of Leeds, Halifax, and Newberry,[416] petition the House of Commons "that
by some means the woollen manufacture may be prevented from being set up
in foreign countries;" and the Commons, in their address, mention the
keeping it as much as possible _entire_ to themselves. But experience has
proved the vanity of those expectations; several other countries cultivate
this trade with success. France now undersells her. England has lost some
of those markets, and it is thought probable that Ireland, if admitted to
them, might have preserved and may now recover the trade that England has
lost.
A perseverance in this restrictive policy will be ruinous to the trade of
Great Britain. Whatever may be the state of America, great numbers of the
inhabitants of Ireland, if the circumstances of this country shall
continue to be the same as at present in respect of trade, will emigrate
there; this will give strength to that part of the empire on which Great
Britain can least, and take it from that part on which at present she may
most securely depend. But this is not all the mischief; those emigrants
will be mostly manufacturers, and will transfer to America the woollen and
linen manufactures, to the great prejudice of those trades in England,
Scotland, and Ireland; and then one of the means used to keep the colonies
dependent by introducing this country into a system of colonisation, will
be the occasion of lessening, if not dissolving, the connection between
them and their parent State.
Great Britain, weakened in her extremities, should fortify the heart of
her empire; Great Britain, with powerful foreign enemies united in lasting
bonds against her, and with scarcely any foreign alliance to sustain her,
should exert every possible effort to strengthen herself at home. The
number of people in Ireland have more than doubled in fourscore years. How
much more rapid would be the increase if the growth of the human race was
cherished by finding sufficient employment and food for this prolific
nation! it would probably double again in half a century. What a vast
accession of strength such numbers of brave and active men, living almost
within the sound of a trumpet, must bring to Great Britain, now said to be
decreasing considerably in population!--a greater certainty than double
those numbers dispersed in distant parts of the globe, the expense of
defending and governing of which must at all times be great. Sir W.
Temple,[417] in 1673, takes notice of the circumstances prejudicial to the
trade and riches of Ireland, which had hitherto, he says, made it of more
loss than value to England. They have already been mentioned. The course
of time has removed some of them, and the wisdom and philanthropy of
Britain may remove the rest. "Without these circumstances (says that
honest and able statesman), the native fertility of the soils and seas, in
so many rich commodities, improved by multitudes of people and industry,
with the advantage of so many excellent havens, and a situation so
commodious for all sorts of foreign trade, must needs have rendered this
kingdom one of the richest in Europe, and made a mighty increase both of
strength and revenue to the crown of England."[418]
During this century, Ireland has been, without exaggeration, a mine of
wealth to England, far beyond what any calculation has yet made it. When
poor and thinly inhabited she was an expense and a burden to England; when
she had acquired some proportion of riches and grew more numerous, she was
one of the principal sources of her wealth. When she becomes poor again,
those advantages are greatly diminished. The exports from Great Britain to
Ireland, in 1778,[419] were less than the medium value of the four
preceding years in a sum of L634,444 3_s._ 0_d_; and in the year 1779,
Great Britain is obliged, partly at her own expense, to defend this
country, and for that purpose has generously bestowed out of her own
exchequer a large sum of money. Those facts demonstrate that the poverty
of Ireland ever has been a drain, and her riches an influx of wealth to
England, to which the greater part of it will ever flow, and it imports
not to that country through what channel; but the source must be cleared
from obstructions, or the stream cannot continue to flow.
Such a liberal system would increase the wealth of this kingdom by means
that would strengthen the hands of government, and promote the happiness
of the people. Ireland would be then able to contribute largely to the
support of the British Empire, not only from the increase of her wealth,
but from the more equal distribution of it into a greater number of hands
among the various orders of the community. The present inability of
Ireland arises principally from this circumstance, that her lower and
middle classes have little or no property, and are not able, to any
considerable amount, either to pay taxes or consume those commodities that
are the usual subjects of them; and this has been the consequence of the
laws which prevent trade and discourage manufactures. The same quantity of
property distributed through the different classes of the people would
supply resources much superior to those which can be found in the present
state of Ireland.[420] The increase of people there under its present
restraints makes but a small addition to the resources of the State in
respect of taxes.[421] In 1685, the amount of the inland excise in Ireland
was L75,169. In 1762, it increased only to L92,842. Those years are taken
as periods of a considerable degree of prosperity in Ireland. The people
had increased, from 1685 to 1762, in a proportion of nearly 7 to 4,[422]
which appears from this circumstance, that in 1685 hearth-money amounted
to L32,659, and in 1762 to L56,611. At the former period the law made to
restrain and discourage the principal trade and manufacture of Ireland had
not been made. There were then vast numbers of sheep in Ireland, and the
woollen manufacture was probably in a flourishing state. At the former of
those periods the lower classes of the people were able to consume
excisable commodities; in the latter they lived for the most part on the
immediate produce of the soil. The numbers of people in a state, like
those of a private family, if the individuals have the means of acquiring,
add to the wealth, and if they have not those means, to the poverty of the
community. Population is not always a proof of the prosperity of a nation;
the people may be very numerous and very poor and wretched. A temperate
climate, fruitful soil, bays and rivers well stocked with fish, the habits
of life among the lower classes, and a long peace, are sufficient to
increase the numbers of people: these are the true wealth of every state
that has wisdom to encourage the industry of its inhabitants, and a
country which supplies in abundance the materials for that industry. If
the state or the family should discourage industry, and not allow one of
the family to work, because another is of the same trade, the consequences
to the great or the little community must be equally fatal.
Is there not business enough in this great world for the people of two
adjoining islands, without depressing the inhabitants of one of them? Let
the magnanimity and philanthropy of Great Britain address her poor sister
kingdom in the same language which the good-natured Uncle Toby uses to the
fly in setting it at liberty:--"Poor fly; there's room enough for thee and
me."
I have the honour to be,
My Lord, &c.
Ninth Letter.
_Dublin, 10th Sept., 1779._
MY LORD,
Besides those already mentioned, various other commercial restraints and
prohibitions give the British trader and manufacturer many great and
important advantages over the Irish. Whilst our markets are at all times
open to all their productions and manufactures, with inconsiderable duties
on the import, their markets are open or shut against us as suits their
conveniency. On several articles of the first importance, and on almost
all our own manufactures imported into Great Britain, duties are imposed
equal to a prohibition. In the instance of woollen goods, theirs in our
ports pay but a small duty; ours in their ports are loaded with
duties[423] which amount to a prohibition.[424] Theirs on the exportation
are subject to no duty; ours, if permitted to be exported, would, as the
law now stands, be subject to a duty[425] over and above that payable for
alnage and for the alnager's fee. If the Act of 1699 was repealed, the
English would still have many great advantages over us in the woollen
trade.
In our staple manufacture, the bounties given on the exportation of white
and brown Irish linen from Great Britain would still continue that trade
in the hands of the British merchant. On all coloured linens a duty[426]
equal to a prohibition is imposed on the importation into Great Britain;
but theirs, imported to us, are subject[427] to ten per cent., and under
that duty they have imported considerably. This inequality of duty, and
the bounty given by the British Act of the tenth of Geo. III., on the
exportation of their chequered and striped linens from Great Britain,
secures to them the continuance of the great superiority which they have
acquired over us in those very valuable branches of this trade. In many
other articles they have given themselves great advantages. Beer they
export to us in such quantities as almost to ruin our brewery; but they
prevent our exportation to them by duties, laid on the import there, equal
to a prohibition. Of malt they make large exports to us, to the prejudice
of our agriculture, but have absolutely prohibited our exportation of that
commodity to them. Some manufactures they retain solely to themselves,
which we are prohibited from exporting, and cannot import from any country
but Great Britain, as glass of all kinds. Hops they do not allow us to
import from any other place, and in a facetious style of interdiction,
pronounce such importation to be a common nuisance.[428] They go further,
and by laying a duty on the export, and denying the draw-back, oblige the
Irish consumer to pay a tax appropriated, it is said, to the payment of a
British debt. I shall make no political, but the subject requires a
commercial observation--it is this: the man who keeps a market solely to
himself, in exclusion of all others, whether he appears as buyer[429] or
seller, fixes his own price, and becomes the arbiter of the profit and
loss of every customer.
The various manufactures[430] made or mixed with cotton are subject, by
several British Acts, to duties on the importation amounting to 25 per
cent.
By another Act, penalties[431] are imposed on wearing any of those
manufactures in Great Britain, unless made in that country. Those laws
have effectually excluded the Irish manufactures, in all those branches,
from the British markets; and it has been already shown that they cannot
be sent to the American. From Great Britain into Ireland all those
articles are imported in immense quantities, being subject here to duties
amounting to 10 per cent. only.
But it would be tedious to descend into a further detail, and disgusting
to write a book of rates instead of a letter.[432]
Their superior capitals and expertness give them decisive advantages in
every species of trade and manufacture. By the extension of the commerce
of Ireland, Great Britain would acquire new and important advantages, not
only by the wealth it would bring to that country, and the increase of
strength to the empire, but by opening to the British merchant new sources
of trade from Ireland.
It is time to draw to a conclusion. I have reviewed my letters to your
lordship, for the purpose of avoiding every possible occasion of offence.
I flatter myself every reader will discern that they have been written
with upright and friendly intentions, not to excite jealousies, but to
remove prejudices, to moderate, and conciliate; and that they are intended
as an appeal, not to the passions of the multitude, but to the wisdom,
justice, and generosity of Britain. Shakespeare could place a tongue in
every wound of Caesar; but Antony meant to inflame; and the only purpose of
those letters is to persuade. I have, therefore, not even removed the
mantle except where necessity required it.
In extraordinary cases where the facts are stronger than the voice of the
pleader, it is not unusual to allow the client to speak for himself. Will
you, my lord, one of the leading advocates for Ireland, allow her to
address her elder sister, and to state her own case; not in the strains
of passion or resentment, nor in the tone of remonstrance, but with a
modest enumeration of unexaggerated facts in pathetic simplicity. She will
tell her, with a countenance full of affection and tenderness, "I have
received from you invaluable gifts--the law of[433] common right, your
great charter, and the fundamentals of your constitution. The temple of
liberty in your country has been frequently fortified, improved, and
embellished; mine, erected many centuries since the perfect model of your
own, you will not suffer me to strengthen, secure, or repair; firm and
well-cemented as it is, it must moulder under the hand of Time for want of
that attention which is due to the venerable fabric.[434] We are connected
by the strongest ties of natural affection, common security, and a long
interchange of the kindest offices on both sides. But for more than a
century you have, in some instances, mistaken our mutual interest. I sent
you my herds and my flocks, filled your people with abundance, and gave
them leisure to attend to more profitable pursuits than the humble
employment of shepherds and of herdsmen. But you rejected my produce,[435]
and reprobated this intercourse in terms the most opprobrious. I
submitted; the temporary loss was mine, but the perpetual prejudice your
own. I incited my children to industry, and gave them my principal
materials to manufacture. Their honest labours were attended with moderate
success, but sufficient to awaken the commercial jealousy of some of your
sons; indulging their groundless apprehensions, you desired my materials,
and discouraged the industry of my people. I complied with your wishes,
and gave to your children the bread of my own; but the enemies of our race
were the gainers. They applied themselves with tenfold increase to those
pursuits which were restrained in my people, who would have added to the
wealth and strength of your empire what, by this fatal error, you
transferred to foreign nations. You held out another object to me with
promises of the utmost encouragement. I wanted the means, but I obtained
them from other countries, and have long cultivated, at great expense, and
with the most unremitted efforts, that species of industry which you
recommended. You soon united with another great family, engaged in the
same pursuit, which you were also obliged to encourage among them, and
afterwards embarked in it yourself, and became my rival in that which you
had destined for my principal support. This support is now become
inadequate to the increased number of my offspring, many of whom want the
means of subsistence. My ports are ever hospitably open for your
reception, and shut, whenever your interest requires it, against all
others; but yours are, in many instances, barred against me. With your
dominions in Asia, Africa, and America my sons were long deprived of all
beneficial intercourse, and yet to those colonies I transported my
treasures for the payment of your armies, and in a war waged for their
defence one hundred thousand of my sons fought by your side.[436] Conquest
attended our arms. You gained a great increase of empire and of commerce,
and my people a further extension of restraints and prohibitions.[437] In
those efforts I have exhausted my strength, mortgaged my territories, and
am now sinking under the pressure of enormous debts, contracted from my
zealous attachment to your interests, to the extension of your empire, and
the increase of your glory. By the present unhappy war for the recovery of
those colonies, from which they were long excluded, my children are
reduced to the lowest ebb of poverty and distress. It is true you have
lately, with the kindest intentions, allowed me an extensive liberty of
selling to the inhabitants of those parts of your empire; but they have no
inducement to buy, because I cannot take their produce in return. Your
liberality has opened a new fountain, but your caution will not suffer me
to draw from it. The stream of commerce intended to refresh the exhausted
strength of my children flies untasted from their parched lips.
"The common parent of all has been equally beneficent to us both. We both
possess in great abundance the means of industry and happiness. My fields
are not less fertile nor my harbours less numerous than yours. My sons are
not less renowned than your own for valour, justice, and generosity. Many
of them are your descendants, and have some of your best blood in their
veins. But the narrow policy of man has counteracted the instincts and the
bounties of nature. In the midst of those fertile fields some of my
children perish before my eyes for want of food, and others fly for
refuge to hostile nations.
Suffer no longer, respected sister, the narrow jealousy of commerce to
mislead the wisdom and to impair the strength of your state. Increase my
resources, they shall be yours, my riches and strength, my poverty and
weakness will become your own. What a triumph to our enemies, and what an
affliction to me, in the present distracted circumstances of the empire,
to see my people reduced by the necessity of avoiding famine, to the
resolution of trafficing almost solely with themselves! Great and powerful
enemies are combined against you; many of your distant connections have
deserted you. Increase your strength at home, open and extend the numerous
resources of my country, of which you have not hitherto availed yourself,
or allowed me the benefit. Our increased force, and the full exertions of
our strength, will be the most effectual means of resisting the
combination formed against you by foreign enemies and distant subjects,
and of giving new lustre to our crowns, and happiness and contentment to
our people."
APPENDIX.--No. I.
Quantity of Wool, Woollen, and Worsted Yarn exported from Ireland to Great
Britain in the following years:--
+-------------------------------------------------------+
| Years | WOOL. | YARN. |
| Ending |-------------|------------------------------|
| the 25th | | _Woollen._ | _Worsted._ |
| of March.| stones. lbs.| stones. lbs.| stones. lbs.|
|----------|-------------|---------------|--------------|
| 1764 | 10,128 6 | 9,991 14 | 139,412 12 |
| 1795 | 17,316 0 | 13,450 12 | 149,915 9 |
| 1766 | 21,722 13 | 7,980 0 | 152,122 0 |
| 1767 | 48,733 8 | 7,553 0 | 151,940 9 |
| 1768 | 28,521 11 | 11,387 6 | 157,721 3 |
| 1769 | 3,840 16 | 5,012 0 | 131,365 2 |
| 1770 | 2,578 0 | 3,833 0 | 117,735 9 |
| 1771 | 2,118 5 | 4,868 2 | 139,378 14 |
| 1772 | 2,045 6 | 5,947 0 | 115,904 4 |
| 1773 | 1,839 2 | -- | 94,098 10 |
| 1774 | 1,007 11 | -- | 63,920 10 |
| 1775 | 2,007 13 | -- | 78,896 14 |
| 1776 | 1,059 15 | -- | 86,527 0 |
| 1777 | 1,734 7 | -- | 114,703 2 |
| 1778 | 1,665 12 | -- | 122,755 15 |
+-------------------------------------------------------+
APPENDIX.--No. II.
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Years| DRAPERY. | LINEN COTTON. |
|ending|----------------------------------------------|----------------|
| the | | | Silk, mixed |
| 25th | New. | Old. | manufacture. |
| of |------------------------|---------------------|----------------|
|March.|Quantity. Value. |Quantity. Value. | Value. |
|------|------------------------|---------------------|----------------|
| | | L s. d. | | L s. d.| L s. d. |
| 1769 |394,553|49,319 3 9 |207,117|144,982 8 6|13,402 10 7 |
| 1770 |462,499|57,812 7 6 |249,666|174,766 14 6|20,907 18 2-1/2|
| 1771 |362,096|45,262 0 0 |217,395|152,176 10 0|20,282 5 8 |
| 1772 |314,703|39,337 18 9 |153,566|107,496 4 0|14,081 15 6-1/2|
| 1773 |387,143|48,392 17 6 |200,065|147,045 13 6|20,472 7 3-1/2|
| 1774 |461,407|57,675 17 6 |282,317|197,621 18 0|21,611 10 3-1/4|
| 1775 |465,611|58,201 9 4-1/2|281,379|196,965 13 0|24,234 16 9-1/2|
| 1776 |676,485|84,560 12 6 |290,215|203,150 10 0|30,371 16 8-1/2|
| 1777 |731,819|91,477 8 9 |381,330|266,931 0 0|45,411 3 7 |
| 1778 |741,426|92,678 6 3 |378,077|264,653 18 0|52,675 1 11 |
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
APPENDIX.--No. III.
An account of the Quantity of Linen Cloth exported out of Ireland to Great
Britain and Plantations, prior to the year 1743.
+-----------------------------------------------+
| Years | Linen Cloth exported to |
| Ending | Great Britain. Plantations. |
|the 25th |-------------------------------------|
|of March.| Yards. | Yards. |
|---------|----------------|--------------------|
| 1705 | 739,278 | 19,742 |
| 1706 | 1,325,771 | 62,727 |
| 1707 | 1,847,564 | 81,037 |
| 1708 | 343,359 | 29,606 |
| 1709 | 1,539,250 | 113,939 |
| 1710 | 1,528,185 | 136,844 |
| 1711 | 1,131,629 | 89,262 |
| 1712 | 1,320,968 | 43,011 |
| 1713 | 1,721,003 | 86,357 |
| 1714 | 2,071,814 | 91,916 |
| 1715 | 2,000,581 | 133,752 |
| 1716 | 1,968,568 | 195,825 |
| 1717 | 2,260,243 | 151,240 |
| 1718 | 2,120,075 | 113,790 |
| 1719 | 2,235,357 | 117,288 |
| 1720 | 2,560,113 | 69,579 |
| 1721 | 2,398,103 | 95,488 |
| 1722 | 3,036,431 | 127,934 |
| 1723 | 4,060,402 | 112,952 |
| 1724 | 3,767,063 | 94,816 |
| 1725 | 3,755,430 | 70,052 |
| 1726 | 4,231,676 | 117,213 |
| 1727 | 4,596,089 | 151,977 |
| 1728 | 4,517,152 | 140,049 |
| 1729 | 3,701,485 | 183,363 |
| 1730 | 3,821,188 | 218,220 |
| 1731 | 3,591,316 | 137,039 |
| 1733 | 4,621,127 | 129,244 |
| 1734 | 5,194,241 | 213,250 |
| 1735 | 6,508,748 | 202,759 |
| 1736 | 6,168,333 | 262,242 |
| 1737 | 5,758,408 | 309,827 |
| 1738 | 4,897,169 | 232,947 |
| 1739 | 5,737,834 | 197,671 |
| 1740 | 6,403,569 | 183,471 |
| 1741 | 6,760,025 | 394,374 |
| 1742 | 6,793,009 | 244,546 |
+-----------------------------------------------+
POSTSCRIPT.
Since these papers were sent to the press, the Commons of Ireland have, in
their address to his Majesty, resolved, unanimously, "that it is not by
temporary expedients, but by a free trade alone that this nation is now to
be saved from impending ruin." And the Lords have in their address
unanimously entered into a resolution of the same import.
INDEX.
A.
Abercrombie, Lord, in Ireland and in Egypt, lxxx-lxxxii
Abraham Hutchinson, lxxxv
Absentees, remittances to, 76
Acts of Parliament quoted:
" Edward III., 17th, 34th, and 50th of, 110
" Edward IV., 3rd of, 4th of, 111
" Henry VII., 10th of, 112
" (English), Henry VIII., 13th and 28th of, &c., 116
" Elizabeth, 87, 116
" James I., 8
" Charles II., 87
" of Settlement and Explanation, 131
" 12th, 57
" 13th and 14th of, 115
" 17th and 18th of, 20
" 20th and 22nd of, 106
" 22nd and 23rd of, 119
" William and Mary, first of, 57
" William III., 7th and 8th of, 57
" (English) Acts of 1697, 59
" (Irish) Acts of 1695, 10th and 11th of, 20, 88, 91, 105
" for encouraging Tillage, 38 note
" for Bounties on Land, Carriage and Coal Supply to Dublin, lxx, 39
" 3rd and 4th of Anne, 108
" 10th, 11th, and 22nd of Anne, 96
" 1st of George II, 122
" 4th and 6th of, 120
" (English), 32nd of George II, 54, note
" (1750), taxing Irish Exports, 92
" George III., 10th of, 93-96
" 18th of, 96
" Imposing Duty on Woollen Goods, 67
" Loan, 1759, 40
Address of English Parliament to William III., 62-65
Admiral Hawke, xv
Aldborough, Petition of, 85
Aldred Mr., of Oxford, xlv
Advance, in Linen Trade, 51
Alexander the Great, xxxiv
Alexandria, Lord Hutchinson of, lxxxvi
Alnager, Office and Fees of, x and 155, note
America, Robertson's History of, xiii
" Wool and Linen Trades transferred to, by Irish Emigrants, 147
Anderson, Dr., quoted, 72, note
Andrews, Provost, xxxi
Anthologia Hibernica, lxxxvi
Archbishop Craddock, xxxiv, note
Archbishop Fowler, lxvi
Archbishop King quoted, 10
Archbishop Laud quoted, xxv
Arms of Militia given to Volunteers, xiv, note
Army Augmentation, 40, 44, 48
Asia, Africa, and America, closed against Ireland, 90
B.
Baird, Sir David, his Expedition from India to Egypt, lxxxii
Ballinamuck, Battle of, French defeated at, lxxxi
Banks in Dublin failed, 35-40
Bankruptcy Law not known here in 1755, 35, note
Barlow, Mr., T.C.D., Exercising the Veto, xxv, note
Barre, Colonel Isaac, his description of Hutchinson, lx, &c., and note
Batchelor, the, xii
_Baratariana_, meaning of name, xiii
" Written by, xiii