the captor, and is properly termed the Ransom Bill, and the other is given to the master of the captured vessel, and serves as a Pass or Safe-conduct for him. The master of the captured vessel at the same time delivers up to the captor one of his crew, generally the mate of his vessel, as a hostage for the payment of the money stipulated in the Ransom Bill. The ransomed vessel is thereupon permitted to proceed to a designated port by a prescribed route and within a limited time. A failure to comply with any of these conditions places the vessel and her cargo out of the protection of the ransom bill, otherwise the ransom bill serves to secure the vessel and her cargo from all molestation from the cruisers of the belligerent state of which the captor is a subject, or from the cruisers of its allies, until she has reached the port of her destination. It has been justly observed that all compacts with the common enemy must bind allies, when they tend to accomplish the object of the alliance; otherwise the ally would reap all the fruits of the compact without being subject to the terms and conditions of it, and the enemy with whom the agreement was made would be exposed in regard to the ally to all the disadvantages of it, without participating in the stipulated benefit. Such an inequality of obligation is contrary to every principle of reason and justice. If the vessel should be forced out of the course prescribed, or her voyage should exceed the time allowed in the ransom bill owing to stress of weather or some overpowering necessity, such a circumstance will not work a forfeiture of her safe-conduct; but if she should have no such excuse for her non-observance of the conditions of her ransom, and should be captured a second time, she is 61 Kent's Commentaries, Tom. I. p. 105. Miller v. The Resolution, 2 Dallas, p. 15. Yates v. Hall, 1 Term Rep. p. 73. liable to be adjudged good prize to the second captors, in which case the debtors under the bill of ransom will be discharged from their contract, and the amount stipulated in her bill of ransom will be deducted from the total proceeds of the prize, the residue only going to the second captor. On the other hand, if the vessel of the captors should be taken by the enemy with the ransom bill and hostage on board, the ransom bill is thereby discharged, and it cannot be revived by recapture. So when the vessel of the captor, after he has transmitted the ransom bill, is taken with the hostage on board, the ransom is discharged by such recapture of the hostage. But if the hostage and the ransom bill have both been transmitted by the captor to a place of safety, and the captor's vessel be subsequently taken by the enemy, the ransom remains due notwithstanding such capture. In such a case there is nothing on board the captor's vessel that represents the ransom of the captured vessel; and where the hostage and ransom bill have both been conveyed to a place of safety it is equivalent to the prize itself having been carried infra præsidia. So if the commander of a privateer should have ransomed an enemy's vessel, under a condition, amongst others inserted in the ransom bill, that the full amount should be paid notwithstanding "the hostage should come to die, or to desert, or that the said privateer should perish or be taken with the hostage on board," and the privateer should have been subsequently captured by the enemy with the hostage and ransom bill on board, but the ransom bill should not have been delivered up to the captors of the 62 Valin, Traité des Prises, c. 11. § 1-3. Pothier, Traité de Proprieté, § 134-137 63 Emérigon, Traité des Assurances, c. 12. sect. 23. § 8. 64 Ibid. privateer, nor have ever come into their possession, the original captor has been held entitled to recover on the ransom bill 65. So likewise if the commander of the ransomed vessel should have given a bill of exchange to the captor as an additional security, together with the ransom bill, and the bill of exchange should have been negotiated in good faith to the order of a third party for value received, it is to be paid by the owners of the ransomed vessel, although the hostage should have been recaptured on board the privateer; but if the bill of exchange has not been negotiated for value received at the time of his recapture, the owners of the ransomed vessel are absolved from their obligation under the bill of exchange, as well as under the ransom bill itself 66. § 182. When a captor releases an enemy's vessel Hostages. on Ransom, it is allowable for him to take one or more hostages from the ransomed vessel. The French Ordonnance de la Marine enjoined all captors, if they. released a vessel and her cargo par composition, to seize all her papers, and to bring away at least two of the principal officers of the captured vessels. In practice however one hostage only is taken, who is liable to be detained as a prisoner of war until the ransom is paid. The validity of the ransom bill does not in any way depend upon the taking of a hostage, but the hostage serves as a security to facilitate the recovery of the ransom in a court of law; for the hostage has a right of action in the courts of his own country against the master, and against the owner of the ship and cargo, to compel them to 65 Corner v. Blackburne, 2 Douglas, p. 640. 66 Emérigon, c. 12. Tit. XXII. 67 The practice of ransom is recognised by this Ordinance in Tit. VI. Des Assurances, § 66. and Tit. VII. Des Avaries, § 6. 68 Valin, Ordonnance de la Marine, Tit. IX. § 19. Lebeau, Nouveau Code des Prises, Tom. I. p. 89. Azuni, Droit Maritime, Tom. II. c. 4. Art. VI. Modern restraints upon ran som. perform the conditions of the contract under which § 183. The practice of releasing captured vessels on ransom being considered to be less beneficial to 69 The Hoop, 1 Ch. Rob. p. 201. 70 Azuni, Droit Maritime, Tom. II. c. 4. Art. VI. § 5. 71 The Gratitudine, 3 Ch. Rob. p. 258. 72 Yates v. Hall, 1 Term Reports, p. 80. the belligerent State, to which the captor belongs, than their detention and conveyance as prize into port, and the power of ransoming vessels being liable to be abused by the captors to the great inconvenience of neutral trade, it has been the policy of the European Powers to restrain the liberty of the captors to ransom their captures. Thus France, by the Ordinance of 15 May 17567, forbade any cruiser to ransom any enemy's vessel on any pretext whatever, until she had sent three prizes into port; and by a later Ordinance of 30 August 1782" prohibited altogether the ransoming of any enemy's vessel or cargo, or the taking of any hostage, or of any written security whatever, which may be suspected to be a disguised form of ransom. The present law of France on the subject of ransom is contained in the Arrêté of 2 Prairial of the year XI, according to which every privateer is bound to send its prizes as soon as possible into the port from which it has been fitted out, unless prevented by stress of weather or the superior force of the enemy; but the commander of a privateer is at liberty to ransom an enemy's vessel, if he is formally authorised by the owners of the privateer under a declaration made by them before the officers of the port from which the privateer is fitted out; but no privateer is permitted under any circumstances to ransom a vessel which has a neutral passport, under very severe penalties against the captain of the privateer. In Great Britain the Parliament has been accustomed on each occasion of passing a Prize Act since 22 Geo. III. c. 25, (A. D. 1782,) to discountenance altogether the practice of ransoming ships and cargoes belonging to 73 Lebeau, Nouveau Code des Prises, Tom. I. p. 547. 74 Ibid. Tom. II. p. 427. 75 Pistoye et Duverdy, Traité des Prises Maritimes, Tom. I. p. 281. |