of Indian corn, wheat, barley, rye, oats, peas, and beans. The cultivation of which might be much extended, if the provinces received due attention and encouragement: indeed, they have become objects highly interesting to the mother country, and are deserving the attention of the legislature; who should direct inquiries to be made as to the nature, soil, and resources of them, the land being generally well adapted for the cultivation of all sorts of grain, and of hemp, flax, and tobacco. On every part of the coast there are fishing banks, of various extent, and in different depths of water, on which cod-fish is found in all seasons, notwithstanding the representations to the contrary. The variety of sea and river fish is great; those taken and cured for exportation are, the cod, herrings, mackarel, the shad, and salmon, which can be procured in any quantities. Fish can be cured, and carried from Newfoundland and the Bay of Fundy to the West Indies at as cheap a rate, and of a superior quality, than most of the fish sent from the United States. Herrings have hitherto been carried to the West Indies from these two provinces at a cheaper rate than from Great Britain *. The Bay of Fundy abounds with seal, the oil of which is preferable to the whale, besides the useful purposes to which its skin is applied. The numerous harbours in this bay are, likewise, accessible at all seasons of the year, and its navigation much more certain and less dangerous, than many other parts of the American coast. . It is not, however, to be expected that the inhabitants of these two provinces will become extensive exporters of grain; the soil, as well as climate, being so much better adapted for other valuable pursuits, to grazing in particular. In all those parts which are called the New England States, it has by experience been found to be the most advantageous occupation; and, long as they have been settled, it is known they still prefer importing from other places the flour and corn they consume, to raising it themselves. For grazing, no part of the United States can exceed these provinces; horses, oxen, sheep †, swine, poultry, and all the various * Appendix, No. 8. p. 190. † By 46 Geo. III. c. xvii. which passed on the 22d March, 1806, wool, the produce of the British plantations in America, is allowed to be imported into the United Kingdom, notwithstanding the roth and 1th William III. c. x. s. 19. until the 25th March, 1809; and accounts of the wool so imported are directed to be made up annually by the commissioners of the customs and revenue, in Great Britain and Ireland, articles under the denomination of live stock, are there raised in the greatest abundance, and sold at the lowest prices in proof of which, it is only necessary to mention, that formerly the inhabitants of Halifax and St. John's were accustomed to import these articles from Boston, and other places; but now, in addition to the large quantities required for home-consumption, his Majesty's navy on the American station, and occasionally that on the West India station, with the King's troops in both provinces, are amply supplied with live stock and fresh provisions, and several thousand barrels of salted beef and pork are annually exported. Numerous saw-mills have been lately erected in various parts of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, and there is every reason to believe, that, with the assistance of Canada for oak staves, they are fully adequate to supply the lumber required in the British West India islands; but of this fact no just estimate can be formed, whilst the relaxations of the navigation and colonial system are persisted in and continued, and whilst so great a proportion of that article, though prepared by British labour, is carried to market in American vessels: yet, if it should appear on investigation that the quantity of lumber prepared in these colonies is not, at present, quite equal to the consumption in the British West India islands, the remainder of the supply may easily be obtained from the United States in British ships, if the trade was revived and again regularly established; and of which no doubt can be entertained, from the offers of the merchants at New York, in 1805, when they apprehended the old system was to be resumed *. It is, however, necessary to state, there is no occasion whatever for sugar to be exported in casks; it may as well be packed in boxes, made of any kind of wood, similar to those used for the same purpose in the foreign Colonies, or be put into bags like the sugar imported from the East Indies and other places. Iron ore + abounds in many places, as well as lime-stone, * Reports of the Board of Trade in 1784 and 1791, and also debates on the American Intercourse Bill in 1806.-See the letters from New York, Jan. 1805, in Lord Sheffield's Strictures, p. 162. Copies of similar letters, it is understood, were delivered to one of the late ministers, at the interview of the merchants and ship-owners on the American Intercourse Bill. † Copper ore, the produce of the British plantations in America, is subjected by the 8th Geo. I. c. xviii. s. 22. to the same regulations as other enumerated commodities of the like nature, and the same has been continued by subsequent statutes to the 29th Sept. 1809, and from thence until the end of the then next session of Parliament. grind-stone, and coal which is to be found in abundance in the eastern and northern parts of the province *. The export of gypsum has been already stated to be an object of great importance, and the carriage of it, if confined to British ships, cannot fail to encourage ship-building in the provinces; to which there is reason to believe the United States must resort for coal in a very few years, as other kinds of fuel have become scarce and dear in the sea-port towns of the eastern provinces of the United States. The country along the shores of the river St. John, extending across the province of New Brunswick more than 200 miles, and other lesser rivers in the same province, abounds with pine trees of various dimensions, suitable for masts, &c. for the navy, more in number and value than are to be found in the King's other provinces in America, that is, in the vicinity of large rivers, for from no other situation can they be conveniently brought to market. From within a few miles of these rivers, the largest masts are drawn on the snow, when from 2 to 3 feet deep, with teams of 20 or more pairs of large oxen, to the banks of the rivers, from whence after the ice is gone, and the rivers are full, and in some places overflown, they are floated to their mouths and exported to Great Britain. In this point of view the province of New Brunswick is more valuable and important to the mother country, than the other provinces. The other products of New Brunswick are similar to those of Nova-Scotia. Its staple commodities are, however, fish, lumber and + salted provisions; of fish there was exported from New Brunswick, in 1806, to Jamaica, 35,000 barrels, besides about 13,000 barrels to the United States, for contraband articles, in addition to which, there was also exported to the West-Indies upwards of 2,000 barrels of beef, besides pork. It also appears in the same year, there was shipped in American vessels, from the islands in the Bay of Passama * Post, Appendix, No. VI. page 102; the memorial from Halifax. + Extract from a letter from Trinidad, dated the 23d of February, 1808, to a merchant in London.-" My last advised the receipt of your favour covering Invoice and Bills of lading of barrels, &c. of beef and pork shipped by the Our market has been lately supplied very abundantly with salt provisions from Nova Scotia, &c.; there is consequently very little prospect of a speedy sale, and as they sell their provisions, so much lover, than provisions from Ireland can be afforded at, I cannot encourage you to repeat your shipment.” quoddy, upwards of five millions feet of pine boards*, which were sawn at the mills on the streams on the British side of the boundary line. The bounty granted in 1806, on fish exported from these colonies to the British West-India islands, was likely to have revived and encouraged the fisheries; but whether from design or from American influence, the views of the British government were that year in some measure frustrated at Jamaica, from the people there, giving the herrings exported from New Brunswick the name of shads, thereby reducing the bounty from 2s. 6d. to 1s. 6d. per barrel. This sort of fish is generally known by the name of herrings, though they are sometimes called alewives (clupea serrata) and are no doubt the fish on which government intended the duty of 2s. 6d. per barrel should be allowed, their object being evidently to encourage the exportation, from the provinces, of such pickled fish as were produced there and used in the British West-India islands. This fish, which the inhabitants denominate herrings and sometimes alewives, is a species peculiarly adapted for the West-India market, being equally nutritious with the herrings from Europe, and possessing a greater degree of firmness, they are capable of being kept longer in warm climates. In such abundance are they to be found, that the quantity cured can only be limited by the insufficient number of hands employed in that business. The full bounty of 2s. 6d. per barrel has since been paid, in consequence of the arrangements which have recently been adopted, to secure it to the British North American colonies, according to the intention of government. The statement of the imports and exports, which was laid before the house of assembly of Jamaica, during their late session, shews how The annual export of lumber from New Brunswick, prior to 1804, exceeded ten millions of feet. See post, appendix, No. 5, p. 100, which is nearly equal to the whole amount of the import of lumber in Jamaica in 1805-6. The Editor regrets he has not been able to ascertain the amount of the export of lumber from Nova Scotia and Canada, it is however believed to be considerable. Account of lumber imported into the island of Jamaica, between the 30th of September, 1805, and the 30th September, 1806. From -British American Colonies United States Ditto Feet 770,709 10,096,031 ,268,629 Ships Total feet 11,135,369. See Yorke's Review, 2 Vol. p. 318. large a proportion of all the pickled and dried fish imported into that island last year was taken from the British colonies in America, and when it is considered that the principal part of those imported in American bottoms, and which are presumed to be American fish, were in reality caught and cured by the British Colonists in North America, there surely cannot be a doubt of their capability to furnish the British WestIndia islands, in conjunction with the mother country, with ample supplies of that necessary and valuable article. It was probably, on this presumption, that in the late order of council the article of fish was added to those of beef, pork, and butter, which constituted the articles excepted and not allowed to be imported in American vessels. The object of including fish in this exception has, however, been entirely frustrated; for it appears by the Jamaica newspapers, that fish is still allowed to be imported into that island in American bottoms. If the subjects of the United States were restricted, in toto, from the carriage of this and other articles in their own vessels, the British colonists would willingly relinquish their claim to the bounty, and then, but not until then, will their resources be duly appreciated and known. From what these two provinces, with Canada, have already done, under circumstances very inauspicious, it may be fairly presumed, they are capable under proper encouragement, of furnishing large and abundant supplies of the articles consumed in the British West-India islands. The danger of a scarcity of this article in the British WestIndia islands, which has been so repeatedly re-echoed by the advocates of the new system, is as absurd, as the misrepresentations+ of the supporters of the intercourse bill, in 1806, The order of council of the 1st July, 1807. + Woodfall's Parliamentary Register, 22d May 1806, p. 485, wherein it is represented a certain noble Earl stated, that "owing to the interruption of the intercourse during the American war, it had been ascertained that about 15,000 negroes had died for want, or from being improperly fed, in the Island of Jamaica alone, in the course of 6 years"!!! See also the newspapers of the 23d of that month. Sir William Young, evidently aware that the clamour raised on this ground was unfounded and not warranted by the fact, observes in his Common Place-book with more prudence" that much distress was alledged, that it had even been said, that a number of negroes in Jamaica to the amount of 15,000 had died of famine, that he mentioned it as a current report, but did not vouch as fact, what he could not authenticate." p. 130, 131.-The truth is, there was not any scarcity, E |