1178 MISCELLANEOUS. 



ment, their condition was extremely sad, and excited deep sympathy. 

 Thousands of persons depended solely upon the hook and line for 

 subsistence, and emigration or starvation were considered the only 

 alternatives. 



The colonists, who rely upon the products of the sea for support, 

 charge the most of then 1 misfortunes to their French and American 

 competitors. They did so in the case before us. Their complaints 

 were groundless, and may be dismissed in perfect good nature. The 

 people who distress them so continually, and whose appearance on 

 their fishing grounds spreads so general consternation, were fellow- 

 sufferers from the ruinous decline of prices of commodities at the 

 general pacification of Europe, and were involved in similar bank- 

 ruptcies. Besides, at the period of commercial disasters at New- 

 foundland, the French and Americans had not recovered from the 

 effects of war, and had not, to a very alarming extent, resumed their 

 adventures upon the coasts or "the banks" of that island. 



The competition between the colonists and the people just men- 

 tioned increased; but the English fishery gradually revived. The an- 

 nual catch is now nearly a million of quintals. There have been sea- 

 sons of fluctuations since the years referred to: depression is an inci- 

 dent in every human employment. Maritime pursuits are more uncer- 

 tain than those of the soil or those of the work-shop. Of the fisheries, 

 particularly, it is entirely true to say that they never have afforded, 

 and never will afford, constant and continuous rewards; for, aside 

 from the losses consequent upon overstocked and glutted markets, the 

 most unwearied industry and the highest degree of skill are often 

 insufficient to insure good fares. Our colonial neighbors should take 

 these matters into the account, and while lamenting their calamities, 

 remember that the American fishermen, whose condition they con- 

 sider so much preferable to their own, are subject to the same reverses, 

 and would gladly surrender many of the privileges they are supposed 

 to enjoy, for the liberty of living near to, and of freely using, the inner 

 or shore fishing grounds, of which they are now deprived, and which 

 are reserved exclusively for British subjects. 



As a branch of industry, we need pursue our inquiries relative to the 

 Newfoundland cod-fishery no further. The table of statistics, com- 

 piled from the best sources of information open to me, and which I 

 think is substantially accurate, may be referred to as affording a gen- 

 eral view of the subject for the last thirty years. The exports are to 

 Portugal, Italy, Spain, Brazil, the British West Indies, the British 

 continental possessions in America, to Great Britain, Ireland, and 

 Scotland. In some of these markets the merchants of Newfoundland 

 have no competitors. As much as they complain of us and of our 

 policy, our ports are open to the importation of their staple com- 

 modity, on terms which are producing alarming changes in the prop- 

 erty and prospects of those of our countrymen whose position on the 

 coast of New England, and whose habits and general circumstances, 

 leave them no choice of employments. 



Newfoundland is connected with some of the most interesting events 

 to be found in our annals. Cabot saw it before Columbus set foot on 

 the American continent. There came the first men of the Saxon race, 

 under the first English charter, to found an English colony. Visitors 

 to, or residents upon its shores, were the noble Gilbert, and Raleigh, 

 the father of colonization in this hemisphere ; Mason and Calvert, the 



