380 A. D. 1796. 



from that port, caught 125 whales and 12,640 feals, which altogether 

 pi-oduced 1,678 tuns of oil, and 807 tuns of fins or whale-bone. 



Augufl 17 A Dutch fquadron confifting of nine fhips, carrying 



342 guns and 1,972 men, bound to the Cape of Good Hope in order 

 to attempt the recovery of that important iettlement, having put into 

 Saldanha bay, which is about 60 miles to the northward of the Cape 

 town, Admiral Elphinflone, who had got intelligence of them, arrived 

 at the entrance of the bay with feven fhips of the line, one fifty-gun 

 fhip, and feven frigates and floops. The Dutch admiral, feeing no pof- 

 fibility of efcape, the mouth of the bay being only two or three miles 

 broad, was obliged to furrender all his fhips, without any contefl, to 

 the Britifli fleet. And the fettlement of the Cape continued in the pol- 

 fefllon of Great Britain. 



September 5'" The French Admiral Richery landed at the Bay of 



Bulls in Newfoundland, and deftroyed the fifh-flages and other property 

 of the Bridfh fifliermen and fettlers to a confiderable amount, 



September 3'' — A proclamation was iflued, permitting the exportation 

 of all kinds of Britifh and foreign merchandize, except military and 

 naval flores, to the United provinces, the Auftrian Netherlands, or any 

 part of Italy, in veflels belonging to any friendly power. 



The Dutch government, confidering this indulgence as a fcheme for 

 draining their country of its ready money, iflued a counter proclama- 

 tion, in the flrongeft terms enjoining their countrymen not to engage 

 in fuch a trade, and ftriclly prohibiting the entry of Britifh goods in 

 their ports. They alfo required the French republic to adopt a fimilar 

 refolution. But the French, though they had already prohibited the 

 importation of Britifh manufactures, finding it convenient to wink at a 

 clandefline importation of them, were unwilling to follow the example 

 of their allies in enforcing a flricl adherence to a line of condud', wdrich, 

 it is faid, they themfelves recommended to them. At lafl, on the Dutch 

 threatening to withdraw their prohibition, the French government not 

 only prohibited the importation of Britifh merchandize, but alio order- 

 ed, that all Britifh goods, which were already in the country, fliould be 

 exported, and that all perfons attempting to evade the prohibition fhould 

 be ftigmatized in the public papers as brokers of Englmid, and dejlroyers 

 of French indtftry (November 2"*). 



In the courfe of this feafon the French had been enabled to detach 

 from the alliance, formed againft them, the king of Sardinia, the dukes 

 of Parma and Modena, the pope, the king of Naples, and all the other 

 princes and flates of Italy, and fome of thofe of Germany. They fti- 

 pulated with the king of Pruflia a line of demarcation in Germany, 

 beyond which the armies of France fhould not extend the operations of 

 war,- provided the ftates thereby exempted from their hoftilities recalled 

 their troops from the armies allied agaijift them, fumiflied no pecuniary 



