armed cruisers and transports. They are assumed to be not bounties in
excess of the actual value of the service performed, with the real
though concealed object of fostering the development of British overseas
navigation. Still, notwithstanding this assumption, such has been their
practical effect.

Their original objects when first applied to steamship service, as
defined by a Parliamentary committee in 1853, were--"to afford us rapid,
frequent, and punctual communications with distant ports which feed the
main arteries of British commerce, and with the most important of our
foreign possessions; to foster maritime enterprise; and to encourage the
production of a superior class of vessels, which would promote the
convenience and wealth of the country in time of peace, and assist in
defending its shores against hostile aggression." To foster British
commerce they have undeniably been employed to meet and check foreign
competition on the seas, as the record shows.

In the United States they have taken the form of postal subsidies openly
granted for the two-fold purpose of the transportation of the ocean
mails in American-built and American-owned ships, and the encouragement
of American shipbuilding and ship-using.




CHAPTER II

GREAT BRITAIN