VENEZUELAN DISPUTE 183 VENIAL SIN the boundary line separating the latter country from British Guiana — a ques- tion which had been long in dispute. The controversy dated back to 1814, when Great Britain acquired by treaty with the Netherlands the province of De- merara, Essequibo, and Bernice. Vene- zuela originally claimed her limits to be those of the captaincy-general of 1810, but contented herself with claiming the line of the Essequibo river as the true boundary. Great Britain apparently ac- quiesced till 1840, when she commissioned Sir R. Schomburgk to lay out the boun- daries, which he proceeded to do by in- cluding a large area which had before been considered by Venezuela a portion of her domain, and to the possession of which by Great Britain a vigorous pro- test was entered. After much diplomatic negotiations the monuments set up by Schomburgk were removed by the order of Lord Aberdeen. Other boundaries were from time to time suggested, but none agreed on, till finally, in 1886, Great Britain returned to her contention of 1840, and claimed all the territory within the Schomburgk line. The controversy continued till 1894, when a Venezuelan force entered the disputed territory and raised the flag of the latter country at Yuruan. The following year the British police removed the flag, for which they were arrested but finally released. Great Britain setting up a demand for repara- tion somewhat in the nature of an ulti- matum. The United States became a party to the dispute by the act of Congress di- recting the President to urge Great Britain to submit to arbitration the ques- tion whether Venezuela was entitled to the territory between the Essequibo and the Orinoco. In his annual message to Congress, Dec. 3, 1895, President Cleve- land called attention to the boundary controversy and the representations made by the United States Government to that of Great Britain with a view of securing the submission of the dispute to arbitra- tion. On the 17th he sent a special mes- sage to Congress, accompanied by the an- swer of the British Government to the representations mentioned, and a recom- mendation that Congress authorize the appointment of a commission to deter- mine the divisional line between Vene- zuela and British Guiana. The message created intense excitement throughout Europe and America. Both Houses of Congress passed a commission bill unani- mously and indulged in much talk of war. Under the bill the President announced, Jan. 1, 1896, the appointment of the fol- lowing commissioners: David J. Brewer, Associate-Justice of the United States Supreme Court; Richard H. Alvey, Chief -Justice of the Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia; Andrew D. White, ex-United States minister to Rus- sia; Frederic R. Coudert; and Daniel C. Gilman, president of Johns Hopkins Uni' versity. Subsequently the commission organized and chose Justice Brewer its president. The commission invited the govern- ments of Venezuela and Great Britain to formulate and present to it their re- spective cases in support of their claims. The invitation was complied with by both governments. Independently of these cases the commission gathered a great mass of evidence bearing on the claims, and continued its sittings till Feb. 27, 1897, when, Venezuela and Great Britain having signed a treaty providing for the submission of the claims to arbi* tration, the commission considered its work at an end, made its report to the President, and terminated its existence. The treaty between Venezuela and Great Britain was signed in Washington, D. C, on Feb. 2, 1897, and provided for the ap- pointment of an arbitration tribunal, to determine the boundary line, consisting of five jurists, the two on the part of Venezuela being Chief -Justice Fuller and Associate-Justice Brewer of the United States Supreme Court; the two on the part of Great Britain being the Rt. Hon. Baron Herschell and the Hon, Sir Rich- ard Henn Collins; and the fifth to be selected by the four jurists nominated in the treaty, or, in the event of their failure to agree, by the King of Norway and Sweden, the fifth jurist to be the president of the tribunal. The treaty provided that the tribunal should sit in Paris, France. The tribunal was com- pleted by the selection of Professor Maertens, a distinguished Russian jurist. Professor of International Law in the University of St. Petersburg, and legal writer, as the fifth member and presi- dent. The award of the tribunal, which was delivered Oct. 3, 1899, gave Great Britain the Schomburgk line, with the exception of Barima Point, at the mouth of the Orinoco, and a strip of territory between the Wenamu and Cuyuni rivers; but it was decided that the mouth of the Orinoco should be open to the British, and both banks of a part of the Cuyuni, where the Schomburgk line had given them only one bank. VENIAL SIN. The distinction made in Roman Catholic theology between mor- tal sin and a venial sin was first made in connection with Church discipline. St. Augustine, in his book of Faith and Works," distinguishes sins into two kinds; greater, or those which obliged men to do public penance, and which he
