the captain of the Dolphin, of Amsterdam, is found among the shipmasters who refused to give security for its payment, and in consequence a warrant was issued, requiring him to appear before the Assembly and justify his conduct. It would be inferred from this that either the impost of ten shillings, adopted in the previous March, had been repealed and the captains of Dutch vessels placed upon the footing of English shipmasters, or the impost of ten shillings remained, and the Dutch captains were compelled to pay two duties, amounting together to twelve shillings. The explanation is possible, that the Dolphin, of Amsterdam, was loaded with tobacco bought with English and not with Dutch merchandise, which would exempt her cargo from the impost of ten shillings, but not from the impost of two. It is also not improbable that the Dolphin, though accredited to Amsterdam, was owned by English merchants, and was sailing with a special license.[1]
The advance in the charges for the transportation of their main crop, which was observed as early as 1657, is an additional indication that the people of Virginia did not enjoy during the whole of the Protectorate all the benefits of open markets.[2] The freight rate increased from four pounds sterling a ton to eight and nine pounds, and in some cases it ran up as high as fourteen. The Dutch had been in the habit of purchasing the tobacco of the planters at three pence a pound, giving for it bills of exchange, which had never failed to be honored; this
- ↑ Hening’s Statutes, vol. I, pp. 491, 513. It was the habit of many English traders at this time to purchase East Indian merchandise at Amsterdam, and export it directly to Virginia and the other American colonies. Documents Relating to the Colonial History of New York, vol. XIV, p. 385. The Dolphin may have been chartered by an English merchant who had bought a cargo of this kind in Holland.
- ↑ Public Good without Private Interest, p. 14.
