ministering to the other. The case is analogous with sugar-growers of the West Indies. Solicitous for the general welfare of the colonies, this class may rejoice in any prospect of additional trade being open to their fellow colonists, who labour in a dif ferent branch of industry from themselves; but it surely would be unjust to make them suffer for their disinterestedness, and sacrifice their own production for anticipated benefits solely appertaining to a foreign carrying trade.

After this investigation of the true merits of the alterations made in our colonial policy, again let us ask, what have the colonists gained? Positively nothing. The innovations in our commercial policy were unsolicited, unsought; and at best acquiesced in passively by the West Indians. It is quite erroneous to assert, that the alterations were made exclusively or principally with the view of benefiting the colonies. The administration that directed the trade of the kingdom were desirous to make great changes in our mercantile policy; they seized upon the colonies as instruments that answered their purpose, which they knew they could handle and work at pleasure, and which they were aware could never possess influence sufficiently potential to oppose, with effect, any uses to which they were employed. The natural disposition of mankind to make, if possible, peremptory and predetermined acts pass for gratuitous indulgence, actuating statesmen fully as much as common men, soon induced a fictitious

colouring to be given to the procedure, such as should strike in and harmonize with the temper of the times. A subordinate agent was made to appear the principal actor, whose interest alone was consulted, and who, in common gratitude, should make tangible acknowledgment for the services conferred on him. It was then that the fancied benefits alleged to flow to the colonies were held forth with a boldness, a vehemence, and a pertinacity sufficient to deceive much of the disinterested portion of the community; but little reflection is required to discover that the West Indians could never have originated the changes. Had they been consulted on the subject, the more intelligent among them might have paused ere they sanctioned even the nominal invasion of a principle that was sure afterwards to be misconstrued; they might have recollected the words of the celebrated preamble already quoted with commendation, that "it was the policy of foreign countries to keep the colonial trade to themselves;" in consequence, they might have conceived that it was not wise to abandon a system that "maintained a close correspondence between the colonies and the mother country, increased shipping, and made this country the staple both of the commodities of the plantations and other countries, in order to supply them." Above all, would the West Indians have ostensibly thrown open a trade which all other nations had hitherto kept shut, without

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stipulating for something in return? Would they have presented their trade to Prussia, a trade held most valuable by all Prussian subjects, and at the same time allowed that country almost simultaneously to heap impediments on the sale of British Plantation sugar? These are surely sufficient proofs. that the West Indians had but little voice in these measures. But enough has been said, and it is time to terminate this unwelcome subject. It may suffice to state that, if much has been sacrificed, nothing has been gained, and that the rules of restriction set forth at the commencement of this section, illustrative of colonial dependence, stand unchanged.), no bolt-ps

I

SECTION II.

On East India Trade.

THE restrictions imposed upon the East India trade are of a very different description from those appertaining to the West India.

The Navigation Act, 12 Car. II., reserved the trade of the British settlements in Asia, in common with all America and Africa, to British vessels. After the East India Company had acquired permanent footing in India, and, in addition to their factories, had obtained large districts of territory, they assumed legislative functions; they framed

commercial regulations themselves to elicit all the advantages of their dominion, without going to the British Parliament for permission or advice. It will not be necessary to particularize all the regulations which, from the time of their first charter, they introduced for the purpose of giving facilities to their trade. It is sufficient to observe, that if, as merchants, they were desirous of realizing large profits, of selling dearly and buying cheaply, as sovereigns they had the power of enacting laws to accomplish their wishes. The broadest possible distinction here appears between the colonial trade and that of the East India Company. The former. is under the rigid direction of the Imperial Legislature, which not only enacts, repeals, and modifies the most trivial commercial regulations at pleasure, but which treats its colonial subjects as subservient dependents, who ought to be passive under every command, and whose interests should implicitly con form to every change desired by the British government. Those who are called their rivals had, for an indefinite period, the law in their own hands; they had the power, within the vast limits of their charter, of making use of every species of interchange to facilitate production in their own immediate territories. This power they may be said still to retain.

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*In a Letter from the first Lord Melville to the Court of Directors, on the subject of East India Trade, there is this passage" These important possessions never have been, and never can be considered as colonies."

In Mr. Pitt's Act, in 1782, regulating the affairs of the East India Company, when the Board of Control was appointed, the legislative functions of the company were formally recognised; and where those functions were inadequate for framing laws, which, in facilitating the East India trade, affected the trade generally of the United Kingdom, or interferes with the prerogatives of the crown, parliament afterwards stepped in to their assistance.

The 37 Geo. III. cap. 117, conferred power on the East India Company to permit vessels belonging to countries in amity with his Majesty to import into, and export from, the British possessions in India, goods not contrary to treaties or expressly prohibited by the statute law of the realm.

In 1813, the trade was thrown open. In the following year, the act called the Circuitous Trade Act was passed, which permitted the trade in ships navigated according to law, to and at any intermediate ports or countries between the United Kingdom and the limits of the Company's charter, situate in North and South America, excepting his Majesty's colonies and possessions, and to and at Madeira, the Canaries, the Cape de Verd Islands, St. Helena, and the Cape of Good Hope.

In 1817, a further extension was granted, by admitting a trade direct from Malta and Gibraltar, to and from the places within the Company's limits; all restrictions as to the size of ships employed in such trade were removed, although they were