Adam Smith, Commissioner (part 10)

Nota bene: Here are the previous installments — parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 — in my multi-part series on Adam Smith’s day-to-day duties as a commissioner of the Board of Customs of Scotland. End notes are below the fold. The next document in my Adam Smith sample is Order #126, which is dated 15 November 1784 [1] and is signed by the same commissioners in the same sequence who signed the previous order in my sample (#125): David Reid (top signature), Adam Smith (middle), and James Edgar (bottom). To the point, this order involves a seizure of 1162 pounds of “leaf tobacco”: “Having received your Letter of the of last Month, enclosing a Return of Seizure by Gabriel Kay Officer of Excise for 1162 lbs Leaf Tobacco; We direct you to call upon the Seizure maker to point out the particular Section of the Act 24th Geo. 3d which prescribes the Certificate, the want of which is given as the ground of Seizure, explaining the Circumstances in respect of which the Tobacco in question is…