nd
so country squires, and London merchants too, listened comfortably to
the reading of the budget so well designed to relieve the one of taxes
and swell the profits flowing into the coffers of the other.

"That a duty of 2 pounds 19s. 9d. per cwt. avoirdupois, be laid upon all
foreign coffee, imported from any place (except Great Britain) into
the British colonies and plantations in America. That a duty of 6d. per
pound weight be laid upon all foreign indigo, imported into the said
colonies and plantations. That a duty of 7 pounds per ton be laid upon
all wine of the growth of the Madeiras, or of any other island or place,
lawfully imported from the respective place of the growth of such wine,
into the said colonies and plantations. That a duty of 10s. per ton be
laid upon all Portugal, Spanish, or other wine (except French wine),
imported from Great Britain into the said colonies and plantations. That
a duty of 2s. per pound weight be laid upon all wrought silks, Bengals,
and stuffs mixed with silk or herbs; of the manufacture of Persia,
China, or East India, imported from Great Britain into the said colonies
and plantations. That a duty of 2s. 6d. per piece be laid upon all
callicoes...." The list no doubt was a long one; and quite right, too,
thought country squires, all of whom, to a man, were willing to pay no
more land tax.

Other men besides country squires were interested in Mr. Grenville's
budget, notably the West Indian sugar planters, virtually and actually
represented in the House of Commons and voting there this day. Many of
them were rich men no doubt; but sugar planting, they would assure you
in confidence, was not what it had been; and if they were well off after
a fashion, they might have been much better off but for the shameless
frauds which for thirty years had made a dead letter of the Molasses Act
of 1733. It was notorious that the merchants of the northern and middle
colonies, regarding neither the Acts of Trade nor the dictates of
nature, had every year carried their provisions and fish to the foreign
islands, receiving in exchange molasses, cochineal, "medical druggs,"
and "gold and silver in bullion and coin." With molasses the thrifty New
Englanders made great quantities of inferior rum, the common drink of
that day, regarded as essential to the health of sailors engaged in
fishing off the Grand Banks, and by far the cheapest and most effective
instrument for procuring negroes in Africa or f