‎SHEFFIELD, J. (BAKER HOLROYD.)‎
‎Observations on the commerce of the American States. With an appendix containing tables of the import and export of Great Britain to and from all parts, from 1700 to 1783. Also, the export of America, &c. with remarks on those tables, on the trade and navigation of Great Britain, and on the late Proclamations, &c. The sixthe edition, enlarged with a complete index to the whole.‎

‎London, printed for J. Debrett, 1784. With 16 tables (mainly folding). (4), xlvii, 345, (30), 24 pp. and 4 lvs of publisher's catalogue. 8vo. Contemporary speckled calf, spine gilt in compartments, green label with gilt lettering. Sabin 32633; JFBL S290; Howes H.616; not in Streeter; Kress B.784; Goldsmiths 12623; cf.: Black 1348 (Dublin edition); not in Einaudi. Much expanded edition. A detailed exposition and statistical comparison of the imports and exports of Great Britain and the United States, from 1700 to 1783. With each edition, Sheffield substantially revised and enlarged the text. Written in opposition to the bill introduced by Pitt in 1783, proposing to relax the navigation laws in favour of the States, the work was influential in determining the abandonment of the motion. Sheffield points up the weak position of America and continually stresses the growing commercial importance and potential of the West Indies and Canada (especially Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, particularly with regard to fisheries, lumber, and ship-building). Howes writes that the work was very influential in shaping England's trade policy from 1783 to 1789, so detrimental to American commerce and shipping interests as to contribute greatly to the formation of a Federal union, better able, than were the separate federated states, to retaliate against British maritime might.The tables provide extensive statistical information, giving a comparative export and import survey of the trade between the United States and other countries. The tables have been bound in a bit of a disorder: tables 12-15 are bound before the "Contents of Tables", the tables start with number 16, followed by the numbers 1-11, but all 16 tables are present. - Page xxiii/xxiv with some damage but no loss of text; inscribed by the author in upper margin of the title-page, slightly touched by the binder's knife. ‎

Reference : 18757

‎‎