Note 260 — Chapter IX

Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson, in a letter to Richard Jackson, Grenville's Secretary in the Exchequer, September, 1763, says, "The real cause of the illicit trade in this Province (Massachusetts) has been the indulgence of the officers of the Customs; and we are told that the cause of this indulgence has been that they are quartered upon for more than their legal fees, and that without bribery and corruption they must starve."

As a specimen of this "bribery and corruption," the deposition on oath of the Deputy Collector of his Majesty's Customs at the port of Salem is given, to the effect that every time he had been in the office it had been customary for the Collector to receive of the masters of the vessels entering from Lisbon casks of wine, boxes of fruit, etc., which was a gratuity for suffering their vessels to be entered with salt or ballast only, and passing over unnoticed such cargoes of wine, fruit, etc., which were prohibited to be imported into his Majesty's plantations; part of which wine, fruit, etc., the Collector used to share with Governor Barnard. (Bancroft's History of the United States, Vol. V., Chap, ix., p. 158, in a note.)