[3] Oscar Browning, the writer of Chapter X, in Volume VIII, of the Cambridge Modern History, recently published, gives the least prejudiced and most accurate account. However, it is very brief. He introduces the Incident as an important episode in the foreign policy of Pitt. He says: “An event occurred on the other side of the world which nearly brought about a European conflagration.” In preparing his brief discussion he consulted the documents in the public record office.
[4] See Duro, Armada Española, VIII, 8-16.
[5] See Hassall, The French People, 341.
[6] Richard Cadman Etches to Captain Portlock, London, September 3, 1785. (Meares, An Answer to Mr. Dixon, 10.) The instructions were not carried out by this commander, but the same company was interested in the expedition which reached Nootka for that purpose in 1789. Nootka Sound was for a time called King Georges Sound by the English and San Lorenzo by the Spanish.
[7] Bancroft, Northwest Coast, I, 172.
[8] Sometimes written “Mears.”
[9] Meares, Memorial, appendix to Voyages.
[10] This condition and the terms on which relief was offered him by Portlock and Dixon, who reached the place in the spring, led to a bitter personal quarrel between Meares and Dixon, which produced several mutually recriminating pamphlets.
[11] Meares, Voyages. Introductory voyage, i-xl. In this Meares quotes the letters which passed between him and Portlock in May, 1787, which gave rise to the quarrel.
[12] Id. 2.