N view of the interest which has been awakened in the boundary question by the Hay-Herbert treaty, recently ratified, for the settlement of the line between Alaska and Canada, I have been asked by the editors to furnish for the NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE a review of the history of the delimitation of the boundary line between the United States and Canada since the independence of our country.

The treaty of peace of 1783, between the United States and Great Britain, sought to fix with accuracy the boundaries of their respective possessions. These boundaries are laid down in detail in Article II of the treaty, the opening words of which are as follows: "And that all disputes which might arise in future, on the subject of the boundaries of the said United States may be prevented, it is hereby agreed and declared, that the following are, and shall be their boundaries," etc.

Notwithstanding the good intentions of the negotiators, the provisions as to

the boundary proved to be a source of disagreement, and sometimes of violent dispute, for nearly a century. The disagreements arose mainly from a want of correct geographic knowledge on the part of the negotiators. For example, the initial point on the east was fixed at the mouth of St Croix River in the Bay of Fundy. But when it was sought to establish the boundary line, it was found that there was no river in that locality popularly known as the St Croix, but that there were two considerable rivers emptying into the Bay of Fundy, both of which had other names than that mentioned in the treaty. The United States claimed that the most eastern of these was the river designated in the treaty as the St Croix, and Great Britain claimed the western river as the treaty boundary.

Throughout almost the entire length of line of contact with Canada laid down in the treaty, geographic difficulties of interpretation have arisen, and the inaccuracy of knowledge of the negotiators is especially conspicuous in their