The Lumber Trade in Neiu England. 119 



for masting grew, had been erected into townships, in order to 

 evade the provisions of the said act, it was enacted that after 

 September 29, 1729, no person or persons within Nova Scotia, 

 New Hampshire, the Province of Maine, Massachusetts Bay, 

 Rhode Island, Providence Plantations, Narragansett County 

 or King's Province, and Connecticut, in New England, or 

 New York and New Jersey in America, or any other provinces, 

 should cut, fell or destroy any white pine trees, except such as 

 were the property of private persons, "notwithstanding the said 

 trees do grow within the limits of any townships laid out, or to 

 be laid out hereafter in any of the said colonies," without license 

 from the Crown. It was further enacted (Section II.) that "no 

 person within the province of Massachusetts Bay should pre- 

 sume to cut or destroy any white pine 24 inches or upwards, 12 

 inches from the ground, not growing within some soil or tract 

 of land the said province granted to some private person before 

 October 7, 1690, without His Majesty's license, on penalty of 

 forfeiture according to 8 Geo. I., c. 12." Here then, at last, we 

 have the ambiguous clause of the charter made clear and the 

 status of the township defined. 



In December, 1729, Colonel Dunbar wrote home that the 

 publication of the new act was having a good efifect on the log- 

 gers, who had since applied to him, in great numbers, to know^ 

 if they might cut trees of any dimensions, because everything 

 was included in the act, without exception.^ But even an act of 

 Parliament was not sufftcient to prevent abuses entirely, for 

 what could not be done legally, was accomplished by evasion 

 and connivance. 



The impossibility of obtaining judgment in the king's favor, 

 in the prosecutions, shows more than anything else the deter- 

 mination of the people to nullify the claim of the Crown, in de- 

 fiance of the king's officers and of Parliament. There is an in- 

 teresting letter from Colonel Dunbar, written in February, 

 1730, which describes the methods of justice pursued in New 

 Hampshire.- It appears that a certain man was convicted for 



iCol. Dunbar to the Board of Trade, B. T. New Eng., Z: 91. 

 2Col. Dunbar to the Board of Trade, B. T. America and West 

 Indies, No. i, fol. 183. 



