334 HISTORY OF THE [book. vl. 
ploying their stock and industry in the way that 
they judge most advantageous to themselves, is a 
manifest violation of the most sacred rights of man¬ 
kind.” To this violation however the West Indian 
planters have hitherto submitted without a murmur, 
considering it as one of the conditions of the com¬ 
pact, or reciprocal monopoly. 
The great hardship on the planters in this case 
is, that the loss to them by the prohibition, is far 
more than proportionate to the gain acquired by 
Great Britain. As this circumstance is not fully 
understood, the subject not having, to my know r - 
ledge, been discussed in any of the publications that 
have treated of colonial commerce, I shall point out 
a few of the many advantages of which the planters 
are deprived by this restriction. 
The first advantage would be an entire saving of 
the loss which is now sustained in the quantity of 
raw sugar, between the time of shipping in the West 
Indies, and the day of sale in Great Britain, arising 
chiefly from unavoidable waste at sea by drainage. 
To ascertain this loss with all possible exactness, I 
have compared, in a great many instances, the in¬ 
voice weights taken at the time of shipping, with 
the sale weights of the same goods in the merchants’ 
books in London; and I will venture to fix the loss, 
on the average of good and bad sugar, at one- 
eighth part: in other words, a hogshead of sugar 
weighing net 16 cwt. when shipped in Jamaica, 
shall, when sold in London, be found to weigh 14 
