CHAP. XXXV. THE RECIPROCITY TREATY. 245 



mensurate with their importance. The great fishing 

 interests have been grievously sacrificed to others 

 of less moment, and far more able to expand and 

 grow indefinitely without legislative assistance. The 

 following paragraph from the Eeciprocity Treaty will 

 show how completely the British American fisheries 

 have been placed at the mercy of the energetic 

 and industrious New-Englanders. The fact cannot be 

 concealed, however, that the French Canadians — who 

 ought, from the remarkable facilities they possess, to hold 

 the Gulf fisheries (in common with their fellow-colonists of 

 Newfoundland, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia) almost 

 exclusively in their grasp — are elbowed here and there 

 by their more active Yankee competitors, and see the 

 rich treasures of their seas snatched from the threshold 

 of their homes with scarcely an effort to seize a tithe of 

 the prize which might be their own. 



It is agreed by the High Contracting Parties, that in addition 

 to the liberty secured to the United States fishermen by the 

 above-mentioned Convention of October 20, 1818, of taking, 

 curing, and drying fish on certain coasts of the British North 

 American Colonies therein defined, the inhabitants of the United 

 States shall have, in common with the subjects of Her Britannic 

 Majesty, the liberty to take fish of every kind, except shell-fish, 

 on the sea-coasts and shores, and in the bays, harbours, and 

 creeks of Canada, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward's 

 Island, and of the several islands thereunto adjacent, without 

 being restricted to any distance from the shore ; with permission 

 to land upon the coasts and shores of those colonies and the 

 islands thereof, and also upon the Magdalen Islands, for the 

 purpose of drying their nets and curing their fish : provided 

 that in so doing they do not interfere with the rights of private 

 property or British fishermen in the peaceable use of any part 

 of the said coast in their occupancy for the same purpose. 



