flitting or rolling of iron, or any plating-forge to work with a tilt-hammer, or any furnace for making fteel, fhall be erected or continued in the faid ifland of Great Britain: And the Lord Lieutenant of every county in the said island is hereby commanded, on information of any fuch • erection within his county, to order, and by force to cause the fame to be abated and deftroyed; as he shall answer the neglect thereof to Us at his peril.—But we are nevertheless graciously pleased to permit the inhabitants of the faid ifland to transport their iron into Pruffia, there to be manufactured, and to them returned; they paying Our Pruffian fubjects for the workmanship, with all the cofts of commiffion, freight, and rifk, coming and returning; any thing herein contained to the contrary notwithstanding.

6

We do not, however, think fit to extend this • Our indulgence to the article of wool; but meaning to encourage not only the manufacturing of woollen cloth, but also the raising of wool, in Our ancient dominions; and to prevent both, as much as may be, in Our faid ifland,-We do hereby abfolutely forbid the transportation of wool from thence even to the mother-country, • Pruffia :-And that those islanders may be far⚫ther and more effectually reftrained in making any advantage of their own wool, in the way of manufacture, We command that none fhall be carried out of one county into another; nor • shall any worsted, bay, or woollen-yarn, cloth,

fays,

*

fays, bays, kerfeys, ferges, frizes, druggets, cloth-ferges, fhalloons, or any other drapery ftuffs, or woollen manufactures whatsoever, made up or mixed with wool in any of the faid counties, be carried into any other county, or be water-borne even across the smallest river or creek; on penalty of forfeiture of the fame, together with the boats, carriages, horfes, &c. that fhall be employed in removing them.Nevertheless, Our loving fubjects there are hereby permitted (if they think proper) to ufe all their wool as manure, for the improvement of their lands.

And whereas the art and mystery of making bats hath arrived at great perfection in Pruffia; and the making of hats by Our remoter fubjects ought to be as much as poffible restrained: And forafmuch as the islanders before mentioned, being in poffeffion of wool, beaver, and other furs, have prefumptuously conceived they had a right to make fome advantage thereof, by manufacturing the fame into hats, to the prejudice of • Our domeftic manufacture:-We do therefore hereby ftrictly command and ordain, that no hats or felts whatsoever, dyed or undyed, finished or unfinished, shall be loaden or put into or upon any veffel, cart, carriage, or horfe; to be tranfported or conveyed out of one county • in the said ifland into another county, or to any • other place whatsoever, by any perfon or perfons whatfoever; on pain of forfeiting the fame, with

a penalty of five hundred pounds fterling for 6 every

every offence. Nor fhall any hat-maker, in 6 any of the faid counties, employ more than two apprentices, on penalty of five pounds fterling per month: We intending hereby that fuch hatmakers, being fo reftrained, both in the pro⚫duction and fale of their commodity, may find

no advantage in continuing their bufinefs.But, left the faid iflanders fhould fuffer inconveniency by the want of hats, we are farther graciously pleased to permit them to fend their beaver furs to Pruffia; and We alfo permit ⚫ hats made thereof to be exported from Pruffia to Britain; the people thus favoured to pay all cofts and charges of manufacturing, intereft, 'commiffion to Our merchants, infurance and freight going and returning; as in the case of

• iron.

And lastly, being willing farther to favour our faid colonies in Britain, We do hereby alfo ordain and command, that all the thieves, highway and ftreet robbers, housebreakers, forgerers, murderers, f-d-tes, and villains of every denomination, who have forfeited their lives to the law in Pruffia; but whom We, in Our great clemency, do not think fit here to hang; fhall be emptied out of Our gaols into the faid ifland of Great Britain, for the better peopling of that country.

We flatter ourselves that thefe Our royal regulations and commands will be thought juft and reafonable by Our much - favoured colonists in England; the faid regulations be

ing copied from their ftatutes of 10 and 11 • Will. III. c. 10.-5 Geo. II. c. 22-23 Geo. II. c. 29.-4 Geo. I. c. 1 and from other equitable laws made by their parliaments; or from • inftructions given by their princes, or from refolutions of both houfes, entered into for the good government of their own colonies in Ireland and America. S

And all perfons in the faid island are here by cautioned not to oppofe in any wife the execution of this Our edict, or any part thereof, fuch oppofition being high-treafon; of which all who are fufpected fhall be transported in • fetters from Britain to Pruffia, there to be tried ' and executed according to the Pruffian law.

Such is Our pleasure.

Given at Potsdam, this twenty-fifth day ⚫ of the month of Auguft, One thousand • feven hundred and feventy-three, and in the thirty-third year of Our reign.

"By the King, in his council.

• RECHTMÆSSIG, Sec.'

Τι

Some

Some take this edict to be merely one of the King's Jeux d'Efprit: others suppose it serious, and that he means a quarrel with England: but all here think the affertion it concludes with, that these regulations are copied from acts of the English parliament refpecting their colonies,' a very injurious one; It being impoffible to believe, that a people diftinguished for their love of liberty; a nation fo wife, fo liberal in its fentiments, fo juft and equitable towards its neighbours; fhould, from mean and injudicious views of petty immediate profit, treat its own children in a manner fo arbitrary and tyrannical !

PREFACE