chap, iii.] WEST INDIES. 117 
of their own nation, they consider themselves to 
be amenable. 
I am sorry historical justice obliges me to ob¬ 
serve, that the liberal conduct of the British go¬ 
vernment towards these people, after they became 
adopted subjects, did not meet with that grateful 
return from them, which, for the general interests 
of mankind, ought to be religiously manifested on 
such occasions. 
At the commencement of the hopeless and de¬ 
structive war hetween Great Britain and her co¬ 
lonies in North America, the island of Dominica 
was in a flourishing situation. The port of Roseau 
having been declared a free port by act of parlia¬ 
ment, was resorted to by trading vessels from most 
parts of the foreign West Indies, as well as from 
America. The French and Spaniards purchased 
great numbers of negroes there for the supply of 
their settlements, together with vast quantities of 
the merchandize and manufactures of Great Bri¬ 
tain; payment for all which was made chiefly in 
bullion, indigo, and cotton, and completed in 
mules and cattle; articles of prime necessity to the 
planter.* 
* Roseau is still a free-port, but the restrictions and regulations cf 
the late act are so rigid, that foreigners are discouraged from resort¬ 
ing to it, and, since some late seizures, consider the law as a snare 
to invite them to rum. 
