magnanimous intentions of his Majesty the Emperor, my august master, have been entirely won over to this object.

In the conviction that this lofty aim is in conformity with the most essential interests and the legitimate views of all the Powers, the Imperial Government thinks that the present moment would be very favourable for an inquiry, by means of international discussion, as the most effectual means of securing to all peoples the benefits of a real and durable Peace, and, before all, of putting an end to the progressive development of the present

armaments.

In the course of the last twenty years the longings for a general appeasement have grown especially pronounced in the conscience of civilised nations. The preservation of Peace has been put forward as the object of international policy. It is in its name that the great States have concluded between themselves powerful alliances; it is the better to guarantee Peace that they have developed their military forces in proportions hitherto

unprecedented, and still continue to increase them without shrinking from any sacrifice,

All these efforts, nevertheless, have not yet been able to bring about the beneficent results of the desired pacification.

The financial charges, following an upward course, strike at and paralyse public prosperity at its very source. The intellectual and physical strength of the nations, their labour and capital, are, for the most part, diverted from their natural application, and unproductively consumed. Hundreds of millions are devoted to obtaining terrible engines of destruction, which, though to-day regarded as the last word of science, are destined to-morrow to lose all value in consequence of some fresh discovery in the same field. National culture, economic progress, and the production of wealth are checked, paralysed, or perverted in their development.

Moreover, in proportion as the armaments of each Power increase, do they less and less fulfil the objects which the Governments have set before themselves. Economic crises, due in great part to the system of armements à outrance and the continual danger which lies in this accumulation of war material, are transforming the armed Peace of our days into a crushing burden which the peoples have more and more difficulty in bearing.

It appears evident, then, that if this state of things continue it will inevitably lead to the very cataclysm which it is desired to avert, and the horrors of which make every thinking being shudder in anticipation.

To put an end to these continual armaments, and to seek the means of warding off the calamities which are threatening the whole world-such is the supreme duty which is to-day imposed upon all States.

Filled with this sentiment, his Majesty has been pleased to order me to propose to all the Governments which have accredited representatives at the Imperial Court, the meeting of a Conference which should occupy itself with this grave problem.

This Conference would be, by the help of God, a happy

presage for the century which is about to open. It would collect into one powerful focus the efforts of all the States which are sincerely seeking to make the great conception of universal Peace triumph over the elements of disturbance and discord.

It would at the same time cement their agreement by a corporate consecration of the principles of equity and right on which rest the security of States and the welfare of peoples.

SAINT PETERSBURG, 12/24 August, 1898.

(Signed) COUNT MURAVIEFF.

The original ran as follows :-
:-

D'ordre de l'Empereur, le comte Mouravieff a remis, le 24 août, à tous les représentants étrangers accrédités à St.-Pétersbourg la communication suivante :

Le maintien de la paix générale et une réduction possible des armements excessifs qui pèsent sur toutes les nations se présentent, dans la situation actuelle du monde entier, comme l'idéal auquel devraient tendre les efforts de tous les Gouvernements.

Les vues humanitaires et magnanimes de Sa Majesté l'Empereur, mon Auguste Maître, y sont entièrement acquises.

Dans la conviction que ce but élevé répond aux intérêts les plus essentiels et aux vœux légitimes de toutes les Puissances, le Gouvernement Impérial croit que le moment présent serait très favorable à la recherche, dans la voie d'une discussion internationale, des moyens les plus efficaces d'assurer à tous les peuples les bienfaits d'une paix réelle et durable, et de mettre avant tout un terme au développement progressif des armements actuels.

Au cours des vingt dernières années, les aspirations à un apaisement général se sont particulièrement affirmées dans la conscience des nations civilisées.

La conservation de la paix a été posée comme le but de la