Art. I. THE FISHEKIES OF THE UNITED STATES.
ORIGIN OF NEW ENGLAND FISHERIES—EARLY HISTORY-POLICY OF FRENCH AND ENGLISH-ACTION OF OUR GOVERNMENT TO ENCOURAGE OUR FISHERIES-Act of 1789-ACT OF 1792-FRENCH CLAIMS -ACT OF 1812-DUTIES ON FISH IN SEVERAL TARIFFS-DUTY ON SALT 1790 TO 1846-ETC.
NEW ENGLAND has always been nearly the exclusive seat of the fishing interest of the country-the tonnage engaged in it, at any time, from all other parts of the coast, being hardly worth mention. The reasons for this are obvious-its nearer situation to the waters where the fish most resort, and which have been famous for centuries as fishing grounds, not only for this continent but for Europe, its earlier settlement, denser population, and greater ability to engage in the pursuit.
It was very natural that the New England colonies should have been early engaged in the Fisheries. Their soil was such as rather to repel than invite their labors to agriculture; and it could not have held them in the primitve simplicity of agriculturists, had it been fat with the later-known luxuriance of the champaign of the Ohio and Missouri. They had a full infusion of that spirit of energetic adventure which was pushing forward the development of modern civilization, and which has become more conspicuous with the expansion of the latter. It led them instinctively, and almost in the outset, to that minute sub-division of labor which is the grand engine in developing at least the mechanical part of our enlightenment. While a portion turned to the soil, and another part busied themselves in fabrication, a third cast their eyes upon the waters. There were treasures beyond the sea, and treasures, also, within the sea; and they immediately bent their energies to the conquest of them. They saw at their doors, and obstructing the light of their windows, forests that would furnish timber sufficient to build all the ships that would be needed for ages-and what should deter them from entering into competition with the ships of the world in the world's ports? What should hinder them from bringing hither the wares of Britain, the