The Rise of Manufactures. 125 



One of two courses was open to the colonists : either to send 

 their goods to the markets of the West Indies or of Europe, 

 where they could sell for cash, and, at least in case of the Dutch, 

 buy manufactures cheaper than in England ;^ and so, by cir- 

 cuitous and skilfully managed voyages, obtain gold and silver 

 to export to Great Britain in payment for what they bought 

 there ; or they must give up foreign luxuries and, by simpli- 

 fying their tastes and style of living, content themselves with 

 homespun linen and woolen clothing, and home-made tools 

 and implements. Either of these courses was sure to meet the 

 disapproval of the home government. 



What happened in England was the inauguration of a con- 

 tradictory system of legislation, by which, on the one hand, 

 inter-colonial and foreign trade was more and more closely re- 

 stricted and manufactures discouraged; while, on the other 

 hand, the colonists were offered a compensation for the loss of 

 foreign markets, by the encouragement of the staples already 

 established in some of the colonies, or by the attempted cre- 

 ation of new staples in the less fortunate provinces, like New 

 England. The need of the government for cheaper naval 

 stores had seemed to statesmen to offer a key for the solution 

 of the problem. If, they reasoned, we can successfully stim- 

 ulate the importation of stores from those colonies that are 

 suited to produce them, and which, at the same time, lack re- 

 turns for the manufactures they buy of us, we shall materially 

 benefit the plantations and by the same means free ourselves 

 from dependence on the northern crowns, which now supply us 

 with those commodities and drain us of our gold and silver. 



What happened in the colonies, was a continuous struggle 

 to make both ends meet. So far as they were permitted, they 

 obtained bullion by a wonderfully involved process of trade 

 with the West Indies, and with Spain, Portugal and France. 

 When the thumb-screws of restriction were applied, they smug- 

 gled or otherwise evaded the law. Even so, their gold and sil- 



^Bolles, "Industrial History of the U. S.," Chapter on "Manufac- 

 tures. "Hutchinson, " History of Massachusetts Bay," Vol. H, p. 438. 



