230 MISCELLANEOUS 



the French fishermen, and consequently ensure a more extended 

 market for our own catch. 



7. I will now proceed to notice the propositions of Monsieur Bon, 

 which are, that the French Government will recognize settlement, 

 and concede to us a concurrent right of fishery in St. George's Bay. 

 This concurrent right we already claim to possess, but it is little used 

 or recognized our fishing grounds already in use being sufficient, if 

 protected from encroachments, to supply the wants of the markets, 

 especially so long as they are so largely supplied by our Foreign 

 rivals. 



8. In return Monsieur Bon proposes 1st. That the French shall 

 have the right of purchasing and fishing for herring and caplin on 

 the Southern coast, without being subject to any tax or retribution 

 whatever. This concession would be fraught with ruinous results to 

 our fishery, as the power of, in some degree, preventing their procur- 

 ing bait, is the only or principal means of averting the fatal disad- 

 vantages our trade labours under in competing with that of the 

 French, sustained as it is by enormous bounties. 



2nd. That they shall have the right to fish during two months of 

 the year (without curing or drying on shore) on that part of the 

 coast of Labrador between the Isle Vertes and the Isle St. Modeste, 

 both included; that is, to establish as a right what has been one of 

 their most injurious encroachments to guard against which, the 

 colony has this year, at considerable expense, fitted out a protective 

 force, and to the action of which force great importance is attached ; 

 the period of two months to which they offer to confine themselves, 

 being the whole period during which fish is caught on this part of 

 the Labrador Coast. 



3rd. The right to fish at Belle Isle, in the Straits, which they en- 

 joj^ed (according to their assertion) up to 1841, without any demur 

 on the part of Great Britain. 



This assertion may, to some extent, be true, as it is only since the 

 very injurious effects on our trade, of the French bounty-sustained 

 fishery have been severely experienced, that the importance of con- 

 fining that fishery to its own proper limits has been so deeply felt. 



The Belle Isle Fishery is usually very good ; nothing that could be 

 offered us, (except the giving up bounties) would, in the view of 

 those interested in our fisheries, be deemed an equivalent for allowing 

 the French a participation in its benefits. 



9. It is true that when in 1845 some negociation took place be- 

 tween Captain Fabvre on the part of the French Government, and 

 Mr. Thomas, the President of the Chamber of Commerce, and a 

 member of the Executive Council, on our behalf, it was proposed by 

 the latter gentleman that in consideration of the French giving up 

 their right to fish on a part of the Western Coast, they should have 

 an exclusive right on the remaining part on what is termed their 

 Shore, and including Belle Isle; but as I have already stated, the 

 operation of the French bounties has, since that time, been so ruin- 

 ously felt, and the West Coast could be of so little service to us, that 

 it would be considered as no equivalent for such a surrender. 



10. In the foregoing observations I have anticipated Sir A. Per- 

 rier's proposals, the adoption of which, I am compelled to say, would 

 cause deep dissatisfaction in the colony, as the strongest objections 



