Page:General History of Europe 1921.djvu/531

How England became Queen of the Ocean 397 sugar, and molasses, but in order to keep this trade within British dominions, the importation of these commodities was forbidden. 682. The Colonists evade the English Restrictions. The colonists naturally evaded these laws as far as possible; they carried on a flourishing smuggling trade and built up industries in spite of them. Tobacco, sugar, hemp, flax, and cotton were grown and cloth was manufactured. Furnaces, foundries, and nail and wire mills supplied pig and bar iron, chains, anchors, and other hardware. It is clear that where so many people were interested in both manufacturing and commerce a loud protest was sure to be raised against any attempts of England to restrict the business of the colonists in favor of her own merchants. But previous to 1763 the navigation and trade laws had been loosely enforced, and business men of high standing in their com- munities ventured to neglect them and engage in illegal trade, which from the standpoint of the mother country constituted "smuggling." English statesmen had been too busy, however, during the previous century with the great struggle at home and the wars with Louis XIV to stop this unlawful trade. 683. Change in English Colonial Policy after 1763. With the close of the successful Seven Years' War, and the conquest of Canada and the Ohio valley, arrangements had to be made to protect the new territories and meet the expenses incident to the great enlargement of the British Empire. The home government naturally argued that the prosperous colonists might make some contribution in the form of taxes to the expenses of the late war and the maintenance of a small body of troops for guarding the new possessions. 684. The Stamp Act. This led to the passage of the Stamp Act, which taxed the colonists by forcing them to pay the Eng- lish government for the stamps which were required on leases, deeds, and other legal documents in order to make them binding. This does not appear to modern historians to have been a tyranni- cal act, and it was certainly perfectly legal. But it stirred up some of the leaders among the colonists, who declared that they had already borne the brunt of the recent war and that Parliament