01 COLONIAL POLICY. 



a reproach. For my part, I shall never learn to be ashamed of our 

 blood and lineage, nor feel any other sentiment than that of contempt 

 towards the men who can attempt to cast a stigma upon it. The 

 British islands want not a defence from my feeble voice, or from any 

 other arms but their own. I pity the man who can read her history, 

 without feeling his moral energies and patriotism invigorated, and 

 who shall not be disposed in all humility as to himself to say, in 

 shutting these illustrious pages, 'AND I, TOO, AM A BRITON/ Whence 

 then has arisen this daring in certain quarters, this forgetfulne>>s of 

 all the favours conferred upon them by England, this open bearding 

 of her authority ? Gentlemen, I must speak to you with the same 

 frankness upon this subject as I have tried to do upon others. It has 

 proceeded from thefrequent changes in the Colonial Office, both of per- 

 sons and policy, and from the want of an efficient system of Colonial 

 Government. So great have been the changes which have taken 

 place within the last half century, that their effects could not but be 

 felt in the colonies, and a system of government which might have 

 done for the feeble beginnings of the British Colonies after the sepa- 

 ration of the old colonies from the empire, will not do for its present 

 more advanced condition. In stating this, I, of course, mean not 

 to cast any reproach upon the several gentlemen who have, in succes- 

 sion, held the office of Secretary of the Colonies. I am too well aware 

 of the difficulties of a colonial minister too well satisfied that the 

 burthen cast upon his shoulders is too great for any man. Mistaken 

 notions of economy produced the suppression of the Board of Planta- 

 tions, the plan of which was originially conceived by the great Lord 

 Bacon, and without which there can be no stability, uniformity, or 

 efficiency of action in the colonial policy of the empire." 



I am not aware what was Lord Bacon's plan for the formation of 

 the Board of Plantations ; but I think there would be little difficulty 

 in the composition of such an assembly by appointing the members of 

 it from amongst those gentlemen who have filled the situation of 

 governor in the colony they may be individually called upon to 

 represent, through whom the correspondence should be carried. The 

 personal acquaintance they must have acquired during their govern- 

 ment, with the several interests of the colony, by being by them com- 

 municated to the board in sesssion, would diffuse amongst the mem- 

 bers a general knowledge of all our possessions, and their delibera- 

 tions would be regulated accordingly ; over which board the colo- 

 nial minister might preside. 



To give an idea of the extent of information the colonial minister 

 is expected to make himself master of, I subjoin a list of our colonies 

 under his control, and leave it to the contemplation of the reader 

 whether such a task can be expected to be ably performed by any 

 one person ; by which means I think I shall have done enough to 

 prove the inefficiency of the present system. It has been said that 

 over the British possessions the sun never sets. The mind of the in- 

 dividual entrusted with watching over their destinies should be as all 

 pervading as is that bright luminary in spreading his rays over these 

 extensive regions in every portion of the globe. 



