INTRODUCTION 



7 



sioners. With this admitted claim, the Colonists could 

 not doubt, that in the event of no further remuneration in 

 money being awarded to them, they would enjoy the 

 operation of such fiscal enactments, as would at least be 

 equal in value to their acknowledged claim. If it had 

 been believed at that time, that the present course would 

 ever be adopted, or that so sweeping and sudden a change 

 would ever take place, the Colonists would not have been 

 lulled into a state of false security, and the value of 

 property would not have been kept up at a false standard. 

 Many persons who are now ruined by having invested 

 their capital in West Indian property, would never have 

 embarked in a speculation w T hich would have been deemed 

 too hazardous to be prudent, even at a much lower value : 

 and those who had no alternative would have began gra- 

 dually to take such steps, as circumstances rendered 

 necessary, to reduce the cost of production by every 

 contrivance which skill, sharpened by necessity, could 

 suggest. 



The question of free trade generally, has been too much 

 mixed and associated with that of the Colonies, and most 

 persons seem to confound them with one another, and con- 

 sider that the protectionist party in this country, and the 

 West India body, are one and the same. There exists, 

 however, a wide distinction. The latter demand not one 

 particular policy or another ; they ask only for the fulfil- 

 ment of the promises made to them, to which this country 

 was solemnly pledged, and which they must obtain before 



