ince, and for the efficient measures adopted by Your Majesty's Government to guard those fisheries during the past season from wanton aggression: The fishermen of the United States, stimulated by a large bounty, and protected by a duty of twenty per cent. on British-caught fish, have been placed in the most favorable position both as regards their own and foreign markets, yet, not content with these advantages, they constantly encroach upon the coast fisheries of these North American colonies, any participation in which was expressly relinquished and renounced by the Convention of 1818. In the commercial transactions between these provinces and the United States the latter possess other decided advantages. Their manufactures are admitted into the provinces at the same rates of duties as are charged on British merchandise. The colonial legislatures, contrary to their wishes and feelings, have been restricted from imposing discriminating duties. While the merchandise of the United States is admitted into this province at a duty of eight and a half per cent. ad valorem, the products of New Brunswick are subject, upon importation to the United States, to duties at an average of from twenty to thirty per cent.; while American ships freely trade between colony and colony, and from England to her distant possessions in Australasia and India, colonial vessels cannot pass from one American port to another, as from Boston to New York, or from the Atlantic ports of the United States to California or Oregon; while colonial ships cannot be sold in the United States or obtain registers there, vessels and steamers built in those States are sold in these colonies, and American-built steamers are at this moment plying on the inland waters of this province with British registers. The manifestations of an enlarged and liberal policy by Your Majesty's Government have not been met in the same spirit by the Government of the United States; and we therefore earnestly entreat that Your Majesty will preserve inviolate the rights and privileges of your attached subjects in these provinces, as secured to them by existing treaties, and will not concede any further or greater privileges to foreign fishermen than they now enjoy without first granting your loyal subjects a hearing thereupon. The protection granted by Your Majesty's vessels of war has this year enabled colonial fishermen to enjoy their shore fisheries undisturbed and in a profitable manner. We therefore humbly entreat that Your Majesty will be pleased to continue such protection as one of the greatest boons to the North American fisheries, because thereby they will be freed from foreign aggression, and may be prosecuted extensively with great benefit and advantage to Your Majesty's devoted subjects. WILLIAM BLACK, President of Legislative Council. Speaker of the House of Assembly. NOVEMBER 1, 1852. No. 23. TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY. The humble address of the house of assembly of the Province of Nova Scotia. May it please Your Majesty: We, Your Majesty's dutiful and loyal subjects, the representatives of your Majesty's faithful people of Nova Scotia, beg leave to approach the throne with the renewal of the tender of affectionate support to Your Majesty's person and government. We have learned with deep interest that negotiations are pending between Your Majesty's Government and the Government of the United States, involving not only questions of reciprocal trade between the two countries, but the surrender of national and colonial rights of a very important character. Warned by the experience of the past, and the results of treaty stipulations, in which the interests of British America have been seriously compromised, without the provincial governments and legislatures being consulted, the house of assembly pray that no treaty may be negotiated by Your Majesty which would surrender to foreigners the reserved fisheries on our sea-coasts, or any participation therein, with. out an opportunity being afforded to the government and legislature of Nova Scotia to consider and express our opinion upon its terms. W. YOUNG, HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY, February 17, 1853. Speaker. No. 24. TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY. The humble address of the representatives of the people of Nova Scotia. May it please Your Majesty: We, Your Majesty's faithful and loyal subjects, the commons of Nova Scotia, with warm attachment to the government and person of Your Majesty, express our gratitude for the protection afforded to the fisheries of British America, and the regard given to colonial interests, which have enabled British subjects during the last year to enjoy their rights and privileges free from foreign aggression. Inspired with confidence, we humbly solicit a continuance of such efficient protection as will maintain inviolate the exclusive enjoyment of those fisheries, the inherent right of the British people, an inexhaustible source of commerce, and a fostering nursery for the national marine of the British Empire. Your Majesty's subjects in this part of your dominions are of opinion that the commerce of their country is supported chiefly by the fisheries, which constitute a source of incalculable wealth, and ought not to be participated in by any foreign power on any consideration whatever. That notwithstanding the advantages conferred on the citizens of the United States by the generous policy evinced by Your Majesty, they still adhere to their illiberal and protective system, which they sustain with unyielding tenacity. Whilst the shipping of America, built, manned, and equipped in the United States, can be sold in the British colonial ports without duty, and obtain British registers, American citizens deny any corresponding privilege to Your Majesty's subjects. Whilst their vessels participate with British tonnage in the trade with Britain's colonies, supplying their productions and manufactures on the same terms as British, whilst they trade with the British North American colonies in the isl ands of the Pacific, a British vessel cannot load from New York or Boston for the other States of the republic, or trade from any American port to California or Texas. Your Majesty's loyal subjects therefore pray Your Majesty to continue the protection which was extended to them last season, and by force to repel all foreign aggression on their reserved fishing grounds-the exclusive enjoyment of which is solemnly renounced to the British by the Convention of 1818, between Your Majesty and the republican govern. ment; fully believing that the admission of foreigners to participation in that fishery would have a most disastrous effect, can be purchased by no equivalent, and would tend to weaken the confidence of Your Majesty's subjects in the policy of a government which does not protect your people in the enjoyment of their inalienable rights. HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY, March 30, 1853. W. YOUNG, Speaker. No. 25. TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY. The humble address of the legislative council of Nova Scotia. May it please Your Majesty: The legislative council of Nova Scotia approach Your Majesty with sentiments of loyalty and attachment to your royal person and government, and beg to express their grateful sense of the benefit conferred upon the people of this province by the protection afforded to the fisheries on their coasts during the past year. The legislative council assure Your Majesty that the exclusive right to the enjoyment of these fisheries is esteemed by them a source of great wealth to the province, upon which its commerce largely depends; and they regard preservation of them from the aggression of foreigners as another instance of the deep interest felt by Your Majesty in its welfare. Notwithstanding the recognition by treaty on the part of the United States of America of the exclusive right of Your Majesty's subjects to fish on the coast of the North American provinces, the citizens of that country have year after year encroached upon that right; and though the most liberal commercial policy is evinced by Your Majesty toward the republic, all attempts to induce them to abandon their protective system have been resisted, and they not only take fish out of our waters after having solemnly renounced the right to do so, but Your Majesty's subjects are met in the United States by almost prohibitory duties, while large bounties are extended to their own people. The legislative council pray Your Majesty to continue to employ such a force as will prevent any encroachment on their fishing grounds, and secure to them the enjoyment of rights to which they are exclusively entitled. MICHL. TOBIN, LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL CHAMBER, April 4, 1853. President. No. 26. TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY. The humble address of the inhabitants of the city and county of St. John, adopted at a public meeting regularly convened. May it please Your Majesty: We, Your Majesty's faithful and loyal subjects in the city and county of St. John, in the Province of New Brunswick, beg leave to approach Your Majesty with renewed assurances of our sincere devotion to Your Majesty's person and Government. In common with all Your Majesty's loyal subjects in the North American colonies, we are deeply impressed with the present and prospective value of our coast fisheries to the present and future inhabitants thereof. Viewing the inshore fisheries as the natural, inherent, and inalienable right of Your Majesty's subjects in the provinces, not to be conceded, alienated, or affected without their consent, we have learned with much anxiety, from the announcement in Your Majesty's speech to the Imperial Parliament, that negotiations are now pending between Your Majesty's Government and that of the United States upon the subject of the North American fisheries, the nature of which has not transpired. Believing, as we do, that "as the value of a participation in our fisheries by the citizens of the United States would greatly exceed any concession that the United States Government can offer to the inhabitants of the British colonies," we humbly, but earnestly, entreat Your Majesty to refuse to entertain any proposition for a modification or alteration of the Treaty of 1818, unless such proposition shall embrace the full and entire question of reciprocal intercourse in commerce and navigation between Your Majesty's North American colonies and the United States, upon terms that will be just and reasonable; and that, before any treaty is agreed upon, Your Majesty will be graciously pleased to afford your loyal and faithful subjects in the provinces an opportunity of becoming acquainted with the terms proposed, and of laying their case before Your Majesty. And as in duty bound will ever pray. JANUARY, 1853. CHARLES JOHNSTON, Chairman. No. 27. TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY. The humble memorial of the inhabitants of the county of Northumberland, in the Province of New Brunswick, in British North America, most humbly showeth: That your memorialists approach Your Majesty with renewed assurance of their loyalty and attachment to Your Majesty's person and Government. Your memorialists observe with deep anxiety, from Your Majesty's royal speech at the opening of Parliament, and the late message of the President of the neighboring republic to Congress, that negotiations are now pending between Your Majesty's Government and that of the United States, affecting the rights of fishery on these shores. The coast fisheries hitherto enjoyed by the people of this province, spared to them by the Convention of 1818, although long an object of jealousy to, and frequently intruded upon by, the people of the United States, your memorialists have ever considered to be their exclusive and unalienable right, in common with their fellow-subjects of Your Majesty's Crown; and they appreciate them accordingly. That these fisheries have not heretofore been prosecuted to an extent commensurate with their importance, we pray Your Majesty not to ascribe to any distaste or unfitness on the part of the people of this province for the pursuit; but rather to the sparseness of population and absence of capital incidental to a new country, as well as to the unhappy preference too long paid to the manufacture and export of timber. But as these obstacles have gradually disappeared, the prosecution of the fisheries has proportionally extended; much capital is now embarked in it; the people, at the cost of much time and labor, have just acquired the necessary skill and experience for its profitable conduct; and already has it become an industrial pursuit of vital importance to the inhabitants of these shores. Your memorialists would further add their conviction that the time is not far distant when the inhabitants of this and the neighboring counties must look to the produce of these fisheries for their chief staple of export; the question, therefore, of the alienation or preservation of these fisheries becomes to them one seriously affecting their future progress or decline as a commercial people. Your memorialists would most humbly bring under Your Majesty's notice that the trade between this province and the United States of America has been conducted, for some years past, upon principles unfair and oppressive to your memorialists; for while the produce and manufactures of that country have been admitted into this province at a moderate rate of duty, and in accordance with the policy of the Imperial Government upon equal term with those of the United Kingdom, our commodities have been met there by a high protecting tariff; and while the ships of the United States are here permitted to be introduced to receive a British register, and enter at once into competition with our own, colonial ships are denied a market in the United States. In view of these evils, your memorialists would humbly submit to Your Majesty that such a modification of the tariff and navigation laws of the United States as would place the trade between that country and these colonies on a footing of equality should be considered merely as an equitable arrangement, mutually beneficial, but by no means affording an adequate compensation for yielding up interests of such magni |