to fish with fewer hands, so that each had a greater dividend in the profit; it made them more vigilant in seeking game, bolder in pursuing it, and parsimonious in all their expenses.  London was their only market.  When, therefore, by the late revolution, they became aliens in Great Britain, they became subject to the alien duty of eighteen pounds five shillings the ton of oil, which being more than equal to the price of the common whale-oil, they are obliged to abandon that fishery.  So that this people, who, before the war, had employed upwards of three hundred vessels a year in the whale-fishery (while Great Britain had herself never employed one hundred), have now almost ceased to exercise it.  But they still had the seamen, the most important material for this fishery; and they still retained the spirit for fishing:  so that, at the re-establishment of peace, they were capable, in a very short time, of reviving their fishery in all its splendor.  The British government saw that the moment was critical.  They knew that their own share in that fishery was as nothing:  that the great mass of fishermen was left with a nation now separated from them:  that these fishermen, however, had lost their ancient market; had no other resource within their country to which they could turn and they hoped, therefore, they might, in the present moment of distress, be decoyed over to their establishments, and be added to the mass of their seamen.  To effect this, they offered extravagant advantages to all persons who should exercise the whale-fishery from British establishments.  But not counting with much confidence on a long connection with their remaining possessions on the continent of America, foreseeing that the Nantuckois would settle in them, preferably, if put on an equal footing with those of Great Britain, and that thus they might have to purchase them a second time, they confined their high offers to settlers in Great Britain.  The Nantuckois, left without resource by the loss of their market, began to think of removing to the British dominions; some to Nova Scotia, preferring smaller advantages in the neighborhood of their ancient country and friends; others to Great Britain, postponing country and friends to high premiums.  A vessel was already arrived from Halifax to Nantucket, to take off some of those who proposed to remove; two families had gone on board, and others were going, when a letter was received there, which had been written by Monsieur le Marquis de la Fayette, to a gentleman in Boston, and transmitted by him to Nantucket.  The purport of the letter was to dissuade their accepting the British proposals, and to assure them that their friends in France would endeavor to do something for them.  This instantly suspended their design:  not another went on board, and the vessel returned to Halifax with only the two families.