sooner will the worthy part of the community be enabled to prosper.

Mr. Fox, in answer to what the learned gentleman had affirmed, that no man would be subjected to punishment unless he were found guilty, replied, that it was better not to take the trouble of entering into any proof of innocence under this bill; because, whether innocent or guilty, the bloody complexion of it seemed to prejudge before trial, and condemn without proof.

Governour Lyttelton was for the clause. He said there was scarce a fair trader throughout America. They were all concerned in a clandestine trade in one form or another.

Mr. T. Townshend said, that the arguments deduced from the method of carrying on trade in America had very little relation to the bill under consideration. That those who were concerned in illicit trade did it at a certain risk; if they were discovered they were punished; and so it was in this and all other trading nations. Merchants, he believed, were not the most scrupulous men in the world in buying bargains.

Honourable Mr. Walpole condemned the bill throughout, and predicted the commencement of the ruin of the British commerce and national greatness would be from the very day it should receive the Royal assent.

Mr. Burke said, it was the first time he ever heard it asserted, either in print or in debate, within or without these walls, that open hostilities and rebellion were the same thing. He said a day would come when the damnable doctrines of this bill would fall heavy on this country, as well as on those who first broached them, and were the means of carrying them into execution.

Mr. Bayley condemned the clause, and said the bill would affect his property very materially in the West-Indies.

Mr. St. Leger Douglass replied, he had a considerable estate in the West-Indies, nevertheless he thought the bill a very wise and salutary measure. He knew that the West-India Islands had lumber sufficient to serve them for one, if not two years; but if not, it was better to suffer temporary inconveniences than sacrifice the British empire in America to the local interests of any of its constituent parts.

Sir George Yonge declared himself entirely against the bill; but, at all events, he saw no objection its most sanguine friends could have to put off the committee for a day or two, or until the West-India merchants, who were, he understood, to present a petition, stating the manner they would be affected by it, were first heard. He therefore moved, that the Chairman do now leave the chair.

The question being put, the Committee divided: Ayes 34, Noes 126.

Captain Luttrell offered a clause for excepting such foreign ships as might be driven upon the American coast, or into those harbours, in distress.

It passed in the negative.

[The clause for making the seizures the property of the captors, was opposed by Mr. Walpole, Mr. Townshend, and Sir Edward Bering. They recommended the mode that was pursued in the year 1755, viz: to let the publick have the benefit of the prizes, and not throw out such a lure to sea officers, the younger part of whom would be so eager to seize every vessel for their own benefit, as might produce much future mischief, and that, bad as the bill would otherwise be, by this clause it would be made ten times worse.]

Captain Luttrell said he had full as much objection to the bill in gross as any of his honourable friends near him, because he thought it replete with that barbarous coercion which destroyed every chance that peace and reconciliation would again subsist between this country and our American Colonies, but that he still thought of the present as he did of every act of Parliament, that, if it must pass into a law, (which he feared it would,) there was no making it too perfect, nor carrying it too fully into execution; and therefore, he said, without much hope that he should be able to influence the opinion of any man, or a wish to mislead, he should endeavour to point out, as the several clauses were read, wherein they appeared to him insufficient to answer the ends for which they were apparently intended by the gentlemen in Administration, with whom he said in some particulars he concurred, uninfluenced by selfish views, having neither the merits to boast of the sea officers now employed in America, nor a wish to subject himself to the orders of the present First Lord of the Admiralty; but he hoped if, in the sequel, he should be thought to lean with partiality towards that corps to which he had the honour and pride to belong, that it would rather be attributed to a natural failing than a wish to misrepresent and deceive. He said that the most able advocate could not put so high a value on their services as Parliament had lately done, by conferring upon them the most beneficial favour in the most flattering and honourable manner they ever received as a corps, and to that he believed the alacrity with which they served in America was in great measure owing. That considering themselves to be embarked in the cause of the British Parliament, they sacrificed their inclinations at least, if not their humanity, at the shrine of gratitude, by accepting the most hazardous, disagreeable, and unthankful employment the oldest of them ever experienced, or that he hoped the youngest would ever be engaged in again. He said he knew the generosity of Parliament towards them was deeply imprinted in their minds; that of the Minister and First Lord of the Admiralty he saw with pleasure beginning to dawn, for, in the present instance, they seemed willing to sacrifice the interest of their dependants, to what he considered (and had not been convinced to the contrary by what fell from his honourable friends) was the just claim of the captors. That he was surprised gentlemen would wish to revert to that shameful precedent in the year 1755, when you made reprisals against France in a manner not less dishonourable than you are now about to do in America, but converted the produce of them, nominally indeed, to the use of the publick, (as gentlemen now propose,) but in fact to the benefit of the Minister’s friends, styled Commissioners for Prizes, who took possession of men-of-war as well as merchant ships, without giving the smallest reward even to the men who were maimed in battle, or to the friends of those that were slain. He said, he would never subscribe to the opinion, that revenue officers, commissioners for prizes, or any other set of men of whatsoever description or situation, were so well entitled to the seizures made under the authority of this act of Parliament, as those who risked their life, and health in a service where no honour was to be got, and where the fatigue of body and anxiety of mind, he feared, would be but ill repaid by any profit they were likely to reap. He observed, that those gentlemen who entertained liberal notions of honour, and were at all acquainted with the duty and temper of British officers and seamen, could never think seriously for a moment that they could sacrifice either to sordid views. If they had done so last war, he said, many of them might have become rich at the expense of the treasure of this country, but that he never knew the officer who did not seek with more diligence the privateers and ships of the enemy, which annoyed our trade, than for the merchantmen, although little but hard blows was to be got by the former, and much wealth by the latter. That he could not think so meanly of any service as to suppose any encouragement necessary to be held out to stimulate your forces by land or by sea to a faithful discharge of their duty; but if such reward as this would be the means of carrying any act of Parliament more effectually into execution, he thought it rather a reason why the seizures should be the property of the captors, than why they should not. He then replied to what had fallen from an honourable gentleman, who had insinuated that there could be no disinclination in the officers or seamen to serve in America, because he had learned from the first naval authority (which the Captain observed was not always the best) that we should be able to man all the fleet destined for the American service without being put to the disagreeable necessity of pressing. He said it might be so, but insisted it did not follow that it was a matter of choice; that we had lost our American trade, which had put a heavier embargo on our shipping than was ever done by any nation to equip the most formidable naval armament, and that the seamen being able to get no other employment, we, of course, procured them with more facility. He concluded by observing, that if France and Spain should, before the conclusion of this dispute, declare war against us, it would be necessary to man a second fleet, to oppose those two great maritime powers; and which way that was to be done, whether with an impress or without, or by what other device, he wished the first naval authority might be able to tell, and only lamented he could not.