They gained by it a
considerable addition of territory, extending their dominion to
the sea on all sides of the island, thereby shutting up all back-doors
against the enterprizes of their enemies. They got an
accession of above a million of useful subjects, constituting a
never-failing nursery of seamen, soldiers, labourers, and
mechanics; a most valuable acquisition to a trading country,
exposed to foreign wars, and obliged to maintain a number of
settlements in all the four quarters of the globe. In the course
of seven years, during the last war, Scotland furnished the
English army and navy with seventy thousand men, over and above
those who migrated to their colonies, or mingled with them at
home in the civil departments of life. This was a very
considerable and seasonable supply to a nation, whose people had
been for many years decreasing in number, and whose lands and
manufactures were actually suffering for want of hands. I need
not remind you of the hackneyed maxim, that, to a nation in such
circumstances, a supply of industrious people is a supply of
wealth; nor repeat an observation, which is now received as an
eternal truth, even among the English themselves, that the Scots
who settle in South-Britain are remarkably sober, orderly, and
industrious.
Pages:
484
485
486
487
488
489
490
491
492
493
494
495
496
497
498
499
500
501
502
503
504
505
506
507
508