A history of emigration from the United Kingdom to North America, 1763-1912 - Tapa blanda

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1914 Excerpt: ... the very people of whom the Empire stood in most need were allowed to drift into a foreign State. So far, the question of the preference for the United States has only been treated in a broad sense. As may be judged, there were many minor issues which diverted the stream o£ British emigration from Canadian shores. The state of the currency, for instance, was so unsatisfactory in British North America that commerce became seriously handicapped. In the early years of the nineteenth century, transactions were seldom effected with the assistance of specie, but card money,1 as the paper currency was then called, was used instead. English money gradually found its way into both the upper and lower provinces and the United States coinage was not unknown along the Canadian frontier, but the supplies of these were limited. As a result, people were forced to adopt a system of barter; farmers took household commodities in exchange for their produce, and labourers were given board, lodgings, and stock as a reward for their labours. The system enabled the bare necessities of life to be obtained but seriously crippled all efforts of thrift. 1 Cf. Chapter IX. 2 Sometimes the purchasers were kept waiting as many as six weeks whilst their grants were being conveyed to them. Whilst contrasting the progress of emigration to Canada and the United States in the opening years of the nineteenth century, it is necessary to mention that certain Acts of Parliament restricted the exodus of British people to the States and so gave a possible preference to British North America. To trace the history of these preventive Acts, it is necessary to go back to the time of Charles I. In this reign, a proclamation was issued to suppress "the disorderly transporting of His Majesty's ...