FISHERIES. 249

demand for fish in those countries than formerly. In Spain, (probably under French influence,) the duty is equal to from 123. 6d. to 14s. per quintal; in Italy, 25s.; in Portugal and Brazil, 15s. per cwt., valuing the fish at eight milrees per barrel of 128 lbs. But, notwithstanding this circumstance, had we but retained our fishing grounds, we should not have met with such poweiful competitors in the different markets of the wor.ld

Nothing could be more unwise than to allow either the French or Americans to enter the Gulf of St Lawrence; it is a Mediterranean, bounded by our colonies, and those powers had neither right nor pretence to its shores or its fisheries.

By these impolitic concessions, therefore, which we have made to France and to the United States, and, partially, by the operation of some other causes, the value of the British American fisheries is great- ly reduced, and their political consequence equally diminished.

The sh01 e, or boat fisher y, to which the fisher men, particularly in Newfoundland, now confine them- selves, is not, strictly speaking, a nursery for seamen. The bank fishery, in which we are supplanted by the French and Americans, was always a school of hardy training for rearing sailors; and the eight or ten English vessels that now frequent the banks, are not of more value than one of the large French ships.

France has completely succeeded in making her fisheries in our American seas of the utmost political consequence, in answering the great end of training