211 



aod improved, was destined to grow with our growth and strengthen 

 with our strength. 



" The prosecution of these coast and bay fisheries, although it 

 had already become extremely advantageous, had undoubtedly 

 reached, in a very small degree, the extension and importance it 

 was capable of attaining. The unsettled state of the commercial 

 world for the past twenty years, and the more alluring objects of 

 mercantile enterprise which such a state of things evolved, seemed, 

 in point of immediate consideration and attention, to throw these 

 fisheries into the back ground ; but still, until first checked by the 

 system of embargoes and restrictions, and finally stopped by a de- 

 claration of war, they were silently, but rapidly, progressing, and 

 reaching an importance which, though generally unknown to -ur 

 country and its statesmen, had become highly alarming to the go- 

 vernments and more wealthy merchants ol' the provinces, and was 

 beginning to attract the attention and jealousy of the cabinet of 

 Great Britain towards them. 



'-'■ The shores, the creeks, the inlets of the Bay of Fundy, the Bay 

 of Chaleurs, and the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the Straits of Bellisle, 

 and the Coast of Labrador, appear to have been designed by the 

 God of Nature as the great ovarium offish ; — the inexhaustible re- 

 pository of this species of food, not only for the supply of the Ame- 

 rican, but of the European continent. At the proper season, to 

 catch them in endless abundance, little more of effort is needed than 

 to bait the hook and pull the line, and occasionally even this is not 

 necessary. In clear weather, near the shores, myriads are visible 

 and the strand is at times almost literally paved with them. 



*' All this was gradually making itself known to the enterprise 

 and vigilance of the Nev/-England fishermen, and for a {e^w seasons 

 prior to the year 1808, the resort to this employment had become 

 an object of attention, from the Thames, at New-London, to the 

 Schoodic ; and boats and vessels of a small as well as a larger size* 

 were Socking to it from all the intermediate parts of the United 

 States. In the fishing season, at the best places for catching the 

 cod, the New-England fishermen, I am told, on a Sunday, swarmed 

 like flies upon the shores, and that in some of these years, it pro- 

 bably would not make an overestimate to rate the number of vessels 

 employed in this fishery, belonging to the United States, at from 

 1500 to 2000 sail, reckoning a vessel for each trip or voyage, and 

 including the larger boat fishery ; and the number, if the fisheries 

 were continued, would shortly be still further and very greatly ex- 

 tended. 



*' The nursery for seamen, the consequent increase of power, 

 the mine of wealth, the accumulation of capital, (for it has been 

 justly observed, that he who draws a cod fish from the sea, gives a 

 piece of silver to his country,) tli€ effect uj)on the trade and cus- 

 tom of Great Britain, and the corresponding advantages to the 

 United States, of w hich the enlargement of such an intercourse 

 was susceptible, (for the stock of fish appears inexhaustible,} yoci 



