44* A. D. 1766. 



with the council, by wliich, and fomc unconftitutional proceedings, 

 they compelled the governor to difTolve them on the 2ifl of May. 



Dominica, St. Vincents, and Tobag^o, not being fo well advanced in 

 population and culture, retained ftill their original temporary form of 

 government, admaiifleredby a lieutenant-governor and a council in each 

 ifland, Subordinate to the governor-general of Grenada and the other 

 ceded iflands. 



If we turn our eyes to the continent of America, we there fee much 

 turbulence and confufion, the confequence of a general diipofition to 

 difown the fupremacy of Great Britain. But the country felt little or 

 no diftrefs : the warehoufcs of the merchants were full of goods, for 

 which no payment was made, and for vv'hich, confidering the condition 

 the country then was in with refpe6t to money, from the luppreffion of 

 thofe branches of trade, which uled to fupply the means of making re- • 

 mittances in cafh or bills of exchange, very little payment could be 

 made. It is true, that, when thofe goods were coniumed, no more 

 would come to replace them, at leafl not in the fame channel of trade ; 

 but that was no great inconvenience in a country, which produces with- 

 in itfelf every real neceflary, with a large (hare of the comforts of life, 

 and among a people, vying with each other, not in the oftentation of ex- 

 travagance and the confamption of foreign vanities, but in the oflenta- 

 tion of parfimony and the pride of encouraging their own infant ma- 

 nufactures. But no petitions againfl: the llamp ad were forwarded this 

 year from any of the continental colonies * exc pt Virginia and Georgia, 

 the others having apparently determined to defifl fi om fuch applications, 

 in confequence of the ill fuccefs of their former ones. 



In the meantime the efFe(n:s of the American non-importation were 

 fenfibly felt in every part of Great Britain. The merchants connedled 

 with America found themfelves unable to fulfill their engagements by 

 the ftoppage of the payment of feveral millions due to them from their 

 American correfpondents ; the whole fyflem of their bufinefs was de- 

 ranged, and general diftrefs was difFufed throughout the wide-lpreuding 

 circle of their connedions ; the manufacturers fuflered by the want of 

 regular payments from the merchants, and moreover found their ma- 

 terials and made-up goods in a great meafure become a dead flock upon 

 their hands; in confequence of which great numbers of theirvvorkmen 

 and other dependents were reduced to idlenefs and want of bread, at a 

 time, when, to heighten the diftrefs, provifions were extravagantly dear. 

 Petitions were prefented from London, Liverpool, Briftol, Lancafter, 

 Hull, Glafgow, and, in a word, from all the trading and manufacturing 

 towns, wherein were difplayed in the ftrongeft colours the advantages 

 derived from the trade with America in the vaft, aird increafing conlump- 



* Tlsat it tj fay, in thi.ir corporate capacity : alfi> fciit home from Ja.raica (and, I believe, from 

 bm a mc iiiorMl.. 01 p :i''on, 'vas .v;nt licme fign-d no o:hcr of the Weil-LiJu illanUs^ againil tlic 

 by 280 merctia..u of Pliilailclpliia. A petition was fxanf^t aft. 



I 



