he has already made; I can only say that I think this Province is under very great obligations to him for the large Sums of Money he has paid out here in promoting the cultivation of Hemp and introducing the valuable manufactures of Iron and Pot-Ash.

D. Domestic Manufacturing in New England, 1761 1

Many of the industries which are now carried on in factories and which produce by machinery in large quantities for sale in a market, were at one time carried on within the household by hand methods and for family consumption. The so-called domestic manufactures of the colonies were of this kind, and were widespread, especially in New England and the middle colonies. The English government never objected to domestic production for family use, though it did forbid manufacturing textiles, hats, or iron and steel for sale. Consequently the colonists throughout the entire colonial period carried on these household industries, of which the textile industry was the most important.

They are almost the only one of our colonies which have much of the woollen and linen manufactures. Of the former they have nearly as much as suffices for their own cloathing. It is a close and strong, but a coarse and stubborn sort of cloth. A number of Presbyterians from the North of Ireland, driven thence, as it is said, by the severity of their landlords, from an affinity in religious sentiments chose New-England as their place of refuge. Those people brought with them their skill in the linen manufactures, and meeting with very large encouragement, they exercised it to the great advantage of this colony. At present they make large quantities, and of a very good kind; their principal settlement is in a town, which in compliment to them is called Londonderry. Hats are made in New-England, which, in a clandestine way, find a good vent in all the other colonies. The setting up of these manufactures has been in a great measure a matter necessary to them; for as they have not been properly encouraged in some staple commodity, by which they might communicate with their mother country, while they were cut off from all other resources, they must either have abandoned the country, or have found means of employing their own skill and industry to draw out of it the necessaries of life. The same necessity, together with their convenience for building and manning ships, has made them the carriers for the other colonies.

1 European Settlements in America. By Edmund Burke (London, 1761), II, 174-5.

TRADE

I. TRADE BETWEEN ENGLAND AND BRITISH COLONIES IN AMERICA

An Early View of Colonial Trade, 17291

The difference between the southern and northern colonies in their relation to English trade is clearly indicated in this selection. The tobacco plantations and other southern colonies sent to England staples which she desired for herself or which furnished the basis for a lucrative trade with Europe - "the surest way of enriching this Kingdom." The northern colonies, on the other hand, while they bought largely from England, could send few of their own products in return and were therefore forced to secure the means of payment by trade with other countries, or to manufacture for themselves. Consequently the southern colonies were preferred during the earlier colonial period, when the colonies were regarded chiefly as a source of materials. The writer was a Mercantilist, who believed in the regulation of trade and industry by the government.

CHAP. XV.

TRADE between England and the Tobacco Plantations.

THE Tobacco Plantations take from England their Cloathing, Household Goods, Iron Manufactures of all Sorts, Saddles, Bridles, Brass and Copper Wares, and notwithstanding their dwelling among the Woods, they take their very Turner's Wares, and almost every Thing else that may be called the Manufacture of England: So that indeed it is a very great Number of People that are employed to provide a sufficient Supply of Goods for them.

ENGLAND takes from them not only what Tobacco we consume at Home, but very great Quantities for Re-exportation, which may properly be said to be the surest Way of enriching this Kingdom.

CHAP. XVI.

TRADE between England and Carolina.

CAROLINA lies in as happy a Climate as any in the World, from 32 to 36 Degrees of Northern Latitude. The Soil is generally fertile: The Rice it produces is said to be the best in the World, and no Country affords better Silk than has been brought from thence, though for Want of sufficient Encouragement the Quantity imported is very small. . . . The Rice Trade, since it hath been made an enumerated Commodity, is under great Discouragement; for it can

1 The Trade and Navigation of Great Britain considered: shewing that the surest way for a Nation to increase in Riches, is to prevent the Importation of such Foreign Commodities as may be rais'd at Home. By Joshua Gee (London, 1729), 20-25.

not be sent directly to Portugal and Spain as formerly; and it will not bear the Charge of bringing home and Re-shipping, unless it be at a Time when the Crops in the Milanese and Egypt prove bad. . .

CHAP. XVII.

TRADE between England and Pensilvania.

...

PENSILVANIA within Forty Years has made wonderful Inprovements; they have built a large and regular City, they have cleared great Tracts of Land, and raised very great Quantities of Wheat and other Provisions, and they have by Way of Jamaica beat out a very great Trade for their Corn and Provisions to the Spanish West-Indies; and if this Trade be properly nurs'd up, it may draw the Spanish Coast very much to depend on us for a Supply of Flower, Bisket, &c. which may be of great Advantage to us.

It is already attended with that good Consequence, that it hath supplied them with Gold and Silver, which is frequently brought home by our trading Ships from thence, and has very much enlarged their Demands upon us for Broad-cloth, Kersies, Druggets, Serges, Stuffs, and Manufactures of all Sorts.

THEY supply the Sugar Plantations with Pipes and BarrelStaves, and other Lumber, with Flower, Bisket, Pork, &c. But this is not sufficient for their Cloathing, and therefore are forced to make something by their own Labour and Industry to answer that End.

CHAP. XVIII.

TRADE between England, New-Jersey and New-York.

THE Provinces of New-Jersey and New-York produce much the same with Pensilvania, and their Traffic is much the same; we have what Money they can raise to buy our Manufactures for their Cloathing, and what they further want, they are forced to manufacture for themselves as the aforesaid Colonies do.

CHAP. XIX.

TRADE between England and New-England.

NEW-ENGLAND takes from us all Sorts of Woollen Manufactures, Linnen, Haberdashery, &c. To raise Money to pay for what they take of us, they are forced to visit the Spanish Coasts, where they pick up any commodity they can trade for: They carry Lumber and Provisions to the Sugar Plantations, exchange Provision for Logwood with the Logwood Cutters at Campeachey. They send Pipe and Barrel

Staves and Fish to Spain, Portugal, and the Streights. They send Pitch, Tar and Turpentine to England, with some Skins: But all those Commodities fall very short of purchasing their Cloathing in England; and therefore what other Necessaries they want, they are forced to manufacture for themselves, as the aforementioned Colonies.

II. NEW ENGLAND

A. Commerce of New England, 17481

Owing partly to the sterility of the soil and partly to the colonial policy of the mother country, by which the natural products of the country were denied access to English ports, the energies of New England were diverted from the channels of agriculture to those of commerce. Since this section of the American colonies lay in the same climatic zone as England itself, and therefore produced much the same things, the natural products of New England were for the most part placed among the non-enumerated articles, which could not be sent to England. The residents of New England were forced, consequently, either to find other markets for their goods, or to engage in other industries. In the fisheries, shipbuilding, and the carrying trade they found the most profitable occupations, and with the profits from these were able to purchase large quantities of manufactured goods from England. The following extract gives a brief account of New England commerce, showing the important products.

The goods which are shipped to London from New England are the following: all sorts of fish caught near Newfoundland and elsewhere; train-oil of several sorts; whalebone, tar, pitch, masts, new ships, of which a great number is annually built, a few hides, and sometimes some sorts of wood. The English islands in America, as Jamaica and Barbadoes, get from New England, fish, flesh, butter, cheese, tallow, horses, cattle; all sorts of lumber, such as pails, buckets, and hogsheads; and have returns made in rum, sugar, molasses, and other produces of the country, or in cash, the greatest part of all which they send to London (the money especially) in payment of the goods received from thence; and yet all this is insufficient to pay off the debt.

B. Carrying Trade of New England, 1761 2

In this extract there is emphasized the part which the shipping of New England played in the carrying trade. The profits of New England ship builders and owners 1 Travels into North America. By Peter Kalm (London, 1771). In Pinkerton, Voyages and Travels (London, 1812), XIII, 439.

2 European Settlements in America. By Edmund Burke (London, 1761), II 173-7, passim.

came from the sale of their vessels and also from their use as carriers. Burke justifies this trade on the ground that the profits were ultimately spent for English manufactures, which otherwise could not have been bought.

That we may be enabled to form some judgment of the wealth of this city, [Boston] we must observe that from Christmas 1747, to Christmas 1748, five hundred vessels cleared out from this port only, for a foreign trade; and four hundred and thirty were entered inwards; to say nothing of coasting and fishing vessels, both of which are extremely numerous, and said to be equal in number to the others. Indeed the trade of New-England is great, as it supplies a large quantity of goods from within itself; but it is yet greater, as the people of this country are in a manner the carriers for all the colonies of North America and the West-Indies, and even for some parts of Europe. They may be considered in this respect as the Dutch of America.

The commodities which the country yields are principally masts and yards, for which they contract largely with the royal navy; pitch, tar, and turpentine; staves, lumber, boards; all sorts of provisions, beef, pork, butter and cheese in large quantities; horses and live cattle; Indian corn and pease; cyder, apples, hemp and flax. Their peltry trade is not very considerable. They have a very noble cod fishery upon their coast, which employs a vast number of their people: they are enabled by this to export annually above thirty-two thousand quintals of choice cod fish, to Spain, Italy, and the Mediterranean, and about nineteen thousand quintals of the refuse sort to the West-Indies, as food for the negroes. The quantity of spirits, which they distil in Boston from the molasses they bring in from all parts of the WestIndies, is as surprising as the cheap rate at which they vend it, which is under two shillings a gallon. With this they supply almost all the consumption of our Colonies in North America, the Indian trade. there, the vast demands of their own and the Newfoundland fishery, and in great measure those of the African trade; but they are more famous for the quantity and cheapness, than for the excellency of their rum. . . .

The business of ship-building is one of the most considerable which Boston or the other sea-port towns in New-England carry on. Ships are sometimes built here upon commission; but frequently, the merchants of New England have them constructed upon their own account; and loading them with the produce of the colony, naval stores, fish, and fish-oil principally, they send them out upon a trading voyage to Spain, Portugal, or the Mediterranean; where, having disposed of their cargo, they make what advantage they