possesses a quality, distinct and separate from that of other kinds of merchandise, which, we believe, never can be observed, except on those occasions, where a slight paralysis or exhaustion is produced by over trade. The disease mani

fests itself in the effect it has on specie, because this agent is selected by common consent to represent value or wealth, though it would require severe legislative enactments to prevent an article of merchandise, so easy of transportation and concealment, from reaching those markets, where it would bring the best price. But, of late years, an occasional high price of exchange has probably diverted the greatest proportion of specie to Europe, where it has appeared and operated in its true genuine character and capacity of merchandise.

*

The convention, signed July 3, 1815, was strictly com

"The United States of America and his Britannic majesty being desirous, by a convention, to regulate the commerce and navigation between their respective countries, territories and people, in such a manner as to render the same reciprocally beneficial and satisfactory, have respectively named plenipotentiaries and given them full powers to treat of and conclude such convention; that is to say, the president of the United States, by and with the advice and consent of the senate thereof, hath appointed for their plenipotentiaries John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay and Albert Gallatin, citizens of the United States; and his royal highness the prince regent, acting in the name and on behalf of his majesty, has named for his plenipotentiaries the right honourable Frederick John Robinson, vice-president of the committee of privy council for trade and plantations, joint paymaster of his majesty's forces, and a member of the imperial parliament, Henry Goulbourn, Esq. a member of the imperial parliament, and under secretary of state, and William Adams, Esq. doctor of civil laws; and the said plenipotentiaries having mutually produced and shown their said full powers, and exchanged copies of the same, have agreed on and concluded the following articles, videlicet :

"ART. 1. Reciprocal liberty of commerce between the territories of the United States and the British territories in Europe. Complete protection to commerce, subject to the laws of each country.

"ART. 2. No other or higher duties shall be imposed on the importation into the United States of any articles, the growth, produce, or manufacture of his Britannic majesty's territories in Europe, and no

mercial, and, being limited to four years, was intended partly as an experiment of the new doctrine of reciprocity. The

higher or other duties shall be imposed on the importation into the territories of his Britannic majesty in Europe of any articles, the growth, produce, or manufacture of the United States, than are or shall be payable on the like articles being the growth, produce, or manufacture of any other foreign country; nor shall any higher or other duties or charges be imposed in either of the two countries, on the exportation of any articles to the United States, or to his Britannic majesty's territories in Europe, respectively, than such as are payable on the exportation of the like articles to any other foreign country; nor shall any prohibition be imposed on the exportation or importation of any articles, the growth, produce, or manufacture of the United States, or of his Britannic majesty's territories in Europe, to or from the said territories of his Britannic majesty in Europe, or to or from the said United States, which shall not equally extend to all other nations.

"No higher or other duties or charges shall be imposed in any of the ports of the United States on British vessels, than those payable in the same ports by vessels of the United States; nor in the ports of any of his Britannic majesty's territories in Europe on the vessels of the United States than shall be payable in the same ports on British vessels.

"The same duties shall be paid on the importation into the United States of any articles, the growth, produce, or manufacture of his Britannic majesty's territories in Europe, whether such importation shall be in vessels of the United States or in British vessels, and the same duties shall be paid on the importation into the ports of any of his Britannic majesty's territories in Europe, of any article, the growth, produce, or manufacture of the United States, whether such importation shall be in British vessels or in vessels of the United States.

"The same duties shall be paid, and the same bounties allowed on the exportation of any articles, the growth, produce or manufacture of his Britannic majesty's territories in Europe to the United States, whether such exportation shall be in vessels of the United States, or in British vessels; and the same duties shall be paid, and the same bounties allowed on the exportation of any articles, the growth, produce, or manufacture of the United States, to his Britannic majesty's territories in Europe, whether such exportation shall be in British vessels, or in vessels of the United States.

"It is further agreed, that in all cases where drawbacks are, or may be allowed upon the reexportation of any goods, the growth, produce, or manufacture of either country respectively the amount of

American commissioners absolutely declined, in conformity with their instructions, to insert a stipulation, allowing a

the said drawbacks shall be the same, whether the said goods shall have been originally imported in a British or an American vessel, but when such reexportation shall take place from the United States in a British vessel, or from the territories of his Britannic majesty in Europe, in an American vessel, to any other foreign nation, the two contracting parties reserve to themselves, respectively, the right of regulating or diminishing, in such case, the amount of the said drawback. "The intercourse between the United States and his Britannic majesty's possessions in the West Indies, and on the continent of North America, shall not be affected by any of the provisions of this article, but each party shall remain in the complete possession of his rights, with respect to such an intercourse.

"ART. 3. His Britannic majesty agrees that the vessels of the United States of America shall be admitted and hospitably received at the principal settlements of the British dominions in the East Indies, videlicet: Calcutta, Madras, Bombay and Prince of Wales' Island, and that the citizens of the United States may freely carry on trade between the said principal settlements and the said United States, in all articles of which the importation and exportation, respectively, to and from the said territories, shall not be entirely prohibited; provided only, that it shall not be lawful for them, in any time of war between the British government and any state or power whatever, to export from the said territories, without the special permission of the British government, any military stores or naval stores, or rice. The citizens of the United States shall pay for their vessels, when admitted, no higher or other duty or charge than shall be payable on the vessels of the most favoured European nations, and they shall pay no higher or other duties or charges on the importation or exportation of the cargoes of the said vessels, than shall be payable on the same articles when imported or exported in the vessels of the most favoured European nations.

"But it is expressly agreed, that the vessels of the United States shall not carry any articles from the said principal settlements to any port or place, except to some port or place in the United States of America, where the same shall be unladen.

"It is also understood, that the permission granted by this article is not to extend to allow the vessels of the United States to carry on any part of the coasting trade of the said British territories; but the vessels of the United States having in the first instance, proceeded to one of the said principal settlements of the British dominions in the East

British trade with the Indians within our borders, a privilege, of course, mutually renounced, but which had been conceded by the London treaty. This was not done so much for commercial as political considerations, several troublesome circumstances of spoliation having taken place between the traders of the two nations, and an influence attempted to be exercised in regard to the Indians, that could not be attended with any good consequences to this country. One of the permanent articles of the treaty established a mutual exercise of this traffic with the Indians as of trade with the inhabitants of the respective territories on the North American continent. The United States, having declared it their intention not to renew this stipulation, recognised in that act the doctrine, that war abrogates treaties. They, also, declined to include in the convention another portion of the same permanent article, that related to trade and commerce between the citizens and subjects of the respective parties, importations of merchandise into their respective territories being subject to the same charges, whether done by alien or native. In the original provision there was no restriction, as to place or extent of intercourse, on any part of the St. Lawrence above Montreal, or any of the streams, flowing into it from the United States. But in

Indies, and then going with their original cargoes, or part thereof, from one of the said principal settlements to another, shall not be considered as carrying on the coasting trade. The vessels of the United States may also touch for refreshment, but not for commerce, in the course of their voyage to or from the British territories in India, or to or from the dominions of the emperor of China, at the Cape of Good Hope, the Island of St. Helena, or such other places as may be in the possession of Great Britain, in the African or Indian seas; it being well understood that in all that regards this article, the citizens of the United States shall be subject, in all respects, to the laws and regulations of the British government from time to time established.

"ART. 4. Consuls to reside in the dominions of each party. Consuls may be punished according to law, or sent home. Particular places excepted from the residence of consuls.

"ART. 5. This Convention, when ratified, to be obligatory for four years. Ratification exchanged in six months."

the conference, that preceded the convention of 1815, the British commissioners refused to grant to the Americans the right of carrying their produce down the St. Lawrence to Montreal, or down the Sorel to the St. Lawrence. They sought to restrict our commerce to those waters only, where the boundary line run in the midst of the stream or lake, and, as we hold neither bank of the St. Lawrence, except from the bottom of Lake Ontario to Lake St. Francis, and no territory upon the Sorel, the whole transportation would have fallen into British hands. They rejected the general land and inland communication and navigation, proposed by the American plenipotentiaries. No intercourse, therefore, exists by treaty with the British possessions in North America, and no furs or peltry can ever be brought across our possessions or water communications in the west, without a violation of territory.

In some respects the theory of this convention appeared unequal, though the defects have not in every case been confirmed by a practical operation. An equality of duties on importations, whether in American or British vessels, was respectively established, and it was, also, agreed, that articles of the growth, produce, or manufacture of either of the countries, should not be charged with a higher duty than similar articles, coming from any other foreign country; that is to say, articles from the United States could be admitted into Great Britain on the same terms as the same articles from Russia, Sweden or Spain, but not on the same terms as the same articles from Canada, Calcutta, or the English West Indies, they not being foreign countries. Whatever, therefore, was grown, produced, or manufactured in a British province of a similar nature with the productions of this country, whether raw or manufactured, entering into the home market, precisely under such advantages as the British government might think it for their interest to confer, almost all the staples of the middle and eastern portions of this Union became in fact excluded;-another of the inconveniences, to which we are exposed, in consequence of the numerous colonial possessions of that people,