160 



1793* authorized the collectors of the customs to grant vessels duly 

 licensed permits "to touch and traile at any foreign port or plnce," 

 and under such documents to procure salt and other necessary outfits 

 without being subjected to the payment of duties. This act, which is 

 still in force, has proved extremely beneficial to our tisiiing vessels in 

 certain emergencies; but it may be admitted that its privilen'es are 

 liable to be abused. Four years later, the system of allowances to 

 vessels employed in the cod-lishery was revised. Under the law then 

 passed, the smallest class were entitled to draw from the treasury one 

 dollar and sixty cents per ton annually ; and vessels upwards of twenty 

 tons, two dollars and forty cents the ton; while the maximum was 

 increased to two hundred and seventy-two dollars. A second revision 

 occurred in the j^ear 1800, which effected some changes in details, but 

 which provided for the continuance of the rates of allowance then 

 fixed until March, 181 1. 



President Jefferson, in his message to Congress in 1802, spoke of 

 "fb.-tering our fisheries as nurseries of navigation, and for the nurture 

 of man," as among "the land-marks b}"- which we were to be guided in 

 all our proceedings;" and made further allusion to the subject in his 

 annual communication of the following j-caj". His remarks, in the 

 second message, were referred to a commiltee of Congress, M'ho, in their 

 report, said that there was too much reason to believe that both the 

 whale and cod-fisheries had been for some time on the decline, and 

 that it was more than doubtful whether the United States employed as 

 many men and tons in these branches of indusirj'^ as when they were 

 colonies or previous to llie Kevolution. As a means to reanimate them, 

 they recommended that ships and vessels actually and exclusively 

 employed in these fisheries should not, in future, be subject to the pay- 

 ment of" the tonnage duty levied on oiher vessels; that fishermen and 

 other persons actualW employed in catching whales and fish should be 

 exempt from the usual charge of hos[)ital money; and that the bounty 

 or allowance under existing laws should be paid in cases of shipwreck 

 or loss of vessels without deduction. 



A single incident more of the year 1803 claims our notice. One 

 hundred and five inhabitants of Block island, engaged in the cod-fish- 

 ery, joined in a petition to Congress for an allowance or bounty on 

 boats of less than five tons burden. They represented, that fiom the 

 bleak situation of the island which they inhabited, and the hi^h surf 



* The following notice, which was piildished in a Boston newspaper, April, 1794, is inserted 

 as a mattiT of cuiioiis history, rather than to illustrate the text: 



"Salmon-stand. — Great inconvenit ney ari.-ini; from exposinjj; salmon for sale on the Ex- 

 ehan<?e, in State street, where citizens of tlu> town, and those fiom ahroad, assemble to trans- 

 act business, the board of selectmen Kave assijrned a stand therefor in Mark-et square Th«ise 

 who bring salmon for sale from neighboiiii!; towns aie requested to apply to the clerk of the 

 market, at his otHce, north corner of Faneuil Hall, wIjo will point them to the stand. The 

 law against nuisances is sufticient; a wish to accommodate, 'tis hoped, will preclude tlie neces- 

 Bity of coercion. The inspector of jjolice makes this puldication, having in view the prosperity 

 of our country brethren, as well as acconnnodation of the town. He gratefully acknowledges 

 the past kindness of his fellow-citizens, and requests, in this instance, that neither themselves, 

 nor those under them, would purchase salmon in State street, but apply at the stand assigned 

 therefor. 



" N. 15. — The printers in town, and those in Salem, Newbui'yport, and Haverhill are requested 

 to publish the above." 



