142 



conduct the examination, as the agent of the committee of North Amer- 

 ican merchants. Much useful information was ehcited in the course of 

 the inquiries. Mr. Brook Watson was the first witness. He stated 

 that he had been called to the bar of the House in 17G5 and 1766, to 

 give such testimony as he could with regard to the American fisheries ; 

 since which time he had received additional information from his cor- 

 respondents in America, and had actually visited the counlr}^ himself. 

 A considerable part of his statement relates to estimates of vessels and 

 men employed, and the value of the produce of the different branches 

 of the business, which I am compelled to omit. As curious facts to 

 show commercial transactions of the time, we may, however, ol)seive, 

 that he testified that the shipment of brandy from England to Canada 

 had entirely ceased, in consequence of the consumption of rum, made 

 in New England from molasses ; and that, so dependent were the 

 colonies upon the mother country, as to import "everything" they 

 used, 'except salt, and the timber of which tlieir vessels were built." 



The second witness was Stephen Higginson, " from Salem, in the 

 Massachusetts Bay, a merchant." After Mr. Higginson, Mr. John 

 Lane, a New England merchant, and Mr. Seth Jenkins, from the island 

 of Nantucket, were interrogated with great particularity and minute- 

 ness. Their testimony as to the injury to be infiicted upon their coun- 

 try by the passage of the bill, was strong and definite. T^Ir. Jenkins, on 

 being asked how long the people of New England, who subsisted by 

 fishing, could live without employment, replied, '■'■ Perhaps three mdnths.''^ 

 The ministry, I think, from several questions submitted to the wit- 

 nesses, indulged the hope that many fishermen would emigi'ate from 

 the disaffected colonies to the more loyal province of Nova Scotia, and 

 there pursue their avocation. But the answers they received must have 

 convinced them of their mistake. 



On the 6th the consideration of the bill was resumed. 

 Lord Howe insisted upon the necessity of its passage, as the only 

 moderate means of bringing the disobedient provinces to a sense of 

 their duty, without involving the empire in all the horrors of a civil 

 war. 



Mr. Fox was of the opinion that the bill was designed to put an end 

 to all that remained of the legislative authority of Great Britain over 

 America. He was quite satisfied, he said, that it was meant to exas- 

 perate the colonies into open and direct rebellion ; that hitherto, rebel- 

 lion was only asserted ambiguously of one colony, but would now lie- 

 come apparent and universal in all, and thus give an opportunit}'- for 

 drawing the sword and throwing away the scabbard; and that the 

 colonists, deprived of their means of subsistence, and of provisions from 

 other comitries, would have no alternative left them but starvation or 

 rebellion. 



Mr. Jenkinson came to very difTerent conclusions. The fact so 

 strongly stated by Mr. Fox, he remarked, impressed him with the belief 

 that the colonists aimed at independence from the beginning; and he 

 thought the bill to be just in every respect, and even merciful, consider- 

 ing the offences of those who were the objects of it. 



Mr. T. Townsend urged the cruelty and injustice of the measure ; a 

 measure which made no discrimination between innocence and guilt; 



