But the Nemesis of this Protective policy was sure to come, and come it did in that fatal folly which caused us to lose those very colonies which we had defended against the French in the Seven Years’ War. [48. See note 15, p. 249, on this point.] § 3. THE LOSS OF THE AMERICAN COLONIES--The way in which English statesmen looked upon our colonies in the last century was that they owed everything to England, and that therefore it was only fair that they should be exploited in the interests of the mother-country. Thus all imports to our colonies from any other country of Europe except England were forbidden, in order that our manufacturers might monopolize the American market. The criminal folly of our legislators went even further than this, for every attempt was made to discourage the colonists from starting manufactures at home. The American woollen industry was practically suppressed; all iron manufactures, as just mentioned, were forbidden in 1750; even colonial hatters were not allowed to send hats from one colony into another. Nevertheless the American colonists evaded the regulations that forbade them to trade with any but the mother-country, and did, for instance, a considerable trade with South America. But in George III.’s reign, Grenville, a Whig minister, was foolish enough to try and stop this. Moreover, he sought to raise money wherewith to pay for the American portion of the Seven Years’ War by taxing the colonists upon the stamps on legal papers (Stamp Act, 1765). The idea that the colonists should pay part of the expenses of the war undertaken in their defence was just enough; but that these expenses should be defrayed by a {171} system of taxation in which they had no voice was exactly the reverse. It is to the credit of Pitt that he protested against this taxation without representation, and exerted his influence for the repeal of this Act (1766). Thus the feelings of the colonists were soothed for a time, and in 1770 Lord North took off all taxes except that on tea. The colonists refused to buy tea: the East India Company, whose trade naturally suffered, tried to force their tea into America, and matters culminated in the celebrated emptying of a shipload of it into Boston harbour by the citizens of that port (1773). North tried to punish the Bostonians by decreeing that their port should be closed, and that the charter of Massachusetts, their colony, should be annulled. Of course war was now imminent. We need not here go into the details of that unfortunate conflict, though we must mention the heroic endeavours of Pitt, now Lord Chatham, to make England give full redress to her offspring. His efforts were in vain. France eagerly took the opportunity of assisting the Americans against the English, and England had to pay very dearly for her adherence to the Mercantile Theory.