This omission is now seen to have been a mistake.

So also was the description of the document as a "declaration." Both mistakes were repeated in 1868 with reference to the "Declaration" of St.
Petersburg (as to explosive bullets).
In those early attempts at legislation for the conduct of warfare it seems to have been thought sufficient that the conclusions arrived at by authorised delegates should be announced without being embodied in a treaty.

Surely, however, what purported to be international agreements upon vastly important topics ought to have been accompanied by all the formalities required for "conventions," and should have been so entitled.

In later times this has become the general rule for the increasingly numerous agreements which bear upon the conduct of hostilities.

Thus we have The Hague "conventions" of 1899 and 1907, and the Geneva "convention" of 1906, all duly equipped with provisions for ratification.