THE Royal Company, as they call themselves, are a great In­jury to the Nation in divers Respects.

I. They hinder the vent of the Woollen Manufacture, trading themselves inconsiderably, nor suffering others, whereby not a Tenth part of the Product of England is Exported for Guiny, as might be, if the Trade were open, or managed by a Regulated Company.

II. They occasion the Decay of Navigation; Ten times the Number of Seamen and Ships might be imployed in that Trade, were it open, or regulated as aforesaid.

III. They Advance the Interest and Trade of other Nations; for whilst we forbear to supply that Coast with Goods, other Nations fill it, and beat us out of our Trade with their Manufactures, when our own would at the same time vend better amongst the Natives, if we would supply the Mar­ket.

IV. They are dangerous for the rest of their Majesties Subjects to deal with; for when a Company has a mind (after they have made ma­ny Dividends) they may break, thô every Individual Person be very rich, there is no Remedy for the Creditors.

V. They set what Price they please upon the Manufacture of England, so lower the Price of Wool, ruin the Workers and Dealers in the Woollen Manufacture, because there is but one Buyer.

VI. They set what Price they please on Ships they hire, for they have none of their own, and so Discourage the Building of Ships, as well as Masters and Seamen.

VII. They consequently hinder their Majesties Customs.

VIII. They have heretofore (and therefore may be expected from them again) been the great Invaders of Property, and contrary to Law and Justice, have taken from their Fellow Subjects their Ships and Goods, and granted Commissions so to do; and in all Differences with those they deal with, have been Judges in their own Cases.

XI. They hinder all manner of Discoveries of Places; and that ma­ny Ingenious Men would go upon, were it not that this Company will let none Profit thereby but themselves.

X. They ruin their Majesties Plantations;

• 1. By their not Supplying them with the quantity of Negroes ne­cessary.
• 2. By taking Excessive Rates for those they sell.
• 3. By furnishing them with Negroes unfit.
• 4. By setting what Price they please on the Commodities the Plan­ters produce, they having the greatest Command of the Mar­ket, there being but one Buyer for them all, and no Nation else suffered to Trade with them; nor they allowed to send their Product any where but to England.

Now all this as well hinders the Trade for England, as it does Injury to the Plantations of England.

All that this Company pretends to about Charges of Presents to the Natives of Guiny, maintaining of Factories on the Coast, Building and Maintaining of Fortifications, and Officers, and Souldiers, can better be performed by a Company regulated, as is already proposed, than by this.

But at Mingo, Alampo, Pittaw, the two Papaws, Arda, Quida, Old and New Callabar, and Angola, which are the chief Places of Trade for Negroes, the Company have no Forts nor Castles, nor are at any charge, and therefore most unreasonable to exact from their Fellow-Subjects 40 per Cent. for Trading thither, as they have done, and do.

This Company takes the same Course now, as is proposed the regula­ted Company should do, but then its to whom they please, and at such excessive Rates, that none can suppose it is for maintaining their Forti­fications, but in plain terms a perfect Tax and Imposition upon the Subjects, that none shall go about their lawful Occasions on the Coast of Guiny, except they will pay them 20. 25. and so to 40. per Cent. a Tax greater than ever any King laid upon his own Subjects. So then this Company can have no pretence to a Patent, for they neither are first Discoverers, nor the prime Traders to this Coast, and therefore have no Reason to expect the Confirmation of their Patent by an Act of Parliament, to the Destruction of the rest of their Majesties Subjects.