"That, nevertheless, if by these considerations and others of the same nature, the navigation to this Colony is longer suspended, the well-being of the Republic cannot avoid the most sensible prejudice, and the Colony must be considered as abandoned; her inhabitants will see themselves even reduced to deliver themselves into the hands of their enemies, to the ruin and total loss not only of the classes the most at their ease, but of all the inhabitants whatsoever of the United Provinces; so that we ought not to delay a single moment, nor neglect any means of encouragement or precaution to preserve them; so much the rather, as it appears scarcely convenient under this embarrassment, to invoke the assistance of foreign nations, to make the transportation, and to go to the Colony and to return; because, that in that case, we should lose this navigation, and we should lend our own hand to the entire declension, not only of the aid furnished to the treasury of the Republic, by the activity of this commerce and this navigation, but also to the interruption of the sales of so many manufacturers, mercers, and traders, and even to the entire privation of the sustenance of an immense number of workmen and artisans, to whom this construction of vessels and this navigation so extended, procured their daily gain, which they cannot forego without being reduced to the most deplorable situation. That this repugnance to navigate on one's own account will be further followed by the desertion of a great number of sailors, who for want of finding employment here, and tempted by the advantageous promises of the enemy, will go there in search of service, to the double detriment of the public interest of the Republic. That the respectable fleet, composed of valuable vessels destined to this navigation, would rot in our ports, and the officers who command them, many of whom have not been thought unworthy to be called to the service of their country, would be obliged to abandon with their families this country, where all the other means of gaining a livelihood fail more and more; and as they have solely applied themselves to navigation, they would go in search of their subsistence into places, where, by our interruption, navigation makes new advances every day. That this method, indicated by necessity, of recurring to foreign flags, by the more considerable expenses which arise from it, would so absorb the revenues, that not only no planter would be able, with the little which should remain to him, to support his plantation, but, moreover, there would remain no well-grounded hope for the great number of bearers of obligations to flatter themselves with obtaining any payment, still less the entire payment of the interests promised them; since without having yet supported these additional expenses, and notwithstanding the excessive prices at which the productions have been sold, they have seen themselves forced to diminish considerably the interests, and in some