ABSTRACT
The most numerous classes of shipping advertisements, however, related to the sales of ships by auction, always at a coffee-house. The splendid service of shipping intelligence which was gradually evolved from very humble beginnings was of direct utility to shipowners and merchants, and was of incalculable value in assisting the Admiralty to furnish protection in time of war. The repeated voyages of the small vessels which carried this extensive traffic ran into thousands a year, and the total clearances in the "Foreign Coasting Trade" accounted normally for at least half of the shipping movements recorded in the foreign trade of Great Britain. The direct foreign trade of Ireland, though small, was not negligible; the clearances of British ships for ports outside Great Britain might amount to 500 in a year, of which rather less than two-fifths would be owned in Ireland itself.
