On Friday, February 21st, an event which led directly and indirectly to results of some importance occurred. Three petitions from the merchants trading in tobacco {294} in London, Bristol, and Liverpool were presented to the House of Commons. These petitions complained of great interruptions for several years past of the trade with the British colonies in America by the Spaniards. The depredations of the Spanish, it was said, endangered the entire loss of that valuable trade to England. The Spaniards were accused of having treated such of his Majesty's subjects as had fallen into their hands in a barbarous and cruel manner. The petitioners prayed for the consideration of the House of Commons, and such timely remedy as the House should think fit to recommend. These petitions only preceded a great many others, all in substance to the same effect. The Commons entered upon the consideration of the subject in a Committee of the whole House, heard several petitioners, and examined many witnesses. An address was presented to the Crown, asking for copies of all memorials, petitions, and representations to the late King or the present, in relation to Spanish captures of British ships. [Sidenote: 1729--The Campeachy logwood] Copies were also asked for of the reports laid before the King by the Commissioners of Trade and of Plantations, concerning the dispute between England and Spain, with regard to the rights of the subjects of Great Britain to cut logwood in the Bay of Campeachy, on the western shore of that Yucatan peninsula which juts into the Gulf of Mexico. English traders had been for a long time in the habit of cutting logwood along the shores in the Bay of Campeachy, and the logwood trade had come to be one of the greatest importance to the West Indies and to England. The Spanish Government claimed the right to put a stop to this cutting of logwood, and the Spanish Viceroy and Governor had in some instances declared that they would dislodge the Englishmen from the settlements which they had established, and even treat them as pirates if they persisted in their trade. There was, in fact, all the material growing up for a serious quarrel between England and Spain.