Massachusetts Bay, in New-England, the Assembly have voted a bounty of thirty shillings for every piece of duck or canvass made in the Province. Some other manufactures are carried on there, as brown holland, for women's wear, which lessens the importation of calicoes, and some other sorts of East-India goods.

ance.

"They also make some small quantities of cloth, made of linen and cotton for ordinary sheeting. By a paper mill set up three years ago, they make to the value of £200 sterling yearly. There are also several forges for making bar iron, and some furnaces for cast iron or hollow ware, and one slitting mill, and a manufacture for nails. The Governour writes concerning the woolen manufacture, that the country people, who used formerly to make most of their clothing out of their own wool, do not now make a third part of what they wear, but are mostly clothed with British manufacture. The surveyor general of his Majesty's woods writes, that they have in New-England, six furnaces and nineteen forges, for making iron, and that in this Province many ships are built for the French and Spaniards, in return for rum, molasses, wines, and silks, which they truck there by connivGreat quantities of hats are made in New-England, of which the company of hatters in London have complained to us, that great quantities of these hats are exported to Spain, Portugal, and our West-India Islands. They also make all sorts of iron work for shipping. There are several still houses and sugar bakers established in New-England. By late advices from New-York, there are no manufactures there, that can affect Great-Britain. There is yearly imported into New-York, a very large quantity of the woolen manufactures of this kingdom, for their clothing, which they would be rendered incapable to pay for, and would be reduced to the necessity of ma king for themselves, if they were prohibited from receiving from the foreign sugar Colonies, the money, rum, molasses, cocoa, indigo, cotton-wool, &c. which they at present take in return for provisions, horses, and lumber, the produce of that Province and of New-Jersey, of which he affirms the British Colonies do not take off above one half. But the company of hatters of London have since informed us, that hats are manufactured in great quantities in this Province.

"By the last letters from the Deputy Governour of Pennsylvania, he does not know of any trade carried on, in that Province, that can

be injurious to this Kingdom. They do not export any woolen or linen manufactures; all that they make, which are of a coarse sort, being for their own use. We are farther informed, that in this Province are built many brigantines and small sloops, which they sell to the West-Indies. The Governour of Rhode-Island informs us, in answer to our queries, that there are iron mines there, but not a fourth part iron enough to serve their own use; but he takes no notice of any manufactures there. No return from the Governour of Connecticut. But we find, by some accounts, that the produce of this Colony is timber, boards, all sorts of English grain, hemp, flax, sheep, black cattle, swine, horses, goats, and tobacco. That they export horses and lumber to the West-Indies, and receive, in return, sugar, salt, molasses, and rum. We likewise find, that their manufactures are very inconsiderable; the people there being generally employed in tillage, some few in tanning, shoemaking, and other handicrafts; others in building, and in joiner's, tailor's and smith's work, without which they could not subsist. No report is made from Carolina, the Bahama, nor the Bermuda isles."

The Commissioners then proceed to say," From the foregoing state, it is observable, that there are more trades carried on, and manufactures set up, in the Provinces on the Continent of America, to the northward of Virginia, prejudicial to the trade and manufactures of Great-Britain, particularly in New-England, than in any other of the British Colonies; which is not to be wondered at, for their soil, cli✓ mate, and produce being pretty nearly the same with ours, they have no staple commodities of their own growth to exchange for our manufactures, which puts them under greater necessity, as well as under greater temptations, for providing for themselves at home; to which may be added, in the charter governments, the little dependence they have upon the mother country, and consequently the small restraint they are under, in any matters detrimental to her interests. And, therefore, we humbly beg leave to repeat and submit to the wisdom of this honourable house, the substance of what we formerly proposed in our report, on the silk, linen, and woolen manufactures herein before recited, namely, whether it might not be expedient to give these Colonies proper encouragements for turning their industry to such manufactures and products, as might be of service to Great

Britain, and more particularly to the production of all kinds of naval stores."*

Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. 3.

NOTE. The British merchants and manufacturers were always jealous of the trade and manufactures of the northern Colonies, and particularly of New-England. Sir Josiah Child, in his discourse on trade, written about the year 1680, says, "That New-England is the most prejudicial Plantation to this Kingdom." In attempting to prove this he says "I am now to write of a people, whose frugality, industry, and temperance, and the happiness of whose laws and institutions, promise to them long life, with a wonderful increase of people, riches, and power; and although no men ought to envy that virtue and wisdom in others, which themselves either can or will not practise, but rather to commend and admire it; yet I think it is the duty of every good man primarily to respect the welfare of his native country; and therefore, though I may offend some, whom I would not willingly displease, I cannot omit, in the progress of this discourse, to take notice of some particulars, wherein old England suffers diminution by the growth of these Colonies settled in New-England, and how that Plantation differs from those more southerly, with respect to the gain or loss of this Kingdom, viz.

"1. All our American Plantations, except that of New-England, produce commodities of different natures from those of this Kingdom, as sugar, tobacco, cocoa, wool, ginger, sundry sorts of dying woods, &c. Whereas New-England produces generally the same we have here, viz. corn and cattle; some quantity of fish they do likewise kill, but that is taken and saved altogether by their own inhabitants, which prejudices our Newfoundland trade, where, as has been said, very few are, or ought, according to pru dence, to be employed in those fisheries, but the inhabitants of old England. The other commodities we have from them are some few great masts, furs, and train oil, of which the yearly value amounts to very little, the much greater value of returns from them being made in sugar, cotton, wool, tobacco, and such like commodities, which they first receive from some other of his Majesty's Plantations, in barter for dry cod fish, salt mackerel, beef, pork, bread, beans, flour, peas, &c. which they supply Barbadoes, Jamaica, &c. with, to the diminution of the vent of those commodities from this Kingdom; the great experience of which in our West-India Plantations would soon be found in the advantage of the value of our lands in England, were it not for the vast and almost incredible supplies these Colonies have from New-England. 2. The people of New-England, by virtue of their primitive charter, being not so strictly tied to the observation of the laws of this Kingdom, do sometimes assume the liberty of trading, contrary to the act of nas

This report exhibits a view, although a very imperfect one, of the state of the trade and manufactures of the Colonies, about the year 1731-2.

The Governours of the several Provinces and Colonies, especially those who were independent of the crown, aware of the object of the queries put to them by the Lords Commissioners, returned answers as favourable as possible to the Colonists, and which would least excite the jealousy of the British merchant and manufacturer.

The disputes, however, between the British West-India sugar Colonies and the northern Colonies, concerning the trade of the latter with the foreign West-India islands, still continued with great warmth, and in 1733, in order to settle this dispute, and to encour age their own sugar Colonies, Parliament passed an act, (6 George II. c. 13,)"For the better securing and encouraging the trade of his Majesty's sugar Colonies in America."

This act imposed a duty of nine pence sterling on every gallon of rum, six pence on every gallon of molasses, and five shillings on every hundred weight of sugar, imported into any of the British Plantations in America from foreign sugar Colonies. This duty was afterwards reduced to six pence on rum, and three pence on molasses. The duty was always very odious to the northern Colonists. It was justly considered by them as sacrificing their interest to the interest of the sugar planter. And it is well known that although this duty was attempted to be collected in the Colonies, by officers appointed by the crown, and by severe legal penalties, yet,

vigation; by reason of which, many of our American commodities especially tobacco and sugar, are transported in New-English shipping, directly into Spain, and other foreign countries, without being landed in England, or paying any duty to his Majesty; which is not only a loss to the King, and a prejudice to the navigation of old England, &c.

"3. Of all the American Plantations, his Majesty has none so apt for the building of shipping as New-England, nor none comparably so qualified for the breeding of seamen, not only by reason of the natural industry of that people, but principally by reason of their cod and mackerel fisheries; and in my poor opinion, there is nothing more prejudicial, and in prospec. more dangerous to any mother Kingdom, than the increase of shipping in her Colonies, Plantations, or Provinces."

by smuggling or some other way, the payment of it was generally evaded. In consequence of the statements in this report, relative to the manufacture and exportation of hats from the Colonies, and undoubtedly at the instigation of the manufacturers of that article in Great-Britain, Parliament passed an act, (5 George II. 1732,)" to prevent the exportation of hats out of any of his Majesty's Colonies or Plantations in America, and to restrain the number of apprentices taken by the hat-makers in the said Colonies or Plantations, and for the better encouraging the making of hats in Great-Britain." By this act, not only was the exportation of hats prohibited to a foreign port, but their transportation from one British Plantation to another British Plantation was also prohibited, under severe penalties; nor could they "be loaden upon any horse, cart, or other carriage, to the intent or purpose to be exported, transported, shipped off," &c. By the same act no person could make hats, unless he had served an apprenticeship for seven years, nor could he employ more than two apprentices at any one time.

The making of pig and bar iron had become an object of some consequence in the Colonies. The British government were willing to encourage the importation of it into England, in its raw and unmanufactured state, but were opposed to the manufacture of it in the Colonies. In the year 1750, therefore, an act was passed, (23 George II.)" to encourage the importation of pig and bar iron from his Majesty's Colonies in America, and to prevent the erection of any mill, or other engine for slitting or rolling of iron, or any plating forge to work with a tilt hammer, or any furnace for making steel, in any of said Colonies." By this act, pig iron is admitted into England duty free, and bar iron is admitted duty free, into the port of London. But the erection of any slitting mill, plating forge, or furnace for making steel, is prohibited under severe penalties. While the British government were thus jealous of the trade and manufactures of the Colonies, which were supposed to interfere with the particular interests of the mother country, they were disposed to encourage the production of such raw materials as were necessary for their manufactures, and such other articles as could not be raised in England, but for which they were entirely, or in a great measure, dependent upon other countries. At different periods, therefore,

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