Another expedient, sir, has been offered on this occasion, not equally tyrannical, but equally inadequate to the end in view.  It is proposed to restrain the merchants from giving wages beyond a certain rate, on the supposition that the sailors have no motive but that of larger wages, to prefer the service of the merchants to that of the crown.

This, sir, is a mistake which might easily arise from a partial and imperfect knowledge of the affair, with which very few gentlemen have opportunities of being well acquainted.  The wages, sir, are the smallest inducements which fix the seamen in their choice.  The prospect of kinder treatment, the certainty of returning home in a fixed time, and the power of choosing what voyages they will undertake, cannot but be acknowledged very reasonable motives of preference.

On the contrary, sir, when they are once engaged in a ship of war, they know neither whither they are going, what dangers they shall encounter, what hardships they shall suffer, nor when they shall be dismissed.

Besides, sir, I do not think it possible by any law to limit the wages to be paid by merchants, since they will change the term of wages into that of a present, or admit the sailors to a small share in the freight, and so all the precaution we can take will become ineffectual.

In the mean time, sir, how much shall we embarrass our own commerce, and impair our natural strength—­the power of our fleets?  We shall terrify our sailors on the one hand, and endeavour to starve them on the other; we shall not only drive them from us by unheard-of severities, but take away every motive that can induce them to expose themselves to the danger of suffering them.

If we consider, sir, with what effect methods nearly approaching these were practised in the reign of the late queen, we shall find that not more than one thousand five hundred seamen were raised, and those at the expense of more than four thousand pounds; so that the effects bore no proportion to the means; our laws were infringed, and our constitution violated to no purpose.

But what reason, sir, can be assigned for which it must be more difficult to supply the fleet now with sailors than at any other time?  This war, sir, was demanded by the publick voice, in pursuance of the particular remonstrances of the merchants, and it is not to be supposed that the sailors or any other body of men engage in it with a particular reluctance.

I am, therefore, inclined to believe that the suspicion of great numbers hid in the country, at a distance from the coast, is merely chimerical; and that if we should pass this bill, we should do nothing more than grant an oppressive and unconstitutional power of search for what, in reality, is not to be found.

How oppressive this power may become in the hands of a corrupt or insolent magistrate, any man may discover, who remembers that the magistrate is made judge without appeal, of his own right to denominate any man a sailor, and that he may break open any man’s doors at any time, without alleging any other reason than his own suspicion; so that no man can secure his house from being searched, or, perhaps, his person from being seized.