246 BRITISH AMERICA.

thus interfering with the very boat fishery of the poor men settled along the shore?16

A contraband trade, also, is carried on by the American fishing vessels, along different parts of the coast. The right of entering the harbours of our colonies for wood and water, affords an opportunity for smuggling; at which there is not in the world a people more expert than the Americans. At the Mag- dalen Islands, and in many parts within the Gulf of St Lawrence, at Fox Island, and other parts of Nova Scotia, and along the coasts of New Brunswick, anillicit trade is extensively persevered in. Rum, molasses, French and East India goods, and American manu- factures, are bartered generally for the best fish, and often sold for specie. The French also sell brandy, wine, and French manufactures, for the best fish, to our fishermen. The consequence of this smuggling trade is, not merely the defrauding of his Majesty’s revenue, but the very fish thus sold to the Ameri- cans and French, is legally and honestly due, and ought to be paid, to the British merchant, who, in the first instance, supplies the fishermen with clothes, provisions, salt, and all kinds of fishing tackle. There are, indeed, such a multiplicity of courses pursued to supplant us in these fisheries, particularly by the

* In making these remarks, I do not mean, nor should it be un- derstood, that the American fishermen act in the way I describe, by direction, or immediate countenance, of their government. The fishermen of all countries, as far as I have been able to ascertain, wherever their numbers predominate, conduct themselves towards the weaker party in the most overbearing and wanton manner.