CHAPTER VII.
THE RIGHTS AND DUTIES OF NEUTRALS SECTION 1 _The Criterion of Neutral Conduct_ The main object of the first of the following letters was to assert, as against any possible misunderstanding of phraseology attributed to a great international lawyer (since lost to science and to his friends by his sudden death on June 20, 1909), the authority by which alone neutral rights and duties are defined.
The letter also touches upon the limit of time which a neutral Power is bound to place upon the stay in its ports of belligerent ships of war; a topic more fully discussed in Section 4.
PROFESSOR DE MARTENS ON THE SITUATION Sir,--The name of my distinguished friend, M.de Martens, carries so much weight that I hope you will allow me at once to say that I am convinced that to-day's telegraphic report of some communication made by him to the St.Petersburg newspapers fails to convey an accurate account of the views which he has thus expressed.
On matters of fact it would appear that he is no better informed than are most of us in this country; and under matters of fact may be included the breaches of neutrality which he is represented as counter-charging against the Japanese.

It is exclusively with the views on questions of law which are attributed to Professor de Martens that I am now concerned.

He is unquestionably right in saying, as I pointed out in a recent letter, that the hard-and-fast rule, fixing 24 hours as the limit, under ordinary circumstances, of the stay of a belligerent warship in neutral waters, is not yet universally accepted as a rule of international law; and, in particular, is not adopted by France.
But what of the further _dictum_ attributed to Professor de Martens, to the effect that "each country is its own judge as regards the discharge of its duties as a neutral"?
This statement would be a superfluous truism if it meant merely that each country, when neutral, must, in the first instance, decide for itself what courses of action are demanded from it under the circumstances.

The words may, however, be read as meaning that the decision of the neutral country, as to the propriety of its conduct, is final, and not to be questioned by other Powers.

An assertion to this effect would obviously be the negation of the whole system of international law, of which Professor de Martens is so great a master, resting, as that system does, not on individual caprice, but upon the agreement of nations in restraint of the caprice of any one of them.