A. D. 1720. 115 



Hereby alfo it was made felony to counterfeit the receipts for fub- 

 fcriptions, and alfo of the dividend warrants of the South-fea company, 

 or any endorfements thereon. 



In the fame famous year 1 720, the Turkey company made a mofl rea- 

 fonable complaint to parliament, againft fome part of the Lnglifh trade 

 to Italy, as then managed by our Italian merchants : an adt was there- 

 for palTed for prohibiting the importation of raw-filk and mohair yarn 

 of the produd or manufadure of Afia from any ports or places in the 

 Straits or Levant feas, except from fuch ports or places as are within the 

 dominions of the grand fignior. [6 Geo. I. c. 14.] It feems our Italian 

 merchants at Leghorn frequently purchafed of the French thofe goods, 

 which they had brought from Turkey, in return for French woollen 

 goods fent to Turkey ; thereby encouraging the French woollen manu- 

 fadure, and difcouraging our own. In this application the Turkey com- 

 pany declared, that they then confifted of 200 members, all of whom 

 traded feparately for themfelves, and bought and fold without limita- 

 tion. 



• We have an authentic view of the ftrengthof the royal navy of Great 

 Britain at this time, 1720, in Secretary Burchet's Naval hiftory, publifli- 

 cd this year, viz. 



7 fliips of - 1 00 guns, 

 13 - - 90 



16 - - 80 



182 fhips, carrying 9,940 guns; 

 excluflve of thofe neceflary for others of lelfer dimenfions ; as fire-lhips, 

 bomb-veflels, ftore-fhips, floops, yachts, hoys, &c. which, he fays, amount- 

 ed to 50 more. We may fafely fubjoin, that fmce then our royal navy 

 is greatly increafed, as well in the bulk and conflrudion, as in their 

 number and ftrength. 



The favourite projed of France, in refpecl to North- America, being 

 to join their colony of Canada to that of Louiliana, and alfo to obtain a 

 port in the Ocean ; they, for thofe ends, began very early after the treaty 

 of Utrecht to extend their limits on that continent ; and though the 

 15th article of that peace had abfolutely excluded them from molefting, 

 or encroaching on, the five Indian nations of the Iroquois, as being 



P 2 



