46 



CIITLI. 



The Port duties, on the other hand, were of 

 an easier nature, relating chiefly to matters of 

 difference between our own countrymen, and re- 

 gulated, to a certain extent, by established writ- 

 ten authorities, which might be referred to. As 

 the number of merchant ships in harbour was ge- 

 nerally considerable, these discussions became 

 very engrossing, and, when superadded to our or- 

 dinary professional avocations, often left us little 

 leisure for attending to the novel scenes of a lo- 

 cal and characteristic nature, daily passing around 

 us. 



It will readily be understood how materially our 

 objects, in the official intercourse above alluded to, 

 were likely to be forwarded by a previous person- 

 al acquaintance with the parties on both sides of 

 the question. For it often happened that both 

 were to blame ; and the only mode of adjustment, 

 therefore, was by compromise, through the instru- 

 mentality of a disinterested third party, the suc- 

 cess of whose interference would evidently depend 

 very much upon his knowledge of the respective 

 characters of the disputants. It was on this ac- 

 count, chiefly, that I wished to have remained 

 4 



