ARGUMENT OF SAMUEL, J. ELDER. 1483 



tion and Trinity Bay on the other, the Fortune Bay which came into 

 prominence in connection with the question of bait in 1836 : 



" That this bait business was one which enabled your petitioners to 

 earn considerable money, and that the visits of these American ves- 

 sels resulted in the circulation of considerably larger amounts to the 

 sale of ice, stores, fishing outfits, shipping men, and proving a means 

 of circulating at least $40,000 per year to the people of this district. 



" That two years ago the Government decided upon excluding these 

 American vessels from our waters, in the mistaken belief that by so 

 doing they would injure the American fishermen, whereas they only 

 succeeded in injuring the people of this country. 



" That not alone have the people of this district been injured 

 directly by the suspending of this intercourse with the Americans, 

 but that the people of the northern districts "- 



Which I assume must include the other side of the island 



" have been injured to an equal extent by the American fishing ves- 

 sels which were excluded from this section of the coast, now invading 

 the Labrador waters where our northern fishermen always previously 

 carried on their fishery without interruption. 



" That during the two years this policy has been enforced 50 or 60 

 American vessels fishing on the Grand Banks and in Labrador waters, 

 have brought home to Gloucester larger catches than they secured 

 before." 



And on p. 381 : 



" That these American vessels have been securing large quantities 

 of bait from freezers in Canadian ports, which are stocked with 

 herring taken around Magdalene Islands and Nova Scotia coasts to 

 use for their spring supply." 



That that profit has become very great to the Nova Scotia ports 

 which are under the jurisdiction of Canada, and, finally: 



" That your petitioners believe that the best interests of the people 

 of this district and the Colony in general would be served more by 

 abandoning the present policy and returning to that enforced up to 

 1904. And that your petitioners, therefore, humbly pray that this 

 Legislature in its wisdom will terminate the present policy of hos- 

 tility towards the American fishermen, and return to that under 

 which the people of this district and other districts of the Colony 

 were able to earn food for their families by carrying on legitimate 

 traffic with the Americans, instead of being, as they are now, obliged 

 to emigrate to foreign lands to obtain a livelihood denied them at 

 home." 



I will not take time to read the rest of the petition. I alluded on 

 Tuesday to the fact that Sir Robert Bond attempted to kindle a 

 back-fire on the British Government by communicating this speech 

 of the 12th April against the modus vivendi to at least one British 

 newspaper, and of course the fair assumption is that it was much 

 more generally transmitted. United States Counter-Case Appendix, 



