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The advantage of such a settlement, in time of peace, is, I think, not easily to be proved. For what use can it have, but of a station for contraband traders, a nursery of fraud, and a receptacle of theft! Narborough, about a century ago, was of opinion, that no advantage could be obtained in voyages to the South sea, except by such an armament as, with a sailor’s morality, might trade by force. It is well known, that the prohibitions of foreign commerce, are, in these countries, to the last degree, rigorous, and that no man, not authorized by the king of Spain, can trade there but by force or stealth. Whatever profit is obtained must be gained by the violence of rapine, or dexterity of fraud.

Government will not, perhaps, soon arrive at such purity and excellence, but that some connivance, at least, will be indulged to the triumphant robber and successful cheat. He that brings wealth home is seldom interrogated by what means it was obtained. This, however, is one of those modes of corruption with which mankind ought always to struggle, and which they may, in time, hope to overcome. There is reason to expect, that, as the world is more enlightened, policy and morality will, at last, be reconciled, and that nations will learn not to do what they would not suffer.

But the silent toleration of suspected guilt is a degree of depravity far below that which openly incites, and manifestly protects it. To pardon a pirate may be injurious to mankind; but how much greater is the crime of opening a port, in which all pirates shall be safe! The contraband trader is not more worthy of protections; if, with Narborough, he trades by force, he is a pirate; if he trade secretly, he is only a thief. Those who honestly refuse his traffick, he hates, as obstructers of his profit; and those, with whom he deals, he cheats, because he knows that they dare not complain. He lives with a heart full of that malignity, which fear of detection always generates in those, who are to defend unjust acquisitions against lawful authority; and when he comes home, with riches thus acquired, he brings a mind hardened in evil, too proud for reproof, and too stupid for reflection; he offends the high by his insolence, and corrupts the low by his example.

Whether these truths were forgotten, or despised; or, whether some better purpose was then in agitation, the representation made in Anson’s voyage had such effect upon the statesmen of that time, that, in 1748, some sloops were fitted out for the fuller knowledge of Pepys’s and Falkland’s islands, and for further discoveries in the South sea. This expedition, though, perhaps, designed to be secret, was not long concealed from Wall, the Spanish ambassadour, who so vehemently opposed it, and so strongly maintained the right of the Spaniards to the exclusive dominion of the South sea, that the English ministry relinquished part of their original design, and declared, that the examination of those two islands was the utmost that their orders should comprise.

This concession was sufficiently liberal or sufficiently submissive; yet the Spanish court was neither gratified by our kindness, nor softened by our humility. Sir Benjamin Keene, who then resided at Madrid, was interrogated by Carvajal, concerning the visit intended to Pepys’s and Falkland’s islands, in terms of great jealousy and discontent; and the intended expedition was represented, if not as a direct violation of the late peace, yet as an act inconsistent with amicable intentions, and contrary to the professions of mutual kindness, which then passed between Spain and England. Keene was directed to protest, that nothing more than mere discovery was intended, and that no settlement was to be established. The Spaniard readily replied, that, if this was a voyage of wanton curiosity, it might be gratified with less trouble, for he was willing to communicate whatever was known; that to go so far only to come back was no reasonable act; and it would be a slender sacrifice to peace and friendship to omit a voyage, in which nothing was to be gained; that if we left the, places as we found them, the voyage was useless; and if we took possession, it was a hostile armament; nor could we expect that the Spaniards would suppose us to visit the southern parts of America only from curiosity, after the scheme proposed by the author of Anson’s voyage.