The English government having been unable to resist the importunities of the manufacturing and mercantile interests, could not therefore forbear from following the pernicious example thus set by Napoleon. When the system, though different in many respects, had been fully established in Great Britain, the number of licences issued rose from four thousand nine hundred and ten in 1808, to no fewer than fifteen thousand two hundred and twenty-six in 1809, and eighteen thousand three hundred and fifty-six in the year 1810. Though these licences were professedly regulated upon fixed principles, they were nevertheless a source of jobbery and fraud, and great peculation and corruption prevailed, “a fruitful source,” as Lord Stowell observed, “of simulation and dissimulation from beginning to end.”
Cost of English licences.
Such licences were payable on a graduated scale on imports and exports not transferable, as well as upon transferable exports and imports. The fees received at the Admiralty were for licences to merchant vessels to carry guns; on granting Mediterranean papers; on ships’ fines for loss of papers; on ships’ protection for three months; on protection granted to barges and boats for a similar period; on commissions, warrants, and appointments; on granting letters of marque; and on licences to join convoy; the Privy Council Office charging for licences to trade 4l. 16s. each, besides gratuities, which were divided amongst the clerks.[283] The amount of the fees during the height of the licence system was calculated to yield annually about 100,000l.[284] beyond the public stamp of 1l. 10s. which was added before delivery of the licence.
But the whole system of licences proved utterly indefensible, and, being granted to foreign vessels to the prejudice of English shipping, it grew at last to be altogether intolerable. Beyond the mere amount of fees claimed by the Council Office, the Secretary of State’s fees for the sign-manual were as much again, and even this aggregate amount was frequently exceeded. For instance, it is reported in the ‘Parliamentary Proceedings’ that there was paid by a certain John Lubock for the certificate of one cargo, imported or exported, 15l. 0s. 6d., and for each duplicate, if required, 3l. 12s.; part of this was, however, admitted to be for agency. The charge for a ship going out in ballast to import a cargo of timber from Wilmington, in the United States, was 17l. 2s. 6d. A licence for St. Domingo (special) to trade to and from that island, cost 25l. 1s. 6d. For an order allowing small vessels to trade to and from Holland for six months, the charge for one licence amounted to 15l. 0s. 6d.; but an order for six ships could be obtained for 44l. 5s. 6d. One agent is reported to have paid no less than 3,952l. 7s. 6d. in the course of a year for licences alone.[285]
Their marketable value.
Sometimes, however, they were estimated at an even extravagant value. Mr. A. Baring said, in the course of a debate in Parliament on the subject, that he would have given 15,000l. for one of the licences issued, which, owing to a clerical error in the substitution of one word for another, became of that marketable value. No wonder that the merchants importuned the government for these licences, when they not only served as a protection to their property, but might, by a lucky error, become the means of making a man’s fortune. In this point of view the licences were wholly and entirely unjustifiable. It seems further that where applications were made, a considerable amount of control and interference were exercised in framing them before they were granted. Mr. Brougham drew a picture of the President and Vice-President of the Board of Trade laying their heads together, and passing a whole morning in determining with the utmost gravity “whether one cargo should consist of cotton or of wool, whether scissors should be added, whether nails should be added to the scissors; whether the nails or the scissors should be left out, or whether the commerce of the country might or might not be ruined by throwing in a little hemp with the nails and the scissors to make up the cargo.”[286] But this was not all.
Working of the licensing system in England.
Simulated papers.
The licence to sail from port to port, for example, contained the following clause: “The vessel shall be allowed to proceed, notwithstanding all the documents which accompany the ship and cargo may represent the same to be destined to any neutral or hostile port, or to whomsoever such property may belong.” With this licence, the ship which carried it, foreign or British, was enabled to pass through the British fleet; every vessel thus authorized being permitted to take on board another set of papers, which were, in point of fact, a forgery from beginning to end. Should the vessel be overhauled by English cruisers, she nevertheless continued her voyage unmolested. If, for example, she had actually cleared out from London, it was stated in the simulated papers that she had cleared out from Rotterdam. With this view, the proper description was made out as nearly as possible in the handwriting of the Custom-house officer at Rotterdam; and, if it were necessary that the signature of the French minister of state should be affixed, as in the case of Holland, this was skilfully forged, and even the fantastic signature of Napoleon himself was sometimes attached to these forged documents![287] These forgeries were not done perfunctorily or by halves, for not only were the names forged, but the seal was admirably engraved, and the wax closely imitated. Indeed a regular set of letters were frequently also forged, containing a good deal of fictitious private anecdote, with a mixture of such news from Rotterdam as might be supposed to be interesting to mercantile people, together with an imaginary letter from a merchant in Rotterdam to the shipowner.
Agencies for the purpose of fabricating them.