under discussion in the British Parliament, England would not obtain from any of those nations the almost entire monopoly she then enjoyed in her maritime intercourse with Portugal. The Viscount de Castro hoped, therefore, that "in Council" no exception would be made to injure the trade of Portugal.
In spite of the want of success (and they received but scanty support) Ministers met in their applications to foreign countries for reciprocity, they resolutely persevered in their policy, resting for their chief support almost wholly on the Free-trade party in the House of Commons. The principles of Free-trade had become the established and predominant policy of the nation, and navigation alone was the exceptional branch which, until then, had successfully resisted innovation.
Progress of Free-trade views. It was very remarkable, that in the celebrated Petition of the London merchants to the House of Commons, so far back as 1820,[1] from which the Free-trade movement may be dated, no mention is made of the Navigation Laws. Mr. Tooke, who drew the petition,[1] directed chiefly attention to the then unacknowledged fact that freedom from restraint was calculated to give the utmost extension to foreign trade, and the best direction to the capital and industry of the country. That the maxim of buying in the cheapest market and selling in the dearest, the rule of every merchant in his individual dealings, was as strictly applicable to the trade of the nation; but had Mr.
- ↑ It was presented on the 8th May, 1820, by Mr. Alexander Baring, afterwards Lord Ashburton. The whole case is reported in Tooke's 'History of Prices.' Appendix, p. 332.
