carry goods from one port to another. The interdiction against foreign vessels carrying "passengers" was only inserted for the first time in the 8 & 9 Vict., cap. 88 (1845), and, previously to this period, there was no law to prevent a foreign steamer carrying passengers between two English ports; while, even in 1847, a vessel built in Norway could have plied in the Thames. Foreigners, however, either were ignorant of the law, or did not avail themselves of it, considering it a barren advantage.
With Mr. Braysher's evidence may be brought to a close the extracts necessary to be given from the mass of conflicting statements and documents laid before Mr. Ricardo's Committee, and I may now proceed with the general history of the measures pursued and subsequently adopted.
Committee's last meeting, July 17.
General dissatisfaction with the results of the inquiry.
On the 17th of July, the Committee of the House
of Commons held its last sitting; and as a dissolution
of Parliament was impending, the Committee, after
having published four successive reports, strictly confined
to the minutes of the evidence taken before
them, came to the conclusion of closing the inquiry.
The Protectionist shipowners complained that this
abrupt termination of the inquiry was brought about
with the view of suppressing the evidence of Mr. D.
C. Aylwin, an intelligent merchant connected with
the Calcutta trade, who was in attendance to give
counter-testimony to many of the Free-trade witnesses.
It was also patent that, during the investigation,
while twenty-five witnesses had been examined in
favour of the repeal of the Navigation Laws, on
the other hand, for their defence and maintenance,
only nine persons had been called to give their testi-
