It is not to be doubted but that the Vendding our Product and Manufactures and promoting our Navigation on advantageous terms is the true Interest of this Nation, and all Foreign Commerce as it advances either is more or less profitable, now the Confinement of the _African_ Trade to a limited Stock promotes the ends of neither, and I believe 'tis one reason why we know so little of that large Continent, because the Company finding ways enough to employ their Fund among those few Factories they had setled on the Sea Coast never endeavoured a farther _Inland_ Discovery, whereas if it was laid open, the busie Merchant that Industrious Bee of the Nation would not leave one River or Creek untraded to, from whence he might hope to make Advantage. It's to Trade and Commerce we are beholding for what Knowledge we have of Foreign Parts, and it is observable that the more remote People dwell from the Sea the less they are acquainted with Affairs abroad; _Africa_ is a large Country, and doubtless the Trade to it might be much enlarged to our Advantage, and better Settlements made and secured if good Methods were taken; Use and Experience make us at last Masters of every thing; and tho' the first Undertakers of a Design fall short of answering their private Ends, yet they may not the Ends of the Nation, by laying open a beaten Path for Posterity to tread in with Success where they miscarry'd; when all places in _England_ may freely send Ships, and be permitted to the management of their own Affairs, this encourages Industry, and sets Peoples Heads at work how they may outdo each other by getting first into a new Place of Trade; besides, the more Traders the more Buyers at Home and Sellers Abroad, and by this means our Plantations on that large Continent of _America_ would be better furnished with _Negroes_, for want of which the Inhabitants there could never arrive to those Improvements they have done in the Islands, the Company having given them little or no Supply, who rather chose to send them to the latter, because they were able to make better Pay; But the Interlopers have done it, tho' under great discouragements from the Company and their Factors, who like the Dog in the Fable, would neither supply those Plantations themselves, nor suffer others to do it. As for the other Commodities brought in Returns from _Africa_, Wax and Teeth, one serves for a Foreign Trade without lessening the Expence of our own Product, the other imploys our Manufacturers at home, and is afterwards Exported to other Markets; and as for the Gold brought thence, I need not mention how much it doth advance our Wealth, all agree it to be a good Barter. On the whole I take the _African_ Trade both for its Exports and Imports, and also as it supplies our Plantations, and advances Navigation, to be very beneficial to this Kingdom, and would be made much more so, and better secured, were it laid open by being formed into a Regulated Company. [Sidenote: Maderas.]