GROWTH AND EXPANSION 75 



fairs in America had no immediate prospect of settlement. 

 Of the two, the French had the advantage. They laid 

 claim to all the fishing grounds between Maine and 

 Labrador. The only fisheries that were open and free to 

 the English subjects were those of the eastern half of 

 Newfoundland and that part of New England between 

 the Kennebec River and Long Island Sound. The su- 

 premacy of the French in the fisheries was due no more 

 to their zeal and daring than to the stupid policy of the 

 English government towards her fishermen in American 

 waters. The edict of 1670, * * to burn and destroy, ' ' had a 

 most disastrous effect upon the fisheries of Newfoundland, 

 even if it increased the number of English vessels coming 

 to the Grand Bank. At the close of the century the gov- 

 ernment allowed about one thousand persons to reside 

 permanently in Newfoundland, since that number could 

 be of use in constructing boats and fishing stages. 



In 1698, the British Parliament enacted a law provid- 

 ing that the master of the first vessel from England arriv- 

 ing on the coast should be admiral of the harbor in which 

 he cast anchor, with authority to administer justice and 

 to regulate the general concerns of the fisheries and the 

 colony. 1 The resident population was ignored entirely. 

 Each autumn, at the close of the fishing season, the ad- 

 miral, with the fleet, disappeared. With them went every 

 semblance of law and order, while the residents were left 

 to pass the winter as best they could. "The triumph of 

 the English merchants over their fellow-subjects, in this 

 lone and desolate isle, was as complete as that of the warrior 

 who storms a city. In fine, the * admirals' selected the 

 best fishing stations, displaced at will the resident fisher- 

 men who occupied them, drove the inhabitants from their 

 own houses, took hush-money and presents of fish in ad- 

 justing cases brought before them for adjudication, and, 



i Sabine, pp. 50-51. 



