THE THIRD ANGLO-FRENCH DUEL 139 



or likely to impart a single political hue to the place of 

 destination ; not that that mattered much, for in the eighteenth 

 century economics were more to the fore than politics ; but 

 the widening of the base, although it brought no new politic?!, 

 brought many new economic forces into play. The merchants 

 of Poole, Jersey, and Guernsey resided on both sides of the Poole, 

 Atlantic, thereby promoting instead of opposing settlement, 

 ' and it is in the memory of several persons when the trade of 

 St. John's was in the hands of five or six merchants ; ... at 

 present the number of persons who can furnish supplies is so 

 increased that all monopoly is broken and a very active 

 competition is come in its place'. 1 In and after I775 2 the and 

 fetters were struck off Ireland, so far as colonial trade was 

 concerned ; the interest of the westernmost island of Europe 

 in the easternmost island of America was enhanced, and the 

 Irish influx, which produced in 1754 a savage murder by 

 citfzens and soldiers, produced in 1800 a mutiny which 

 might easily have ripened into a rebellion. Intercolonial trade 

 became more free. Canada instead of New England fed j ( ' 

 Newfoundland. Newfoundland artificers helped to defend Wennuda 

 Quebec in 1776; the Royal Newfoundland regiment fought u ac j, s 

 for Canada in the Canadian war (i8i2-i4) 3 ; and Celtic 

 Irish Newfoundlanders began to emigrate to Nova Scotia and . 

 Prince Edward Island, where Celtic Irishmen were hitherto 

 unknown. In 1788 some merchants of Bermuda sent ships 

 with black slaves to the Great Banks, where they fished with 

 success, returning to Newfoundland to cure what they caught. 

 Englishmen as well as Newfoundlanders were alarmed at 

 their skill, prophesied that black would drive out white labour, 

 and procured the enactment of a law, which confined the right 

 to dry and cure fish in Newfoundland to the British who 



1 J. Reeves, Evidence, p. 84. 

 ' 2 Palliser's Act, 15 George III, c. 31, s. 5. 



3 C. P.Lucas, History of Canada, 1763-1812, p. 114 ; The Canadian 

 War of 181 2, passim. 



