HISTORY OF EUROPE. 



261 



cured elsewhere. The embargo and 

 the acts which grew out of it ren- 

 dered it necessary to obtain from 

 other sources the articles in ques- 

 tion, and to send through other 

 channels those furnished by our 

 manufacturers. Canada has, in 

 consequence, risen to a degree of 

 importance and prosperity alto- 

 gether unexampled. In 1810, up- 

 wards of 600 sail of ships arrived 

 at Quebec for timber ; and saw- 

 mills every where sprung up, 

 worked by steam engines. Our 

 navy is supplied with her timber ; 

 our West-India islands with her 

 lumber ; large and every year in- 

 creasing quantities of corn, the 

 growth both of the Upper Pro- 

 vince, and of the States bordering 

 upon the Lakes, and the river St. 

 Lawrence supply the deficiency of 

 what had before been obtained 

 from New York, Philadelphia, and 

 the towns situated within the Vir- 

 ginian Cape. On the other hand, 

 we are now the carriers of our 

 own manufactures, to places where 

 thej' had before been sent under 

 the protection of the American 

 flag, and through the lucrative 

 agency of American commission- 

 ers. A very general belief has 

 been sedulously propagated, by 

 those persons who are interested 

 in the trade with the United 

 States, that the failure of their 

 market would inflict a deadly 

 blow on our manufacturing inter- 

 ests. This assertion is specious, 

 and not without some apparent 

 foundation. But, besides that it 

 has been disproved by the event, 

 the contradiction of it is satisfac- 

 torily explained by this circum- 

 stance, that of the whole amount 

 of British manufactures, at any 

 time sent to the United States, 



only a small portion of thera was 

 consumed in that country. By 

 far the largest part was re-export- 

 ed with the accumulated profits of 

 duties, commission, and freight, 

 accruing to the American treasury, 

 merchant, and ship owner. These 

 profits have been willingly, but we 

 must think unwisely, relinquished 

 by America, although it is not for 

 us to quarrel with her policy, 

 since they are thrown by it into 

 British hands. We have the best 

 official authority of the returns of 

 our own custom house, and those 

 of the American treasury, for as- 

 serting, that the British manufac- 

 tures, exported to the island of 

 Jamaica alone, exceed, by one 

 million sterling, the greatest 

 amount of annual exportation that 

 was ever sent to the United States. 

 The loss then of our trade to 

 those states, even if it were not 

 counterbalanced by theacquisition 

 of markets in other quarters, 

 would be reduced to the amount 

 of our manufactures actually con- 

 sumed in them, deducting from 

 that amount always the quantity 

 that must, of necessity, be con- 

 veyed there in spite of all re- 

 strictions and prohibitions whatso- 

 ever. If, then, this loss would not 

 greatly affect the general balance 

 of our trade, still less can it be 

 put in competition with the advan- 

 tage of maintaining unimpaired 

 those principles of general policy 

 which the dignity and the interests 

 of the empire have suggested. 



What effect such an alteration 

 of our usual relation has had, and 

 will continue to have, upon the 

 resources and prosperity of the 

 United States, we may also collect 

 from an authority equally unex- 

 ceptionable, that of the American 



