shore, and being disguised like fishing boats, had not
only taken a considerable number of prizes, to the great annoyance of
the enemy, but also obtained material intelligence of their designs on
many important occasions; that these services could not be performed by
large vessels, which durst not approach so near the coast, and indeed
could not appear without giving the alarm, which was communicated from
place to place by appointed signals. Being informed that a bill was
depending, in order to prohibit privateers of small burden, they
declared that such a law, if extended to privateers equipped in those
islands, would ruin such as had invested their fortunes in small
privateers, and not only deprive the kingdom of the before-mentioned
advantages, but expose Great Britain to infinite prejudice from the
small armed vessels of France, which the enemy, in that case, could pour
abroad over the whole channel to the great annoyance of navigation and
commerce. They prayed, therefore, that such privateers as belonged to
the islands of Guernsey and Jersey might be wholly excepted from the
penalties contained in the bill, or that they, the petitioners, might
be heard by their counsel, and be indulged with such relief as the
house should judge expedient. This representation being referred to the
consideration of the committee, produced divers amendments to the
hill, which at length obtained the royal assent, and contained these
regulations: That, after the first day of January in the present year,
no commission should be granted to a privateer in Europe under the
burden of one hundred tons, the force of ten carriage guns, being
three-pounders or above, with forty men at the least, unless the lords
of the admiralty, or persons authorized by them, should think fit to
grant the same to any ship of inferior force or burden, the owners
thereof giving such bail or security as should be prescribed: that the
lords of the admiralty might at any time revoke, by an order in
writing under their hands, any commission granted to a privateer; this
revocation being subject to an appeal to his majesty in council, whose
determination should be final: that, previous to the granting any
commission, the persons proposing to be bound, and give security, should
severally make oath of their being respectively worth more money than
the sum for which they were then to be bound, over and above the payment
of all their just debts: that persons applying for su