de neutral cargo. Suddenly English merchants and shippers woke
to the fact that they were often victims of deception. Cargoes would
be landed in the United States, duties ostensibly paid, and the goods
ostensibly imported, only to be reshipped in the same bottoms, with the
connivance of port officials, either without paying any real duties
or with drawbacks. In the case of the Essex the court of appeals cut
directly athwart these practices by going behind the prima facie payment
and inquiring into the intent of the voyage. The mere touching at a
port without actually importing the cargo into the common stock of the
country did not alter the nature of the voyage. The crucial point
was the intent, which the court was now and hereafter determined to
ascertain by examination of facts. The court reached the indubitable
conclusion that the cargo of the Essex had never been intended for
American markets. The open-minded historian must admit that this was
a fair application of the Rule of 1756, but he may still challenge the
validity of the rule, as all neutral countries did, and the wisdom of
the monopolistic impulse which moved the commercial classes and the
courts of England to this decision.*

* Professor William E. Lingelbach in a notable article on
"England and Neutral Trade" in "The Military Historian and
Economist" (April, 1917) has pointed out the error committed
by almost every historian from Henry Adams down, that the
Essex decision reversed previous rulings of the court and
was not in accord with British law.

Had the impressment of seamen and the spoliation of neutral commerce
occurred only on the high seas, public resentment would have mounted to
a high pitch in the United States; but when British cruisers ran into
American waters to capture or burn French vessels, and when British
men-of-war blockaded ports, detaining and searching--and at times
capturing--American vessels, indignation rose to fever heat. The
blockade of New York Harbor by two British frigates, the Cambrian and
the Leander, exasperated merchants beyond measure. On board the Leander
was a young midshipman, Basil Hall, who in after years described the
activities of this execrated frigate.

"Every morning at daybreak, we set about arresting the progress of all
the vessels we saw, firing of guns to the right and left to make every
ship that was running in heave to, or wait until we had leisure to send
a boat on boar