Page:Henry Adams' History of the United States Vol. 3.djvu/429

1807. than the famous decision of Sir William Scott in the case of the "Essex." Its apparent effect was to double the cost and risk of neutral commerce, while incidentally it asserted a right to prohibit such trade altogether.

Unfortunately more remained behind. The new order was not only an act of violence; it was, according to the Tories, also one of meanness. On its face it purported to be a measure of retaliation, taken in order to retort upon France the evils of Napoleon's injustice. In the Parliamentary debate four weeks afterward, when the order was attacked, all parties argued it as a matter of retaliation. The King's advocate. Sir John Nicholls, who defended it, took the ground that for the moment no severer retaliation was needed; while Spencer Perceval and Lord Castlereagh held that Napoleon's decree should have been retaliated in full.


 * "You might turn the provisions of the French decree against themselves," said Perceval; "and as they have said that no British goods should sail freely on the seas, you might say that no goods should be carried to France except they first touched at an English port. They might be forced to be entered at the custom-house, and a certain entry imposed, which would contribute to advance the price and give a better sale in the foreign market to your own commodities."

Sir John Nicholls replied: —