176 APPENDIX TO BRITISH COUNTER CASE. 



future war. I showed them the indispensable necessity of both to 

 our affairs, and that no treaty we could make, which should be unsat- 

 isfactory to our people upon these points, could be observed ; that the 

 population near the Mississippi would be so rapid, and the necessities 

 of the people for its navigation so pressing, that nothing could re- 

 strain them from going down, and if the force of arms should be 

 necessary, it would not be wanting; that the fishery entered into our 

 distilleries, our coasting trade, our trade with the Southern States, 

 with the West India Islands, with the coast of Africa, and with every 

 part of Europe, in such a manner, and especially w y ith England, that 

 it could not be taken from us, or granted us stingily, without tearing 

 and rending ; that the other States had staples ; we had none but fish ; 

 no other means of remittances to London, or paying those very debts 

 they had insisted upon so seriously; that if we were forced off at 

 three leagues distance we should smuggle eternally; that their men- 

 of-war might have the glory of sinking now and then a fishing 

 schooner, but this would not prevent a repetition of the crime; it 

 would only inflame and irritate and enkindle a new war; that in 

 seven years we should break through all restraints and conquer from 

 them the island of Newfoundland itself, and Nova Scotia too. 



Mr. Fitzherbert always smiled, and said it was very extraordinary 

 that the British ministry and we should see it in so different a light: 

 that they meant the restriction, in order to prevent disputes and kill 

 the seeds of war, and we should think it so certain a source of dis- 

 putes, and so strong a seed of war; but that our reasons were such, 

 that he thought the probability of our side. 



I have not time to minute the conversations about the sea-cow 

 fishery, the whale fishery, the Magdalen Islands, the Labrador coasts, 

 and the coasts of Nova Scotia; it is sufficient to say, they were ex- 

 plained to the utmost of our knowledge, and finally conceded. 



I should have noted before, the various deliberations between the 

 English gentlemen and us, relative to the words "indefinite and 

 exclusive " right, which the Count de Vergennes and M. Gerard had 

 the precaution to insert in our treaty with France. I observed often 

 to the English gentlemen, that aiming at excluding us from fishing 

 upon the north side of Newfoundland, it was natural for them to 

 wish that the English would exclude us from the south side; this 

 would be making both alike, and take away an odious distinction; 

 French statesmen must see the tendency of our fishermen being treated 

 kindly and hospitably like friends, by the English on their side of 

 the island, and unkindly, inhospitably, and like enemies, on the 

 French side. I added, further, that it was my opinion, neither our 

 treaty with the French, nor any treaty or cause to the same purpose, 

 which the English could make, would-be punctually observed; fisher- 

 men, both from England and America, would smuggle, especially the 

 Americans in the early part of the spring before the Europeans could 

 arrive; this, therefore, must be connived at by the French, or odious 

 measures must be recurred to by them or us to suppress it, and, in 

 either case, it was easy to see what would be the effect upon the 

 American mind; they, no doubt, therefore, wished the English to 

 put themselves upon as odious a footing, at least, as they had done. 



Dr. Franklin said, that there was a great deal of weight in this 

 observation, and the Englishmen showed plainly enough that they 



felt it. 



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