cap. 11] LIMITATION OF LEGISLATION 377 
Courts could exercise an admiralty jurisdiction over a vessel 
which was arrested while on the Canadian side of the 
boundary in the St. Lawrence, but in a channel which was 
open to free passage under the Ashburton Treaty of 1842. 
There were various other questions at issue ; whether by the 
Act of 1891 the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court and the 
Exchequer Court was not restricted to vessels and happenings 
in Canadian waters—in this case the accident occurred in 
Rio de Grande, outside Canada—and whether the objection 
to the jurisdiction was taken too late in the Supreme Court 
on appeal, as Idington J. held. But the majority of 
the Court (Davies, Maclennan, and Duff, JJ.) held that the 
exercise of the right of innocent passage was not ground for 
an arrestment, and Davies J. thought that a mere passage 
through territorial waters was quite inadequate in any 
case to found an arrestment, as distinct from the case of 
entry into a harbour, where such entry gave a certain claim 
to jurisdiction in rem. Idington J.} on the other hand, 
insisted that the Canadian Courts had the full admiralty 
jurisdiction over all foreign vessels for accidents in foreign 
waters as exercised in Great Britain,? and that arrest was 
a proper mode of procedure. 
Of Colonial cases there may be noted also two Newfound- 
land cases of considerable interest : in Rhodes v. Fairweather? 
decided in 1888, the question was whether the Colonial Act 
of 1879, which fixed a close time for seal-fishing, could be 
applied to a Scottish sealer which caught seals outside the 
boundaries of the Colony during a prohibited time. The 
vessels cleared from St. John’s for the fishery, and returned 
thither for manufacture and shipment of the skins. It was 
expressly held by Carter C. J., that even if the vessel, which 
' (1907) 38 8. C. R., at pp. 323 seq. 
* The Diana, Lush. 539; The Courier, Lush. 541 ; The Jassy, 95 L. T. 
363. See 24 Vict. ¢. 10. But hedid not meet the point that the vessel was 
never in a Canadian port and never really in Canadian waters proper. 
3 1897 Newfoundland Decisions, 321. It may be noted that the Court 
of Newfoundland (not the Legislature) has a jurisdiction over offences 
on the Grand Banks by 5 Geo. IV. c. 67, which, however, would equally 
exist under the Act of 1849 (12 & 13 Vict. c. 96) as to admiralty matters.