If They Brought Their Prize Safe Into Harbour,
The Advantage Was Considerable.
In time of peace the merchants of
Boulogne deal in wine brandies, and oil, imported from the South,
and export fish, with the manufactures of France, to Portugal,
and other countries; but the trade is not great.
Here are two or
three considerable houses of wine merchants from Britain, who
deal in Bourdeaux wine, with which they supply London and other
parts of England, Scotland, and Ireland. The fishery of mackarel
and herring is so considerable on this coast, that it is said to
yield annually eight or nine hundred thousand livres, about
thirty-five thousand pounds sterling.
The shop-keepers here drive a considerable traffic with the
English smugglers, whose cutters are almost the only vessels one
sees in the harbour of Boulogne, if we except about a dozen of
those flat-bottomed boats, which raised such alarms in England,
in the course of the war. Indeed they seem to be good for nothing
else, and perhaps they were built for this purpose only. The
smugglers from the coast of Kent and Sussex pay English gold for
great quantities of French brandy, tea, coffee, and small wine,
which they run from this country. They likewise buy glass
trinkets, toys, and coloured prints, which sell in England, for
no other reason, but that they come from France, as they may be
had as cheap, and much better finished, of our own manufacture.
They likewise take off ribbons, laces, linen, and cambrics;
though this branch of trade is chiefly in the hands of traders
that come from London and make their purchases at Dunkirk, where
they pay no duties.
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