by the Inspector General of the Customs, London, and presented to Parliament.[1]
Early registry of ships not always to be depended on. Prior to the Registry Act of the 24th of George III. vessels were measured in a very loose manner, and in order to evade the payment of lighthouse dues, and various port charges collected on tonnage, they were usually registered far below their real burthen; indeed the difference between the measurements under the old Act of William and that of George III., being on the aggregate no less than one third, accounts in some measure for the apparently very small tonnage of the vessels given in the returns to which we have just referred. But the return, as a whole, furnishes pretty accurately the position of the merchant navy and of the oversea commerce of the United States when they separated from the mother-country. That important event in the history of the world produced a complete revolution in the relative positions of the great maritime nations; a merchant navy having
- ↑ In 1769 the colonies built and launched 389 vessels, 113 square rigged, and 276 sloops and schooners, of an aggregate burthen of 20,001 tons. Of these, Massachusetts (including Boston and Salem) provided nearly one-half, New Hampshire and Rhode supplied the next largest numbers, while New York had only 5 square-rigged vessels and 14 sloops and schooners, measuring in all 955 tons. Pennsylvania owned 1344 tons; Virginia, 1249; North and South Carolina, 1396; and Connecticut, 1542; while Georgia had 1 sloop and 1 schooner, whose combined measure was only 50 tons! In 1769 the entrances to all the ports of the present United States amounted to 332,146 tons, and the clearances to 339,362 tons; of which 99,121 tons cleared for Great Britain; 42,601 for Southern Europe and Africa; 96,382 for British and Foreign West Indies; and 101,198 for the continent of America and the Bahama Islands. The aggregate value of the whole imports amounted to 2,623,412l., and of the exports to 2,852,441l.; of which Great Britain sent 1,604,975l., receiving in return produce to the value of 1,531,516l. ('Journals of the House of Commons,' 1792, p. 357).
