45 8 A. D. 1798. 



venting^ plunder, to which there belong, befides the fuperintendant and 

 clerks, 80 fvvorn mafter lumpers, and 820 regiftered working lumpers, 

 to be employed in unloading veflels on the application of the owners at 

 the office ; 



and 4) a general department for the accounts, 8cc. under the diredion 

 of the magillrates. 



To thefe may be added 220 fliip-conftables, paid by the veflels on 

 which they are employed, inftead of the former inefficient watchmen ; 

 and the lumpers, who come in place of the former uncontrouled ones, 

 being alio paid by the veflels, neither of thefe clafles conftitute any 

 new charge upon the trade or upon the public. 



The whole efl;ablifliment con{ifl;s of i ,200 people, whofe vigilance is 

 oppoled to the formidable army of depredators, efl:imated by Mr. 

 Colquhoun to be about 1 1,000 of all defcriptions, inured to habits of 

 depravity, and long exercifed in all the arts of villainy. 



Though this eftablifliment is yet in its infancy, it has been aflionifh- 

 ingly efficient in breaking down that formidable confpiracy, which for 

 half a century has waged dayly and nightly war with impunity againfl 

 the prodigious mafs of property conftantly in motion upon the river : 

 and it has been conducted with the mofl; benevolent intentions to the 

 offenders themfelves, the objed: being to render punifliment unnecef- 

 fary by depriving them of the opportunity of committing crimes. In 

 the Wefl;-India trade, which has hitherto chiefly benefited by it, the 

 faving to the planters and merchants in fugar, rum, coffee, cotton, and 

 other produce, mufl; have been above ^^i 00,000 a-year, befides the fav- 

 ing to the fhip-owners of the freight, and to the revenue of all the 

 duties, to the amount of about ^"50,000 a-year, upon the quantity of 

 goods which ufed to be ftolen : and there is good reafon to believe, that 

 the plunder of Weft-India produce on the river from July 1798 to 

 March 1799 did not amount to one fiftieth part of what it ufed to be in 

 former years. But the preventive powers of the eftablifliment have not 

 been entirely confined to the hoft of plunderers, againft whom they 

 were originally direded ; they have alfo, beyond expedation, extended 

 to the fmugglers, who have openly declared, ' that their trade has been 

 ' 7nore cut up by the marine police than by the ivhole combined efforts of the 

 ' revenue officers.^ And thus does the revenue reap a double advantage 

 by an inftitution, which has coft the government only ;£2,35o a-year. 



Strange as it may appear, fome owners of veflels have negleded to 

 avail themfelves of the protedion offered by the marine police to their 

 property, not only in their freights, but alfo in the rigging and ftores 

 of their veflels. The magiftrates of the police, neverthekfs, ordered 

 their officers, when patroling the river, to watch the unproreded veffels 

 and fearch the lumpers employed on them, in confequence of which 

 near two hundred were imprifoned or fined for petty offences, and four- 

 een were put upon trials for higher crimes. 



