2. Inasmuch as they were only carriers for the French, they were to be regarded as French transports, carrying national assistance to the enemy, and therefore to be condemned on the same principle as vessels carrying troops or despatches.
3. That the property they carried being from one part of the French empire to the other, was so completely identified with French interests as to take a hostile character.
4. When war comes it is necessary to shut some of the avenues of commerce, otherwise the belligerent rights could not be protected.
5. That the neutral ought not to have through and by means of the war, which is not his affair, that he has not in time of peace; and by natural justice he is only entitled to his accustomed trade. That any inconveniences he may suffer are quite balanced by the enlargement of his commerce; the trade of the belligerents is usually interrupted to a great degree, and falls into the lap of the neutral.[205]
6. That it is a direct assistance to the enemy, and an injury to the belligerent interests of the other country, to carry on for the enemy the commerce that she has lost by the pressure of the war,—rendering the efforts of the successful power nugatory.
NOTE D.—Articles that have been declared Contraband at various times.
Gunpowder, arms, military equipments, and other things peculiarly adapted to military purposes.
Sail cloths, masts, anchors, pitch, tar, and hemp, universally contraband, even when destined to ports not of military equipment.
Cheeses, fit for naval use; such as Dutch cheeses, when exclusively used in French ships of war.
Rosin, tallow, and ship biscuits, if destined to ports of military or naval equipment.