relinquish, but which they would as certainly lose if they were to allow the importation of goods, the produce of distant quarters of the globe, in foreign ships direct into Great Britain from the place of production.
This modification of the Navigation Laws was, doubtless, important, and was said to be in strict harmony with the principle then regulating the importation of goods from the various countries of Europe, which, in 1825, was permitted by Mr. Huskisson to be made from the place where found, the earlier restriction having been that the importation must be from the place of production.
The shipowners would still have retained to British shipping the advantage of the direct voyage, which was, after all, their great point. In consenting to the plan, they urged that, in the end, the interest of the consumer would be equally secured with that of the shipowner, by giving that encouragement afforded by the Navigation Act to direct rather than indirect importation. The opponents of repeal exhibited great alarm lest, if indirect importations were permitted, these would take place from distant ports of the world into the nearer ports of Europe, and be there warehoused: and they expressed the fear that the people of this country would then consume considerable proportions of the productions of tropical climates, burdened with the expenses of previous importation into the ports of continental nations, in addition to what was then paid under the limited direct importation!! It was only, he said, with the view of remedying palpable absurdities, such as that of the hides brought from Buenos Ayres to Ham-
