These observations upon the incomplete form of this judicature and police, suggest themselves upon the bare reading of the act; but the experience of the manner in which it was executed, shewed all this in a more aggravated appearance. It has been too often repeated in the course of this historical enquiry to need repetition here, that the admirals were the servants of the merchants, inasmuch as they were the masters of some of their ships; that in many cases, therefore, justice was not to be expected from them; that is, in cases where their owners were concerned. In many others, where their owners or themselves were not concerned, there was always a partiality towards the description and class of persons with which they were connected; and a poor planter, or inhabitant, (who was considered as little better than a law-breaker in being such) had but small chance of justice, in opposition to any great west-country merchant. This bias must have been a strong impediment to the equal administration of justice in the hands of the fishing admirals. Besides this which arose from their employment and connection, there was another disqualification, that was to be corrected by no integrity or fairness whatsoever. It should seem, that persons, educated as masters of merchant ships, could not in general possess that discrimination and discernment, which was necessary for determining right and property, even in fishing stages and flakes. Such being the judicature established by the statute of King William, and such the hands in which it was lodged, we have found, that it was executed fully as ill as could from the nature of it be expected. We find that the admirals were most of their time out on the fishery; that, when in harbour, they were still employed about curing of their fish, and the other parts of their business; that the commanders of the king’s ships were obliged to summon, enjoin, and enforce them to hold courts; that discovering the sluggishness of the admirals, they were under the necessity of taking liberties not given by the statute; that, being only a court of appeal, they were obliged to erect themselves into an original court. This they did by degrees, and with a sort of deference to the provisions of the act of parliament. At first they got the admirals to sit with them; and I have seen many judgments and proceedings to which the commander of some of the king’s ships has first subscribed his name, and the admirals have added theirs. It is not to be wondered, that the commanders of the king’s ships, with their superior endowments, should gradually obtain an ascendancy; and having thus blended their appellate jurisdiction with the original one lodged in the admirals, should at length wholly dispense with their attendance of the fishing admirals (who would be glad enough to be excused), and so in time succeed to a complete original exercise of judicial authority in the place of the admirals.