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LIBRARY
THE UNIVERSITY
OF CALIFORNIA
SANTA BARBARA
FROM THE LIBRARY OF
MRS. H, RUSSELL AMORY.
GIFT OF HER CHI LDREN
R. W. AND NINA PARTRIDGE.
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Mi^¥Wl lA
THE HISTORY
OF
BRITISH COMMERCE,
jf rom t^e Orarliest Cimes.
REPRINTED FROM
THE PICTORIAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND;
WITH CORRECTIONS, ADDITIONS,
AND A CONTINUATION TO THE PRESENT DAY.
By GEO. L. CRAIK, M.A.
IN THREE VOLUMES.— VOL. I.
LONDON:
CHARLES KNIGHT & Co., LUDGATE STREET.
1844.
London: — rrinleJ by W. Clowes hikI Suns, Stannford Street.
[I'HE HISTORY
OF
BRITISH COMMERCE,
REPRINTED FROM
THE- PICTORIAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND;
WITH CORRECTIONS, ADDITIONS,
AND A CONTINUATION TO THE PRESENT DAY.
By GEO. L. CRAIK, M.A.
IN THREE VOLUMES.— VOL. I.
LONDON:
CHARLES KNIGHT & Co., LUDGATE STREET.
_ 1844.
C5\
London: — IVinled hy W. ('LowKsaiKl Sons. Stamlord StiPet.
n^2 HISTORY
BRITISH COMMERCE.
CHAPTER 1.
BEFORE AXD DURING THE ROMAJJ OCCUPATION.
The small beginnings, hidden in the depths of ancient
time, of that which has become so mighty a thing as Bri-
tish commerce, have an interest for the imagination, the
same in kind with that belonging to the discovery of the
remote spring or rill which forms the apparently insigni-
ficant source of some famous river, but as much higher in
degree as the history of human affairs is a higher study
than the history of inanimate nature.
The Phoenicians, the great trading people of antiquity,
are the first foreigners who are recorded to have opened
any commercial intercourse with the British islands.
There are some facts which make it probable that this
extremity of the globe was visited even by the navigators
of the parent Asiatic states of Sidon and Tyre. Tin, a
product then to be obtained only from Britain and Spain,
was certainly used in considerable quantities by the civi-
lized nations of the earliest times. It was the alloy with
which, before they attained the knowledge of the art of
giving a high temper to iron, they hardened copper, and
made it serve for warlike instruments and many other
purposes. A mixture of copper and tin, in due propor-
tions, was perhaps fitted, indeed, to take a sharper edge
as a sword or spear than could have been given to iron
itself, for a long time after the latter metal came to be
known and wrought. It is certain at least that swords
and other weapons fabricated of the compound metal
continued to be used long after the introduction of iron.
VOL. I. B
10 HISTORY OF
This composition was really what the Greeks called cImI-
cos and the Romans aes, although these words have usually
been improperly translated brass, which is compounded
not of copper and tin, but of copper and zinc. There is
no reason to suppose that zinc was at all known to the
ancients ; and, if so, brass, properly so called, was equally
unknown to them. What is commonly called the brass
of the Greeks and Romans, being-, as we have said, a
mixture of co))per and tin, is not brass, but bronze. This
is the material, not only of the ancient statues, but also of
many of their other metallic articles both ornamental and
useful. It was of this, for instance, that they fabricated
the best of their mirrors and reflecting specula ; for the
composition, in certain proportions, is capable of taking 'a
high polish, as well as of being hammered or filed to a sharp
and hard edge in others. This also is the matei'ial of
which so many of the Celtic antiquities are foi-nied, and
which on this account is sometimes called Celtic brass,
although it might with as much propriety be called Greek
])rass, or Roman brass. In like manner the swords found
at Cannae, which are supposed to be Carthaginian, are of
bronze, or a composition of copper and tin. Tin, too, is
supposed, with much probability, to have been used by
the Phoenicians at a very early period in those processes
of dyeing cloth for which Tyre in particular was so fa-
mous. Solutions of tin in various acids are still applied
as mordants for fixing colours in cloth. Tin is under-
stood to be mentioned under the Hebrew tei'm bedil,
in the Book of Numbers ;* and, as all the other metals
supposed to have been then known are enumerated in the
same passage, it would be difficult to give another pro-
bable translation of the word. The lexicographers de-
rive it from beclL to separate ; tin, they say, being a sepa-
rating metal. This would carry the knowledge and use
of tin back to a date nearly 1500 years antecedent to the
commencement of our era. At a much later date, the
prophet Ezekiel is supposed to mention it under the same
name as one of the conmiodities in which Tyre traded
with Tarshish, probably a general appellation for the coun-
* xxxi. 22.
BRITISH COMMKRCE. 11
tries lying beyond the Pillars of Hercules. The age of
Ezekiel is ])laced nearly six centuries before the birth of
Christ ; but we have evidence of the knowledge and em-
ployment of tin by the Phanicians at a much earlier pe-
riod in the account of the erection and decoration of the
Temple of Solomon, the principal workmen employed in
which — and among the rest the makers of the articles of
brass, that is, bronze, and other metals — were brought
from Tyre.
The oldest notice, or that at least professing to be
derived from the oldest sources, which we have of the
Phoenician trade with Britain, is that contained in the
narrative of the voyage of the Carthaginian navigator Hi-
milco, which is given us by Festus Avienus.* This
voyage is supposed to have been performed about 1000
years before the commencement of our era. Himilco is
stated to have reached the Isles of the CEstrymnides within
less than four months after he had set sail trom Carthage.
Little doubt can be entertained, from the description
given of their position and of other circumstances, that
these were the Scilly Islands. The CEstrymnides are
placed by Avienus in the neighbourhood of Albion and
of Ireland, being two days' sail from the latter. They
were rich, he says, in tin and lead {metallo cUvites stanni
atque plumhi). The people are described as being nu-
merous, high-spirited, active, and eagerly devoted to
trade ; yet they had no ships built of timber wherewith
to make their voyages, but in a wonderful manner effected
their way along the water in boats constructed merely of
skins sewed together. We must suppose that the skins or
hides were distended by wickerwork which they co\ ered,
although that is not mentioned. There are well authen-
ticated accounts of voyages of considerable length made in
such vessels as those here described at a much later period.
It is observable that in this relation neither the CEs-
trymnides, nor the Sacred Isle of the Hiberni, nor that of
the Albiones in its neighbourhood, appear to be spoken
* Avienus wrote his work, entitled " Ora ^Nlaritima," in
Latin iambic verse in the fourth century ; but he states that
he drew his information from the ancient Punic records.
ij2
12 HISTORY OF
of as discoveries made by Himilco ; on the contrary, the
Isle of the Hiberni is described as known by the epithet
of the Sacred Isle to the ancients, and the resort for the
purposes of traffic to the QSstrymnides is declared to have
been a custom of the inhabitants of Tartessus and Car-
thage.
No mines of any kind are now wrought in the Scilly
islands ; but they present appearances of ancient excava-
tions, and the names of two of them, as Camden has
remarked, seem to intimate that mining had been at one
time carried on in them. They may in early times have
produced lead as well as tin ; or, these metals here ob-
tained by the Phoenicians, or their colonists of Tartessus
and Carthage, may have been brought from the neigh-
bouring peninsula of Cornwall, which produces both, and
which besides was most probably itself considered one of
these islands. Pliny, it may be noted, has preserved the
tradition, that the first person who imported lead (phim-
bwn — by which name, however, he designates both lead
and tin) from the island of Cassiteris was Midacritus,*
which has been supposed to be a corruption of JNIeli-
airtus, the name of the Phoenician Hercules. Cassiteris
means merely the land of tin, that metal being called in
Greek cassiteron.
The next notice which we have of the trade of the
Phoenicians, or their colonists, with Britain, is that pre-
served by Strabo. His account is, that the traffic with
the isles called the Cassiterides, which he describes as
being ten in number, lying close to one another, in the
main ocean north from the Artabri (the people of Gal-
licia), was at first exclusively in the hands of the Phoeni-
cians of Gades, who carefully concealed it from all the
rest of the world. Only one of the ten islands, he states,
was uninhabited ; the people occupying the others wore
black cloaks, which were girt about the waist and reached
to their ankles : they w^alked about with sticks in their
hands, and their beards were as long as those of goats.
They led a pastoral and wandering life. He expressly
* Nat. Hist. VII. 57.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 13
mentions their mines both of tin and lead, and these
metuls, he adds, along with skins, they give to the foreign
merchants who resort to them in exchange for earthen-
ware, salt, and articles of bronze.
We may here observe that the geographer Dionysius
Periegetes gives the name of the Isles of the Hesperides
to the native country of tin, and says that these isles,
which he seems to place in the neighbourhood of Britain,
are inhabited by the wealthy descendants of the famous
Iberians. It is remarkable that Diodorus Siculus de-
scribes the Celtiberians, or Celts of Spain, as clothed in
black and shaggy cloaks, made of a wool resembling the
hair of goats, thus using almost the same terms which
Strabo employs to describe the dress of the people of the
Cassiterides. The chief island of the Scilly group is
called Silura by Solinus ; and perhaps the original occu-
pants of these isles were the same Silures who are stated
to have afterwards inhabited South Wales, and whose
personal appearance Tacitus has expressly noted as be-
tokening a Spanish origin.
It was undoubtedly through the extended commercial
connexions of the Phoenicians that the metallic products
of Britain were first distributed over the civilized world.
A regular market appears to have been found for them
by these enterprising traffickers in some of the most re-
mote parts of the earth. Both Pliny and Arrian have
recorded their exportation to India, where the former
writer says they were wont to be exchanged for precious
stones and pearls. It is probable that this commerce
was at one time carried on, in part at least, through the
medium of the more ancient Palmyra, or Tadmor of the
Desert, as it was then called, which is said to have been
founded by Solomon a thousand years before our era.*
* See in Maurice's Indian Antiquities, vol. vi. pp. 249,
&c., a " Dissertation on the Commerce carried on in very
remote ages by the Phoenicians, Carthaginians, and Greeks,
with the British Islands, for their ancient staple of tin, and
on their extensive bai-ter of that commodity with those of
the Indian Continent ; the whole confirmed by extracts
from the Institutes of Menu, &;c." The extracts from the
14 HISTORY OF
The Phoenicians, and their colonists settled in Africa
and the south of Spain, appear to have retained for a long-
period the exclusive possession of the trade with the Bri-
tish islands, even the situation of which they contrived
to keep concealed from all other nations. It appears
from Herodotus, that, in his time, about four centuries
and a half before the birth of Christ, although his coun-
trymen knew that tin came from certain islands which,
on that account, went by the name of the Cassiterides, or
Tin Isles, yet all that was known of their situation was,
that they lay somewhere in the north or north-west of
Europe. It is generally supposed that the first Greek
navigator M'ho penetrated into the seas in this part of the
world was Pytheas of Marseilles, who appears to have
flourished about a hundred years after the time of Hero-
dotus. From this celebrated colony of Marseilles some-
thing of the Greek civilization seems early to have
radiated to a considerable distance over the surrounding
regions ; but whether there ever was any direct inter-
course between Marseilles and Britain we are not in-
formed. The only accounts of the trade which have
come down to us, represent it as carried on through the
medium of certain ports on the coast of Gaul nearest to
our island ; and we are probably to understand that the
ships and traders belonged, not to Marseilles, but to these
native Gallic towns. From the north-west coast of Gaul,
the tin and lead seem to have been for a long time trans-
ported across the country to Marseilles by land car-
riage.
Strabo relates, on the authority of Poly bins, that, when
Scipio Africanus the younger made inquiry respecting
the tin islands of the people of Marseilles, they professed
to be totally ignorant of where they lay. From this we
must infer, either that the Massilians had adopted the
policy of the Carthaginians with regard to the navigation
to these isles, and studiously concealed what they knew of
them, or, what is more probable, that they really knew
Institutes of Menu, however, hardly deserve this formal an-
nouncement ; and the essay, altogether, is, like everything
else of this author's, a very tlimsy performance.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 15
nothing- of the countries from which their tin came, the
trade being, in fact, carried on, as we have just sup])osed,
through the medium of the merchants of the north-west
coast of Gaul. The Romans, according to the account
given by Strabo in another place, had made many en-
deavours to discover the route to these mysterious isles,
even while the trade. was still in the exclusive possession
of the Carthaginians. He relates, that, on one occasion,
the master of a Carthaginian vessel finding himself pur-
sued, while on his way to the Cassiterides, by one \^hom
the Romans had appointed to watch him, purposely ran
his vessel aground, and thus, although he saved his life,
sacrificed his cargo ; the value of which, however, was
repaid to him, on his return home, out of the public
treasury. But the Romans, he adds, at length succeeded
in discovering the islands, and getting the tin trade, or
at least a part of it, into their own hands. As Strabo
died A.D. 25, this commercial intercourse of the Romans
with the south-west of Britain must have long preceded
the invasion of the south-eastern part of the country by
Claudius, and may very possibly have preceded even the
earlier invasion by Cffisar. It is remarkable that Strabo
does not speak of it as having been a consequence of, or
in any degree connected \\ith, the last-mentioned event.
He says, that some time after its commencement a
voyage was made to the island by a Roman navigator of
the name of Publius Cnissus, who, finding the inhabit-
ants of a pacific disposition, and also fond of navigation,
gave them some instructions, as the words seem to imply,
for carrying it on upon a larger scale. This passage has
attracted less attention than it would seem to deserve ;
for, if the Cassiterides be, as is generally supposed, the
Scilly Islands, we have here the first notice of any com-
mercial intercourse carried on with Britain by the
Romans, and a notice which must refer to a date con-
siderably earlier than that at which it is usually assumed
that the country first began to be resorted to by that
people.
We are inclined to believe, however, that the trade of
the Romans with the Cassiterides was entirely confine^i
HISTORY OF
to their colonial settlements in the south of Gaul. Of
these the city of Narbonne, situated about as far to the
west of the mouth of the Rhone as the Greek city of
]^7larseilles stood to the east of it, Mas the chief, as well
as one of the oldest, having been foimded about the year
B.C. 120, The historian Diodorus Siculus, who waij
contemporary with Julius Csesar, has given us an ac-
count of the manner in which the trade between Britain
and Gaul was carried on in his day, which, although it
does not expressly mention the partici})ation of either the
Romans or any of their colonies, at least shows that the
Cassiterides and the island of Britain had become better
known than they were a hundred years before in the
time of the younger Scipio. Diodorus mentions the
expedition of Caesar, of which he promises a detailed
account in a part of his history now unfortunately lost ;
but he tells us a good many things respecting the island,
the knowledge of which could not have been obtained
through that expedition. We must, therefore, suppose
that he derived his information either through an inter-
course with the country which had arisen subsequent to
and in consequence of Caesar's attempt, or, as is much
more probable, from the accounts of those by whom the
south-western coast had been visited long before. . In-
deed, various facts concur to show that, however igno-
rant of Britain Csesar himself may have been when he
first meditated his invasion, a good deal was even then
known about it by those of the Greeks and Romans who
were curious in such inquiries. Caesar notices the fact
of tin, or white lead, as he calls it, being found in the
country ; but he erroneously ])laces the stores of this
mineral in the interior {in mediten'aneis regiombi(s), pro-
bably from finding that they lay a great distance from the
coast at which he landed ; and he does not seem to have
any suspicion that this was really the famous Land of
Tin, the secret of whose situation had been long guarded
with such jealous care by its first discoverers, and which
his own countrymen had made so many anxious endeavours
to find out. But a century and a half before this date
Foiybius, as he tells us himself, had intended to write
BRITISH COMMERCE. 17
respecting Britain ; and Strabo informs us that the great
historian had actually composed a treatise on the subject
of" the British Islands, and the mode of preparing tin.
His attention had probably been drawn to the matter by
the inquiries of his friend Scipio ; for Polybius, as is
well known, was the companion of that celebrated gene-
ral, in several of his military expeditions and other
journeys. No doubt, although the people of Marseilles
were unwilling or unable to satisfy the curiosity of the
travellers, they obtained the information they wanted
from some other quarter.* And in the title of this lost
* Camden has here expressed himself in a manner sin-
gularly contrasting with his customary, and, it may be
justly added, characteristic accuracy. First, in order to
prove " that it was late before the name of the Britons was
heard of by the Greeks and Komans," he quotes a passage
from Polybius, which in the original only implies that it
was doubtful whether the north of Europe was entirely en-
compassed by the sea, but which he renders as if it asserted
that nothing was known of Europe to the north of Mar-
seilles and Narbonne at all. Polybius has, in fact, himself
described many parts of Gaul to the north of these towns.
Next he makes the historian to have been the friend, not of
the younger, but of the elder Africanus, and to have tra-
velled over Europe not about B.C. 150, but 370 years before
Christ. Even if he had been the contemporary of the elder
Scipio, this would be a monstrous mistake. The whole of
this passage in Camden, however (it is in his chapter on the
Manners of the Britons), is opposed to his own opinions as
expressed in other parts of his work. The authority of
Festus Avienus, which he here disclaims, he elsewhere
makes use of very freely (see his chapter on the Scilly
islands, at the' end of the Britannia). And, whereas he
contends here that Britain had never been heard of by the
Greeks till a comparatively recent date, he has a few pages
before a long argument to prove that it must have been
known " to the most ancient of the Greeks." In the same
chapter (on the Name of Britain) he quotes a passage from
Pliny, in which that writer characterizes the island as
famous in the writings (or records, as it may be translated)
of the Greeks and Romans — " clara Grsecis nostrisque mo-
numentis."
B 3
i O HISTORY or
treatise of Polybius, as quoted by Strabo, it is important
to remark that we find the tin country distinctly recog-
nized as being the British Islands, J:he vague or ambi-
guous name of the Cassiterides being dropped. It is so,
likewise, in the account given by Diodorus. That writer
observes that the people of the promontory of Belerium
(the Bolerium of Ptolemy, and our present Land's End)
were much more civilized than the other British nations,
in consequence of their intercourse with the great num-
ber of foreign traders who resorted thither from all
parts. This statement, written subsequently to Caesai-'s
expedition, warrants us in receiving that writer's asser-
tion as to the superior refinement of the inhabitants of
Kent as true only in a restricted sense. In fact, there
were two points on the coast of the island separated by a
long distance from each other, at which the same cause, a
considerable foreign commerce and frequent intercourse
with strangers, had produced the same natural efiect.
I)iodorus goes on to describe the manner in which these
ancient inhabitants of Cornwall prepared the tin which
they exported. To this part of his description we shall
afterwards have occasion to advert. After the tin has
been refined and cast into ingots, he says, they convey it
in wheeled carriages over a space which is dry at low
water, to a neighbouring island, which is called Ictis ; and
here the foreign merchants purchase it, and transport it
in their ships to the coast of Gaul, The Ictis of Dio-
dorus has, by the majority of recent writers, been as-
sumed to be the Isle of Wight, the Uectis of Ptolemy,
and the Vectis or Vecta of some of the Latin writers.
But this seems to us altogether an untenable supposition.
It is impossible to believe either that Diodorus would
call the Isle of Wight an island in the neighbourhood of
the promontory of Bolerium, seeing that it is distant from
that promontory about 200 miles, or that the people of
Bolerium, instead of carrying down their tin to their
own (;oast, would make a practice of transporting it by
land carriage to so remote a point. Least of all is it
possible to conceive how a journey could be accom-
plished by wheeled carriages irom the Land's End to the
BRITISH COMMERCE. 19
Isle of Wight over the sands which were left dry at
low water, as Diodorus says was the case. There car^
be no doubt whatever that Ictis was one of the Scilly
Isles, between which group and the extremity of Corn-
wall a long reef of rock still extends, part of which
appears, from ancient documents, to have formed part of
the main land at a comparatively recent date, and which
there is no improbability in supposing may have afforded
a dry passage the whole way in the times of which Dio-
dorus writes. The encroachments of the sea have un-
questionably effected extensive changes in that part of
the British coast ; and at a very remote period it is
evident from present appearances, as well as from facts
w^ell attested by records and tradition, that the distance
between the Scilly Isles and the main land must have
been very much less than it now is. " It doth appear
yet by good record," says a writer of the latter part of
the sixteenth century, "that, whereas now there is a
great distance between the Scyllan Isles and point of the
Land's End, there was of late years to speak of scarcely
a brook or drain of one fathom water between them, if so
much, as by those evidences appeareth that are yet to be
seen in the hands of the lord and chief owner of those
isles."* Some of the islands may even have been sub-
merged in the long course of years that has elapsed since
the Ictis was the mart of the tin trade ; and the numerous
group of islets which we now see may very possibly be
only the relics left above water of the much smaller
number of a considerable size, which are described as
forming the ancient Cassiterides. It may be added that,
if the south-west coast of Brittany, where the maritime
nation of the Veneti dwelt, was, as seems most probable,
the part of the continent from which the tin ships sailed,
the Isle of Wight was as much out of their way as of
that of the people of Bolerium. The shortest and most
direct voyage for the merchants of Vannes was right
across to the very point of the British coast where the
tin mines were. It appears to us to admit of little doubt
* Harrison's Description of England, b. iii. c. 7.
20 HISTORY OF
that the Ictis of Diodorus is the same island which, on
the authority of the old Greek historian, Timaeus, is men-
tioned by Pliny under the name of Mictis, and stated to
lie six days' sail inward (introrsus) from 13ritain (which
length of navigation, however, the Britons accomplished
in their wicker boats), and to be that in which the tin
was produced. It must no doubt have taken fully the
space of time here mentioned to get to the Scilly Isles
from the more distant parts even of the south coast of
Britain.
Diodorus goes on to inform us that the foreign mer-
chants, after having purchased the tin at the Isle of
Ictis, and conveyed it across the sea to the opposite
coast of Gaul, were then wont to send it overland to the
mouth of the Rhone, an operation which consumed
thirty days. At the mouth of the Rhone it was no doubt
purchased by the merchants of Marseilles, and at a later
period also by their rivals of Narbonne, if we are not
rather to suppose that the Gallic traders who brought it
from Britain were merely their agents. Caesar, however,
expressly informs us that the Veneti, who occupied a
part of the present Bretagne, had many ships of their
own, in which they were accustomed to make voyages to
Britain. From the two great emporia in the south of
France the commodity was diffused over all other parts
of the earth, as it had been at an earlier period from
Cadiz and the other Phcenician colonies on the south coast
of Spain.
It appears from Strabo, however, that the operose and
tedious mode of conveyance by land carriage from the
coast of Brittany to the gulf of Lyons was eventually
abandoned for other routes, in which some advantage
could be taken of the natural means of transportation
afforded by the country. By one of these, the British
goods being brought to the mouth of the Seine, in
Normandy, were sent up that river as far as it was
navigable, and then, being carried on horses a short dis-
tance overland, were transmitted for the remainder of
the way down the Rhone, and afterwards along the
coast to Narbonne and Marseilles. It is probable enough
BRITISH COMMERCE. 21
that the Isle of Wight, which is opposite to the mouth
of the Seine, may have been used as the mart of the
British trade in this navigation, for which purpose it
was also well adapted as lying about midway between
Cornwall and Kent, and being- therefore more conve-
niently situated than any other spot both for the supply
of the whole line of coast with foreign commodities, and
for the export of native produce. When the route we
are now describing came to be adopted for the British
trade generally, even a portion of the tin of Cornwall
may have found its way to this central depot. But, even
after land carriage came to be displaced by river na\ iga-
tion, a large portion of the British trade still continued
to be carried on from the west coast of Gaul, through the
medium both of the Loire and the Garonne. The Loire
seems to have been taken advantage of chiefly to convey
the exports from Narbonne and Marseilles down to the
sea-coast after they had been brought by land across the
country from Lyons, to which point they had been sent
up by the Rhone. The Garonne was used for the con-
veyance to the south of France of British produce, which
was sent up that river as far as it was navigable, and
thence carried to its destination over land.
This is nearly all that is known respecting the commer-
cial intercourse of Britain with other parts of the world
before the country became a province of the Roman
empire. The traffic both with Carthage and the Phoe-
nician colonies in the south of Spain had of course ceased
long before Caesar's invasion ; at that date the only direct
trade of the island was with the western and north-
western coasts of Gaul, from the Garonne as far pro-
bably as to the Rhine ; for, in addition to the passage of
commodities, as just explained, to and from Provence,
the Belgic colonists, who now occupied so large a por-
tion of the maritime districts in the south of Britain,
appear also from their first settlement to have kept up
an active intercourse with their original seats on the con-
tinent which stretched to the last-mentioned river. The
British line of communication, on the other hand, may
be presumed to have extended from the Land's End to
22 HISTORY OF
the mouth of the Thames ; though it was probably only
at two or three points in the course of that long distance
that the continental vessels were in the habit of touch-
ing. There is no evidence that any of the vessels in
which the trade with the continent was carried on be-
longed to Britain. The island in those days seems only
to have been resorted to by strangers as the native place
of certain valuable commodities, and to have maintained
little or no interchange of visits with foreign shores.
Even fi'om this imperfect intercourse with the rest of the
world, however, the inhabitants of all this line of coast
must have been enabled to keep up, as we are assured
they did, a very considerably higher degree of civilization
than would be found among the back-woodsmen beyond
them. It is to be remembered that no small amount
of the commercial spirit may exist in a country which main-
tains no intercourse with foreigners except in its own ports.
The situation of Britain in this respect, two thousand
years ago, may be likened, indeed, to that of Spitzbergen
or New Zealand at present ; but the same peculiarity,
which at first sight seems to us so remarkable and so un-
natural, characterizes the great commercial empire of
China. There the national customs and the institutions
of the government have done their utmost to discourage
and restrain the spirit of commercial enterprise ; but that
spirit is an essential part of the social principle, and as
such is unextinguishable wherever the immutable cir-
cumstances of j)hysical situation are not adverse to its
development. Hence, although their laws and tradi-
tionary morality have operated with so much effect as to
prevent the people of China from pushing to any extent
what may be called an aggressive commerce, that is to say,
from seeking mai-kets for their commodities in foreign
countries, these adverse influences have not been able so
far to overcome the natural incentives arising out of their
geographical position as to induce them to refrain equally
from what we may call admissive commerce, or indeed to
be other than very eager followers of it. The case of
the early Britons may have been somewhat similar. The
genius of most of the Oriental religions seems to have
BRITISH COMMERCE. 23
been opposed to foreign intercourse of every kind, the
prohibition or systematic discouragement of which the
priests doubtless regarded as one of their most important
securities for the preservation of their influence and
authority ; and very probably such may also have been
the spirit of the Celtic or Druidical religion. It is re-
markable, at least, that the well ascertained Celtic tribes
of Europe, though distributed for the most part along the
sea-coast, have never exhibited any striking aptitude
either for navigation or for any employment in connexion
with the sea.
The most particular account of the exports and im-
ports constituting the most ancient British trade is that
quoted above from Strabo, and it is probably not very
complete. It only adds the single article of skins to
the tin and lead mentioned by Festus Avienus and others.
It is probable, however, that the island was known for a
few other products besides these, even before the first
Roman invasion. Caesar expressly mentions iron as
found, although in small quantities, in the maritime
districts. And it appears from some passages in the
Letters of Cicero, that the fame of the British war-
chariots had already reached Rome. Writing to Tre-
batius, while the latter was here with Csesar, b.c. 55,
after observing that he hears Britain yielded neither gold
nor silver, the oi'ator playfully exhorts his friend to get
hold of one of the esseda of the island, and make his
way back to them at Rome with his best speed. In
another epistle he cautions Trebatius to take care that
he be not snatched up and carried off before he knows
where he is, by some driver of one of these rapid vehi-
cles, Strabo's account of the foreign commodities im-
ported into Britain in those days is, that they con-
sisted of earthenware, salt, and articles of bronze, which
last expression is undoubtedly to be understood as mean-
ing not mere toys, but articles of use, in the fabrication
of which bronze, as we have explained above, was the
great material made use of in early times, Caesar also
testifies that all the bronze made use of by the Britons
was obtained from abroad. The metal, however, as we
24 HISTORY or
shall presently have occasion to show, was probably im-
ported to some extent in ingots or masses, as well as in
manufactured articles. Much of the bronze which was
thus brought to them, whether in lumps of metal, or in
the shape of weapons of war and other necessary or use-
ful articles, had no doubt been formed by the aid of
their own tin. Neither the Britons themselves, nor any
of the foreigners who traded with them at this early
period, appear to have been aware of the abundant stores
of copper which the island is now known to contain.
Indeed the British copper-mines have only been wrought
to any considerable extent in very recent times.
There is no reasonable ground for supposing, as some
writers have done, that the ancient Britons possessed any
description of navigating vessels, which could properly
be termed ships of war. The notion has been taken up
on an inference from a passage in Caesar, or rather from
a comparison of several passages, which the language of
that writer rightly understood certainly does not at all
authorize. Caesar gives us in one place an account of a
naval engagement which he had with the Veneti of
western Gaul, whose ships appear, from his description,
to have been very formidable military engines. In a
preceding chapter he had informed us, that in making
])reparations for their resistance to the Roman arms, the
Veneti, after fortifying their towns, and collecting their
whole naval strength at one point, associated with them,
for the purpose of carrying on the war, the Osismii, the
Lexobii, and other neighbouring tribes, and also sent for
aid out of Britain, which lay directly over against their
coast. But it is not said that the assistance which they
thus obtained, either from Britain or any other quarter,
consisted of ships. It does not even appear that it con-
sisted of seamen ; for, although it so happened that the
war was terminated by the destruction of the naval
power of the Veneti in the engagement we have just
mentioned, preparations had evidently been made in the
first instance for carrying it on by land as well as by sea.
The supposition that the Britons possessed any ships at all
resembling the high-riding, strong-timbered, iron-bound
BRITISH COMMERCE. 25
vessels of this principal maritime power of Gaul — pro-
vided, amongst other things, Csesar assures us, with chain
cables (anchorce^ pro fwdbus.ferreis catenis revindce) —
is in violent contradiction to the general bearing of all
the other recorded and probable facts respecting the con-
dition of our island and its inhabitants at that period.
There is no evidence or reason for believing that they
were masters of any other navigating vessels than open
boats, of which it may be doubted if any were even
furnished with sails. Their common boat appears to have
been what is still called the currach by the Irish, and the
coracle (cwrwgyJ) by the Welsh, formed of osier twigs,
covered with hide. The small boats yet in use upon
the rivers of Wales and Ireland are in shape like a
walnut-shell, and rowed with one paddle. Pliny, as
already noticed, quotes the old Greek historian Timseus,
as affirming that the Britons used to make their way to
an island at the distance of six days' sail in boats made of
wattles, and covered with skins ; and Solinus states that,
in his time, the communication between Britain and
Ireland was kept up on both sides by means of these
vessels. Caesar, in his history of the Civil War, tells
us that, having learned their use while in Britain, he
availed himself of them in crossing rivers in Spain ; and
we learn from Lucan, that they were used on the Nile
and the Po, as well as by the Britons. Another kind of
British boat seems to have been made out of a single
tree, like the Indian canoes. Several of these have
been discovered. In 1736 one was dug up from a morass
called Lockermoss, in Dumfries, Scotland. It was seven
feet long, dilated to a considerable breadth at one end ;
the paddle was found near it. Another, hollowed out of
a solid tree, was seen by Mr. Pennant, near Rilblaia.
It measured eight feet three inches long, and eleven
inches deep. In the year 1720 several canoes similar to
these were dug up in the marshes of the river ^ledway,
above Maidstone ; one of them so well preserved as to
be used as a boat for some time afterwards. C)n draining
Martine Muir, or Marton Lake, in Lancashire, there
were found sunk at the bottom eight canoes, each made
26 HISTORY OF
of a single tree, much like the American canoes.* In
1834 a boat of the same description was found in a creek
near the village of North Stoke, on the river Arun,
Sussex. It is now in the British Museum, and measures
in length thirty-five feet four inches ; in depth one foot
ten inches ; and in width, in the middle, four feet six
inches. There are three bars left at the bottom, at dif-
ferent distances from each other, and from the ends,
which seem to have served the double purpose of strength-
ening it and giving firm footing to those who rowed or
f)addled the canoe. It seems to have been made, or at
east finished, by sharpened instruments, and not by fire,
according to the practice of the Indians. f
Among the useful arts practised by the ancient Britons,
they must be allowed to have had some acquaintance with
those relating to the metals, but how much it is not easy
to determine. Both Strabo and Diodorus Siculus have
briefly noticed their mode of obtaining the tin from the
earth. The former observes that Publius Crassus, upon
his visit to the Cassiterides, found the mines worked to
a very small depth. It may be inferred from this ex-
pression, that the only mining known to the natives was
that which consisted in digging a few feet into the earth,
and collecting what is now called the stream tin, from
the modern process of washing and separating the parti-
cles of the ore thus lodged by directing over their bed a
stream of water. No tools of which they were possessed
could have enabled them to cut their way to the veins of
metal concealed in the rocks. The language of Diodorus
supports the same conclusion. He speaks of the tin as
being mixed with earth when it is first dug out of the
mine ; but, from what he adds, it would appear that the
islanders knew how to separate the metal from the dross
by smelting. After it was thus purified, they prepared
it for market by casting it into ingots in the shape of dice.
What lead they had was no doubt procured in like man-
ner from the surface of the soil or a very small depth
under it. Pliny indeed expressly states that, even in
* King's Munimenta Antiqua, vol. i. page 28, &c.
•f Archaeologia, vol. xxvi. p. 257, &c.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 27
his time, this latter metal was found in Britain in great
plenty lying thus exposed or scarcely covered.
There is reason to believe that some knowledge of the
art of working in metals was possessed by the Britons
before the Roman invasion. Moulds for spear, arrow,
and axe heads have been frequently found both in Britain
and Ireland;* and the discovery in 1735, on Easterly
Moor, near York, of 100 axe-heads, with several lumps
of metal and a quantity of cinders, may be considered
sufficient testimony that at least the bronze imported into
Britain was cast into shapes by the inhabitants thcm-
selves.f The metal of which the British weapons and
tools were made has been chemically analyzed in modern
limes, and the proportions appear to be, in a spear-head,
one part of tin to six of copper ; in an axe-head, one of
tin and ten of copper ; and in a knife, one of tin to seven
and a half of copper. J
Whatever knowledge the Gauls possessed of the art
of fabricating and dyeing cloth, the more civilized inha-
bitants of the South of Britain, having come originally
from Gaul, and always keeping up a close intercourse
with the people of that country, may be fairly presumed
to have shared with them. The long dark-coloured
mantles, in which Strabo describes the inhabitants of the
Cassiterides as attired, may indeed have been of skins,
but were more probably of some woollen texture. The
Gauls are stated by various ancient authors to have both
woven and dyed wool ; and Pliny mentions a kind of
felt which they made merely by pressure, which was so
hard and strong, especially when vinegar was used in its
manufacture, that it would resist the blow of a sword.
Caesar tells us that the ships of the Veneti of Gaul, not-
withstanding their superior strength and size, had only
skins for sails ; and he expresses a doubt as to whether
that material was not employed either from the want of
* Archajologia, vol. xiv. pi. Iv. and vol. xv. pi. xxxiv.
Collectanea de Reb. Hibern. vol. iv. pi. x.
t Borlase's Cornwall, p. 287.
X Meyrick's Original Inhabitants; and Philosophical
Transactions for 1796, p. 395, &c.
28 HISTORY or
linen or ignorance of its use. At a somewhat later
period, however, it appears from Pliny that linen cloth
was fabricated in all parts of Gaul. The dyes which the
Britons used for their cloth Avere probably extracted from
the same plant from which they obtained those with which
they marked their skin, namely, the isatis, or woad.
" Its colour," says a late writer, " was somewhat like
indigo, which has in a great degree superseded the use
of it. . . . The best woad usually yields a blue
tint, but that herb, as well as indigo, when partially
deoxidated, has been found to yield a tine green. . .
The robes of the fanatic British women, witches, or
priestesses, were black, vest'is feral is ; and that colour
was a third preparation of woad by the application of a
greater heat."* Woad is still cultivated for the purposes
of dyeing in France, and also, to a smaller extent, in
England.
Some of these facts would seem to afford us reason for
suspecting that Britain was better known even to the
Roman world before the two expeditions of Caesar than
is commonly supposed, or than we should be led to infer
from Caesar's own account of those attempts. We may
even doubt whether he was himself as ignorant of the
country as he affects to have been. He may very pos-
sibly have wished to give to his achievement the air of a
discovery as well as of a conquest. Tacitus appears to
be disposed to claim for Agricola, a century and a half
later, the honour of having first ascertained Britain to be
an island, although even Cffisar professes no doubt about
that point ; and, from the language of every preceding
writer who mentions the name of the country, its insular
cliaracter must evidently have been well known from
time immemorial. The Romans did nothing directly,
and, notwithstanding all their conquests, little even
indirectly, in geographical discovery ; almost w herever
they penetrated the Greeks or the Orientals had been
before them ; and any reputation gained in that iield
would naturally be valued in proportion to its rarity.
But, however this may be, Cuisar's invasion certainly
* Britannia after the Romans, p. 56.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 29
had the immediate effect of giving a celebrity to Britain
which it had never before enjoyed. Lucretius, the
oldest Roman writer who has mentioned Britain, is also,
we believe, the only one in whose works the name is
found before the date of Caesar's visit. Of the interest
which that event excited, the Letters of Cicero, to some
passages of which we have already referred, written at
the time both to his brother Quintus, who was in Caesar's
army, and to Atticus and his other friends, aftbrd suffi-
cient evidence. In the first instance, expectations seem
to have been excited that the conquest would probably
yield more than barren laurels ; but these were soon
dissipated. "It is ascertained," Cicero writes to Atti-
cus, before the issue of the expedition was yet known at
Rome, "■ that the approaches to the island are defended
by natural impediments of wonderful vastness {mirificis
molibus) ; and it is known too by this time that there is
not a scruple of silver in that island, nor the least chance
of booty, unless it may be from slaves, of whom you will
scarcely expect to find any very highly accomplished
in letters or in music."* So, also, in the epistle imme-
diately following to the same correspondent, he mentions
having had letters both from his brother and from Caesar,
informing him that the business in Britain was finished,
and that hostages had been received from the inhabit-
ants ; but that no booty had been obtained, although
a pecuniary tribute had been imposed {imperata tamen
pecunid).
Although the island was not conquered by Caesar, the
way was in a manner opened to it, and its name rendered
ever after familiar, by his sword and his pen. Besides,
the reduction of Gaul, which he effected, removed the
most considerable barrier between the Romans and
Britain. After that, whether compelled to receive an
imperial governor or left unattacked, it could not remain
as much dissociated from the rest of the world and unr
visited as before. A land of Roman arts, letters, and
government, — of Roman order and magnificence, public
and private, — now lay literally under the eyes of the
* Epist. ad Alt. iv. 16.
30 HISTORY OF
natives of Britain ; and it was impossible that such a
spectacle should have been long conteni})lated, and that
the intercourse which must have existed between the two
closely approaching coasts could have long gone on,
without the ideas and habits of the formerly secluded
islanders, semibarbarians themselves and encompassed by
semibarbarians, undergoing some change. Accordingly,
Strabo has intimated that, even in his time, that is to
say, in the reign of Augustus, the RoiJkan arts, manners,
and religion had gained some footing in Britain. It
appears also, from his account, that, although no annual
payment under the obnoxious name of a tribute was
exacted from the Britons by Augustus, yet that prince
derived a considerable revenue, not only from the pre-
sents which were made to him by the British princes,
but also by means of what would certainly now be
accounted a very decided exercise of sovereignty over
the island, the imposition of duties or customs upon
exports and imports. To these imposts, it seems, the
Britons submitted without resistance ; yet they must of
course have been collected by functionaries of the imperial
government stationed within the island, for it was a
leading regulation of the Roman financial system that all
such duties should be paid on goods exported before
embarkation, and on goods imported before they were
landed. If the duties were not paid according to this
rule, the goods were forfeited. The right of inspection,
and the other rights with which the collectors were
invested to enable them to apportion and levy these
taxes, were necessarily of the most arbitrary description ;
and they must have been even more than ordinarily so
in a country where the imperial government was not esta-
blished, and there was no regular superintending power
set over them. Strabo says that a great part of Britain
had come to be familiarly known to the Romans through
the intercourse with it which was thus maintained.
All this implies, that the foreign commerce of the
island had already been considerably extended ; and
such accordingly is proved to have been the case even
by the catalogue — probably an incomplete one — of its
BRITISH COMMERCE. 31
exports and imports which Strabo gives us. Among tho
former he mentions gold, silver, and iron, but, strangely
enough, neither lead nor tin ; corn, cattle, skins, — in-
cluding both hides of horned cattle and the skins and
tleeces of sheep, — and dogs, which he describes as pos-
sessing various excellent qualities. In those days slaves
were also obtained from Britain as they now are from the
coast of Africa ; and it may be suspected, from Cicero's
allusion already quoted, that this branch of trade was
older even than Caesar's invasion. Cicero seems to
speak of the slaves as a well-known description of British
produce. These several kinds of raw produce the Britons
appear to have exchanged for articles the manufacture of
which was probably of more value than the material, and
which were, for the gi'eater part, rather showy than
useful. The imports enumerated by Strabo are ivory
bridles, gold chains, cups of amber, drinking glasses,
and a variety of other articles of the like kind. Still,
all these are articles of a very different sort from the
brass buttons and glass beads, hy means of which trade
is carried on with savages.
After the establishment of the Roman dominion in the
country, its natural resources were no doubt much more
fully developed, and its foreign trade both in the way of
cx])ortation and importation, but in the latter more espe-
cially, must have assumed altogether a new aspect. The
Roman colonists settled in Britain of course were con-
sumers of the same necessaries and luxuries as in other
parts of the empire ; and such of these as could not be
obtained in the country were imported for their use
from abroad. They must have been paid for, on the other
hand, by the produce of the island, of its soil, of its
mines, perhaps of its seas, and by the native manufac-
tures, if there were any of these suited to the foreign
market.
The chief export of Roman Britain, in the most flourish-
ing times of the province, appears to have been corn.
This island, indeed, seems eventually to have come to be
considered in some sort as the Sicily of the northern part
of the empire ; and in the fourth century we find the
32 HISTORY OF
armies of Gaul and Germany depending in great part for
their subsistence upon the regular annual arrivals of corn
from Britain. It was stored in those countries for their
use in public granaries. But on extraordinary emer-
gencies a much greater quantity was brought over than
sufficed for this object. The historian Zosimus relates
that in the year 359, on the Roman colonies situated in
the Upper Rhine having been plundered by the enemy,
the Emperor Julian built a fleet of 800 barks, of a larger
size than usual, which he dispatched to Britain for corn ;
and that they brought over so much that the inhabitants
of the plundered towns and districts received enough not
only to support them during the winter, but also to sow
their lands in the spring, and to serve them till the next
harvest. It is probable also that Britain now supplied
the continental parts of the empire with other agricultural
produce as well as grain. No doubt its cattle, which
were abundant even in the time of Csesar, frequently
supplied the foreign market with carcases as well as hides,
and were also exported alive for breeding and the plough.
The British horses were highly esteemed by the Romans
both for their beauty and their training. Various Latin
poets, as well as the geographer Strabo, have celebrated the
pre-eminence of the British dogs above all others both fo^
courage, size, strength, fleetness, and scent.* Cheese, also,
which the natives, when they first became known to the
Romans, are said not to have understood how to make, is
stated to have been afterwards exported from the island
in large quantities. The chalk of Britain, and probably
also the lime and the marl, seem to have been held in
high estimation abroad ; and an altar or votive stone is
related to have been found in the seventeenth century at
Domburgh, in Zealand, with an inscription testifying it
to have been dedicated to a goddess named Nehaiennia,
for her preservation of his freight, by Secundus Silvanus,
a British chalk-merchant (Ncgociator Cretarius Bri-
tannicianus).
* See a curious collection of these testimonies in Cam-
den's Britannia, by Gibson, i. 139-40. See also Harrison's
Description of England, B. iii. c. 7.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 33
We may fairly ]:)resiime that the trade in the ancient
metallic products of the island, tin and lead, was greatly
extended during the Roman occupation. It seems to
have been then that the tin-mines first began to be
worked to any considerable depth, or rather that the
metal began to be procured by any process which could
properly be called mining. It ha-, been sup])Osed that
convicted criminals among the Romans used to be con-
demned to work in the British mines. Roman coins,
and also blocks of tin, with Latin inscriptions, have been
found in the old tin-mines and stream-works of Cornwall.
The British Museum contains several pigs of lead
stamped by the Romans, which have been discovered in
different parts of the country. Britain then, as now,
seems to have produced nmch moi-e lead than all the
rest of Europe. But we have no direct information as
to any actual exports of the metals from Britain in the
Roman times, and can merely infer the fact from the
mention which we find made of them as important pro-
ducts of the country, and i'rom the other evidences we
have that they were then obtained in considerable quan-
tities. On those grounds it has been supposed that sup-
plies were in those days obtained fi'om Britain not only
of lead and tin, but also of iron, and even of the precious
metals. Tacitus expressly mentions gold and silver as
among the mineral products of the island.*
The same writer adds that Britain likewise produces
pearls, the colour of which, however, is dusky and livid ;
but this he thinks may probably be attributed to the
unskilfulness of the gatherers, who do not pluck the fish
alive from the rocks, as is done in the Red Sea, but
merely collect them as the sea throws them up dead.
The ])earls of Britain seem to have very early acquired
celebrity. A tradition is preserved by Suetonius tliat
Julius Caesar was tempted to invade the island by the
hope of enriching himself with its })earls ; and Fliny
speaks of a shield studded with British pearls which,
after his expedition, he dedicated to Venus, and sns-
* Agric. 12i
34 HISTORY OF
pended in her temple at Rome. Solinus affirms that
the fact of the pearls being British was attested by an in-
scription on the shield, which agrees very well with Pliny's
expression, that Ci3esar wished it to be so understood.
The oldest Latin writer, we believe, who mentions the
Bi-itish pearls is Poniponius Mela, who asserts that some
of the seas of Britain generate pearls and gems. They
are also mentioned in the second century by Aelian in
his History of Animals, and by Origen in his Commen-
tary on St. Matthew, who, although he describes them
as somewhat cloudy, affirms that they were esteemed
next in value to those of India. They were, he says,
of a gold colour. Some account of the British pearls is
also given in the fourth century by Marcellinus, who
describes them, however, as greatly inferior to those of
Persia. In the same age the poet Ausonius mentions
those of Caledonia under the poetical figure of the white
shell-berries.* But the British pearls have also been well
known in modern times. Bede notices them as a product
of the British seas and rivers in the eighth century.
There is a chapter upon those found in Scotland, in the
description of that country prefixed to Hector Boece's
History, in which the writer gives an account of the
manner of catching the fish in his time (the beginning of
the sixteenth century). It is very different from that
which Tacitus has noticed, as will appear from the pas-
sage, which is thus given in Harrison's English transla-
tion : — " They are so sensible and quick of hearing,
that, although you, standing on the brae or bank above
them, do speak never so softly, or throw never so small
a stone into the water, yet they will descry you, and
* Ausonius, in Mosella. His expression is, " Albentes
concharum germiua baccas ;" literally, the white berries,
the buds of shells. This appears to be the origin of the
verse " Gignit et insigncs antiqua Britannia baccas," quoted
by Camden, and by other writers after him, from Marbo-
daeus, a Frenchman of the eleventh century, who wrote a
liatin poem entitled " De Gemmarum Lapidumque precio-
sorum formis, natura, et viribus." Of course a writer of that
age can be no autliority in this case.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 35
settle again to the bottom, without return for that time.
Doubtless they have, as it were, a natural carefulness of
their own commodity, as not ignorant how gi'eat estima-
tion we mortal men make of the same amongst us ; and,
therefore, so soon as the fishermen do catch them, they
bind their shells together, for otherwise they would open
and shed their pearls, of purpose for which they know
themselves to be pursued. Their manner of apprehension
is this ; first, four or five persons go into the river to-
gether, up unto the shoulders, and there stand in a com-
pass one by another, with poles in their hands, whereby
they rest more surely, sith they fix them in the ground,
and stay with one hand upon them ; then, casting their
eyes down to the bottom of the water, they espy where
they lie by their shining and clearness, and with their
toes take them up (for the depth of the water will not
suffer them to stoop for them), and give them to such
as stand next them." The Scotch pearls, according to
Boece, were engendered in a long and large sort of
mussel, called the horse-mussel. On the subject of the
origin of the pearl he follows Pliny's notion. These
mussels, he says, " early in the morning, in the gentle,
clear, and calm air, lift up their upper shells and mouths
a little above the water, and there receive of the fine and
pleasant breath or dew of heaven, and afterwards, accord-
ing to the measure and quantity of this vital force re-
ceived, they first conceive, then swell, and finally pro-
duct the pearl." " The pearls that are so got in Scotland,"
he adds, " are not of small value ; they are veiy orient
and bright, light and round, and sometimes of the quan-
tity of the nail of one's little finger, as I have had and
seen by mine own experience." In his owti Description
of England, also, written about the middle of the six-
teenth century, Harrison notices those still to be found
in that part of the island. He accounts for their having
fallen into disrepute in a curious way. " Certes," he
writes, " they are to be found in these our days, and
thereto of divers colours, in no less numbers than ever
they were of old time. Yet are they not now so much de-
sired because of their smallness, and also lor other causes,
c 2
36 HISTORY OF
but especially sith clmrcli-work, as copes, vestments,
albes, tiinicles, altar-cloths, canopies, and such tr£ish are
worthily abolished, upon which our countrymen super-
stitiously bestowed no small quantities of them. For
I think there were few churches or religious houses, be-
sides bishops' miires, books, and other j)ontifical vestures,
but were either thoroughly fretted or notably garnished
with huge numbers of them." He adds, " I have at
sundry times gathered more than an ounce of them, of
which divers have holes already entered by nature, some
of them not much inferior to great peason (peas) in
quantity, and thereto of sundry colours, as it happeneth
among such as are brought from the easterly coast to
Saffron Walden in Lent, when for want of flesh stale
stinking fish and welked mussels are thought to be good
meat, for other fish is too dear amongst us when law
doth bind us to use it. They (pearls) are also sought
for in the latter end of August, a little before which
time the sweetness of the dew is most convenient for
that kind of fish which doth engender and conceive
them, whose form is flat, and much like unto a lempit.
The further north, also, that they be found, the brighter
is their colour, and tlieir substances of better valure, as
lapidaries do give out." In another place, Harrison
mentions, as found in England, what he calls mineral
pearls, " which," he says, " as they are for greatness
and colour most excellent of all other, so they are digged
out of the main land, and in sundry places far distant
from the shore." Camden, and his translator, Gibson,
have given us an account of pearls found in the river
Conway in their time. "The pearls of this river," sa^-s
the latter, ' ' are as large and well coloured as any we find
either in Britain or Ireland, and have probably been fished
for here ever since the Roman conquest, if not sooner."
The writer goes on to inform us, that the British and
Irish pearls are found in a large black mussel ; that they
are peculiar to rapid and strong rivers ; and that they
are common in Wales, in the North of England, in Scot-
land, and some parts of Ireland. They are called by
the people of Caernarvonshire, kretyin diliw, or deluge
BRITISH co:mmerce. 37
shells. The mussels that contain pearls are generally
known by being a little contracted, or contortt'd from
their usual shape. A Mr. Wynn had a valuable col-
lection of pearls, procured from the Conway, amongst
which Gibson says that he noted a stool-pearl, of the
form and bigness of a lesser button mould, weighing
seventeen grains. A Conway pearl presented to the
queen of Charles II., by her chamberlain, Sir Richard
Wynn (perhaps of the family of this Mr. Wynn), is said
still to be one of the ornaments of the British crown.
Camden also speaks of pearls found in the river Irt, in
Cumberland. " These," he says, " the inhabitants
gatiier up at low w ater ; and the jewellers buy them of
the poor people for a trifle, but sell them at a good
price." Gibson adds (writing in the beginning of the
last centuiy), that not long since a patent had been
granted to some persons for pearl-fishing in this river ;
but the pearls, he says, were not very plentiful he'-e, and
were most of the dull-coloured kind, called sand-])carl.
Mention is made in a paper in the Philosophical Trans-
actions, of several pearls of large size that were found
in the sixteenth century in Ireland ; among the rest, one
that weighed thirty-six carats.* Pennant (Tour in
Scotland, 1769) gives an account of a pearl-fishery then
carried on in the neighbourhood of Perth, in Scotland,
which, though by that time nearly exhausted, had, a few
years before, produced between three and four thousand
pounds' worth of pearls annually. An eminent naturalist,
we observe, has recently expressed some surprise that the
regular fisheries which once existed for this native gem
should have been abandoned. f The pearl, however,
though still a gem of price, is not now held in the same
extraordinary estimation as in ancient times, when it
ai)pears, indeed, to have been considered more valuable
than any other gem whatever. " The chief and topmost
* Phil. Trans, for 1G93, p. 659.
t Swainson on the Zoology of England and Wales, in
MaccuUoch's Statistical Account of the British Empire, vol.
i. p. IGU,
38 HISTORY OF
place," says Pliny, " among all precious things, belongg
to the pearl."*
Another product of the British waters, which was
highly prized by the luxurious Romans, was the oyster.
From the manner in which the oysters of Britain are
mentioned by Pliny, their sweetness seems to have been
the quality for which they were especially esteemed. f
Juvenal speaks of them as gathered at Rutu})iae, now
Richborough, near Sandwich. { Pliny also mentions as
among the greatest delicacies of Britain a sort of geese
which he calls chenerotes, and describes as smaller than
the wiser, or common goose. §
Solinus|| celebrates the great store found in Britain of
the stone called the gagates, in English the black amber,
or jetstone. This mineral, as may be seen from Pliny ,^
was held by the ancients to be endowed with a great
variety of medical and magical virtues, Camden men-
tions it as found on the coast of Yorkshire. " It grows,"
he says, " upon the rocks, within a chink or cliff of
them ; and before it is polished looks reddish and rusty,
but after, is really (as Solinus describes it) diamond-like,
black, and shining." " Certain it is," says Harrison,
" that even to this day there is some plenty to be had of
this commodity in Derbyshire and about Berwick, whereof
rings, salts, small cups, and sundry trifling toys are made ;
although in many men's opinions nothing so fine as that
which is brought over by merchants daily from the
main." Marbodaeus, however, gives the preference to
the jets of Britain over those of all other countries.
The inhabitants of Britain under the Roman govern-
ment no doubt carried on traffic with the other parts of
the empire in shi})s of their own ; and the province must
be supposed to have possessed a considerable mercantile
as well as military navy. It is of the latter only, how-
ever, that the scanty history of the island we have during
the Roman domination has preserved any mention.
* Nat. Hist. ix. 54.
t Nat. Hist. ix. 29, and xxxii. 21.
J Sat. iv. 141. § Nat. Hist. x. 29.
II Polyhistor, 22. f Nat. Hist, xxxvi. 34.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 39
A powerful maritime force was maintained by the
Romans for the defence of the east, or, as it was called,
the Saxon coast; and about the end of the third cen-
tury we have the first example of an exclusively
British navy under the sovereignty of the famous Ca-
rausius. The navy of Carausius must have been man-
ned in great part by his own Britons ; and the superiority
which it maintained for years in the surrounding seas,
preserving for its master his island empire against " the
superb fleets that were built and equipped," says a con-
temporary writer,* " simultaneously in all the rivers of the
Gauls to overwhelm him," may be taken as an evidence
that the people of Britain had by this time been long
familiar with ships of all descriptions.
Wholly uncultivated as the greater part of the country
was when it was first visited by the Romans, it was
most probably not unprovided with a few great highways,
by which comnmnication was maintained between one
district and another. Ceesar could scarcely have marched
his force' even so far into the interior as he did, if the
districts through which he passed had been altogether
without roads. Rude and imperfect enough these
British roads may have been, but still they must have
been to a co-tain extent artificial ; they must have been
cleared of such incumbrances as admitted of being removed,
and carried in a continuous line out of the way of marshes
and such other natural impediments as could not be
otherwise overcome. Tacitus would seem to be speaking
of the native roads, when he tells us that Agricola, on pre-
paring in his sixth summer to push into the regions be-
yond the Forth, determined first to have a survey of the
country made by his fleet ; because it was apprehended
that the roads were infested by the enemy's forces. The
old tradition is, that the southern part of the island Avas,
in the British times, crossed in various directions by four
great highways, still in gi'cat part to be traced, and
known by the names of the Fosse, Watling-street,
Ermine-street, and the Ichenild. The Fosse appears to
* The Orator Mamertinus, c. xii. ; quoted in Britannia
after the Romans, p. 10.
40 HisTOiiY or
have begun at Totiiess, in Devonshire, and to have pro-
ceeded by Bristol, Cirencester, Chipping Norton, Co-
ventry, Leicester, and Newark, to Lincohi. Watling-
street is said to have conunenced at Dover, to have pro-
ceeded thence through Kent, by Canterbury, to London ;
then to have passed tovs^ards the north, over Hampstead
Heath, to Edgeware, St. Alban's, Dunstable, Stoney
Stratford, in Northamptonshire, along the vs'cst side of
Leicestershire, crossing the Fosse near Bosworth, and
hence to York and Chester-le-Street, ,in the county of
Durham. Some carry it, in later times, from this point
as far as to Lanark and Falkirk, in Scotland ; and others
even to Caithness, at the extremity of the island. The
Ermine-street is understood to havie run from St. David's,
in Wales, to Southampton, crossing the Fosse between
Cirencester and Gloucester. The Ichenild is supposed
by some to have been so called from having begun in the
country of the Iceni, on the east coast. It is commonly
thought to have crossed Watling-street, at Dunstable,
and thence to have taken a north-easterly direction,
through Staffordshire, to the west side of the island.
The utmost, however, that can be conceded in regard to
these roads being of British origin is, that lines of com-
munication in such directions may have existed in the
time of the Britons. It was the Romans, undoubtedly,
by v\hom they were transformed into those elaborate
and almost monumental works which their remains de-
clare them to have been. Roads constructed to last for
ever were laid down by that extraordinaiy people, as the
first foundations of their empire, wherever they planted
theiTiselves, and seem to have been considered by them
as the indispensable veins and arteries of all civilization.
In Britain it is probable that they began their operations
with the great native high roads, the course of which
would be at least accommodated to the situation of the
princij)al towns and other more important localities
throughout the country. These they no doubt levelled,
straightened, and paved, so as to fit them not only for the
ordinary purj)oses of ])edestrian and carriage communi-
cation, but also for the movements of large bodies of
BRITISH COMMERCE. 41
infantry and cavalry in all weathers and in all seasons.
But they formed also many new lines of road, leading
from one to another of the many new stations which they
established in all parts of the country. Camden describes
the lloman ways in Britain as running in some places
through drained fens, in others through low valleys,
raised and paved, and so broad that they admit of two
carts easily passing each other. In this country, as else-
where, the Roman roads were in great part the v»ork of
the soldiery, of wdiose accomplishments skill in this kind
of labour was one of the chiefs But the natives were also
forced to lend their assistance ; and we find the Cale-
donian Galgacus, in Tacitus, complaining, with indigna-
tion, that the bodies of his countrymen were worn down
by their oppressors, in clearing woods and draining
marshes — stripes and indignities being added to their
toils. To this sort of work also criminals were sentenced,
as well as to the mines. The laws of the empire made
s])ecial provision for the rcj)air of the public ways, and
they were given in chai*ge to overseers, whose duty it
was to see them kept in order. The ancient document
called the Itinerary of Antoninus, enumerates fifteen
routes or journeys in Britain, all of which we may pre-
sume were along regularly formed high-roads ; and jjro-
bably the list does not comprehend the whole number of
such roads that the island contained. In every instance
the distances from station to station are marked in Roman
miles ; and no doubt they were indicated on the actual
road by milestones regularly placed along the line.
Of these, the famous London stone, still lo be seen lean-
ing against the south wall of St. Swithhi's church, in
Cannon-street, London, is supposed to have been the
first, or that from which the others were numbered along
the principal roads, which a})j)ear to have proceeded
from this point as from a centre. The Roman roads in
Britain have undergone so many changes since their first
formation, from neglect and dilapidation on the one hand,
and from many repairs which they are known to have
received long after the Roman times, and in styles of
workmanship very difi'erent from the Roman, that the
c 3
42 HISTORY OF
mode in which they were originally constructed is in
most cases not very easy of discovery. One of those
which had probably remained most nearly in its primitive
condition was that discovered by Sir Christopher Wren
under the present Cheapside, London, while he was
preparing- to erect the church of St. Mary-le-Bow.
" Here," says the account in the Parentalia, " to his
surprise, he sunk about eighteen feet deep through made
ground, and then imagined he was come to the natural
soil and hard gravel ; but, upon full examination, it ap-
peared to be a Roman causeway of rough stone, close and
well rammed, with Roman brick and rubbish at the
bottom for a foundation, and all firmly cemented. This
causeway was four feet thick. Underneath this cause-
way lay the natural clay, over which that part of the
city stands, and which descends at least forty feet
lower." Wren eventually determined to erect the tower
of the church upon the Roman causeway, as the firm-
est foundation he could obtain, and the most proper
for the lofty and weighty structure he designed. Some
of the other Roman roads in Britain, however, and espe-
cially those connecting some of the lines of military
posts, were constructed in a more ambitious style of
workmanship than appears to have been here employed —
being paved, like the famous Appian way and others in
Italy, with flat stones, although of ditl'erent sizes, yet
carefully cut to a uniform rectangular shape, and closely
joined together. Some of our great roads still in use
were originally formed by the Romans, or were used at
least in the Roman times. One example is the great
western road leading to Bath and Bristol, at least for a
considerable part of its course.*
There has been much speculation and controversy on
the subject of the description of Money in use among the
ancient Britons. Caesar's statement is, distinctly, that
* In the " United Service Journal " for January, 1836, is
an account of a survey of the Koman Road from Silchester
to the station on the Thames called Pontes, made shortly
before by the officers studying at the Senior Department of
the Royal Military College.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 43
they had no coined money. Instead of money, he says,
they used pieces either oi' bronze or of iron, adjusted to
a certain weight. There is some doubt, owing to the
disagreement of the manuscripts, as to whether he calls
these pieces of metal rings, or thin plates, or merely
tallies or cuttings (taleoe) ; but the most approved read-
ing is rings. A curious disquisition on this ring-money
of the Celtic nations was published a few years ago by
Sir William Betham.* Specimens of this primitive cur-
rency, according to Sir William, have been found in
great numbers in Ireland, not only of bronze, but also of
gold and silver. Sometimes the form is that of a com-
plete ring, sometimes that of a wire or bar, merely bent
lUl the two extremities are brought near to each other.
In some cases the extremities are armed with flattened
knobs, in others they are rounded out into cup-like hol-
lows. Sometimes several rings are joined together at the
circumferences ; other specimens consist of rings linked
into one another. The most important peculiarity, how-
ever, distinguishing these curious relics, and that which
Sir William Betham conceives chiefly proves them to
have really served the purposes of money, is, that, upon
being weighed, by far the greater number of them appear
to be exact multiples of a certain standard unit. The
smallest of gold which he had seen, he says, weighed
twelve grains, or half a pennyweight ; and of others, one
contained this quantity three times, another five, another
ten, another sixteen, another twenty-two, another four
hundred and eighty (a pound troy), and another five
hundred and thirty-four. The case he affirms to be
similar both with those of silver, and those of bronze. All,
he says, w'ith a very few exceptions, which may easily be
accounted for on the supposition of partial waste or other
injury, weigh each a certain number of half pennyweights.
The smallest specimens even of the bronze ring-money are
quite as accurately balanced as those of the more valuable
metals; and among these bronze specimens, indeed, he
states, that, after having weighed a great many, he has
* Papers read before the Royal -Irish Academy, 4to.,
Dublin, 1836.
44 HISTORY OF
never found a single exception to their divisibility into so
many halt" pennyweights. It would thus appear that the
ancient Celtic scale was the same with that which we now
call troy weight. Sir William conjectures that the Latin
uncia, an ounce, is the Celtic word itnsha, which he says
signifies one-sixth ; in which case we must suppose the
original integral weight of which the ounce was a frac-
tion to have been half our present pound troy. " To
what remote period of antiquity," he observes, " do these
singular facts carry us back ! To many ages before the
time of Cassar, or even Herodotus. The latter speaks of
the Lydians as the first who coined metallic money, at
least six centuries before our era. These are no vision-
ary speculations ; we have here the remains and imperish-
able relics of those early times to verify the whole ; and
recent investigations and discoveries, in a most singularly
convincing manner, come to our aid, by showing that the
fresco paintings in the tombs of Egypt exhibit people
bringing, as tribute to the^foot of the throne of Pharaoh,
bags of gold and silver rings, at a period before the
exodus of the Israelites." These rings, however, are
not the only specimens that have been found of the sub-
stitutes used by the Britons before the introduction of
coined money. Both in barrows and elsewhere there h&ve
been occasionally turned up hoards of what has all the
appearance of being another species of primitive currency,
consisting of small plates of iron, mostly thin and ragged,
and without any impression.
Of British coined money the description which is appa-
rently of greatest antiquity is that of which the specimens
present only certain pictorial figures, without any legends
or literal characters. Of this sort of coins a consider-
able collection was discovered about the middle of the
last century, on the top of Carnbre Hill, in Cornwall.
Of these, some were stamped with figures of horses,
oxen, hogs, and sheep ; a few had such figures of ani-
mals on one side, and a head apparently of a royal per-
sonage on the other. All of them were of gold ; and
perhaps it was only nioney made of the more precious
metals which it was thought necessary at first to take the
BRITISH COMMERCE. 45
trouble of thus impressing. When the convenience of
the practice had been experienced, and perhaps its ap-
plication facilitated, it would be extended to the bronze
as well as to the gold and silver currency. Although
even that point has been disputed, it may be admitted as
most probable that the Carnbre coins were really British
money, that is to say, that they were not only current in
Britain, but had been coined under the public authority
of some one or more of the states of the island. This
we seem to be entitled to infer, from the emblematic
figures impressed on them, which distinguish them from
any known Gallic or other foreign coins, and are at the
same time similar to those commonly found on what ap-
pears to be the British money of a somewhat later period.
The questions, however, of when, where, and by whom
they were coined, still remain. Although the figures
upon them are peculiar, they still bear a general resem-
blance to the money, or what has been supposed to be
the money, of the ancient Gauls ; and, as well from this
circumstance as from the whole character of the early
British civilization, which appears to have been mainly
borrowed from Gaul, we may presume that they were
either fabricated in that country, or were at least the
work of Gallic artists. It is remarkable that these coins
are all formed of pure gold ; and Diodorus Siculus in-
forms us, that in no articles which they made of gold did
the Gauls mix any alloy with the precious metal. As to
their date, it would seem to he subsequent to the time of
Caesar, since, according to his account, as we have just
seen, the Britons were then unacquainted with the use of
coined money of any description ; and it may be placed
with most probability in the interval between his invasion
and that of the Emperor Claudius — a ]>eriod, as we have
already endeavoured to show, during which British
civilization must have made a very considerable, though
unrecorded, progress.
Besides this merely pictured metallic money, however,
there exist numerous British coins, or what bear the
appearance of being such, which are marked not only
with figures of various kinds, but also with legends in
HISTORY OF
Early Bkitisii Coins
BRITISH COMMERCE. 47
Roman characters. One of these, from having the letters
Sego inscribed upon it, has been attributed to Segonax,
who is mentioned by Caesar as one of the four kings of
Kent ; but it is obvious that upon such an inference as
this no rehance can be placed. The greater number of the
coins in question bear, either in full or abbreviated, the
name of Cunobelinus, who is said to have lived in the
reign of Augustus. Some of these have the name
Cunobelin at full length ; one has Cunobelinus Re, the
latter word being probably the Latin Rex ; others have
the abbreviations Cun, Cuno, Cunob, or Cwiobe. Several
have, in addition, what has been supposed to be the
abbreviated name of their place of coinage ; being most
frequently Cam, or Canm, for Camulodunum, as it is
conjectured ; in one instance Ve?', perhaps for Verula-
mium ; in other cases JVo, or Novane, or Novanit, of
which no probable interpr.etation has been given. And
in addition to these inscriptions, the greater number
present the singular word Tascia, or Tascio, either written
at length, or indicated by two or more of its commencing
letters. This word has given occasion to much disputa-
tion ; but perhaps nothing has been proposed on the
subject so probable as Camden's suggestion, who con-
ceives that the word, derived apparently from the Latin
taxatio, signified, in the British language, a tribute, or
tribute-money. The figures upon these coins of Cuno-
beline are very various. Some have a head, probably
that of the king, occasionally suiTounded with what seems
to be a fillet of pearls, in allusion, we may suppose, to the
ancient fame of the island for that highly prized gem ;
others have a naked full length human figure, with a club
over his shoulder ; many have the figure of a horse,
sometimes accompanied by a wheel, which has been sup-
posed to convey an allusion to the formation of highways,
but perhaps is rather intended to indicate the national
war-chariot : a crescent, an ear of corn, a star, a comet, a
tree, a hog, a dog, a sheep, an ox, a lion, a sphinx, a
centaur, a Janus, a female head, a woman riding on an
animal like a dog, a man playing on a harp, are some of
the representations that have been detected on others.
48 HISTORY OF
One shows what evidently appears to be a workman in
the act of making money ; he is seated in a chair, and
holds a hammer in his hand, while a number of pieces lie
before him. About forty of these coins of Cunobeline
have been discovered. Many others also exist, which,
from the names, or fragments of names inscribed on them,
have been assigned to Boadicca, Cartismandua, Carac-
tacus, Venutius, and other British sovereigns. The
legends on most of these, however, are extremely obscure
and dubious. What is somewhat remarkable is, that no
two, we believe, have been found of the same coinage.
They are almost all more or less dish-shaped, or hollowed
on one side — a circumstance which is common also to
many Roman coins, and may be supposed to have been
occasioned by the want of tli« proper guards to prevent
the metal from being bent over the edges of the die by
the blow of the hammer. The British coins thus in-
scribed with Roman characters are some of them of gold,
some of silver, some of bronze, some of copper. Unlike
also to the coins, mentioned above, without legends, all
of them that are formed of the more precious metals are
much alloyed.
It must be confessed that the whole subject of these
supposed British coins, notwithstanding all the disputa-
tion to which they have given rise, is still involved in
very considerable obscurity. It has even been denied
that they ever served the purposes of a currency at all.
" They are works," observes a late writer, " of no earlier
date than the apostasy and anarchy after the Romans.
Moreover, they were not money. They were Bardic
works belonging to that numerous family of Gnostic,
Mithriac, or Masonic medals, of which the illustration
has been learnedly handled in Chifflet's ' Abraxas
Proteus,' Von Hammer's ' Baphomctus,' the Rev, R.
Walsh's ' Essay on Ancient Coins,' and (as applicable
to these very productions) the Rev. E. Davies's * Essay
on British Coins.' The coins engraved by Dom. B, de
Monlfaucon as remnants of ancient Gaulish money are
pro(hictions of similar a])pearance and of the same class.
Paracelsus alludes to them as money coined by the
r.RITISH COMMERCE.
49
gnomes and distributed by them among' men. Their
uses have never been known ; but I explain them thus.
Money is a ticket entitling- the bearer to goods of a given
value Masonic medals were tickets entitling one
initiate to receive assistance from another. It may be
objected, that there was no great difficulty of stealing or
forging them. True ; but to be a beneficial holder of
these baubles it was necessary that you should be able to
explain the meaning of all the devices upon them. Ac-
cording to the sort of explanation given by the paxty, it
would appear whether he was an authorized holder, and,
if such, what rank of initiation he had attained, and con-
sequently to what degree of favour and confidence he
was entitled. The names selected to adorn these British
medals are unequivocally marked with hatred for the
Romans, and love for the memory of those Britons who
warred against them ; and they imply an exhortation and
a compact to expel and exclude the Roman nation from
the island." * This view is supported by some plausible
arguments ; but it is far from being altogether satisfactory.
The denial, however, of the title of these coins or medals
to be accounted a species of ancient money, is no mere
piece of modern scepticism. Camden, though he inclines
to a different opinion, expresses himself upon the point
with the greatest hesitation. " For my part," he says,
" I freely declare myself at a loss what to say to things
so much obscured by age ; and you, when you read these
conjectures, will plainly perceive that I have groped in
the dark " " Whether this sort of money passed cur-
rent in the way of trade and exchange," he observes in
conclusion, " or v/as at first coined for some special use,
is a question among the learned. My opinion (if I may
be allowed to interpose it) is this. After Csesar had
appointed how much money should be paid yearly by
the Britons, and they were oppressed under Augustus
witli the payment of customs, both for exporting and im-
porting commodities, and had, by degrees, other taxes
laid upon them, namely, for corn-grounds, plantations,
groves, pasturage of greater and lesser cattle, as being
* Britannia after the Eomans, pp. 218, &c.
50 HISTORY OF
now in the condition of subjects, not of sla- es ; I have
thought that such coins were first stamped for these
uses ; for greater cattle with a horse, for k .• t with a
hog, for woods with a tree, and for corn-grou • with an
ear of corn ; but those with a man's head see to have
been coined for poll-money. Not but I -grant that
afterwards these came into common use. Nor can I
reconcile myself to the judgment of those i. ho would
have the hog, the horse, the ear, the Janus, &c., to be
the arms of particular people or princes ; since we
find that one and the same prince and people used several
of these, as Cunobeline stamped upon his coitis a hog, a
horse, an ear, and other things. But whether this tri-
bute-money was coined by the Romans, or the provin-
cials, or their kings, when the whole world was taxed by
Augustus, I cannot say. One may guess them to have
been stamped by the British kings, since Britain, from
the time of Julius Caesar to that of Claudius. L»'ed under
its own laws, and was left to be governed by its own
kings, and since also they have stamped on them the
effigies and titles of British princes."
After the establishment of the Roman dom'nion in the
island, the coins of the empire would naturally become
the currency of the new province ; and i _^ ;d Gildas
expressly states that from the time of Claud ■; it was or-
dained by an imperial edict that all money ent among
the Britons should bear the imperial stam These ex-
pressions, by the by, would rather seem ^j ountenance
the opinion, that coined money not bearing- tne imperial
stamp had been in circulation in the country before the
publication of the edict. Great numbe of Roman
coins of various ages and denominations hf ,2en found
in Britain. " There are prodigious : •.i'ties found
here," observes Camden, " in the rui) demolished
cities, in the treasure-coffers or vaults wh • ere hidden
in that age, and in funeral urns ; and I • j very much
surprised how such great abundance s.. - aid remain to
this day, till I read that the melting v/ ./n of ancient
money was prohibited by the imperial co^. 'titutions."
It is highly probable, also, that some hi' this imperial
BRITISH COMMERCE. 01
money was coined in Britain, where the Romans may be
presumed to have established mints, as they are known
to have done in their other provinces. There are several
coins extant both of Carausius and of Allectus, and these
it can hardly be doubted were the productions of a
British mint. It is remarkable that in tlie sepulchral
barrows there has been found imi)erial money of the
times of Avitus (a.d. 455), of Anthemius (a.d. 467 —
472), and even of Justinian (a.d. 527 — 565). Many of
the Roman coins, also, or imperial medals struck upon
particular occasions, from the time of Claudius, bear
figures or legends relating to Britain, and form interest-
ing illustrations of the history of the island.*
* See upon this subject, " The Coins of the Eomans re-
lating to Britain," by J. G. Akerman, 12mo. Lond. 1836.
62 HISTORY or
CHAPTER II.
THE ANGLO-SAXON PERIOD. A.D. 449 — 1066.
Britain, as an island, and one of the largest in the
world, as well as from its nearness to the continent of
Europe, would seem to have been intended by nature for
the residence of a navigating and commercial people,
and it might be supposed that any people who had ob-
tained the occupation of it would be speedily turned to
navigation and commerce by the natural temptations and
advantages of their position. The political state of a
country, however, and its social circumstances generally,
as well as the condition of the rest of the world and the
spirit of the time, may all be so unfavourable as long
eftectually to counteract these advantages of geographical
position, and even the genius and the old habits of the
people themselves.
Of the successive nation.? that obtained possession of
the south of Britain within the period of authentic his-
tory, the Gallic colonists of the time of Caesar were in
too early a stage of civilization to hold any considerable
intercourse with the rest of the world ; and the Romans
who succeeded them, although they necessarily main-
tained a certain connexion both with the central and
other parts of the extended empire to which they
belonged, were of a stock that had always shown itself
anti-commercial in genius and policy. But the Saxons,
although they had not been in circumstances to turn their
skill in navigation to commercial purposes, had long
before their conquest of our island been accustomed to
roam the seas, and were famous for their naval enter-
prises. We read of predatory warfare carried on by
the diiferent Germanic nations in small and light vessels
on rivers, and even along the adjacent parts of the sear-
coast, so early as before the middle of the first century.
In the year 47, as we learn from Tacitus, the Chauci,
BRITISH COiMMERCE. 53
dwelling along the Batavian coast, ravaged in this manner
the neighbouring coast of Gaul, under the conduct of
their countryman Gannascus, vvlio had long served in the
Roman armies.* It is probable that it was in the impe-
rial service Gannascus acquired his knowledge of naval
warfare, or at least the general military education which
fitted him to train and connnand the Chauci in this expe-
dition. In little more than twenty years after this we
find the Roman fleet on the Rhine partly manned by
Batavians,t and even a Batavian fleet under the com-
mand of Paulus Civilis, another individual of that nation
who had been educated in the Roman armies, giving
battle to the naval forces of the empire. J In the course
of the next two hundred years the German nations gene-
rally appear to have improved upon the instruction and
experience thus gained ; and both the Saxons and others
became distinguished for their familiarity with the sea
and for their naval exploits. About the year 240 the
union, under the name of Franks, of the various tribes
of the Lower Rhine and the Weser laid the foundation
for those more extensive predatory incursions upon the
neighbouring countries, both by sea and land, by which
the barbarians of the north-west first assisted those of
the north-east in harassing and enfeebling the Roman
empire, and afterwards secured their share in its division.
One remarkable incident has generally been noted as
having given a great impulse to these expeditions, what
Gibbon has called " the successful rashness" of a party
of Franks that had been removed by the Emperor
Probus from their native settlements to the banks of the
Euxine. " A fleet," to give the story as he tells it,
'* stationed in one of the harbours of the Euxine, fell
into the hands of the Franks ; and they resolved, through
unknown seas, to explore their way from the mouth of
the Phasis to that of the Rhine. They easily escaped
through the Bosphorus and the Hellespont, and, cruising
along the Mediterranean, indulged their appetite for
revenge and plunder, by frequent descents on the unsus-
* Tac. Annal. xi. 18. f Tac. Hist. iii. 16.
X Id. V. 23.
54 HISTORY OF
pecting- shores of Asia, Greece, and Afriea. The
opulent city of Syracuse, in whose port the navies of
Athens and Carthage had formerly been sunk, was sacked
by a handful of barbarians, who massacred the greatest
part of the trembling inhabitants. From the island of
Sicily the Franks proceeded to the Columns of Hercules,
trusted themselves to the ocean, coasted round Spain and
Gaul, and, steering their triumphant course through the
British Channel, at length finished their surprising
voyage by landing in safety on the Batavian or Frisian
shores. The example of their success, instructing their
countrymen to conceive the advantages and to despise the
dangers of the sea, pointed out to their enterprising spirit
a new road to wealth and glory."
This event happened about the year 280. Imme-
diately after this time we read of the commencement of
ravages on the coasts of Gaul, of Belgium, and of Britain,
by assailants who are called Germans by Aurelius
Victor, and Saxons by Eutropius. They appear to have
been a mixture of Franks and Saxons, which latter name
ere long began to be also distinguished as that of another
military confederacy of the Germanic nations not less
powerful than the Franks. In maritime affairs, indeed,
the Saxons soon took the lead ; and, while the Franks
pushed their conquests by land, the Saxon name became
a terror to all the neighbouring sea-coasts. Yet their
marine was still of the rudest description. " If the fact,"
says Gibbon, " were not established by the most un-
questionable evidence, we should appear to abuse the
ci'edulity of our readers by the description of the vessels
in which the Saxon pirates ventured to sport in the
waves of the German Ocean, the British Channel, and
the Bay of Biscay. The keel of their large flat-bottomed
boats was framed of light timber, but the sides and upper
works consisted only of wicker, with a covering of strong
hides. . . . But the daring spirit of the pirates
braved the perils both of the sea and of the shore : their
skill was confirmed by the habits of enterprise ; the
meanest of their mariners was alike capable of handling
an oar, of rearing a sail, or of conducting a vessel ; and
BRITISH COMMERCE. 55
the Saxons rejoiced in the appearance of a tempest,
which coVioealed their design, and dispersed the fleets of
the enemy." The Romans now found it necessary to fit
out and maintain a fleet expressly for the protection of
the coasts of Britain and Gaul. The command of this
armament, which was stationed in the harbour of Boulogne,
was given to Carausius. His revolt soon after, and his
establishment of an emj^ire for himself in Britain, where
he endeavoured to maintain his power by alliances with
those very nations of the north whom he had been
appointed to repress, and by enlisting the barbarians
both among his land and sea forces, was another event in
the hi- ■ st degree favourable to the progress of the
Saxon; i navigation and naval warfare. It was a new
lesson ^-^ them both in ship-building and in tactics,
which must have made their boldness and hardihood
much more formidable than ever. The empire of
Carausius had lasted for seven years, when it w^as over-
thrown by his death in 294.
In the next century we find the Saxons almost the
acknowledged masters of the northern seas, and so. con-
stantly infesting Britain that the east coast of the island
had come to be known by the name of the Saxon coast,
and was strongly fortified, and put under the charge of a
wai'den, whose especial duty it was to repel their assaults.
Their defeat by Theodosius, in the neighbourhood of
the Orkney Islands, in 368, for which he obtained the
surname of Saxonicus, was not accomplished till the
barbarians had sustained several encounters with the
Roman fleet ; and although it seems to have deterred
them for a long time after from repeating their descents
upon Britain, and although, after the example of the
Franks, they were now also beginning to employ their
strength more than formerly in military operations by
land, they certainly did not abandon the field of their
elder renown. The keels of Ilengist and Horsa were
cruising in the British Channel when they received the
invitation of Vortigern in 449 ; and it was their command
of the seas that, by enabling them to maintain all along
a free communication with the continent, and also to
56 HISTORY OF
make their descents upon the island at the most advan-
tageous points, chiefly contributed to g-ain for the Saxons,
Angles, and Jutes, the possession of Britain.
These new settlere, therefore, the fathers of the
future population of the country, and the founders of its
political institutions and its social state, were by long
use a thoroughly navigating race, and, having obtained
their island stronghold, the}^ would naturally, it might
be thought, proceed both to fortify it by securing the
dominion of the surrounding seas, and to make it the
centre of a great commercial empire. But, although all
this was to come to pass in process of time, nothing of
the kind happened in the first instance ; and the Saxons,
after their settlement in Britain, completely neglected
the sea, now more truly their proper element than ever,
for so long a period, that, when they did at last apply
themselves again to maritime affairs, their ancient skill
and renown in that field of enterprise must have been
a mere tradition, if it was so much as remembered among
them at all, and could have lent no aid in directing or
even in exciting their new efforts. It was not till the
reign of Alfred, towards the end of the ninth century,
that the Saxons of England appear ever to have thought
of building a ship, at least for v/ar ; and it may be
doubted if before that time they had even any trading
vessels of their own. Ever since their settlement in
Britain they seem to have wholly abandoned the sea to
their kindred who remained in their native seats in the
north of Germany and around the Baltic, — the North-
men or Danes, by whom they were destined to be suc-
ceeded in their career of rapine and conquest.
This latter race of sea-rovers had adopted a policy
different from that which had been followed both by the
Franks and the Saxons. These two nations, or rather
great confederacies of various nations, although they had
both first made themselves formidable at sea, had, as we
have seen, successively abandoned that field of adven-
ture as soon as they had entered upon the course of
land conquest, or at least as soon as they had secured the
possession the first of Gaul, the second of Britain, and
BRITISH COMMERCE. 67
had established their Gothic sovereignties in these fair
provinces of the former western empire. But the Danes,
who were also a great confederacy, — the several Scan-
dinavian nations of the Danes, the Swedes, and the
Norwegians, being all comprehended under that name,
— continued to seek plunder and glory on the waters
long after they had founded a multitude of kingdoms on
shore. These, however, were not kingdoms carved,
like the possessions of the Franks and Saxons, out of the
rich and cultivated Roman territory, but were all con-
fined to the bleak and barbarous coasts of the Baltic and
the neighbouring seas, where the Romans had never
been. Down to the close of the eighth century, Den-
mark, Sweden, and Norway were each parcelled out
into numerous independent principalities, the chiefs of
all of which were at the same time also either sea-kings
themselves, or more usually were the fathers or elder
brothers of the bold piratical captains, who rejoiced in
that designation ; the custom being for the younger
sons of the royal house to be sent to seek theu' fortune
on the ocean, while the eldest was kept at home to
inherit his ancestral throne. But the class of sae homm-
geii, or sea-kings, otherwise called vikitigr, which is sup-
posed to mean kings of the bays, where they had their
head stations, was very numerous, and comprehended many
individuals who were not of royal extraction. Piracy
was the common resource of the yomiger sons of all the
best families among these Scandinavian nations ; and the
sea was regarded as a field whereon a bold adventurer
might rear for himself a fabric both of wealth and domi-
nion almost as stable as could be founded on the land. In
the course of the ninth century in all the three countries
central sovereignties had arisen, and absorbed or reduced
to dependence the rest of the chieftainships ; but this
change did not for some time affect the free movements
of the vikingi'. They continued as heretofore to main-
tain their independence on their own element. The
new state of things in the north only had the effect of
giving a new direction to their enterprises. Formerly
the natural prey of the sea-kings of the Baltic had been
VOL. I. D
58 HISTORY OF
the territories of the petty land-sovereigns along the
coasts of that sea ; for their common origin formed no
general or permanent bond between the two classes, in
circumstances so nearly resembling those under which
the various descriptions of wild beasts are thrown toge-
ther in a forest. But now, that something of the strength of
union and consolidation had been acquired by the northern
kingdoms, they had become less easily assailable ; and
the captains of the piratical armaments began to look out
for adventures and plunder farther from home. The
coasts of England, of Scotland, of Ireland, and of France,
became henceforth the chief scenes of their ravages. Nor
had civilization yet advanced so far in any of the Scan-
dinavian countries as to discountenance these expeditions.
On the contrary, the Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish
kings were no doubt well pleased to see their natural
enemies and the most turbulent spirits among their
subjects thus finding occupation elsewhere ; and, as for
the popular feeling on the subject, the old national
custom of roaming the seas was still universally held to
be among the most honourable of employments. Navi-
gation can be cherished and promoted only by commerce
or by war ; it never has flourished in the absence of the
former except under the nourishment and support afforded
by the latter. It was the M-ant of both war and com-
merce that brought about its decay and extinction among
the Franks and Saxons, after their conquests of Gaul
and ]3ritain ; it was preserved among the Danes through
the habits and necessities of that predatory life uj)on
which they were tlirown for some centuries by the
peculiar circumstances in which they were ])iaced.
I'he power of this third northern confederacy grew up
during a period when the spirit of foreign conquest and
settlement, generated among the barbarous nations by
the dismemberment of the Roman empire, was still in
full vigour, but when the means of satisfying it had been
taken away in consequence of the ])revious occupation of
Gaul, of Britain, of Sj)ain, and of all the other Roman
jjrovinces, by those whose fortinie it had been to be
earlier in the movement. The Danes were in this way
BRITISH COMMERCK. 51)
left to the piratical maritime uarfure in uhich they soon
became so distinguished ; it was the natural result of the
ambition of foreign conquest checked by the want of any
territory lying open for them to invade and overrun.
Still this was in its nature only an intermediate and
temporary resource. The instinct of aggression, which
it could only imj)erfectly gratify, it yet fostered, and
was constantly strengthening and arming with nev/
power for the full attainment of what it sought. The
Danes, under this discipline, were becoming every day
more warlike and formidable, and more capable of
achieving foreign conquests, whenever they should make
the attem])t. On the other hand, the Franks and
Saxons, whom they would have to drive before them,
were, in the unassailed security of their rich and ample
settlements, gradually losing the use of war and the
power of defending the possessions they had gained.
This was the state of circumstances when the Danes
commenced, in the latter part of the eighth century,
their descents upon the coasts of France, England,
Scotland, and Ireland, These Northmen were now
merely repeating what had been done by their kindred,
the Franks and Saxons, three or four centuries before.
They too, from mere plundering incursions, with which
they had hitherto satisfied themselves, were about to
rise in their turn to the grander operations of invasion,
conquest, and colonization, now that occasion presented
itself, and called them to that career. This was the
proper consummation of their system of sea-kingship ; the
true end and development of their long course of piracy
and desultory warfare. That was but the impatient
restlessness of the animating passion repelled, baffled,
and in some sort imprisoned ; this was its free and
natural action. The new path of enterprise, accord-
ingly, immediately attracted to itself all the disposable
courage, activity, and resources of the North. It was
not left to the sea-kings alone ; the most potent of those
of the land joined the great national movement, which
promised to add new realms to those they already
possessed, or to enable them to eichamre their niiiiraidly
i}-2 ^^
GO HISTORY OF
ancestral islets and strips of sea-coast for broader domains
in a sunnier clime. By means of these expeditions the
pressure and uneasiness occasioned by the opposition be-
tween the old piratical system and the new order of
things that was now growing up in the Scandinavian
kingdoms were at once relieved ; and, while occupation
and settlements were found for the more active and ad-
venturous who chose to abandon their native country,
more room was also made, and more quiet secured, for
those that remained behind.
By these bold sea-captains and their crews was a great
part of England taken possession of and occupied ; and
thus, a second time, did the country receive an accession of
the kind of population most appropriate to it as an island,
— a race of navigating spirit and habits. The Normans
also, we may anticipate so far as just to remark, were,
before they won their settlements here and hi France,
pirates as well as the Danes and the Saxons ; in fact they
were merely a division of the Danish vikingr and their
companies. So that, of the several races that were even-
tually mingled together to form the English people, no
one had to be gradually turned towards maritime affairs
by the force of the new circumstances in the midst of
which it was placed ; all brought along with them an old
familiarity with the sea, on which they had in fact lived,
and conquered, and maintained dominion, before they
had ever made good any footing for themselves upon land.
Notv/ithstanding all this, however, we find each race,
as soon as it has established itself in the country, almost
wholly abandoning the former theatre of its exploits, and
attaching itself to the land as exclusively as if the sea haa
been left a thousand miles behind. We cannot discover
that either the previous navigating habits of the Saxons
and Danes who successively settled in Britain, or the
natural advantages of their new position, prompted them
to any considerable efforts of commercial enterprise, after
they had lost the motive which had originally impelled
them to the sea. Nay, as we have already observed,
the ships in which, and through which, they had made
their conquests, were abandoned by them even as in-
BRITISH COMMERCE. 61
strumcnts of protection ; they had served their turn in
asrgressive warfare, but in the defensive warfare that
followed their employment was not thought of, till after
long and disastrous experience of the insufficiency of
other military means. Such being the case, we need
not wonder that commercial navigation was neglected.
The navigating spirit, in fact, will not of itself create
commerce ; it appears to have been usually rather the
commercial spirit that has taught a people navigation,
where it has not been taught by war ; and even war
does not teach it in the effective manner that commerce
does, as we may see at once by comparing the Saxons
or the Danes with the Phoenicians. The latter had no
doubt been a commercial long before they became a
navigatinsr, a discovering, a colonizing, and a civilizing
people. In the same manner it is their commercial
habits, growing out of their permanent geographical
position, and not their use and wont of maritime warfare,
that has made the English, the descendants of these old
Saxons and Danes, the great lords of the sea, planters
of nations, and diffiisers of civilization in the modern
world.
But a power like this can only grow up under a
favourable state of circumstances in the world generally,
or throughout a large portion of it. The commercial
empire of the ancient Phoenicians was reared during the
most flourishing period of the early civilization of the
east ; the commercial empire of modern Britain has in
like manner arisen in the midst of the later civilization
of the west. In the rude and turbulent ages that
followed the overthrow of the Roman power in Europe,
the existence of an extensive commerce in any hands
was impossible. Almost continual wars everywhere,
either between one people and another, or between two
factions of the same people, or, where there M-as any
temporary relaxation of war, the still more brutifying
effects of misgovernment and oppression, left no time, no
inclination, and no means for carrying on any considerable
commerce. The great mass of the people were in all
countries sunk in ignorance and in poverty ; their miser-
C2 HISTORY OF
able condition hardly permitted them to aspire after the
enjoyment of anything beyond the absolute necessaries of
existence ; they were untaught in those arts and processes
of industry by which conunerce is fed ; there had been
little or no accumulation of capital, without which there
can be no extensive commerce, nor any other sj)ecies of
undertaking that looks much beyond the passing day. It
was only by slow degrees that Europe emerged out of
this condition, and that the beginnings of modern commerce
were nurtured into strength and stability.
Wq shall now mention the most interesting of the few
facts that have been preserved relating to the foreign
trade carried on by the Anglo-Saxons, in their chrono-
logical order. The first distinct notice which we have
u})on the subject is not of earlier date than the close of the
eighth century. At this time, it appears that some Eng-
lish commodities were carried abroad, and probably some
of those of the continent brought to this country, by the
devotees who went on pilgrimage to Rome, or by persons
who found it convenient to make profession of being so
engaged. It is not to be supposed that these pilgrimages
opened the first commercial mtercourse between England
and the continent ; but they undoubtedly made tlie com-
nnmication much more frequent than it had been before.
The practice established by the Romans, of exacting
certain payments at each seaport, on the embarkation and
landing of goods, appears to have been retained in all the
new kingdoms formed out of the western empire ; and
their amount probably long remained nearly the same
that had been paid under the imperial regime. Hence
the name of customs, or some equivalent term, by which
they were called, as if they had been dues universally
and immemorially demanded. There is a letter still ex-
tant, from the French Emperor Charlemagne lo Ofia,
king of Mercia, and Bretwalda (or chief lord of Britain),
which seems to have been the result of a negociation
between the two sovereigns, respecting the exaction of
these duties in the case of the English pilgrims travelling
to Rome. The document must be assigned to the year
795, in which Oifa died, at the latest ; and it may be re-
BRITISH COMMERCK. G3
gardcd as the earliest eommercial treaty on record, or
perluijjs that ever was entered into, between Engkmd and
any other country. It runs as follows: "Charles, by
the grace of God, king of the Franks and Lombards, and
patrician of the Romans, to our venerable and most dear
brother, Offa, king of the Mercians, greeting. First, we
give thanks to Almighty God, for the sincere Catholic
faith which we see so laudably expressed in your letters.
Concerning the strangers, who, lor the love of God an<l
the salvation of their souls, wish to repair to the thres-
holds of the blessed apostles, let them travel in peace
without any trouble ; nevertheless, if any are foiuid among
them not in the service of religion, but in the pursuit of
gain, let them pay the established duties at the proper
places. We also will that merchants shall have lawl'ul
protection in our kingdom according to our command ;
and, if they are in any place unjustly aggrieved, let them
apply to us or our judges, and we shall take care that
ample justice be done to them." There is more of the
letter, which it is unnecessary to quote. We gather from
it that the profession of pilgrimage had already been
taken advantage of as a cloak ibr smuggling ; and, no
doubt, in this way the practice gave an impulse to trade.
Even the smuggler is sometimes of use ; he may be the
means of jjlanting a traffic which would not have grown
up without his assistance, and which, of however objec-
tionable a character originally, may eventually assume a
legitimate form, and attain to great value and importance.
It is conjectured that articles in gold and silver were
probably the principal commodities in which these traders
from England dealt, who thus put on the guise of pilgrims
with the view of cheating the custom-house of its dues.
Such articles, being of small bulk, would be easily con-
cealed in a traveller's baggage ; and it appears that even
at this early age the English works in gold and silver
were famous over the continent.* Alread}', it may be
noted, there seem to have been Jews resident in England,
and even in the northern kingdom of Northumberland ;
for among the Excerpts of Archbishop Egbert of York —
* Macpherson s Annals of Commerce, i. 248.
64 HISTOEY OF
which must have been compiled between the years 735
and 766 — we find a transcript of a foreign canon, pro-
hibiting Christians from imitating the manners of that
people, or partaking of their feasts. The Jews have been
the introducers or chief encouragers of foreign commerce,
especially in jewellery, articles made of the precious
metals, and other such luxuries, in most of the countries
of modern Europe.
From this date the history of Anglo-Saxon commerce
is again nearly a blank till we come down to the reign of
Alfred. Of this illustrious prince it is recorded that he
cultivated an intercourse with distant countries, in which
he seems to have had in view the extension of commerce
as well as other objects. He appears to have kept up a
frequent communication with Rome ; and his biographer
Asser states, that he also corresponded with Abel, the
patriarch of Jerusalem, who sent him several valuable
presents of Oriental commodities. His embassy to the
Christians in India is mentioned, not only by Malmesbury
and other authorities of the next age, but by the contem-
porary compiler of the Saxon Chronicle, who says that
Swithelm, Bishop of Shireburn, made his way to St.
Thomas, and returned in safety. Malmesbury gives Sig-
helm as the name of the adventurous bishop, and relates
that he brought back from India aromatic liquors and splen-
did jewels ; some of the latter, the historian says, were still
remaining in the treasury of his church when he wrote,
in the twelfth century. Sighelm is stated to have left
England in the year 883, and to have gone in the first
instance to Rome, from which he probably sailed up the
Mediterranean to Alexandria, and then made his way by
Bassora to the Malabar coast, where it is certain that a
colony of Syrian Christians, who regarded St. Thomas as
their apostle, were settled from a very early period.
Asser relates that he received, on one occasion, as a pre-
sent from Alfred, a robe of silk, and as much incense as a
strong man could carry ; these precious commodities may
have been obtained from the East.
But the interest which Alfred took in hearing of remote
parts of the earth is most distinctly shown in the accounts
BRITISH COMMERCE. G5
he has himself given us of the two voyages of Ohthcre
and Wulfstan ; the first to the North Seas, the second
towards the east of the Baltic. These voyages were re-
lated to Alfred by the navigators themselves ; and he lias
inserted what they told him in his Saxon translation of
the Latin History of Orosius. It has been observed
that Alfred " obtained from Ohthcre and Wulfstan such
information of the Baltic sea with the adjacent countries,
as far exceeded that of professed geographers, cither
before or after his time, till the route of Ohthcre was re-
traced in the year 1553 by the English navigator Chan-
cellor, who was supposed the original discoverer of the
northern passage to Russia."* Ohthere rounded the
North Cape, and penetrated into the White Sea, from
which he ascended a great river, which must have been
the Dvvina, on which Archangel now stands. Wulfstan
navigated the Baltic as far as to the land of the
Estum, the present Prussia. " This Eastland," says his
narrative, " is very large, and there be a great many
towns, and in every town there is a king ; and there is a
great quantity of honey and fish. The king and the
richest men drink mares' milk, and the poor and the slaves
drink mead. There be very many battles between them.
There is no ale brewed amid the Estum, but there is mead
enough." Pytheas had remarked the same abundance of
honey and use of mead, among the people of this coast,
twelve centuries before.
It is one of Alfred's many gi'eat merits, and titles to
perpetual and grateful remembi'ance, that he first called
into action, and gave proof of what could be achieved by
the natural right arm of England — her maritime strength.
The year 887, the sixth of his reign, while he was en-
gaged in that first struggle with the northern invaders
which ended so disastrously, is marked as the year in
which he fitted out his first few ships. Twenty years
later, in his days of prosperity and power, he built a much
larger fleet, and introduced certain important improve-
ments in the form of the vessels, which, whether suggested
by his own inventive sagacity, or borrowed, as it has been
* Macpherson's Annals of Commerce, i. 2G3.
D 3
GG HISTORY OF
conjectured they might have been, from the galleys then
used in the Mediterranean, of which he had obtained
models, he showed at least his usual active and inquisitive
spirit in searching after, and his good sense in adopting.
The Saxon Chronicler says that Alfred's ships were
neither like those of the Danes nor those of the Frisians,
but were made in a fashion which he himself thought
would be more serviceable than that of either. Tliey
were twice as long as the aescas, as they wei'e called, of
the Northmen, and also higher than theirs ; in sailing,
thoy were swifter and less unsteady. Some of them had
sixty oars, some more. Yet, notwithstanding the state-
ments of some later writers, we have no authentic account
of any attempt by Alfred to create an English mercantile
marine. One of his laws only shows that merchant ships
sometimes arrived in England in those days ; and even
this regulation regards not the cargoes of these foreign
vessels, but the i)assengers. The only notice that has
been found of the export of any English commodity in
the time of Alfred, is the mention of some of the famous
native breed of dogs having been sent as a present to
Folk, archbishop of Rheims, in France.*
By far the most remarkable and significant event in the
whole history of Anglo-Saxon connnerce, is the law
passed in the reign of King Athelstan, in the second
quarter of the tenth century, by which it was enacted
that every merchant who should have made three voyages
over the sea with a ship and cargo of his own should
have the rank of a thane or nobleman. The liberality of
this law has usually been ascribed exclusively to the en-
lightened judgment of Athelstan ; but we are entitled to
])resume that it nuist have been also in some degree in
accordance with the general feeling of the country ; for,
not to mention that it must have been passed with the
consent of the Wittenagcmot, it is unlikely that so able
and ])rudcnt as well as })opular a monarch as Athelstan
would ha\e attempted in regard to such a matter to do
violence to public opinion, without the acquiescence and
* MacphLTSoi), i. 205.
BRITISH CO.MMi;UCK. G7
support of which the measure could have had lit^^lc effi-
cacy or success. We may take tliis decree coni'erring
the honours of nobility upon commerce, therefore, as
testifying not only to the liberality and wisdom of Athel-
stan, but also to the estimation in which commerce had
already come to be held among the English j)eople. It
may be regarded as a proof that the Anglo-Saxons had
ne\er entertained much of that prejudice against the
pursuits of trade, which we find so strongly manifested
during the middle ages, wherever the political and social
institutions were moulded upon, and fully animated by,
the spirit of the feudal system. But it is especially inter-
esting in reference to the present subject, as an indica-
tion of the growing importance of English commerce and
of the public sense of that importance. From this time
English fleets and ships of war come to be frequently
mentioned. Athelstan assisted his nephew, Louis IV. of
France, in his contest with the Emperor Otho, by sending
a fleet to the coast of Flanders, to ravage the emperor's
territories in that quarter. This was done in conformity
with a treaty of mutual defence, which is memorable as
the first of the kind that had been entered into between
the two kingdoms. Edgar's navy, and also that which
Ethelred fitted out by a tax upon all the lands in the
kingdom to repel the Danes, make a great figure in the
history of the next half century. Some accounts make
Edgar's fleet to have amounted to between three and four
thousand ships — a statement resembling in its style of
evident hyperbole the whole history the old monkish
chroniclers have given us of this king, whose lavish bene-
factions to the church have secured him an extraordinary
return of their gratitude and laudation. Ethelred's, again,
is recorded to have been the most numerous naval arma-
ment that had yet been seen in England ; so that it must
have surpassed that of Edgar.
Even in the disastrous reign of Ethelred, we find in-
dications of the continued progress of trade, both coasting
and foreign. In certain laws enacted by Ethelred and
his Witan, at Wantage, in Berkshire, it is declared, that
every smaller boat arriving at Billingsgate (so old are tijat
68 HISTORY OF
landing-place and that name) should pay for toll or cus-
tom one halfpenny ; a larger boat with sails, one penny ;
a keel, or what wo should now call a hulk, four pennies ;
a vessel with wood, one piece of wood ; a boat with fish
coming to the bridge, one halfpenny, or one penny,
according to her size. And from other passages of these
laws, it appears that vessels w^ere then wont to come to
England from Rouen, wath wine and large fish ; fi-om Flan-
ders, Ponthieu, Normandy, France, Hegge (an unknown
place), Liege, and Nivell. Certain German merchants,
called the Emperor's men, when they came with their
ships, are declared to be worthy of good laws — that is, of
being treated with favour ; but they were to pay their
dues, and were not to forestall the market to the preju-
dice of the citizens. The dues to be paid by the Em-
peror's men, who were probably the representatives of some
trading company, were two grey cloths and one brown one,
ten pounds of pepper, five pairs of men's gloves, and two
vessels or measures (called cabillini colenni, the meaning
of which is unknown) of vinegar, at Christmas, and the
same again at Easter. These were probably the articles
of which their cargoes usually consisted. It is also worth
notice, that a meeting was held in this reign of the wise
men of England and Wales for regulating the intercourse,
commercial and general, between the two kingdoms ; at
which rates of compensation were fixed for slaves, cattle,
&c,, that might be stolen or injured, and it was agreed to
appoint a standing tribunal, consisting of six English and
six Welsh lawmen, or persons skilled in the law, to settle
all disputes between individuals of the two nations.
Among many other interesting details derived from a
volume of Saxon Dialogues, apparently intended for a
school-book, which is preserved in the British Museum,*
Mr. Turner has quoted the following passage, in which
the Merchant, as one of the characters introduced, gives
an account of his occupation and way of life : " I say
that I am useful to the king, and to ealdermen, and to
the rich, and to all people. I ascend my ship with my
merchandize, and sail over the scalike places, and sell my
* Cotton MS. Tib. A. lii.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 69
.tliiiig-s, and buy dear things which are not produced in
this land, and I bring them to you here with great
danger over the sea ; and sometimes I suffer shipwreck,
with the loss of all my things, scarcely escaping myself."
He is then asked, " What do you bring to us ?" to which
he answers, " Skins, silks, costly gems, and gold ;
various garments, pigment, wine, oil, ivory, and orichalciis
(perhaps brass) ; copper and tin, silver, glass, and such
like." The principle of all commercial dealings is dis-
tinctly enough stated in the answer to the next question,
— " Will you sell your things here as you bought them-
there?" " I will not; because what would my labour
benefit me ? I will sell them here dearer than 1 bought
them there, that I may get some profit to feed me, my
wife, and children." The silks and other Oriental com-
modities here mentioned were usually, in all probability,
obtained from Italy, or sometimes perhaps from Mar-
seilles.
Foreign commodities can only be obtained by the ox-
change of other commodities produced at home. But
the Anglo-Saxons had not much to export. Notwith-
standing the flourishing state to which British agriculture
had been raised by the Romans, there is no evidence or
reason for believing that a single cargo of corn was ever
exported from England during the whole of the period
now under review. Although, however, there is no
positive authority to establish the fact, Mr. Macpherson
thinks there can be little doubt that the Flemings, the
great manufacturers of fine woollen goods for the \\ hole
of Europe, carried away great quantities of English wool
in this period, as we know for certain they did in the
following ages. That there was an export trade in w ool
would seem to be indicated by the disproportionate price
the fleece appears to have borne compared with the
whole sheep, and also by the high price of wool.* Pro-
bably also the mines of the different metals yielded
something for exportation. The Abbe Raynal has
mentioned, but without quoting his authority, that among
the traders of different nations who resorted to the iaii's
* Macpherson, i. 288.
70 HISTORY or
established in France by King- Dagobert in the seventh
century, were the Saxons with the tin and lead ot" Eng-
land;* and Mr. Macphcrson is of opinion that, as we
know from Domesday Book that in the neighbour-
hood of Gloucester there were iron-works in the time of
Edward the Confessor, which had probably been kept
up since before the invasion of the Romans, iron, too, as
well as lead and tin, may perhaps have been one of the
few British exports during the Anglo-Saxon period.
This M^riter thinks it also not impossible that mines of
the precious metals may have been wrought at this time
in England, and part of their produce exported, although
the existence of such mines in the island is unnoticed by
any historian since the beginning of the Roman dominion,
with the exception of Bede.f It is certain that large
sums in gold and silver were raised in the country on
different occasions, and much coin or bullion repeatedly
carried out of it ; and it appears difficult to comprehend
whence all this vvcalth could be obtained with so few
manufactures and so little exportable produce of any
kind. The early eminence of the Anglo-Saxons in the
art of working gold and silver may be taken as afSbrding
another presumption that, whencesoever procured, there
was no want of these metals in the island. " We have
undoubted proof," says Mr. Macpherson, "that the
English jewellers and workers of gold and silver were
eminent in their professions, and that probably as early
as the beginning of the seventh century, ... So great
was the demand for highly-finished trinkets of gold and
silver, that the most capital artists of Germany resorted
to England ; and, moreover, the most {)recious specimens
of foreign workmanship were inijwrted by the mer-
chants."! On the other hand, articles in gold and silver
seem to liave been the chief description of manufactured
goods exported from England in this period.
Among the exports from Britain during part of this
period are su})posed to have been horses, because one of
* Hist, des Indes, ii. 4. f Macpherson, i. 29 U
X Macpherson, i. 2'JO.
BRITISH COMMKRCE. 71
Kinir Atlielstan's laws prohibits their being carried out
of tiie kingdom unless they were to be given as presents.
Another part of the export trade, which was probablj
carried on to a much greater extent, was the trade in
slaves. The mission of Augustine, which eti'ected the
conversion of the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity, was, it
may be recollected, the memorable result of the attention
of Augustine's patron, Gregory, having been attracted
by the appearance of a groujj of young Angles exposed for
sale as slaves in the market-place of Rome. Afterwards
several laws and ecclesiastical canons were passed prohi-
biting the sale of Christian slaves to Jews or Pagans.
Finally it was enacted that no Christians, and no per-
sons who had not committed some crime, should be sold
out of the country. But William of Malmesbury, who
wrote nearly a century after the Conquest, affirms that
the practice of selling even their nearest relations had
not been altogether abandoned by the peoj)le of North-
umberland in his own memory. And in the contempo-
rary biography of "Wulfstan, who was Bishop of Wor-
cester at the time of the Conquest, the following curious
account is given: — "There is a sea-port town called
Bristol, opposite to Ireland, into which its inhabitants
make frequent voyages on account of trade. Wulfstan
cured the })eople of this town of a most odious and
inveterate custom, which they derived from their
ancestors, of buying men and women in all parts of
England, and exjiorting them to Ireland for the sake of
gain. The young women they commonly got with child,
and carried them to market in their pregnancy, that they
might bring a better price. You might have seen with
sorrow long ranks of young persons of both sexes, and
of the greatest beauty, tied together with ropes, and
daily exposed to sale ; nor were these men ashamed, O
horrid wickedness ! to give up their nearest relations,
nay, their own children, to slavery. Wulfstan, knowing
the obstinacy of these people, sometimes stayed two
months among them, preaching every Lord's Day, by
which, in process of time, he made so great an impres-
sion upon their minds that they abandoned that wicked
72 HISTORY OF
trade, and set an example to all the rest of England to
do the same."* But for this remarkable passage it
would scarcely have been suspected that there ever was a
time when the natives of England were regularly ex-
ported to be sold as slaves to the Irish. Their principal
purchasers were probably the Danes, or Ostmen (that is,
Eastern men), as they were called, who were at this
time the dominant people in Ireland, and especially were
masters of nearly the whole line of the coast opposite to
Britain. They appear to have carried on a considerable
commerce both with England and other countries.
Chester, as v>'ell as Bristol, is particularly mentioned as
one of the ports to which Irish ships were accustomed
to resort about the time of the Norman Conquest.
William of Malmesbury describes the inhabitants of
Chester as depending in his day upon Ireland for a sup-
ply of the necessaries of life ; and, in another place, he
speaks of the great distress the Irish would suffer if they
were deprived of their trade with England. Marten
skins are mentioned in Domesday Book among the com-
modities brought by sea to Chester ; and this appears,
from other authorities, to have been one of the exports
in ancient times from Ireland. Notices are also found
of merchants from Ireland landing at Cambridge with
cloths, and exposing their merchandise to sale.t Other
English ports which are noticed as possessed of ships at
the time of the Conquest, or immediately before that
event, are Pevensey, llomney, Hythe, Folkstone, Dover,
Sandwich, Southwark, and London. Bede speaks of
merchants' ships sailing to Home ; and it appears that
trading-vessels sometimes joined together, and went out
armed for their mutual protection.:}:
At all the above places, and at every other seaport in
the kingdom, customs seem to have been exacted upon
the arrival and departure of ships and goods, both by
the king and by the lord, generally called the earl or
comes, whose property or under whose protection the
* Wharton's Anglia Sacra, ii. 258.
t See Turner, iii. 113. | Ibid.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 73'
to\"in was ; and trade was besides fettered by many
restrictive regulations. At Chester, for instance, if "a
ship arrived or sailed without the king's leave, she was
subject to a fine of forty shillings to the king and the
earl for every one of her crew. If they came against the
king's express prohibition, the ship, the men, and the
cargo were forfeited to the king. Ships that came in
with the king's permission might sell quietly what they
brought, paying at their departure to the king and the
earl four pennies for every last, or load. Those that
bi'ought marten skins, however, were bound to allow the
king the pre-emption of them, and, for that jmrpose, to
show them to an officer before any were disposed of,
under a penalty of forty shillings. It is possible, how-
ever, that some of these oppressive regulations may have
been first imposed by the Conqueror. At the time
when the account in Domesday Book was drawn up,
the port of Chester yielded to the crown a revenue of
forty-five pounds, and three timbres (whatever quantity
that may have been) of marten skins.
Of the internal trade of England during this period
we know very little. That it was on a very diminutive
scale might be inferred from the single fact, that no
person was allov/^ed to buy anything above the value of
twenty pennies, except within a town, and in the
presence of the chief magistrate, or of two or more
witnesses. Such at least is the regulation found in the
laws of King Hlothaere (or Lothair) of Kent, who
reigned in the seventh century. Another enactment in
the same collection is, that, " if any of the people of
Kent buy anything in the city of London, he must have
two or three honest men, or the king's port-reve (who
was the chief magistrate of the city), present at the
bargain." And a third of Hlothaere's laws is — " Let
none exchange one thing for another except in the
presence of the sheriff, the mass priest, the lord of the
manor, or some other person of undoubted veracity. If/
they do otherwise they shall pay a fine of thirty shil-
lings, besides forfeiting the goods so exchanged to the
lord of the manor."
74 HISTORY OF
These regulations were probably intended in part to
prevent fraud and disputes, and they might perhaps be
in some measure serviceable for that j)urpose in an age
when writing was not in common use ; but there can be
no doubt that they had principally in view the protection
of the revenue of the king and the lord of the manor ;
to each of whom, it appears from Domesday Book, a
certain proportion of the price of everything sold for
more than twenty pennies was paid, the one-half by the
buyer, and the other by the seller. The amount here
specified would prevent the rule from affecting the
ordinary purchases of the people in shops, to which it
must be supposed they were permitted to resort for the
necessaries of life without any of these annoying for-
malities. The transactions to which it applied would
chiefly take place at the public markets or fairs, which
appear to liave been established in various parts of the
country, and which in all the greater towns were pro-
bably held every week. Originally the Sunday seems
to have been the usual market-day ; but the repeated
efforts of the church at length effected the general sub-
stitution of Saturday. Besides the weekly markets,
however, there were probably others of a more import-
ant kind held at greater intervals. At many of the
markets, besides the duties exacted upon all sales, a toll
aj)pears to have been demanded either from every indi-
vidual frequenting the market, or at least from all who
brought goods to dispose of. Most of these commercial
usages of the Anglo-Saxons were inherited from their
predecessors the Romans.
They had also, to a certain extent, the advaiitage of
the facilities of communication between the different
parts of the country, which had been created while it
was in the occuj)ation of that great people. The four
great highways appear to have received Saxon names,
and they were undoubtedly maintained in use during the
whole of the Saxon period, as were also, it may be ])re-
sumed, most of the other roads, or streets, as they were
called, with which the country M'as intersected in all
directions. And, besides the navigable rivers, it has
BllITISir COMMERCE. / 5
been supposed that artificial canals were cut in some
places. A canal in Huntingdonshire, in particular,
called Kingsdelf, is mentioned in the Saxon Chronicle
under the year 963 ; and several of the boundary ram-
parts, erected primarily for the purposes of defence,
appear to have had wide ditches, along which boats
might be dragged.
The subject'of the Money of the Anglo-Saxons is in
some parts extremely perplexed and obscure. The
ditlercnt denominations of money of which mention is
found, are, the pound, the mark, the mancus, the ora,
the shilling, the thrimsa, the sceatta, the penny, the
triens, the balding, or halfpenny, the feorthling, or
farthing, and the styca, or half-farthing. Of some of
these, however, we know with certainty little more than
the names.
The first difliiculty that occurs is in regard to which of
these kinds of m.oney were actual coins, and which were
merely nominal, or money of account. Upon this part
of the subject, Mr. Ruding, from whom it has received
the latest as well as the most elaborate investigation,
comes, though not without hesitation, to the following
conclusion: "'That the penny, halfpenny, farthing, and
half-larthing were actual coins ; as was probably the
triens, which divided the penny into three equal parts ;
and that the mancus, the mark, the ora, the shilling, and
the thrimsa, were only money of account ; or, that if
the mancus was ever current among the Anglo-Saxons,
it was a foreign coin, and was never imitated in their
mints."* There is no doubt that the pound was merely
money of account. The sceatta seems to have been
rather a general expression for a piece of money, than
the denomination either of a coin or a particular sum.
Others, however, have held that the sceatta, the mancus,
tlie sliilling, the thrimsa, and perhaps also the ora, were
all coins.
The next question that arises relates to the metal of
which each coin was made. Mr. Ruding is of opinion,
* Annals of the Coinage, i. 316. (Edit, of 1819.)
76 HISTORY OF
*' that no evidence has yet been adduced to prove that
the Anglo-Saxons struck any gold money ; but that the
balance of probability apparently inclines to the deter-
mination that no such money was issued from their mints."*
By others the mancus is supposed to have been of gold ;
and Mr. Turner thinks that both gold and silver were
used in exchanges in an uncoined state.f It is certain
that mention is repeatedly made of payments in gold. It
is agreed that the penny, the halfpenny, the farthing, and
the triens (if that was a coin) were all of silver ; and that
the styca was of copper, or of that metal with an alloy.
In fact, no Saxon coins have yet been discovered except
some of those last mentioned. Of pennies and stycas
some large hoards have been found within these few years.
In April, 1817, a wooden box was turned up by a plough-
man in a field near Dorking, in Surrey, which contained
nearly seven hundred Saxon pennies, principally of the
coinages of Ethclwulf, the son and successor of Egbert,
and of Ethelbert, the father of Alfred, but partly also of
those of preceding kings of Wessex, of Mercia, and of
East-Anglia.J Eighty-three silver coins of King Ethel-
red, and two of his father, King Edgar, were found in
1820, by a peasant while digging a woody field in Bol-
stads Socked, in Sweden, and are now deposited in the
Royal Cabinet of Antiquities at Stockholm.§ And in
1 832, a bi-ass vessel containing about eight thousand stycas,
principally of the kings of Northumberland, was found at
Hexham in that county. About five thousand of them
were recovered from the persons into whose hands they
had fallen ; and a selection of about three hundred of them
is now in the British Museum. ||
* Annals of the Coinage, i. 316. (Edit, of 1819.)
t Hist, of Anglo-Saxons, ii. 470, 471
X See account of these coins, by Taylor Combe, Esq., in
the Archseologia, vol. xix. (for 1821), p. 110.
§ Turner's Anglo-Saxons, ii. 480.
II See account of these stycas, by John Adamson, Esq.,
\rith engravings of some hundreds of them, in the Archreo-
logia, vol. xxv. (for 1834), pp. 229-310 ; and vol. xxvi. (for
1836), pp. 346-8.
BRITISH COMMEECE. 77
But the most important, and unfortunately also the
darkest question of all, is that of the determination of the
value of these several coins or denominations of money.
There has been the greatest doubt and difference of opi-
nion both as to the absolute value or v/eight, and as to the
relative value, of nearly every one of them. Almost the
only thing which is perfectly certain is, that the pound
was always understood to be a full pound of silver. It
appears, however, to have been not the common troy
pound, but another measure, long known in Germany by
the name of the Cologne pound, and used in this country
as the Tower or Mint weight down to the reign of
Henry VII. It was three quarters of an ounce less than
the pound troy, and was equal, therefore, to only eleven
ounces and a quarter troy weight, that is, to 5400 gi-ahis.
Out of this amount of silver, throughout the whole
Saxon period, the rule seems to have been to coin 240
silver pennies, each of which would therefore weigh 22:^
of our grains. Accordingly, this is about the average
weight of the Saxon pennies that have been found. Our
present pound no longer means a pound of silver of any
denomination ; but the old relation between the pound
and the penny, it will be remarked, is still preserved —
the value of the pound is still 240 pence. A few passages
in old v/riters and documents have inclined some antiqua-
ries to suspect that the Saxons had two kinds of pennies,
a greater and a less ; but, on the whole, this notion does
not seem to be tenable. The name of the penny in Saxon
is variously written, — peneg, penig, peninc, pening, pe-
nincg, penning, and pending.
Supposing the value of the penny to have been thus
ascertained, we have obtained that also of each of the in-
ferior coins. The halfpenny, which, as existing speci-
mens show, was also of silver, would weigh about 11^ of
our grains, and the feorthling, or farthing, about 5|. But
no Saxon farthings have been discovered, and we do not
know whether the coin was of silver or copper. The styca
was of copper much alloyed, — in other words, of bronze ;
but, as it was the half of the farthing, its precise value
would be estimated at 2jf grains of silver. All the stycas
that have yet been found are from the mints of the
78 HISTORY OF
Northumbrian kings and the Archbishop of York ; but
the circulation of the coin aj)pears to liave been general
throughout England. If there were such coins as the
thrimsa and the triens, the former at least was probably
of silver. The value of the thrimsa seems to have been
three peiniies, or 67^ grains of silver ; that of the triens,
the third of a penny, or 7^ grains of silver.
These conclusions, as we have intimated, are not un-
attended with some difficulties ; but they seem, on tiie
whole, to be tolerably well made out, and at any rate it
would only embarrass the statement, without adding any
information of the least interest or value for our j)resent
purpose, to enter upon a discussion of the doubts or objec-
tions that have been raised upon certain points.
One of the main hinges on which the investigation of
the subject of the Saxon money turns is the question of
the nature and value of the shilling.
The Norman shilling, like that of the present day, was
the twGjitieth part of the pound, and consisted of twelve
pence ; and this is the scale according to which the ]>ay-
ments in Domesday Book are commonly stated. The
scill or scilling of the Saxons is the denomination of mo-
ney most frequently mentioned in their laws and writings,
and it appears to have been that in which sums were
usually reckoned ; yet no Saxon shilling has ever been
found, and the different ancient accounts and computa-
tions in which it is mentioned seem to be only reconcile-
able upon the supposition that it was of fluctuating value.
Both- these facts go to support the conclusion that the shil-
ling was not a coin, but only a denomination of money of
account. At one time it appears to have contained five,
and at another only four pennies ; if there were not in-
deed two sorts of shillings circulating together of these
different values.* When the shilling contained five pen-
nies its value was the forty-eighth part of the pound,
or 112.^ ijrains troy of silver ; when it contained four pen-
nies only, it was the sixtieth part of the pound, and its
value was only 80 grains troy of silver. The princij)al
evidence for there ever having been a shilling containing
* Mr. Kuding is inclined to think that this was the case.
See his Annals of tlie Coinage, i. 310.
BRITISH COMMERCE. i \)
only four pennies is a law of Athelstan, in which 7200
shillings are distinctly stated to be equal to 1-20 pounds ;
in which case there must have been 60 shillings in each
pound. But there is equally g-ood evidence that five pen-
nies was the value of the shilling; both before and after
the time of Athelstan ; and it has therefore been sup-
posed that the shilling was depreciated by that king:, and
afterwards restored to its ancient value. In the laws of
Canute the shilling- appears clearly to be reckoned the
forty-eighth part of the jx)und ; and ^Ifric, the gram-
marian, who wrote in this age, expressly states that there
were five pennies in the shilling.
If the mancus ever was a coin, Mr. Ruding is of
opinion that it became latterly merely a denomination
of money of account. The commonly received etymo-
logy of the word, from the Latin manu ciiswn, struck
witlrthe hand (though this etymology may be doubted),
would seem to favour the notion that it had been a coin
at one time ; but, as we find the mancus of silver men-
tioned as well as the mancus of gold, it must be concluded
that the name came to be afterwards used as that simply
of a certain sum, for it is improbable that any coin was in
use of so large a size as a silver mancus would have been.
The value of the mancus is stated by ^Ifric to have been
thirty pennies, in the same passage in which he states five
pennies to have made a shilling. The mancus, therefore,
contained six Saxon shillings, or was of the value of 675
grains troy of silver, being rather more than is contained
in seven of our present shillings. It is observable that a
gold coin, sometimes called a mancus, in other cases
known by other names, circulated during the middle ages
in many countries both of Europe and the East, the
weight of which was 56 grains troy, which would be just
about the weight of gold equivalent to thirty Saxon
pennies, on the supposition, which other considerations
render probable, that the relative value of gold and silver
was then as twelve to one. Of this weight were the
mancuses or ducats of Italy, Germany, France, Spain,
and Holland, the sultani of Constantinople, the sequins of
Lai-bary, and the sherilis of Egypt.
80 HISTORY OF
The mark used to be supposed the same with the man-
cus, but this opinion is now quite exploded. The mark
appears to have been a Danish denomination of money,
and to have been introduced into this country by the
Danish settlers, the first mention of it being found in the
articles of agreement between Alfred and Guthrun. Some
of the notices would seem to imply that, at first, the mai'k
was accounted equivalent in value to only a hundred Saxon
pennies ; but it certainly came eventually to be estimated
at one hundred and sixty pennies, that is, at two-thirds
of the pound. Two-thirds of a pound is still the legal
value of a mark. The mark, therefore, may be set down
iis of the value of 3600 grains troy of silver. The mark
has never been supposed to be a real coin, except by
those who have taken it for the same with the mancus.
The ora was also a Danish denomination, and appears
to have been the eighth part of the mark. Its vSlue,
therefore, would be twenty Saxon pennies, or 450 grains
troy of silver. There appears also, however, to have
been an ora which was valued at only sixteen pennies.
The amount of silver, 5400 troy grains, which made an
Anglo-Saxon pound, is now coined into 2/. I6s. 3d.
sterling. The value, therefore, of each of the Saxon
coins, according to the view that has now been taken,
would be as stated in the following Table. (See p. 81.)
The Saxon coins are generally sufficiently rude in
workmanship ; and this circumstance has been used as an
argument to prove that the Saxons brought the art of
coining with them to Britain from Germany, and did not
acquire it by imitation of the Roman models. The
earliest Saxon coin that has been appropriated is one in
silver (a penny apparently, though commonly called a
sceatta) of Ethelbert, king of Kent, who reigned from 561
to 616, the patron of St. Augustine. As the coin does
not exhibit the usual Christian symbol of the cross, it may
be presumed to have been struck before the year 597,
in which Ethelbert was baptized. According to Mr.
lludiiig's description, " it bears on the obverse the name
of the monarch, and on the reverse a rude figure, which
occurs on many of the sceattae, and which is supposed to
BRITISH COMMERCE.
81
--!-*
-4^
H-«
-In *:!•*
-N"*
eiH
CO
o
O
CO
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CO CI
c-i
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t^
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•
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u.
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t-
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o =:
cS
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t^
o
rt
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• tp
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,
.
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82 HISTORY OF
be intended to represent a bird." But other coins that
exist without names, or with names that cannot be deci-
phered, may be older than this. Besides the kings of
the different states of the Heptarchy, and aftervvards of" all
England, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York had
mints and issued money in the Anglo-Saxon times. In
addition to the name of the king or the archbishop, the
coins usually contain that of the moneyer by whom they
were struck, and from the time of Athelstan also that of
the town where the mint was situated. The later kings
appear to have usually had numerous moneyers, and mints
in all the principal towns throughout the kingdom,*
Besides the coins of their own minting, several foreign
coins appear to have circulated among the Anglo-Saxons,
especially the byzantine gold solidi, commonly called
byzantines, or byzants, each weighing seventy-three
grains troy, and being of the value of forty Saxon pen-
nies, or (at their estimation of the relative values of gold
and silver) nine shillings and fourpence-half])enny of our
present money. Thus St. Dunstan is recorded to have
])urchased the estate of Hindon (now Hendon), in Mid-
dlesex, from King Edgar, for 200 gold byzantines, and
then to have presented it to the monks of St. Peter in
* Complete lists of the moneyers and mints in each reign,
as far as they can be recovered, are given in Ruding's ela-
borate and exact Annals of the Coinage, 2nd Edit. 5 vols.
8vo. and 1 4to. of Plates, Lond. 1819. On the subject of the
Anglo-Saxon Coinage, the reader may also consult Bishop
Fleetwood's Chronicon Preciosum, 2nd Edit. Svo. Lond. 174"! ;
the Introduction to Leake's Historical Account of English
money from the Conquest, 2nd Edit. Svo. Lond. 1745 (but
the views of these earlier writers have been corrected in
some important respects by the results of subsequent investi-
gation): Pegge's Dissertations on some Anglo-Saxon Remains,
4to. Lond. 1756 ; Clai'ke's Connection of the Roman, Saxon,
and English Coins, 4to. Lond. 1767 (both Peggeand Clarke
endeavour to show that the Saxons coined gold) ; and
Folkes's Tables of English Coins, published at the expense
of the Society of Antiquaries, 4to. Lond. 1763 (in this work
was announced the important discovery that the Saxon pound
was the Old Tower or Cologne pound).
BRITISH COMMEBCE. 83
Westminster.* There were also silver byzantines, which,
according to Camden, were valued at two shillings each.
At an early period even some of the Roman imjiei-ial
money might remain in use. " That gold and silver,"
Mr. Turner remarks, " had abounded in the island while
it was possessed by the Romans and Britons, the coins
that have been found at every period since, almost every
year, sufficiently testify ; and it was the frequency of
these emerging to view which made treasure-trove an im-
portant part of our ancient laws, and which is mentioned
by Alfred as one of the means of becoming wealthy."!
Slaves and cattle passed also as a sort of circulating
medium during this period so generally that they are
spoken of as living money. Cattle, the first wealth of
mankind, were probably in most countries the first money ;
that is to say, commodities were valued at so many cattle,
and cattle were commonly given in exchange for all other
things. When metal money, therefore, was first intro-
duced, it was looked upon not as a convenient represen-
tative of commodities or property of all kinds, but only as
a substitute for cattle ; some of the oldest coins have the
figures of cattle stamped on them ; and in some languages
money was actually called cattle. Thus peciis, cattle, is
the origin of the Latin pecunia, money, and of our Eng-
lish pecuniary. The same thing is very curiously shown
by the history of another still existing term, the word
tnulct^ meaning a fine or pecuniary penalty. Mulct is a
translation of the Latin mulcta, or, as it is more properly
written, midta, which was an ancient Roman law-term
for a fine, but which the Roman lawyers and antiquaries
themselves, as we learn from Aulus Geilius, admitted to
have originally meant a sheep, or rather a ram. V'arro
asserted that it was a Samnite word, and that the Sam-
nites, the descendants of the old Sabines, had used it in
that sense within his own recollection. It is remarkable
that the original word still survives, in its oi-iginal sig-ni-
fication, in the Celtic dialects of Ireland and Scotland, in
* Camden's Britannia, 399.
t Hist. Ang.-Sax. iii. 237.
E 2
84 HISTORY OF
the former of" which a wether ic to this day molt, and in
the latter 7mdt* Hence, in fact, come the French
7iwnfon, and our EngHsh imittoii. The Antrlo-Saxons, it
would appear, although they had metallic money, had not
completely passed out of the state of only commencing
civilization in which cattle serve the pur{)Oses of money.
A certain value seems to have been affixed by the law to
horses, cows, sheep, and slaves, at which they might be
seized by a creditor in payment of a debt due to him ;
and it is sujjposed that all kinds of fines, or pecuniary
penances, imposed either by the state or the church, might
be discharged either in dead or living money. The
church, however, which, to its honour, from the first
opposed itself to slavery, and greatly contributed by its
systematic discouragement and resistance to put down that
evil, early refused to accept of slaves instead of money in
the payment of penances.
In the parts of liritain not occupied by the Saxons, it
may be doubted if during the present period any metallic
money was coined. No coins either of Scotland or of
Wales of this antiquity have ever been found. Consi-
dering the intercourse, however, that in the later part of
the period subsisted between both of these countries and
England, it is impossible to suppose that, although they
may not have minted any money themselves, they could
be unacquainted with its use. A few of the Saxon coins
probably found their way both to the Welsh and Scotch,
and su])piied them with a scanty circulation. The Welsh
laws, indeed, show that the denominations, at least, of
money were familiarly known to that people ; but they
seem to show, also, by the anxious minuteness with which
they fix the })ricc of almost every article that could be-
come the subject of commerce, that a common represen-
tative of value and medium of exchange was not yet in
common use. These Welsh laws, for instance, in one
section, lay down the prices of cats, of all diftcrcnt ages,
and with a most elaborate discrimination of species and
properties. This may be regarded as a rude attempt to
* Thoughts on the Origin and Descent of the Gael, by
James Grant, Esq., of Corrimony, 8vo. Loud. 1828, p. 145.
BKITISH COMMKRCE. 8y
provide a substitute for barter without a coinage ; but the
system which it would aim at establishing is in realiry
anything rather than an improvement of sim])lc, unregu-
hited barter. The real price, or exchangeable value, of a
commodity, depending as it does upon a variety of cir-
cumstances which are constantly in a state of fluctuation,
is essentially a variable quantity, and we can no more fix
it by a law than we can fix the wind. A law, therefore,
attempting to fix it would only do injustice and mischief;
it would, in so far as it was operative, merely substitute a
false and unfair price of commodities for their natural and
pro])er ])rice.
When the prices of commodities, however, are thus
settled by the law, it may be presumed that the prices
assigned are those generally borne by the commodities at
the time ; and in this point of view the law becomes of
historic value as a record of ancient prices. Thus, from
one of the Saxon laws of King Ethelred we learn that in
England the common prices of certain articles, about the
end of the tenth century, were as follows : —
Of a Man, or slave
Horse . .
Mare or colt.
Ass Gr mule.
Ox ...
Cow . . .
Swine
Sheep . .
Goat . . .
We are not to suppose, howevei", that these legal rates
were always adhered to in actual sales and purcha.scs.
The prices of all commodities among the Saxons no doubt
rose and fell as they do at present, and with much more
suddenness and violence than now ; for, in that rude
period, from the scarcity of capital, and the comparatively
little communication between one place and another,
supplies of all kinds were necessarily much more imi)er-
fectly distributed than they now are over both time and
space ; and any deficiency that might, from any cause,
occur, was left to press with its whole severity upon the
garticular moment and the local market^ without the
A pound . . .
equivalent to
£. s.
2 16
d.
3 i
Tliirty shillings
1 15
2
Twenty shilUn<;s
1 3
5
Twelve shilling's
14
1
Six shillings
7
Oi
Five shilling'^
5
6
One sliil. and 3 pennies „
1
m
One sliilling
>)
1
Two pennies
5i
86 HISTORY OF
greater abundance of other places or other seasons being
admitted to relieve it. Comparative, though not absolute
steadiness of prices, or at any rate a steady and calcu-
lable, in lieu of an irregular and jolting movement of
prices, especially of those of the great necessaries of
subsistence, is, on the whole, the accompaniment of an
advanced civilization, the general character and result of
which, indeed, may be said to be to repress irregularities
of all kinds, and to bring all social processes nearer and
nearer to the equability of those of mechanics. Several
of the articles enumerated in the above list we find men-
tioned elsewhere as bearing a variety of other prices.
In one case, for instance, we find a slave purchased for
half a pound ; in another, for an yre of gold (the amount
of which is not known) ; in another, for three mancuses,
or about a guinea ; in another, for five shillings and some
pence.* In these purchases it is generally mentioned
that, besides the price, the toll was paid. " The tolls
mentioned in some of the contracts for slaves," observes
jMr. Turner, " may be illustrated out of Domesday Book.
In the burgh of Lewes it says that at every purchase and
sale money was paid to the gerefa : for an ox, a farthing
was collected ; for a man, four pennies." Slaves, of
course, diftered very considerably from one another in
real value. On the other hand, the same sum at which a
sheep is here rated at the end of the tenth century ap-
])ears to have been also its legal price three hundred years
before. At least, in the laws of Ina, king of the West
Saxons, who reigned at the close of the seventh century,
a sheep with its lamb is valued at a shilling. In another
of Ina's laws, the fleece alone is valued at two pennies,
that is, at two-fifths of the price of the entire sheep and
lamb. This high price of wool, as has been mentioned
above, is accounted for on the supposition that there was
some foreign trade in that commodity in the Anglo-Saxon
times. By a law of Edgar, in the latter half of the tenth
century, the highest price which could be taken for a
weigh of wool was fixed at half a pound of silver ; " be-
* See these instances collected by Mr. Turner, from Hickes
and other authorities, in Hist. Ang.-Sax. iii. 90.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 87
ing," observes Mr. Macpherson, '' if the weigh contained
then, as now, 182 pounds of wool, near three-fourths of a
[Saxon] penny (equivalent to nearly twopence in modern
money) for a pound ; a price which, as far as we are
enabled to com])are it with the prices of other articles,
may be thought high."*
Of the prices of articles, however, in the Anglo-Saxon
times, with the exception of some articles of agricultural
produce, we scarcely know anything. Money being then
comparatively scarce, the prices of most commodities were
of course much lower than they now arc — that is to say,
they might be purchased for a much smaller amount of
money. But there is no uniform proportion between the
prices of that period and those of the present day, some
things being nominally dearer than they now are, as well
as many others nominally cheaper. Books, for instance,
were still scarcer than money ; and accordingly their
prices were then vastly higher than at present. It fol-
lows, that no correct estimate can be formed of the pro-
portion generally between the value of money in those
times and its value at present ; for the calculation that
might be true of some articles would not hold in regard
to others.
* Annals of Commerce, i. 288.
SS iiisTOEY or
CHAPTER III.
FROM THE ISORMAN COXQUEST TO THE DEATH OF KING
JOHX. A.D. lOGG— 1210.
The Norman Conquest, by the closer connexion M'hicli
it established between our island and the continent, must
liave laid the foundation for an ultimate extension of
English conuTierce ; but a revolution which so completely
overturned the established order of things, and produced
so much suftering to the body of the population, could
not be favourable, in the first instance, or until after the
lapse of a considerable space of time, either to the
foreign trade of the country, or to the national industry
in any of its other branches. For the first four reigns
after the Conquest, accordingly, the notices that have
come down to us on the subject of the national commerce
are still comparatively few and unimportant.
When the Normans first came over, however, they
found England a country possessed of considerable capi-
tal, or accumulated wealth, and also, as it would seem, of
a flourishing Ibreign commerce, Avhich had, no doubt,
chiefly grown up in the long and, for the greater part,
tranquil reign of the Confessor. William of Poictiers
gives a glowing account of the quantities of gold and
silver and otlier precious effects which the Conqueror
carried with him on his first visit to Normandy, and of
the admiration which these spoils excited both in the
Normans themselves and in strangers from other parts of
the continent by whom they were seen. He expressly
testifies that merchants from distant countries were at this
time wont to im])ort to Eiigland articles of foreign manu-
facture that were unknown in Normandy. He mentions
also in other passages the great Mcalth of the native or
lesident merchants both of London and Winchester.
Plxeter was another town distinguished for its opulence ;
and Ordericus Vitalis relates,, that when it was attacked
BRITISH COMMERCE. 89
by the Conqueror, in 1068, there were in the harbour a
great number of foreign merchants and mariners, who
were compelled by the citizens to assist them in their de-
fence. These notices occur incidentally in the relation
of political transactions or military events ; no chronicler
has thought it worth his while to enumerate either the
various points at which this foreign commerce was carried
on, or the articles in the exchange of which it consisted.
If our information were more complete, we should jn-o-
bably find that it was shared by various other to\^ ns be-
sides those that have been mentioned. There is reason
to believe that Hastings, Dover, Sandwich, and the other
towns on the coast nearest to France, which afterwards
came to be distinguished as the Cinque Ports, and also
Lincoln, and York, and other ])]aces in the more north-
ern parts of the kingdom, all at this time maintained some
commercial intercourse with the continent — with Italy,
and perhaps also witli Spain, as well as with France and
the north of Europe or Germany. An active trade, as
noticed in the last Chapter, also seems to have existed
between Irehmd and both Bristol and Chester on the
w est coast.
The principal exports at this early period were proba-
bly the same that for many ages after constituted the
staples of our trade with foreign countries, namely, the
natural jjroductions of the island — its tin and lead, its
wool and hides, and sometimes perhaps also its beeves,
and the other produce of the same description reared in
its pastures and forests. We find a regular trade in these
and other articles established at the most remote date to
which it is possible to carry back the history of English
commerce : and it may be safely presumed that they were
the commodities for which the island was resorted to by
foreign merchants from the earliest times. As for corn,
it was probably at this date, as it long afterwards con-
tinued to be, sometimes an article of export, sometimes
of import. The articles we have enumerated were, no
doubt, those in the production of w Inch the industry of
the great body of the people was employed. The only
manufacture for their skill in which the English were as
E 3
00 HISTORY OF
yet eminent, was the working in gold and silver ; and
William of Poictiers states that the best Gcrnjan artists
in that department found themselves encouraged to come
and take up their residence in the country. From this,
we may presume that the chief demand for their produc-
tions and those of the native artists of the same class was
among the English themselves ; but, from the high re-
pute of the English workmanship, some of the embroi-
dered stuffs, of the vases, ornamented drinking-cups, and
other similar articles fabricated here, would, no doubt,
also be sent abroad. Considerable quantities of the pre-
cious metals must have been consumed in the manufac-
ture of these articles ; and it is not unlikely that the
suj)ply was in great part obtained from Ireland, where it
is agreed on all hands that, whencesoever it may have
been obtained — whether from native mines, or from the
ancient intercourse of the island with the East, or from
the Northmen, enriched by the spoils of their piracy, who
had conquered and occupied a great part of the island in
the period immediately preceding that with which we
are now engaged — there was formerly an extraordinaiy
abundance of gold and silver, of the former especially.*
* " It appears that there were greater stores of the precious
metals in Ireland than could well be supposed. Large sums
of gold and silver were frequently given for the ransom of
men of rank taken iu battle ; and duties or rents, paid in gold
or silver, to ecclesiastical establishments, occur very often in
the Irish annals. At the consecration of a church in the
year 1157, Murha O'Lochlin, king of Ireland, gave a town,
150 cows, and 60 ounces of gold, to God and the clergy : a
chief called O'Carrol gave also 60 ounces of gold; and Tier-
nan O'Ruark's wife gave as much — donations which would
have been esteemed very great in that age in England or
npon the continent. What superstition so liberally gave,
some species of industry must have acquired ; and that was
most probably the pasturage of cattle . . . unless we will
suppose that the mines of Ireland, which, though unnoticed
by any writer, seem to have been at some time very produc-
tive, were still capable of supplying the sums collected in the
coffers of the chiefs and the clergy." — Macphersoii's Annals
of Commerce, vol. i. p. 334.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 91
"William of JNIalmesbury, it may bo observed, seems to
speak of the trade between England and Ireland as one
which the former country could dispense with without
any serious inconvenience, but u}X)n which the latter was
dependent for the necessaries of life. He tells us that
upon one occasion, when the Irish monarch, JNIurcard
(or Murtach) O'Brien, behaved somewhat haughtily
towards Henry I., he was speedily humbled by the Eng-
lish king prohibiting all trade between the two countries ;
" for how wretched," adds the historian, "would Ire-
land be if no goods were imported into it from England."
Perhaps English agricultural produce was exchanged for
Irish gold.
In the violent transference and waste of property,
however, that followed the Conquest, and the long
struggle the invaders had to sustain before they made
good their footing in the country, the wealth, and com-
merce, and general industry of England must all have
received a shock from which it was not possible that they
could rapidly recover. The minds and the hands of
men were necessarily called away from all peaceful pur-
suits, and engaged in labours which produced no wealth.
Nor was the system of government and of society that
was at last established favourable, even after its consoli-
dation and settlement, to trade and industry. It was a
system of oppression and severe exaction on the one
hand, depriving the industrious citizen of the fruits of his
exertions and of the motive to labour ; and, on the ether
hand, it was a sj-stem of which the animating principle
was the encouragement of the martial spirit, to which
that of trade and industry is as much opposed as creation
is opposed to destiniction.
Two charters were granted to the city of London by
the Conqueror, and a third by Henry I. ; but it is remark-
able^ that not even in the last-mentioned, which is of
considerable length, and confers numerous privileges, is
there anything relating to the subject of commerce, with
the exception of a clause, declaring that all the men of
London and their goods should be exempted throughout
England and also in the ports from all tolls and other
i)2 HISTORY OF
customs. Thero is no reference to the city itself as a
great mart, or to either its ship]>ing or its port. Even in
the general charter granted by Henry I., on his acces-
sion, there is not a word in relation to commerce or mer-
chants. It is stated, however, by William of Poictiers,
that the Conqueror invited foreign merchants to the
country by assurances of his protection.
The numerous shij:>s in which the Conqueror brought
over his troops — amounting, it is said, in all, to about
700 vessels of considerable size, besides moi-e than three
times that number of inferior dimensions— must have
fonned, for some time, a respectable royal navy. William
of Poictiers informs us that the first care of the duke,
after disembarking his men, was to erect defences for the
protection of his ships ; and most of them w'ere, doubt-
less, preserved, and afterwards employed in war or com-
mei'ce. It is the opinion of a late writer, that the nume-
rous fleet thus brought over by the Conqueror, "when
not engaged in ferrying himself and his armies to and
•from the continent, was probably employed in trading
Jjetvveen his old and new territories and the adjacent
coasts of France and Flanders, which were all now con-
nected with the new masters of England."* We find a
naval force occasionally cmjjloyed in the wars even of the
first English kings after the Conquest. The Saxon
Chronicle states that, when the Conqueror made his ex-
pedition against Scotland in 1072, he sent a fleet to
attack that country by sea, at the same time that he in-
vaded it in person at the head of his army. Good service
w as done for Rufus against his brother Robert by the
privateers which he permitted his English subjects to flt
out in the beginning of his reign. A fleet was also
equijjped by Henry I., to oppose the threatened invasion
of Robert, on his accession, the greater part of which,
liowevcr, deserted to the enemy. Provision, indeed, was
made by the Conqueror for the defence of the kingdom,
whene\er it shoidd become necessary, by a naval force,
by means of the regulations which he established in re-
* jNIacpherson's Annals of Commerce, i. 307.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 93
ojarJ to the Cinque Ports — orig-inally IIastinp:s, Ilythe,
lloniney, Dover, and Sandwich — each of which towns
was bound, upon forty days' notice, to furnisli and man a
certain number of ships of war, in proportion ])robably to
its estimated wealth or popuUition. Otiier towns in dif-
ferent j)arts of the coast also appear to have held of the
crown by the same kind of service.
One of the old Saxon laws revived or continued by the
Conqueror, and the only one in the collection of enact-
ments which passes under the name of his Chaiter hav-
ing any reference to trade, is the prohibition against all
purchases above a certain amount, except in the pre-
sence of witnesses. " No one shall buy," it is declared,
^' cither what is living or what is dead, to the value of four
pennies, without four witnesses, either of the borough or
of the village."
About the year 1110, Henry I. established a colony
of Flemings in the district of Ross, in Pembrokeshire.
These foreigners had come over in the reign of the Con-
queror, driven from their native country, it is said, by an
inundation of the sea, and they had been settled, in the
first instance, chiefly about Carlisle and the neighbouring
ports, and, as it would seem, with a view merely to the
service their hardihood and skill in war might be of in
the defence of the northern frontier of the kingdom. But
they were as dexterous in handling both the j)lougli and
the shuttle as the sword. Henry is saitl to have been
induced to remove them to Wales, by finding that they
and the English, with whom they were mixed, did not
agree well together. In the district of which he put
them in possession, and which he had taken from the
Welsh, they maintained their ground against all the efforts
of the hostile people by whom they were surrounded to
dislodge them, and soon came to be regarded as the force
to be mainly depended upon for keeping the Welsh in
check. By these Flemings the manufactiu-e of woollen
cloths appears to have been first introduced into this
country ; and it is supposed that they soon came to be
made for exportation as well as for home consumption.
GiraWus Cambrensis describes the foreigners as '' a people
94 HISTORY OF
excellently skilled both in the business of making: cloth
and in that of merchandize, and always ready with any
labour or danger to seek for gain by sea or land."* It is
probable that they also introduced some improvements
in agriculture ; and, altogether, the example of industry,
activity, and superior acquirements set by this interesting
colony — the last, as it has been remarked, of any con-
sequence settled in any part of the island till the coming
over of the French Protestant silk-weavers, after the re-
vocation of the edict of Nantes in 1685 — could not fail
to be of high public benefit. Their language was very
nearly the same with the English ; and the district in
which they dwelt, it seems, used to be called Little Eng-
land beyond Wales ; in fact, they made the whole county
of Pembroke, though lying at tlie further extremity of
Wales, an English county. Henry II. afterwards added
to their numbers by permitting some of those of their
countrymen who had served as mercenaries under Stephen
to settle among them. It is said that the descendants
of these Flemings may still be distinguished from their
Welsh neighbours.
The Flemings were indebted, both for the welcome
reception they met with in the first instance, and for the
permanent settlement they obtained, to their martial more
than to their commercial skill — to their being a people,
as Giraldus expresses it, equally most ready, now at the
plough— now at the sword. f The Jews, who came over
in great numbers soon after the Conquest, were a people
of altogether another stamp. Precluded by their religion
from engaging in the wars of any of the European nations
among whom they had settled, they had become mere
traders, and wei'e, indeed, men of peace in a more strict,
sense than any other class of persons in those days, the
clergy themselves not excepted. Independently, tliere-
fore, of the odium to which their faith exposed them,
* Itinerar. Camb. i. ii. Giraldus adds, that they were
admirably skilled in soothsaying, by the inspection of the
entrails of beasts !
f Nunc ad aratra, nunc ad anna, gens promptissima.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 95
their habits made them in a peculiar degree objects of
hatred and contempt to the warlike population of England
and the other countries in which they took up their resi-
dence. Yet almost wherever commerce had taken any
root, there were they to be found, pursuing perse vcringly
under obloquy, danger, and the cruellest oppression, tlieir
peculiar trade. To draw down upon them still more of
the popular suspicion and dislike in a rude and ignorant
age, that trade was not any species of industry by -s^ hich
produce of any kind was visibly created ; it did not neces-
sarily imply even the exertion of any peculiar powers or
acquirements ; it was labour neither of the hand nor of
the head. Yet it was, in truth, a trade as essential to the
creation of wealth as any labour. The Jews were the
capitalists of those times ; they were dealers in that other
element, by a combination with which alone it is that
labour itself can, in the creation of wealth, accomplish
any extraordinary results. Even in that dark and turbu-
lent age the inherent power of property was strikingly
evinced in their case, by the protection which it long
secured to them, notwithstanding all the hostility of the
popular feeling, and the disregard of them by the law
itself. It was early found necessary to support them in
their rights over their debtors ; and, while affairs went on
in their ordinary com'se, it does not appear that a Jew
ever had any greater difficulty in recovering the money
owing to him than a Christian. The law, indeed, seems
to have considered the Jews as the property of the king :
and he oppressed and plundered them to any extent that
he deemed prudent. But he did not usually allow them
to be injured by others ; and j)erhaps, indeed, they were
more secure under the royal protection than they would
have been under that of the law. Some of the kings,
William Rufus in particular, excited much popular cla-
mour by favouring them, as it was alleged, too much.
Their wealth enabled them, at different times, to purchase
charters from the crown. For one which they obtained
from King John, and which is styled a confirmation of
their charters, they are recorded to have paid four thou-
96 HISTORV OF
sand marks ; and it refers to previous charters which they
had received both from Henry I. and Henry II.*
There are traces of an intercourse having subsisted
between these islands and the East from the remotest
times. The mere derivation of the people of f^urope
from Asia most ])robably, of itself, had always ke{)t up
some connexion between the East and the West ; neither
the Gothic nor the earlier Celtic colonists of Europe
seem to have ever altogether forgotten their Oriental
origin ; the memory of it lives in the oldest traditions
alike of the Irish and of the Scandinavians. But even
within the historic period we find a succession of different
causes operating to keep up a connexion between Britain
and the East. As long as the island was under the
dominion of the Romans it was of course united by many
ties, and by habits of regular intercourse, with all the
other parts of the extended empire to which it belonged.
Afterwards, in the Saxon times, the establishment of
Christianity in the country contributed in various ways to
maintain its connexion with the East. The Greek learn-
ing, and probably also some of the Greek arts, were in-
troduced by Archbishop Theodore and other churchmen
from Asia : at a later date we find Alfred despatching a
mission to the Christians in India ; and not long after-
wards we find pilgrimage to the Holy Land becoming a
common practice. From this practice we may most pro-
})erly date the commencement of our modern trade w ith
the East ; it has ever since been a well established and
regular intercourse. The pilgrims, from the first, very
generally combined the characters of devotees and mer-
chants. Then, towards the close of the eleventh century,
commenced the crusades, which for nearly two hundred
years kept, as it were, a broad highway o])cn between
Europe and Asia, along M'hich multitudes of persons of
all sorts were continually passing and repassing.
Some curious evidences of the extent to which eastern
ccnimodities now began to find their way to the remotest
* I»fadox, Hist. Excheq., p. 174.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 97
extremities of Europe may be collected from the records
of the times. One very remarkable notice occurs in the
Registry of the Priory of St. Andrew's, in Scotland, in
which it is related that Alexander I., when bestowing a
certain endowment of land upon the church of that city,
presented at the same time an Arabian horse which he
was wont to ride, with his bridle, saddle, shield, and silver
lance, a magnificent pall or horse-cloth, and other Turk-
ish arms {arma Turdiensici) of various descriptions. He
caused the horse, arrayed in its splendid furniture, to be
led up to the high altar of the church ; and the record
adds that the Turkish armour, the shield, and the saddle
were still preserved there, and shov/n to the people, who
came from all ])arts of the country to behold them.
Alexander reigned from 1107 till 1124; and this ac-
count is written in the reign of his brother and successor,
David I.*
But the most precious gift which Europe obtained from
the East within the present period was the knowledge of
the art of rearing and managing the silk-worm. Cloth
of silk had long been known in England and other Euro-
])ean countries, to which it was brought in a manufactured
state from Greece and other parts of the East. After-
wards the Saracens introduced the art of weaving silk
into Spain. The silk-worm, however, was first brought
from Greece in 1146, by Roger, the Norman king of
Sicily, who, in an expedition w hich he led against Athens,
Thebes, and Corinth, carried oft:' a great number of silk-
weavers from these cities, and settled them in his ca])ital
of Palermo. From them the Sicilians learned both how
to weave the cloth and how to rear the worm ; and within
twenty years from this time the silk iabrics of Sicily were
celebrated over Europe. It is not till some centuries
later that we have any accounts of the establishment of
any branch of the manufacture in this country ; but from
* Extracts from the Register of St. AndreAv's, printed in
Pinkerton's Inquiry into the History of Scotland preceding
the reign of Malcolm III., i. 464. The circumstance is also
mentioned by Wynton, who is, however, a much later au-
thority-
98 HISTORY OF
about this time we find silks becoming much more abun-
dant in England as well as in the other countries of
Europe than formerly — and they must now have been
imported, ])robably from Sjmin, Sicily, and Italy, as well
as from Asia, in considerable quantities.
It so happens that rather more information has come
down to us respecting the commerce of Scotland than of
England during the first half of the twelfth century.
We have not onh'- some very interesting notices i-espcct-
ing David I,, who reigned from 11 ^-l- till 1153, from the
historian Ailred, or Aldred, who was educated in Scot-
land along with Prince Henry, David's eldest son ; but
we have also a collection of the laws and customs of the
burghs of Scotland, which ])rofesses to be as old as the
reign of the same king, and is generally admitted to be,
in the greater part, of that antiquity. Ailred celebrates
the attention of David to foreign commerce. He ex-
changed, he says, the produce of Scotland for the wealth
of other kingdoms, and made foreign merchandize
abound in his harbours. Among the laws of the burghs
attributed to him the following may be quoted as re-
ferring to trade with other countries : — By chap. 10, all
goods imported by sea are ordered not to be sold before
being landed, except salt and herrings ; by chap. 18,
foreign merchants are prohibited from buying wool, hides,
or other goods, from any but burgesses ; and by chap.
48, the lands of all persons trading to foreign countries
are exempted from seizure for any claim whatever during
their absence, unless they appeared to have withdrawn
on purpose to evade justice. From this regulation it
would aj^pear that some of the Scottish merchants already
traded themselves to foreign parts. Another of these
burgh laws prohibits all persons except burgesses from
buying wool for dyeing or making into cloth, and from
cutting cloth for sale, except the owners of sheep, who
might do with their own wool what they chose. The
manufacture of woollen cloth had, therefore, been by this
time introduced into Scotland. The art had probably
been taught to the inhabitants of that countiy by settlers
from England. William of Newburah, writing al)out
BRITISH COMMERCE. 99
twenty years after the death of David, says that the
towns and burghs of Scotland were then chiefly occupied
by English inhabitants. We know, too, that in the next
reign numbers of Flemings left England and took refuge
in Scotland. "We can trace the settlement of these
industrious citizens," says Mr. Tytler, " dui'ing the
twelfth and thirteenth centuries, in almost every part of
Scotland ; in Berwick, the great mart of our foreign
commerce ; in the various towns along the east coast ; in
St. Andrew's, Perth, Dumbarton, Ayr, Peebles, Lanark,
Edinburgh ; and in the districts of Renfrewshire, Clydes-
dale, and Annandale. There is ample evidence of their
industrious progress in Fife, in Angus, in Aberdeenshire,
and as far north as Inverness and Urquhart. It woidd
even appear, from a record of the reign of David II.,
that the Flemings had procured from the Scottish
monarchs a right to the protection and exercise of their
own laws. It has been ingeniously conjectured that
the story of Malcolm IV. having dispossessed the ancient
inhabitants of Moray, and of his planting a new colony
in their stead, may have originated in the settlement of
the Flemings in that remote and rebellious district. The
early domestic manufactures of our country, the woollen
fabrics which are mentioned by the statutes of David,
and the dyed and shorn cloths which appear in the
charter of William the Lion to the burgh of Perth, must
have been greatly improved by the superior dexterity and
knowledge of the Flemhigs ; and the constant commer-
cial intercourse which they kept up with their own little
states could not fail to be beneficial in imparting the
knowledge and improvements of the continental nations
into the remoter country where they had settled.''* A
manuscript in the Cottonian Library, the work of a con-
temporary writer, is quoted by Mr. Macpherson for the
fact, that in the reign of David I., the Frith of Forth
was frequently covered with boats manned by English,
Scottish, and Belgic fishermen, who were attracted by the
great abundance of fish (most probably hen-ings) in the
* History of Scotland, ii. 28 7.
100 HISTORY OF
neighbourhood of the island of May. Anderson speaks
of the Nctherlanders resorting to Scotland so early as
about the year 836, for the purpose of buying salted fish
of the Scotch fishermen ; * but his authority for this
statement is not known. Mr. Macpherson considers the
passage in the Cottonian Manuscript to be "the very first
authentic and positive notice of a fishery, having any
claim to consideration as a commercial object, upon the
North British coast." He also doubts if it be not " the
earliest notice of English fishermen going so far from
their own ports on a fishing voyage, if they were in-
deed subjects of England ; for in the age of the writer
here quoted the Scottish subjects on the south side of the
Frith of Forth were called English." f
The long reign and able and successful government of
Henry II. not only enabled the commerce of England
to recover from the dej^ression under which it had lan-
guished during the Avhole of the turbulent and miserable
reign of his predecessor, but eventually raised it to an
extent and importance which it had certainly never at-
tained either since the Conquest or before it, at least
since the departure of the Romans. The intercourse, in
])articular between this country and France, must inune-
diately have been ])laced upon a new footing, and no
doubt greatly augmented, both by the restoration of the
old connexion with Normandy, and still more by Henry's
acquisition thi'ough his marriage of the great Duchy of
Aquitaine, which gave the English crown the dominion
of all the P'rench coast from Picardy to the Pyrenees.
Some years afterwards the conquest of Ireland, and the
establishment in that island of a numerous English popu-
lation, must have also considerably extended the range, or
at least added to the activity, of English commerce in
that other direction.
In several contemi)orary writers we find notices of tlie
conmierce of London, and also of other English cities, in
this reign. Henry II., in a charter which is without
date, but which was ])robably granted soon after he came
* Origin of Commerce, i. 77. (Edit, of 17S7.)
■j;^ Annals of Commerce, i. 325.
BRITISH COMMERCK. 101
to the throne, confirmed to the citizens of London all the
privileges uhich they enjoyed under his grandfather,
\vith some others in addition, none of which, however,
have any particular reference to the commerce of the
city. The fullest and most curious account we have of
London at this period is that given in the introduction
to a Latin life of Becket by a monk of Canterbury, of
Norman descent, named William Fitz-Stephen, or Ste-
phanides, as he calls himself in Latin, which appears to
have been written about 1174. He says that no city in
the world sent out its wealth and merchandize to so
great a distance ; but he has not recorded either the de-
scriptions of goods that were thus exported or the coun-
tries to which they were sent. Among the articles,
however, which were then brought to London by foreign
merchants, he enumerates gold, spices, and frankincense,
from Arabia ; precious stones from Egyj)t ; purple cloths
from India ; palm-oil from Bagdad ; furs and ermines
i'rom Norway and Russia ; arms from Scythia ; and wines
from France. The citizens he describes as distinguished
above all others in England for the elegance of their
manners and dress, and the magnificence of their tables.
It was in this reign, it may be observed, that London
first became decidedly, what Fitz-Stephen calls it, the
caj)ital of the kingdom of England (regni Angloium
sedes), Winchester, the ancient royal seat of the West
Saxons, although it was the place where the early Norman
kings kept their treasury, had begun to decline even be-
fore the Conquest, and had sustained such calamities in
tlie civil wars of the time of Stephen that it was never
afterwards in a condition to dispute the ascendancy of its
rival on the Thames. At this time, according to Fitz-
Stephen, and his account is confirmed by Peter of Blois,
writing a few years earlier, there were, in the city and
suburbs, thirteen large conventual churches and 126 pa-
rochial ones. Peter of Blois says, in an epistle to Pope
Innocent II., that the population was only 40,000; but
this is not absolutely inconsistent with the statement of
Fitz-Stephen, that in the reign of Stephen there issued
from the city, of fighting men, no fewer than 60,000 foot
102 HISTORY or
and 20,000 horse, since the army assembled in the city,
or raised under the orders of" its authorities, might very
possibly greatly exceed the number of the actual inha-
bitants. It is most probable, however, that there is an
error in the numbers found in Fitz-Stephen's text as it
has come down to us. He adds, that the dealers in the
various sorts of commodities, and the labourers and arti-
zans of every kind, were to be found every day stationed
in their several distinct places throughout the city, and
that a market was held every Friday in Smithfield for the
sale of horses, cows, hogs, &c. At this time Ludgate,
now far within Temple Bar, was the west end of London ;
the space from thence to Westminster was a tract of
fields and gardens : Moorfields was a large lake of water,
into which ran several streams turning mills ; the rising
grounds towards Pentonville and Islington were co\ ered
with corn and grass ; and a large district of country be-
yond was a forest, that had probably stood since the
creation, in which the citizens hunted wild-boars and
other game. According to Fitz-Stephen, the citizens of
London were distinguished from those of other towns by
the api^ellation of barons ; and Malmesbury, an author of
the same age, also tells us that, from their superior opu-
lence and the greatness of the city, they were considered
as ranking with tlie chief people or nobility of the king-
dom, " It is filled," he adds, " with merchandize brought
by the merchants of all countries, but chiefly those of
Germany ; and, in case of scarcity of corn in other parts
of England, it is a granary where the article may be
bought cheaper than anywhere else." It was in London
that the Jews chiefly resided, and many of them were no
doubt among its wealthiest citizens.
The following are some of the most remarkable parti-
culars that are to be collected from contemporary autho-
rities respecting other English cities at this jjeriod.
Exeter, according to Malmesbury, was a magnificent city,
filled with opulent citizens. Henry of Huntingdon states,
that, in consequence of its being the principal port for the
mineral productions of the adjacent country, it was so
much resorted to by foreign merchants that everything
BRITISH COMMERCE. 103
that could be desired might be purchased there in abun-
dance. Bristol is mentioned by Malmesbury as having- a
great trade, not only with Ireland, but also with Norway
and other foreign countiies. Both Gloucester and Win-
chester are celebrated tor the excellence of their wines
made from the grapes of the country. For foreign wines,
again, Chester would appear to have been one of the
chief ports, if we may trust the testimony of a monk of
that city named Lucian, whom Camden quotes. Accord-
ing to this authority, ships rej)aired to Chester in great
numbers, not only from Ireland, but also from Gascony,
Spain, and Germany, and supplied the inhabitants with
all sorts of commodities ; " so that," adds Lucian, " being
comforted by the favour of God in all things, we drink
wine very plentifully ; for those countries have abundance
of vineyards." Dunwich, on the coast of Sutiblk, now
reduced by the encroachments of the sea to an insignifi-
cant village, is described by William of Newburgh as a
i'amous sea-port town, stored with various kinds of riches ;
and in the reign of John this town is stated to have ]jaid
twice as much rent to the king as any other upon the
neighbouring coast. Norwich is described in general terms
by Malmesbury as famous for its commerce and the num-
bers of its population. Lynn is described by Newburgh
as a city distinguished for commerce and abundance, the
residence of many wealthy Jews, and resorted to by
foreign vessels. Lincoln, Malmesbury speaks of as having
become one of the most populous seats of home and
foreign trade in England, principally in consequence of a
canal of about seven miles in length, made by Henry I.,
from the Trent to the Witham, which enabled foreign
vessels to come up to the city. Grimsby is noted by the
Norwegian or Icelandic writers as an emporium resorted
to by merchants from Norway, Scotland, Orkney, and
the Western Islands York is mentioned by Malmesbury
as resorted to by vessels both from Germany and Ireland,
though surely it lay very much out of the way of any
trad.e with the latter country. Whitby, Hartlepool, and
some other towns on the same part of the eiist coast, ap-
pear to have possessed shipping. Berwick, as already
104 HISTORY or
noticed, was the most eminent of" the Scottish towns for
foreign commerce. It had many ships. Perth, however,
was at this time, properly speaking, the capital of Scot-
land ; and Alexander Neckham, abbot of Cirencester, a
-Latin poet of this age, says that the whole kingdom was
supported by the wealth of that city. Inverleith (now
Leith), Striveling (now Stirling), and Aberdeen, are also
mentioned in charters as places at which there was some
shipping and trade, and where customs were collected.*
Glasgow was as j^et a mere village ; it was made a burgh,
subject to the bishop, by William the Lion, in 1175 ; but
in the charter there is no mention of a guild, of any mer-
cantile privilege, or of any trade whatever, except the
liberty of having a weekly market. Edinburgh, though
it was probably made a burgh by David T., was of little
note till the middle of the fifteenth century. In Ireland,
Dublin, which Henry II. granted by a charter in 1172
to be inhabited by his men of Bi-istol, is spoken of by
Newburgh as a noble city, which, it is added, somewhat
hyperbolically, might be considered as almost the rival
of London for its o])ulence and commerce.
There are two laws of Henry II. relating to commerce,
that deserve to be mentioned. Henry I. had so far miti-
gated the old law or custom, which made all wrecks the
property of the crown, as to have enacted, that, if any
human being escaped alive out of the ship, it should be
no wreck ; and his grandson still farther extended the
operation of the humane principle thus introduced, by
decreeing, that, if either man or beast should be found
alive in any vessel wrecked upon the coasts of England,
Poictou, Gascony, or the isle of Oleron, the property
should be preserved for the owners, if claimed within
three months. The other law is the last clause of the
statute called the Assize of Arms, published in 1181 : it
very emphatically commands the Justices in Eyre, in their
progress through the counties, to enjoin upon all the
* See these and other facts collected, and the authorities
cited, by the laborious and accurate INIacphersou, Ann. of
Com. i. 330—333.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 105
lieges, as they love themselves and their property, neither
to buy nor sell any ship for the purpose of its being- car-
ried out of England, and that no person should convey,
or cause to be conveyed away, any mariner out of England.
It has been inferred, from these regulations, that both
English ships and English seamen were already held to
be superior to those of other countries ; but they can only
be considered as showing that the naval force of the
kingdom had now come to be looked upon as an important
arm of its strength, and was the object of a watchful and
jealous superintendence.
The only articles that are mentioned as imported into
England from foreign countries in this period, are the
spiceries, jewels, silks, furs, and other luxuries enume-
rated by Fitz-Stephen, of which there could not be any
very extensive consumption ; some woad for dyeing, and
occasionally corn, which was at other times an article of
export. The exports, on the other hand, appear to have
been of much greater importance and value. Henry of
Huntingdon enumerates, as being annually sent to Ger-
many by the Rhine, great cargoes of flesh and of different
kinds of fish (especially herrings and oysters), of milk,
and, above all, of what he calls " most precious wool."
He also mentions mines of copper, iron, tin, and lead as
abundant ; and it appears from other authorities that
there was a large exportation both of lead and tin. The
roofs of the principal churches, palaces, and castles, in all
parts of Europe, are said to ha\e been covered with Eng-
lish lead ; and the exports of tin from mines belonging to
the crown in Cornwall and Devonshire furnished at this
time and for ages afterwards a considerable portion of the
royal revenue. It is probable also that hides and skins
and woollen cloths were exported, as well as wool. Ail
this could not be paid for by the few articles of luxury
above enumerated ; and it may therefore be concluded
that a large part of the annual returns derived by the
country at this time from its foreign trade was received in
the form of money or bullion. This supposition is icon-
firmed by the account of Huntingdon, who expressly
informs us that the Germans paid for the wool and pro-
voL. 1. r
106 IIISTOEY OF
visions they bought in silver ; on which account, he adds,
that metal is e\en more plentiful in England than in
Germany, and all the money of England is made of pure
silver. The balance of trade, then, was what is commonly
called in favour of England, unreasonably enough, as if
nothing were wealth but gold and silver. The country
at this time did not really become richer by exchanging
its produce for money, than it would have done by taking
foreign produce or manufactures in exchange for it. Nor,
even if we should hold money to be the only true wealth,
could it have accumulated in the country Avith more ra-
pidity or to a greater amount under the one system than
under the other ; for a country in a given social condition
can only retain a certain quantity of money in circulation
within it, and that quantity it always will obtain, if it is
able to obtain anything else of equivalent value. Money
is necessary, and profitable to a certain extent, just as
shoes or hats are ; but beyond that extent, neither they
nor it are either profitable or necessary — that is to say,
something else for which the article could be exchanged
would be more useful. The money anciently obtained
by England through its foreign trade did not enrich the
country, or even remain in it ; so much of it as was not
required for the purposes of circulation was as sure to find
its way abroad again, as the stone thrown up into the air
is to return to the ground.
If the commerce of England had not struck far deeper
root, and grown to far greater magnitude and strength, at
the time of the death of Henry II. than at that of Henry
I., somewhat more than half a century before, the reign
of Richard would have been, in proportion to its length,
nearly as ruinous to it as was the disorderly and distracted
reign of Stephen. All the activity and resources of the
country were now turned from trade and industry to the
wasteful work of war, which was carried on, indeed, in a
foreign and distant land, and therefore did not produce
the confusion and desolation within the kingdom that
would have resulted from a civil contest ; but, on the
other hand, was, doubtless, on that account attended with
a much larger expenditure both of money and of human
BKITISII COMMERCK. 107
life. Yet even from Richard's warlike preparations, and
the pecuniary burdens which his expedition in other ways
brought upon his people, we may collect a few notices of
interest in regard to the progress of the commerce, navi-
gation, and wealth of the country. The fleet which
earned out his troops to the Holy Land was probably by
far the most magnificent that had ever as yet left the
English shores, although some of those of former times
may have consisted of a gi'cater number of vessels. But
the barks, amounting, it is said, to some thousands, in
which the Conqueror brought over his army from Nor-
mandy, and the four hundred vessels in which Henry II.
embarked his forces for the conquest of Ireland, not to
speak of the more ancient navies of Edgar and Ethclred in
the Saxon times, must have been craft of the smallest size,
or what would now be merely called boats. Besides a crowd
of vessels of this description — the number of which is not
given — Richard's fleet, when it assembled in the harl)our
of Messina, is said to have consisletl of thirteen large
vessels, called busses or dromons, fifty -three armed galleys,
and a hundred carricks or transports. All these vessels
were constructed both to row and to sail, the dromons
having three sails, probably each on a separate mast, and
both they and the galleys having, as it would appear, in
general two tiers or banks of oars. " Modern vessels,"
says Yinisauf, " have greatly fallen off from the magnifi-
cence of ancient times, when the galleys carried three,
four, five, and even six tiers of oars, whereas noM' they
rarely exceed two tiers. The galleys anciently called
liburncB are long, slender, and low, with a beam of wood
fortified with iron, couunonly called a spur, projecting
from the head, for piercing the sides of the enemy.
There are also small galleys called galeons, which, being
shorter and lighter, steer better, and arc fitter for throw-
ing fire."* T!ie fire here alluded to is the famous Greek
fire, the great instrument of destruction at this time, both
in encounters at sea, and in assaults upon fortified places
on shore. This expedition of Richard was the first in
♦ Translation in Macpherson, Ann. of Com. i. 352.
108 mSTOKY OF
which an English fleet had accomplished so long and va-
rious a navigation ; and, under the conduct of so energetic
a commander, it could not fail to give an impulse to the
naval progress of the country, and to raise both the mili-
tarj" skill and the seamanship of English sailors.
The kingdom had not yet recovered from the exhaust-
ing exertions it had made in fitting out this great fleet
and army, when it was called upon to raise what was in
those days an immense sum for the king's ransom. The
agreement was, that before Richard's liberation, his
jailor, the emperor, should be paid 100,000 marks of
silver, besides 50,000 more afterwards — an amount of
money then deemed so great, that a contemporary foreign
chronicler. Otto de St. Bias, declines mentioning it, as
he could not, he says, expect to be believed. It does
not clearly appear how much of the 150,000 marks was
paid in all ; but it is stated that 70,000 marks of silver,
equal in weight to nearly 100,000/. of our money, were
remitted to Germany before the king was set free. This
money was only raised by the most severe and grievous
exactions. It was not all obtained till three successive
collections had been made. Four years before this, it
may be noted, in the beginning of Richard's reign, the
much poorer kingdom of Scotland had repurchased its
independence at the cost of 10,000 marks.
A few laws for the regulation of trade are recorded to
have been enacted by Richard after his return home. The
same year in which he returned, a prohibition was issued
against the exportation of corn, " that England," as it
was expressed, "might not suffer from the want of its
own abundance." The violation of this law is stated to
have been punished in one instance with merciless seve-
rity : some vessels having been seized in the port of St.
Valery, laden with English corn for the King of France,
Richard burned both the vessels and the town (which be-
longed to that king), hanged the seamen, and also put to
death some monks who had been concerned in the illegal
transaction. He then, after all this wild devastation,
divided the corn among the {)oor. In 1197, also, a law
was passed for establishing a uniformity of weights and
BRITISH COMMERCE. 109
measures, and for regulating the dyeing and sale of wool-
len cloths. The business of dyeing, except in black, it
was enacted, should only be carried on in cities and bo-
roughs, in which alone also any dyeing stuffs, except
black, were allowed to be sold. It appears that the duties
upon woad imjiorted into London in 1195 and 1196
amounted to 96/. 6s. Sd. " If London alone," observes
Macpherson, "imported woad to an extent that could
bear such a payment (and it will afterwards appear that
but a small part of the whole woad imported arrived in
London), the woollen manufacture, to which it was ap-
parently mostly confined, must have been somewhat con-
siderable. But there is reason to believe that but few
Jjne woollen goods were made in England, and that the
Flemings, who were famous at this time for their superior
skill in the woollen manufactiu'c, as is evident from the
testimony of several of the English historians of this age,
continued for a series of ages to supply most of the western
parts of Europe, and even some of the Mediterranean
countries, with fine cloths, which the Italians called
French cloths, either as reckoning Flanders a part of
France (as, indeed, in feudal language it was), or be-
cause they received them from the ports of the south
coast of that country." Much of the wool used in Flan-
ders, however, appears to have been obtained from Eng-
land. In the history, indeed, which bears the name of
JMatthew of Westminster, it is said that all the nations of
the world used at this time to be kept warm by the wool
of England, which was made into cloth by the Flemish
jnanufacturers. In the patent of incorporation of the
guild of weavers in London by Henry II., granted in the
thirty-first year of his reign, there is a prohibition against
mixing Spanish with English wool in the making of
cloth, from which it may be inferred that the wool of
England was in this age of superior quality to that ob-
tained from Spain.
From the commencement of his reign, John appears to
have affected to favour the interests of the part of the
community connected with trade, now daily rising into
more importance, and to have courted their support
110 HISTORY OF
against the power of the nobility and the clergy. Im-
mediately after his accession, he granted three charters
to the citizens of London ; the first generally confirming
all their ancient rights and privileges ; the second em-
powering them to remove all kidells, or wears for catch-
ing fish, from the rivers Thames and Medway, the
navigation of which had been much impeded by these
erections, set up by the keeper of the Tower and others ;
and the third confirming to them the fee-farm of the
sheriffwicks of London and Middlesex at the ancient rent,
and also giving to them the election of the sheriffs. For
these charters he received 3000/. He also, probably at
the same time, addressed letters to the most important
commercial towns throughout the kingdom, promising
that foreign merchants of every country should have safe
conduct for themselves and their merchandize in coming
into and going out of England, agreeably to the due
right and usual customs, and should meet with the same
treatment in England that the English merchants met
with in their countries.* The places to which these
letters were sent were the towns of London, Winchester,
Southampton, Lynn, the Cinque Ports, and the counties
of Sussex, Kent, Norfolk, Suffolk, Dorset, Somerset,
Hants, Hertford, Essex, Devon, and Cornwall ; *' whence
it appears," observes Macpherson, " that the south coast,
and the east coast only as far as Norfolk, were esteemed
the whole, or at least the chief, of the commercial part of
the country." It is certain, however, that several towns
beyond these limits had already risen to considerable com-
mercial importance. In a list of towns which in tlie year
1205 paid the tax called the quinzieme, or fifteenth,
wliich appears to have been a species of excise or tallage
exacted from merchants, we find enumerated the follow-
ing places in the northern part of the kingdom : — New-
castle in Northumberland ; Yarum, Cotham, Whitby,
Scarborough, Hcadon, Hull, York, and Selby, in York-
shire ; and Lincoln, Barton, Ymmingham, Grimsby, and
* Maitland's Hist, of London, i. 73 — 75. Hakluyt's
Voyages, i. 129.
BRITISH COMMERCK. ] 1 1
Boston, in Lincolnshire. The other towns in the list are
Lynn, Yarmouth, and Norwich, in Norfolk; Dunvvich,
Orford, and Ipswich, in Suflblk ; Colchester in Essex ;
Sandwich and Dover in Kent ; Rye, Winchelsea, Peven-
sey, Seaford, and Shoreham, in Sussex ; Southampton in
Hampshire ; Exmouth and Dartmouth in Devonshire ;
Esse (now Saltash) and Fowey, in Cornwall ; and
London. It will be observed, however, that these
are all coast towns, or places having a river com-
munication with the sea ; and it surely cannot be sup-
posed that there were not at this time some trading
towns in the interior of the country. Either the quin-
zieme was not a duty payable, as has been asserted, by
" all persons who made a business of buying and selling,
however trifling their dealings might be,"* or this is not
a complete list of the places from which it was collected.
Besides, not a single place on the western coast of the
kingdom is mentioned, not even Bristol or Chester. We
should be disposed to conjecture that the quinzieme was
only an impost upon foreign commerce, and even perhaps
only upon some particular branch or branches of that.
This supposition would make somewhat more intelligible
the proportions of the whole amount collected which are
set down as received from particular towns. It appears
that the whole tax at this time yielded about 5000/. per
annum; while of this total Lynn paid 651/., Southamp-
ton 712/., Boston 780/,, and London only 836/. It can-
not for a moment be believed that in their general mer-
cantile wealth London and Boston stood in this relation
to each other. To add to the perplexity, we find that
three years after this time the merchants of London pur-
chased from the king an entire exemption from paying
the quinzieme for the small sum of 200 marks, that is to
say, for less than a sixth part of the amount of the tax for
one year. We must, in these circumstances, suppose the
exemption to have been accorded as a mark of royal favour
to the city, and the 200 marks to have been paid merely as
an acknowledgment. Newcastle is the only other town
* Macpherson, Ann. of Com. i. 371;
112 HISTOSY OF
the amount paid by which is mentioned ; it is set down
as paying 158/., and must therefore have already grown
to considerable consequence, although only founded little
more than a century before this time. Hull also appears
for the first time as a place of trade only in the close of
the last reign.
That several of the Scotch burghs were at this period
possessed of very considerable opulence is testified by
their having, in 1209, contributed 6000 marks of the
15,000 wdiich William the Lion bound himself to pay to
John by the treaty of Berwick. In this age Mr. Mac-
pherson calculates that 6000 marks would have purchased
in Scotland about 240,000 bolls of oats, or 60,000 bolls
of wheat. Among other countj-ies, a trade with Norway
appears to have been carried on by the Scotch in the be-
ginning of the thirteenth century. Among the articles
which are mentioned in the monastic chartularies of the
country as paying tithe at this time are wool, corn, butter,
cheese, cattle, fish, and flax. From the occurrence of
the last article it may be inferred that some linen was
already made in Scotland.
It was in the reign of John that their first great naval
victory was gained by the English, at the battle of Damme,
or of the Sluys, as it is sometimes called, fought in 1213.
As yet, however, the country possessed nothing that
could properly be called a navy. The royal navy usually
consisted merely of merchant-ships collected from all the
ports of the kingdom, each of which, as we have seen, was
bound, w'hen required by the king, to furnish him with a
certain number. In pressing emergencies, indeed, the
king seized upon the whole mercantile shipping of the
kingdom, or as much of it as he required ; "so that in
those times," as the historian of commerce observes, " the
owners could never call their vessels their own." " A
striking illustration," it is added, " of the king's claim of
right to the services of all merchant-ships appears in a let-
ter written by Edward II. to the king of Norway, upon
the detention of three English vessels, which he concludes
by saying, that he cannot quietly put up with the vessels
belonging to his kingdom, ivhich ought at all times to be
BRITISH COMMliKCE. 113
ready for his service, being detained in foreign coun-
tries."* John appears to have possessed merely a few
galleys of his own.
In this reign we find the earliest mention of what may
be called letters of credit, the first form, it may be sup-
posed, of bills of exchange, the introduction and general
employment of which very soon followed. In a docu-
ment printed in the Foedera, John, under date of 25th
August, 1199, at Rouen, engages to repay in four instal-
ments, in the course of two years, a sum of 2125 marks,
which had been advanced by a company of merchants of
Placentia to the bishops of Anjou and Bangor on the
faith of the letters of Xing Richard. Afterwards John
himself repeatedly raised money by such letters, addressed
to all merchants, whereby he bound himself to repay the
sums advanced to his agents to the amount named, at such
time as should be agreed upon, to any person presenting
his letter, together with the acknowledgment of his
agents for the sum received by them. Mr. Macpherson
is of opinion that, as there is no mention of interest in
any of those letters, it must have been discounted when
the money was advanced. It is remarkable that, although
at this time, in England, no Christian was permitted by
law to take interest, or usury as it was called, even at the
lowest rate, upon money lent, the Jews in this respect
lay under no restriction whatever. The interest which
they actually received, accordingly, was sometimes enor-
mous. In the large profits, however, which they thus
made the crown largely shared, by the power of arbitra-
rily fining them, which it constantly exercised. William
of Newburgh frankly speaks of them as well known to be
the royal usurers ; in other words, their usury was a mode
of suction, by which an additional portion of the property
of the subject was drawn into the royal treasury : and this
sufficiently accounts for the manner in which they were
tolerated and protected in the monopoly of the trade of
money-lending.
Very few direct notices of the state of trade in this
* Macpherson's Ann. of Com. i. 379.
r 3
114 HISTORY OF
reign have come down to us. Licences are recorded to
have been granted to the merchants of various ibreig-n
countries to bring their goods to England, on due pay-
ment of the quinzieme, which would thus appear to have
been a customs duty, payable probably both on the import
and export of commodities. The Flemings were the chief
foreign traders that resorted to the country, and next to
them, apparently, the French. In 1213 the duties paid
on woad imported from foreign countries amounted to
nearly 600/. ; of which the ports in Yorkshire paid 98/. ;
those in Lincoln, 47/. ; those in Norfolk and Suffolk, 53/. ;
those in Essex, 41. ; those in Kent and Sussex (exclusive
of Dover), 103/. ; Southampton, 72/. ; and other places,
not named, 214/. The woad, it may be presumed, was
almost wholly used in dyeing cloths ; but much cloth
would also be both exported and worn at home without
being dyed.
The freedom of commerce was sought to be secured by
one of the clauses of the Great Charter (the forty-first),
which declared that all merchants should have safety and
security in going out of, and coming into England, and
also in staying and travelling in the kingdom, whether by
land or by water, without any grievous impositions, and
according to the old and upright customs, except in time
of war, when, if any merchants belonging to the hostile
country should be found in the land, they should, at the
commencement of the war, be attached, without injury of
their persons or property, until it should be known how
the English merchants who hapjjened to be in the hostile
country were treated there; if they were uninjured, the
foreign merchants should be equally safe in England.
This was as reasonable and even liberal a regulation as
could have been desired on the subject. By other
clauses, it was dt^clarcd, that the debts of a minor should
bear no interest during his minority, even if they should
be owing to a Jew ; that London and other cities and
towns should enjoy their ancient privileges ; that no fine
should be imposccl upon a merchant to the destruction of
his merchandize ; and that there should be a uniformity
of weights and measures throughout the kingdom.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 1 1 5
The only coined money of this period, as far as is cer-
tainly known, was the silver penny, which, as at present,
was the twelfth part of a shilling ; the shilling being also,
as it has ever since been, the twentieth part of a pound.
The pound, however, was still a full pound of silver, ac-
cording to the ancient Saxon or German standard of
eleven ounces and a quarter troy, or 5400 grains to the
pound. The same amount of silver is now coined, as
explained in the preceding chapter, into 2/. I6s. Scl. ster-
ling ; and that, therefore, was the amount of money of
the present denominations in the early Norman pound.
The shilling, consequently, being the twentieth ])art of
this, was equivalent to 2^. 9|r/. of our present money ;
and the penny, being the twelfth part of the shilling, or
the 240th part of the pound, was still of the same value
as in the Saxon times, and contained an amount of silver
equal to a trifle more than what might be purchased by
2ld. of our money. But both the pound and the shilling
were only money of account ; there were no coins of
these denominations. It is doubtful, also, if there were
any coins of inferior value to the silver penny ; no speci-
mens of any such have been discovered. Both halfpence
and farthings, however, are mentioned in the writings
of the time ; and a coinage of round halfpennies by
Henry I. is expressly recorded by Florence of Wor-
cester, Simeon of Durham, and Hoveden. It has been
supposed that the people before, and also perhaps after
this, used to make halfpence and farthings for themselves,
by breaking the penny into halves and quarters, which,
it has been said, they were more easily enabled to do
from the coin having on one side of it a cross very deeply
indented. Leake, however, has remarked that " the
story of the cross being made double, or so deeply im-
pressed, for the conveniency of breaking the penny into
halves and quarters, is disproved by the coins now extant,
whereon the crosses generally terminate at the inner
circle, and, instead of being impressed, are embossed,
which prevents their being broken equally."* It is most
' * Historical Account of English Money (2nd edit.), p. 38.
116 HISTORY OF
probable, perhaps, that both halfpence and farthings
were actually coined, though none have come down
to us.
Other denominations of money, however, than the
alcove are also mentioned. In the early part of the
period, and especially in the reign of the Conqueror, the
Saxon mode of reckoning appears to have remained in
general use. " In his laws," sa.ys Ruding, " the fines
are regulated by pounds, oras, marks, shillings, and pence.
The shillings are sometimes expressly stated to be En-
glish shillings of four pennies each. But in Domesday
Book various other coins or denominations of money are
to be found, such as the mite, farthing, halfpenny, mark
of gold and silver, ounce of gold, and marsum. There
seems also to have been current a coin of the value of half
a farthing, which was probably the same as the mite
above mentioned." The values of the Saxon coins here
enumerated have been stated in the last chapter. The
mark, it may be added, long remained a common deno-
mination, and was at all times reckoned two-thirds of the
pound. Some foreign coins, especially byzantines, which
were of gold, are also supposed to have been still in use,
as in the Saxon times.
The coins of the earlier Norman kings are of great
rarity. Those issued by the Conqueror " were made,"
Ruding thinks, " to resemble those of Harold in weight
and fineness, and some of them in typo," in conformity
with the policy upon wliich William at first acted, of
affecting to be the regular successor of the Saxon kings.
The coins of the two Williams can scarcely be distin-
guished, the numerals being for the most part absent.
The 'Same is the case with those of the two Henrys.
Royal mints were still established in all the principal
tov.'us ; and the name of the place where it was struck
continues to be conunonly found on the coin. In the
lawless times of Stephen all the bishops and greater
barons are said to have very generally coined and issued
money of their own ; every castle had its mint ; and the
money thus thrown into circulation is alleged to have
been so debased that, in ten shillings, not the value of
BRITISH COMMEHCE. 117
one in silver was to be found. Stephen himself is also
charged with having, in his necessities, resorted to the
expedient of diminishing the weight of the penny. When
Henry II. came to the throne, however, he put down all
this base money ; and none of the baronial coins of Ste-
phen's reign are now known to exist, with the exception
of a few bearing the names of his son Eustace, and of his
brother, the Bishop of Winchester, which were probably
issued by the royal licence.
Henry I., on his accession, abolished the tax of mo-
neyage, which had been introduced either by the Con-
queror or his son Rufus ; and he afterwards^ effected a
reform of the coinage, which had been greatly corrupted
by the frauds of the moneyers. Henry II. also called in
all the old coins in circulation in the year 1180. No
coins are known to be in existence either of Richard I.
or John, as kings of England, although there are some of
the former as Earl of Poictou and as Duke of Aquitaine,
and of the latter as lord of Ireland.
An English penny of Richard's is given in various
collections of plates of coins, but is admitted to be a for-
gery. Mr. Ruding, speaking of it and another of John,
says — " These two pennies are now well known to be
the fabrication of a late dealer in coins, who pretended to
have discovered them amongst some which were found
upon Bramham Moor in Yorkshire. He sold one of them
for thirty guineas ; the other remained in his possession,
and was disposed of with the rest of his collection, after
his death." The man's name was White.*
The earliest Scotch coins that have been discovered arc
some of Alexander I., who began his reign in 1107.
The Scotch money appears to have, at this period,
entirely corresponded with the English ; and, indeed, the
circulation of Scotland probably consisted in great part of
English coins.
In regard to the real or efficient value of the money of
those days, as compai-ed with that of our present money,
* See Ruding's Ann. of the Coinage, ii. 35 and 50, and v.
98 aud 262.
118 HISTORY OF
it is, as we have already had occasion to remark, impos-
sible to make any statement which shall be universally
applicable. The question of the value of money at any
given period is merely a question of the price of a par-
ticular commodity — namely, the metal of which the
money is made. But we have no means of estimating-
with precision the price of any commodity whatever, in
the scientific sense of that term. All that we can do is
to state it relatively to the price of some other com-
modity. This is all that we really do when we state the
money-price of anything. That is only a statement of
the relation between the price of the article in question
and the price of the other article called money. It is no
expression either of the general price of either, or of the
relation of the price of either to that of any other article
whatever. Commodities of all kinds, from causes suffi-
ciently obvious, are constantly changing their relative
positions in regard to price ; and, thei'efore, the relation
between the prices of any two of them can be no perma-
nent index of the relation between the prices of any two
others. In other Mords, the money -price of any one
article at a particular time will give us no certain inform-
ation as to the money-price cither of all other articles, or
of any other article.
Although, indeed, no precise estimate can be arrived
at of the general value of money in former times as com-
pared with its present value, many important conclusions
in regard to the state of society, and the command pos-
sessed by the several classes of the population over the
necessaries and comforts of life, may be drawn from the
notices that have been preserved of the money-prices of
commodities and labour at different periods. But the
only point which ])roperly belongs to our present subject
is that of the relative values of gold and silver in the
period we have been reviewing. The relation between
the values of these two metals has fluctuated considerably
in different ages. In ancient Rome, about the com-
mencement of our era, it seems to have been usually as
one to ten. About the fourth century, however, silver
had become so much more plentiful, or gold so much
BRITISH. COMMERCE. 119
scarcer, that fourteen pounds eight ounces of the former
were exchanged for a pound of the latter. In England,
in Ihe Saxon times, the legal proportion appears to have
been as one to twelve. After the Conquest, liowever,
gold became cheaper ; and, about the middle of the
twelfth century, one pound of it was exchanged for nine
pounds of silver. In the beginning of the thirteenth
century we find the value of silver rated to that of gold
in the proportion of ten to one. At present the propor-
tion is about as fourteen to one.
120 HISTORY or
CHAPTER IV.
FROM THE ACCESSION OF HENRY III. TO THE END OF THE
REIGN OF RICHARD II. A.D. 1216 — 1399.
The history of English commerce during the thirteenth
and fourteenth centuries is in great part the record of a
course of legislative attempts to resist or annul the laws
of nature, such as probably never was outdone in any
other country. A full detail would serve no useful pur-
pose ; but a few samples will be found both curious and
instructive.
A term which makes a great figure in the commercial
regulations of this period is that of the Staple. The
word, in its primary acceptation, appears to have meant
a particular port or other place to which certain com-
modities were obliged to be brought to be weighed or
measured for the payment of the customs, before they
could be sold, or in some cases exported or imported.
Here the king's staple was said to be established. The
articles of English produce upon which customs were an-
ciently paid were wool, sheep-skins (or woolfels), and
leather; and these were accordingly denominated the
staples or staple goods of the kingdom. The persons
who exported these goods were called the Merchants of
the Staple : they were incorporated, or at least recog-
nized as forming a society with certain privileges, in the
reign of Edward II,, if not earlier. Ilakluyt has printed
a charter granted by Edward II., the 20th of May, 1313,
to the mayor and council of the merchants of the staple,
in which he ordains that all merchants, whether natives
or foreigners, buying wool and woolfels in his dominions
for exportation, should, instead of carrying them for sale,
as they had been wont to do, to several places in Bra-
bant, Flanders, and Artois, carry them in future only to
one certain staple in one of those countries, to be ap-
pointed by the said mayor and council. It a])pears that,
BRITISH COMaiERCE. 121
upon this, Antwerp was made the staple. But, although
the power of naming the place, and also of changing it,
was thus conferred upon the society, this part of the
charter seems to have been very soon disregarded. In
subsequent times the interferences of the king and the
legislature with regard to the staple were incessant. In
1326 it was, by the royal order, removed altogether from
the continent, and fixed at certain places within the
kingdom. Cardiff, in Wales, a town belonging to Hugh
Despenser, is the only one of these new English staples
the name of which has been preserved. It may be noted,
also, that tin is now mentioned as one of the staple com-
modities. In 1328 (by the statute 2 Edw. III. c. 9) it
was enacted, " that the staples beyond the sea and on
this side, ordained by kings in times past, and the pains
thereupon provided, shall cease, and that all merchant
strangers and privy (that is, foreigners and natives) may
go and come with their merchandizes into England , after
the tenor of the Great Charter." In 1332, however, we
find the king ordaining, in the face of this act, that
staples should be held in various places within the king-
dom. Acts of parliament, indeed, on all kinds of sub-
jects were as yet accustomed to be regarded by all degrees
of people as little more than a sort of moral declarations
or preachments on the part of the legislature — expres-
sions of its sentiments — but scarcely as laws which were
compulsory like the older laws of the kingdom. Most
of them were habitually broken, until they had been
repeated over and over again ; and this repetition, rather
than the exaction of the penalty, appears to have been
the recognized mode of enforcing or establishing the law.
In many cases, indeed, such a way of viewing the statute
was justified by the principle on which it was evidently
passed ; it was often manifestly, if not avowedly, intended
by its authors themselves as only a tentative or experi-
mental enactment, the ultimate enforcement of which
was to depend upon the manner in which it was found to
work. The act of parliament was frequently entitled,
not a statute, but an ordinance ; and in that case it seems
to have been merely proposed as an interim regulation.
122 HISTORY OF
which was not to become a permanent law until some
trial should have been had ofit, and such amendments
made in it as were found by experience to be necessary.*
In other cases, again, and those of no rare occurrence,
the law was of such a nature that it could not be cari'ied
into execution ; it was an attempt to accomplish what was
impossible. These considerations may account for the
numerous instances in which our old laws are merely
confirmations, or in other words, repetitions of some pre-
ceding law, and also for the extraordinary multiplication
which we find of fluctuating or contradictory law s. Of
this latter description, those relating to the staple afford
an eminent example. In 1334, all the lately established
staples were again abolished by the king in a parliament
held at York. In 1341, the staple was re-established by
a royal act at Bruges, in Flanders. In 1348, again,
after the capture of Calais, that town was made the staple
for tin, lead, feathers, English-made woollen cloths and
worsted stuffs, for seven years. All the former inhabit-
ants of Calais, with the exception, it is said, of one
priest and two lawyers, had been removed, and an Eng-
lish colony, of which thirty-six merchants from London
were the principal members, had been settled in their
room. In 1353, by the statute called the Ordinance of
the Staples (27 Edw. III. st. 2, c. 1), the staple for
wool, leather, woolfels, and lead, was once more removed
from the continent by act of parliament, and ordered to
be held for ever in the following places, and no others —
namely, for England, at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, York,
Lincoln, Norwich, Westminster, Canterbury, Chichester,
Exeter, and Bristol ; for Wales, at Carmarthen ; and for
Ireland, at Dublin, Waterfbrd, Cork, and Drogheda.
The " for ever" of this statute remained in force for ten
years, and no longer. From the j)reamble of the statute
43 Edw. III., it appears that it had been ordained, for
the profit of the realm, and ease of the merchants of
England, that the staple of wools, woolfels, and leather,
should be holden at Calais ; and that there accordingly it
♦ See on this subject Hallam's ]Middle Ages, iii. 72 — 75»
BRITISH COMMERCE. l^S
had been holden since the 1st of March, 1363. By this
last mentioned act, however, passed in 1369, it was
again, in consequence of the renewal of the war with
France, fixed at certain places within the kingdom —
being for Ireland and Wales the same that have been
i'ast mentioned, but with the substitution, in the case of
•England, of Hull, Boston, Yarmouth, and Queenburgh,
for Canterbury, York, Lincoln, and Norwich. In 1376
nevertheless, on the complaint of the inhabitants of
Calais, that their city was declining, the staple was re-
stored to that i)lace ; and it was now made to compre-
hend, not only the ancient commodities of wool, wool-
fels, and leather, and those more recently added of lead,
tin, worsted stuffs, and feathers, but also cheese, butter,
honey, tallow, peltry (or skins of all kinds), and what
are called " gaulse," which have been supposed to mean
osiers for making baskets ; these different articles pro-
bably comprehending all the ordinary exports from the
kingdom. But this restriction of the whole export trade
to one market was soon relaxed. In 1378 (by the 2nd
Bich. II. Stat. 1, c. 3), it was enacted, that all merchants
of Genoa, Venice, Catalonia, Arragon, and other coun-
tries toward the West, that would bring their vessels to
Southampton, or elsewhere within the realm, might there
freely sell their goods, and also recharge their vessels
with wools, and the other merchandises of the staple, on
paying the same customs or duties that would have been
payable at Calais; and in 1382 (by the .5th Rich. II.
Stat. 2, c. 2), all merchants, whether foreigners or na-
tives, were permitted to carry wool, leather, and woolfels,
to any country whatever, except France, on payment of
the Calais duties beforehand. In 1384, we find the
wool-staple altogether removed from Calais, and esta-
blished at Middleburgh. In 1388 (by the statute
12 Rich. II. c. 16), it was ordered to 136 fixed once
more at Calais ; but in 1390 (by the 14th Rich. II. c.
1), it was brought back to the same English towns in
which it had been fixed in 1353. The very next year,
however, it was enacted that, instead of these towns, the
staple should be held at such others upon the coast as the
124 HISTORY OF
lords of the council should direct ; and it would even
appear (from the 15th Rich. II. c. 8), that, at least for
a part of the year, the staple of wool and also of tin was
still at Calais. ''Staples and restraints in England, and
a second staple and other restraints at the same time on
the continent !" exclaims the historian of our commerce,
in noting this fact : " the condition of the merchants who
^yere obliged to deal in staple goods was truly pitiable in
those days of perpetual changes."* It is not quite clear,
however, that the English staples were still continued ;
it is perhaps more probable that they had been abolished
when the staple was restored to Calais. However this
may be, it aj)pears from the statute 21 Rich. II. c. 17,
passed in 1398, that at that time Calais was the only
staple ; and such it continued to be flrom this time till it
was recovered by the French in 1538, when the staple
v/as established at Bruges. The old staple laws, how-
ever, had been considerably relaxed in the course of that
long- interval.
The history of the staple is an important part of the
history of our early foreign commerce, of which it in
some degTee illustrates the growth and gradual extension
from the progressive development of the resources of the
country, as well as the artificial bonds and incumbrances
against the pressure and entanglement of which the prin-
ciple of that natural growth had to force its way. We
now proceed to quote some further instances of the per-
plexities, the blunders, and the generally oppressive or
annoying character of our ancient commercial legislation.
One of the prerogatives assumed by the crown in those
days, somewhat similar in its nature to that of fixing the
staple of the foreign trade of the kingdom, was the right
of restricting all mercantile dealings whatever, for a
time, to a certain place. Thus, Matthew Paris tells us
that, in the year 1245, Heniy III. proclaimed a fair to
be held at Westminster, on \\ hich occasion he ordered
that all the traders of London should shut up their shops,
and carry their goods to be sold at the fair, and that ail
* Macphei-son, Annals of Com. i. 604.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 125
other fairs throughout England should be suspended
during the fifteen days it was ai)pointed to last. The
king's object, no doubt, was to obtain a supply of money
from the tolls and other dues of the market. What
made this interference be felt as a greater hardship \\a'5,
that the weather, all the time of the fair, happened to bo
excessively bad; so that not only the goods were spoilt,
exposed as they were to the rain in tents only covered
w^ith cloth, and that probably imperfectly enough ; ])\\i
the dealers themselves, who were obliged to eat their
victuals with their feet in the mud, and the wind and
wet about their ears, suffered intolerably. Four years
afterwards the king repeated the same piece of tyranny,
and was again seconded by the elements in a similar
fashion. This time, too, the historian tells us, scarcely
any buyers came to the fair ; so that it is no wonder the
unfortunate merchants were loud in expressing their dis-
satisfaction. But the king, he adds, did not mind the
imprecations of the people.
There was nothing that more troubled and bewildered
both the legislature and the popular understanding, during
the whole of this period, than the new phenomena con-
nected with the increasing foreign trade of the country.
The advantages of this augmented intercourse with other
parts of the world were sensibly enough felt, but very
imperfectly comprehended ; hence one scheme after an-
other to retain the benefit upon terms wholly inconsistent
w ith the necessary conditions of its existence. Of course,
in all exchange of commodities between two countries,
besides that supply of the respective wants of each which
constitutes the foundation or sustaining element of the
commerce, a certain portion of what the consumer pays
must fall to the share of the persons by whose agency
the commerce is carried on. It is this that properly
forms the profits of the commerce, as distinguished from
its mere advantages or conveniences. The general ad-
A-antages of the commerce, apart from the profits of the
agents, are alone the proper concern of the community :
as for the mere profits of the agency the only interest of
the community is, that they shall be as low as possible.
126 HISTOKY OF
From the course, however, that the popular feeling has
at all times taken, it might be supposed that the very
contrary was the case ; for the cry has constantly been in
favour of making this agency, as far as possible, a mono-
poly in the hands of the native merchants, although the
ettect of the exclusion of foreign competition, if it could
be accomplished, really could be nothing else than an
enhancement of the profits of the agency, and conse-
quently of the charge upon the consumer. In fact, if
the exclusion wei-e not expected to produce this efiect, it
never would be sought for by the native merchants. That
it should be sought for by them is natural enough, but
that they should be supported in this demand by the
community at large is only an instance of popular pre-
judice and delusion. In all commerce, and especially in
all foreign commerce, a body of intermediate agents, to
manage the exchange of the commodities, is indispen-
sable ; the goods must be brought from the one country
to the other, which makes what is called the carrying
trade ; they must be collected in shops or warehouses for
distribution by sale ; even their original production, in
many cases, cannot be efficiently accomplished without
the regular assistance of a third class of persons, — namely,
dealers in money or in credit. But to the public at large
it is really a matter of perfect indifference whether these
merchants, ship-owners, and bankers or other capitalists,
be natives or foreigners. Not so, however, thought our
ancestors in the infancy of our foreign commei-ce. The
commerce itself was sufficiently acceptable ; but the fo-
reigners, by whose aid it was necessardy in part carried
on, were the objects of a most intense and restless jealousy.
Whatever portion of the profits of the commerce fell to
their share was looked upon as nothing better than so
much plunder. This feeling was even in some degree
extended to the whole of the foreign nation v/ith which
the commerce was carried on ; and, in the notion that all
trade was of the nature of a contest between two adverse
parties, and that whatever jhe one country gained the
other lost, the intlammation of the popular mind occa-
sionally rose to such a height that nothing less would sa-
BRITISH COMMERCE. 127
tisfy it than an abjuration of the foreign trade altogether.
Bat it never was long before this precipitate resolution
was repented of and revoked.
In the wars between Henry III. and his barons, the
latter endeavoured to turn to account against the king
the national jealousy of foreigners, which his partiality to
his wife's French connexions had greatly exasperated.
In 12GI they passed a law which may be regarded as the
first attempt to establish what has been called, in modern
times, the manufacturing system. It prohibited the ex-
portation of wool, the chief sta])le of the country, and
ordained that no woollen cloths should be worn except
siich as were manufactured at home. Whatever may be
thought of the policy of nursing the infancy of domestic
manufactures in certain circumstances by protections of
this description, the present attempt was undoubtedly
premature, and its authors confessed as much by append-
ing to their prohibition against the importation of foreign
cloth an injunction or recommendation that all persons
should avoid every superfluity in dress. What were thus
denounced as extravagant superfluities were evidently
those finer fabrics which could not yet be produced in
England. The eftect of this law, in so far as it was en-
forced or obeyed, could only have been to add to the
general distress, by embarrassing more or less all classes
of persons that had been ever so remotely connected with
the foreign trade, and above all others the chief body of
producers in the kingdom. If the wool was not to go
out of the country, much wealth both in money and in
goods would be prevented from coming in, and all the
branches of industry which that wealth had hitherto
contributed to sustain and feed would sufter depression.
It would appear that, either from want of skill, or a
scarcity of woad in consequence of the usual importations
from the continent being checked, dyed cloths could not
be obtained in sufficient quantity in England a few years
after this time ; for it is recorded that many people were
now wont to dress themselves in cloth of the natural
colour of the wool. Simon de Montford, it seems, pro-
fessed to be an admirer of this plainness of a])parel, and
128 HISTORY OF
was accustomed to maintain that foreign commerce was
unnecessary, the produce of tlie country being fully
sufficient to supply all the wants of its inhabitants. And
so no doubt it was, and would be still, on this principle
of rigidly eschewing ail superfluities ; but that is the
principle of the stationary and savage state, not of civi-
lization and progressive improvement.
The prohibition against the importation of foreign
cloth, however, appears to have been soon repealed. In
1271, when disputes broke out between Henry and the
Countess of Flanders, we find it renewed in terms which
imply that the trade had for some time previous been
carried on as usual. This second suspension, also, was
of short duration ; and on various subsequent occasions,
on which the attempt was made to break off the natural
commercial intercourse between the English producers
and the Flemish manufacturers, the result was the same ;
the inconvenience was found to be so intolerable to both
countries that it never was submitted to for more than a
few months or weeks.
Absurd regulations, however, were from time to time
imposed on the trade carried on by foreigners, the temper
and ])rinciple of which would, if carried out, have led to
its complete extinction, and which, half measures as they
were, could only have had the effect of diminishing its
natural advantages. In 1275, for instance, an order was
issued by Edward I., obliging all foreign merchants to
sell their goods within forty days after their arrival. If
foreigners continued to resort to the country in the face
of the additional risks created by this law, — risks of in-
adequate returns if they complied with it, of detection
and punishment if they attempted to evade it, — we may
be certain they exacted a full equivalent in the shape
of higher prices for their goods ; or, if they failed to do
this, they must soon have been forced to give up the
trade altogether, for there was no other way by which it
could be made to yield its usual ])rofits.
In the year 1290 the bigotry and rapacity of Edward I.
inflicted what must have })roved a severe blow upon the
commerce of the kingdom by the sudden expulsion of the
BRITISH COMMERCE. 129
Avhole body of the Jews. The principal pretence for
this procecilinp: a}>))ears to have been that the Jev/s had
been the chief cHppers of the coin. The principal
motive, no doubt, was the replenishing of the royal ex-
chequer by the spoil of the hated and helpless race ; ibr
the Jews had al\\ ays been regarded, not only as foreigners
antl aliens, but as, in a manner, the absolute property of
the crown, v/hich, under that view, was restrained from
pillaging and otherwise oppressing them to any extent it
chose by neither law nor custom, nor by anything except
a prudent calculation of how far it might go without in-
jury to its o\'\n interests — without impairing the produc-
tiveness of the source from which it drew its iniquitous
profits. In the present instance even this consideration
gave v.ay under the pressure of some strong excitement
or urgent need, the popular feeling, we may be sure,
eagerly seconding the royal passion or policy. The
manner of the proceeding was as barbarous as the motive,
\vhether fanaticism or thirst of j)lunder, might prepare us
to expect. Only two months' warning was given before the
fatal 1st of November, on which day it ^\'as ordered that
every Jew should quit England, never to return, on pain
of death. Not only all their houses and tenements, but
also all their bonds for money owing them by Christians,
were seized by the king, who afterwards exacted pay-
ment of the debts, as if the money had been lent by
himself. The accounts dilier as to whether they were
allov.ed to carry their moveable property with them ; as
much, of course, was left them as might defray their
charges in crossing the sea, and we may suppos'^e they
secretly conveyed av/ay as nuicli more as they could ; it
is atlirmcdthat v.hole ship-loads of them were made away
with by the sailors on their i)assage ibr the sake of A\hat
they had with them. The common account is that the
exact number thus driven out was 16, .511 ; and no Jew
was ever alter wards allowed to set foot in this country,
till, without any change having been made in the law,
they quietly began to reappear alter the Restoration,
three hundred and seventy years subsequent to their
general expulsion.
VOL. I. G
130 HISTORY OF
No foreign merchants were in those days allowed to
reside in England except by special licence from the
king ; and even under this ])rotection, they were sub-
jected to \arious oppressive liabilities. It was not till
1303 that a general charter was granted by Edward I.,
permitting the merchants of Germany, France, Spain,
Portugal, Navarre, Lombardy, Tuscany, Provence, Cata-
lonia, iXquitaine, Toulouse, Quercy, Flanders, Brabant,
and all other foreign countries, to come safely to any of
the dominions of the English crown with all kinds of
merchandize, to sell their goods, and to reside under the
protection of the laws. But even this general toleration
was clogged with many restrictions. The goods im-
ported, with the exception of spices and mercery, were
only to be sold wholesale. No wine was to be carried
out of the country without special licence. Above all,
no relaxation was granted of the ancient grievous liability
under which every resident stranger was placed of being
answerable for the debts and even lor the crimes of
every other foreign resident. It appears from the re-
cords of the Exchequer that, in 1306, a number of
foreign merchants were committed to the Tower, and
there detained until they consented severally to give
security that none of their number should leave the
kingdom, or export anything from it, without the king's
special licence. Each of them was at the same time
obliged to give in an account of the whole amount of his
property, both in money and goods. Security against
being subjected to this kind of treatment had been ac-
corded in a few particular instances ; but it was not till
the year 1353 that the law was formally altered by the
Statute of the Staple already mcMitioned, and the ancient
practice was not wholly discontinued till long afterwards.
The general charter of 1303 was followed within four
years by a still more extraordinary attempt than any that
had yet been made to control the natural course of com-
merce. In 1307, Edward issued an order prohibiting
cither coined money or bullion to be carj-ied out of the
country on any account. The merchants, therefore, who
came from other countries were now reduced to the
ERlTISn COMxMEECE. 131
necessity of either directly bartering their commodities
for the produce of the kingdom, or, if they sold them
for money in the first instance, of investing the proceeds
in other goods before they could be permitted to return
home. This was a restri(.'tion so thoroughly opposed to
every commercial principle that it could not be rigidly
maintained ; the very year following its promulgation,
an exemption from it was accorded to the merchants of
France b}' the new king, Edward II., and similar relaxa-
tions of it were afterwards permitted in other cases.
But, although from its nature it did not admit of being
strictly enforced, it long continued to be regarded as the
law of the country, and repeated attempts were made to
secure its observance. In 1335, by the 9th Edw. III.
St, 2, it was enacted that no person should henceforth carry
out of the kingdom either money or plate \\'ithout special
licence, upon pain of forfeiture of whatever he should
so convey away. Sworn searchers were appointed to
see that the la^v was observed at all the ports , and it
was further ordered that the inn-keepers at every port
should be swoni to search their guests : the fourth part
of all forfeits was assigned as the reward of the searchers.
In 1343, by the 17th Edw. III., nearly the same
regulations were repeated, the principal variation being,
that, to induce them to do their duty more diligently,
the reward of the searchers was now raised to a third
part of the forfeits, and penalties were provided for their
neglect or connivance. We may gather from all this
that the law had been extensively evaded. At length
permission was given generally to foreign merchants to
carry away one half of the money for which they sold
their goods; the law is thus stated in the 14th Rich. II.
c. 1, passed in 1390, and more explicitly in the 2nd
Hen. IV. c. 5, passed in 1400; but it is still expressly
ordered by the former of these statutes that every alien
bringing any merchandize into England shall find sufficient
sureties before the officers of the customs to expend the
value of half of what he imports, at the least, in the pur-
chase of wools, leather, woolfels, lead, tin, butter, cheese,
cloths, or other commodities of the land.
1 32 HISTORY OF '
The ignorance and misconception from which all this
legislation proceeded, are exhibited in a striking point of
view by the fact that the above-mentioned original order
of Edward I,, prohibiting the exjwrtation of money, ex-
pressly permits the amount of the money to be remitted
abroad in bills of exchange. And at all times, while the
exportation of money was forbidden, the remittance of
bills seems to have been allowed. But a bill of exchange
remitted abroad is merely an order that a certain party
in the foreign country shall receive a sum of money
which is due to the drawer of the bill, and which v/ould
otherwise have to be sent to the country where he resides ;
if no such money were due, the bill would not be
negotiable ; every such bill, therefore, if it did not carry
money out of the country, produced precisely the same
effect by preventing money Irom coming in. It was fit
and natural enough, however, that this simple matter
should fail to be perceived in times when it was thought
that a great advantage was gained by compelling the
foreign merchant to sell his goods for produce instead of
for the money which the produce was worth ; indeed it
may be fairly said, instead of for less money than the
produce was worth, for all restraints of this description
inevitably operate to enhance the price of what is })re-
vented from being openly bought and sold on the terms
that would be naturally agreed upon between the parties
themselves.
Another strange attempt of the English commercial
legislation of those times was to impose a certain mea-
sure upon all foreign cloths brought to the country. By
the Act 2 Edw. III. c. 14, passed in 1328, it was or-
dered that, from the Feast of St. JSIichael ensuing, all
cloths that were im])ortcd should be measured by the
king's aulnagers, and that all those that were not ibund
to be of a certain specified length and breadth should be
forfeited to the king. The dimensions fixed by the
statute were, for cloth of ray (supposed to mean striped
cloth), 28 yards in length by G ((uarters in breadth ; and
for coloured cloth, 26 yards' in length by 6.^ quarters in
breadth. The regulation of weights and measures within
BRITISH COMMERCE. 133
the kinp-clom was a proper subject of legislation, and had
necessarily engaged attention long before this date ;
although, at a period when science was unknown, tlie
methods resorted to were necessarily very inartificial,
and sometimes singular enouuh ; Henry I., for example,
soon after he came to the throne, in ordaining that the
ell or yai-d should be of uniform length throughout the
kingdom, could find no better standard for it than the
length of his own arm. It might also have been found
expedient, both for fiscal and other purposes, to direct
that all cloth made for sale within the kingdom should
be of certain specified dimensions ; regulations to that
effect have at least been usual down to our own day.
But it was to stretch legislation on such matters beyond
all reasonable limits to attempt to fix a measure for the
cloth made in all foreign countries. Such a law, in so
far as it was enforced, could only have the effect of di-
minishing the supply, — in other words, of raising the
prices of foreign goods. But, like most of the other ab-
surd restrictions of the same character, the maintenance
of this regulation was soon found to be impracticable : if
it had been rigorously insisted upon, it would have ex-
cluded the manufactured goods of certain foreign coun-
tries from the English market altogether ; and accordingly,
after giving a great deal of useless annoyance both to
foreign merchants and their English customers, and after
special exemptions from it had been granted to several
nations, it was at last repealed by the 27 Edw. III. st. 1,
c. 4, passed in 1353, wliich provided that, " whereas the
great men and commons have showed to our lord the king
how divers merchants, as well foreigners as denizens, have
withdrawn them, and yet do withdraw them, to come with
cloths into England, to the great damage of the king and
of all his people, because that the king's aulnager sunniseth
to merchant strangers that their cloths be not of assize,"
therefore no foreign cloths should in future be forfeited
on that account, but, when any was found to be under
assize, it should simply be marked by the aulnager, that
a proportionate abatement might be made in the i)rice.
This was also the era of various statutes as-aiust the
134 HISTORY or
supposed mischiefs of forestalling. The statute " De
Pistoribus " (attributed by some to the 51st year of
Hen. III., by others to the 13th of Edw. I.) contains
the following empassioned description and denouncement
of this offence: " But especially be it commanded, on
the behalf of our lord the king, that no forestaller be
suffered to dwell in any tov/n, which is an open oppressor of
poor people, and of all the commonalty, and an enemy of
the whole shire and country ; which for greediness of his
private gains doth prevent others in buying grain, fish,
herring, or any other thing to be sold coming by land or
water, oppressing the poor and deceiving the rich ;
which carrieth away such things, intending to sell them
more dear ; the which come to merchant strangei's that
bring merchandize, offering them to buy, and informing
them that their goods might be dearer sold than they
intended to sell, and an whole town or a country is de-
ceived by such craft and subtlety." It might be sujiposed
from all this that the forestaller bought the commodity
for the purpose of throwing it into the sea or otherwise
destroying it ; it seems to have been forgotten that, like all
other deiilers, he bought it only that he might sell it again
for more than it^cpst him, that is to say, that he might
preserve it for a time of still higher demand and greater
necessity. But for him, when that time of greater
scarcity came, there would be no provision for it ; if the
people were pinched now, they would be starved then.
The forestaller is merely the economical distributor, who,
by preventing waste at one time, prevents absolute want
at another ; he destroys nothing ; on the contrary, what-
ever he reserves from present consumption, is sure to be
reproduced by him in full at a future day, when it will
be still more needed. Were it otherwise, forestalling
would be the most losing of all trades, and no law would
be required to put it down. The English laws against
forestalling, regrating, and engrossing, however, cannot
well be made a reproach to the thirteenth century, seeing
that they were formally renewed and extended in the
sixteenth,* and were not finally removed from the
* By the 5 and G Edward VI. c. 14 and 15.
uransH commekce, 135
Statute Book till to^A•ar(ls the end of the oishfeenth.*
And even yet lbrestalli)ig' is considered to be a misde-
meanour at common lav/, and punishable by tine and
imprisonment.
A still more direct attempt to derange the natural
balance of supply and demand was made by parliament
in 1315, when, with the view of relieving the people
from the press'.'.re of a severe famine, it was enacted that
all articles of food should be sold at certain prescribed
prices. It was strangely forgotten that the evil did not
lie in the high prices, but the scarcity, of which they
were the necessary consequence. That scarcity, of
course, the act of parliament could not cure. In fact,
food became more ditHcult to procure than ever ; for even
those who had any to sell, and would have brought it to
market if tliey could have had a fair price for it, with-
held it rather than dispose of it below its value. What
was sold was for the most part sold at a price which
violated the law, and which was made still higher than
it would otherwise have been by the trouble and risk which
the illegality of the transaction involved. Butcher-meat
disappeared altogether ; poultry, an article of large con-
sm)ij)tion in those times, became nearly as scarce ; grain
was only to be had at enormous prices. The result was,
that the king and the parliament, after a few months,
becoming convinced of their mistake, hastened to repeal
the act.
The same thing in principle and effect, however, was
repeated not many years after, by acts passed to fix the
wages of labourers, — in other words, the price of the
commodity called labour. In 1349 (the 23rd of
Edw. III.), immediately after what is called the Great
pestilence, there was issued (apparently by the autho-
rity of the king, although it is printed as a statute)
" An Ordinance concerning Labourers and SerAants ;"
which directed, first, that persons of the class of servants
should be bound to serve when required ; and secondly,
that they should serve for the same v.ages that were
* Bv the 12 Geo. HI. c. 71.
1 38 HISTORY OF
accustomed to bo Q:iven three years before. This ordi-
nance, indeed, further proceeded to enjoin that all dealers
in victual should be bound to sell the same " for a rea-
sonable price," and inflicted a penalty upon persons
offending against that enactment— although it did not
presume ex[)ressly to fix a maximum of prices. The
next year, by the 25 Edw. III., st. 2,* after a preamble,
declaring that servants had had no regard to the pre-
ceding ordinance, " but to their ease and singular
covetise," the ])arliament established a set of new pro-
visions for effecting its object : this act, however, contains
nothing on the subject of the prices of provisions. The
Statute of Labourers was confirmed by parliament in
1360 (by the 34 Edw. III. c. 9), and its principle was
long obstinately clung to by the legislature, notwithstand-
ing the constant experience of its inefficiency, and indeed
of its positive mischief, and its direct tendency to defeat
its own proposed object ; for a law is rarely harmless
because it is of impracticable execution ; the unskilful sur-
gery of the body politic, as of the body natural, tears and
tortures when it does not cure, and fixes deeper and
more firmly the barb v.'hich it fails to extract. By the
13 Rich. II. St. 1, c. 8 (passed in 1389-90), it is ordained
that, " forasmuch as a man cannot put the price of corn
and other victuals in certain," the justices of peace shall
every year make proclamation " by their discretion, ac-
cording to the dearth of victuals, how much every mason,
carpenter, tiler, and other craftsmen, workmen, and other
labourers by the day, as well in harvest as in other times
of the year, after their degree, shall take by the day,
with meat and drink, or without meat and drink, and
that every man obey to such proclamations from time to
time, as a thing done by statute." It is also ordered
that victuallers " shall have reasonable gains, according
to the discretion and limitation of the said justices, and
no more, upon pain to be grievously punished, according
to the discretion of the said justices." Finally, provision
is made for the correct keeping of the assize (or assess-
* Commonly entitled Statute the First.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 137
ment from time to time) of t/ie prices of bread and ale.
The earliest notice of an assize in Enprland is found in
the rolls of parliament for 1203, the oth of John; but
the first introduction of the practice is probably of older
date. The most ancient law upon the subject that ha^
been preserved is that entitled the Assisa Panis et Cere-
visiae, commonly assiprned to the 51st Hen. III. (a.d.
12G6). The assize of bread and ale, it is to be remem-
berecl, determined the prices of these commodities, not
arbitrarily, but by a scale regulated according- to the
market-prices of wheat, barley, and oats, so that the
prices that were really fixed were those of baking- and
of brewing. The assize of bread was I'c-enacted so
lately as the beginning of the last century, and was
only abolished in London and its neighbourhood about
thirty years ago : in regard to other places, although it
has fallen into disuse, the old law still remains unre-
pealed. But various other articles, such as wine, fish,
tiles, cloths, wood, coal, billets, &c., have at different
times been made subject to assize ; and in the case of
most of these the assize was a perfectly arbitrary deter-
mination of the price. The present period furnishes us
with a curious example of the manner in which some of
these attempts operated. By an ordinance issued in
1357 (commonly called the 31 Edw. III. st. 2), it was
directed that no herrings should be sold for a higher
price than forty shillings the last. But, in 1361, we find
the king and his council, in a second ordinance (com-
monly called the statute 35 Edw. III.), frankly con-
fessing that the effect of the attempt to fix prices in this
case had been, " that the sale of herring is much decayed,
and the peoj^le greatly endamaged, that is to say, that
many merchants coming- to the fair, as well labourers and
servants as other, do bargain for herring, and every of
them, by malice and envy, increase upon other, and, if
one proffer forty shillings, another will proffer ten shil-
lings more, and the third sixty shillings, and so every
one surmounteth other in the bargain, and such proffers
extend to more than the price of the herring upon which
the fishers proffered it to sell at the beginning." The
g3
13S HISTOP.T OF
ordinance promulgated with the intention of keeping
down the price of herrings, had actually raised it.
Wherefore '' we," concludes the new statute, " per-
ceiving the mischiefs and grievances aforesaid, by the
advice and assent of our parliament, will and grant, that
it shall ])e lawful to every man, of what condition that he
may be, merchant or other, to buy herring openly, and
not privily, at such price as may be agreed betwixt him
and the seller of the same herring." This failure, how-
ever, did not deter the parliament two years after from
fixing a price for poultry (by the statute 37 Edw. III.
c. 3) ; but the next year that also was repealed by the
38 Edw. III. St. 1, c. 2, which ordained that all people,
in regard to buying and selling and the other matters
treated of in the preceding statute, should be as free as
they v.cre before it passed, and as they were in the time
of the king's grandfather and his other good progenitors.
Notwithstanding, however, the impediments and em-
barrassments occasioned by all this blind and contradic-
tory legislation, English commerce undoubtedly made a
very considerable progress in the course of the space of
nearly two centuries included within the period now
under review.
The directing property of the magnet, and its appli-
cation in the mariner's compass, appear to have become
known in Europe towards the end of the twelfth centmy,
and the instrument was probably in common use among
navigators soon after the middle of the thirteenth. Both
Chaucer the English, and Barbour the Scottish poet,
allude familiarly to the compass in the latter part of the
fourteenth century. Barbour tells us that Robert Bruce
and his companions, when crossing, during the night,
from Arran to the coast of Carrick, in 1307, steered by
the light of the fire they saw on the shore,— " for they
na needle had nor stane :" the words seem to imply rather
that they were by accident without a compass, than that
the instrument was not then known. Chaucer, in his
prose treatise on the Astrolabe, says that the sailors
reckon thirty-two parts (or points) of the horizon ; evi-
dently referring to the present division of the card, of
BRITISH COMMERCE. 139
which the people of Bruges are said to have been the
authors. Gioia, of Amalfi, who flourished in the begin-
ning- of this century, is supposed to have been the first v/ho
attached a divided card to the needle ; but his card seems
to have had only eight winds or points drawn upon it.
The contemporary chroniclers have not recorded the
eifects produced by the introduction of the compass on
navigation and commerce ; but it must have given a great
impulse to both. A fev/ interesting facts, however, con-
nected with English shipping during the present period
have been preserved. Henry III. appears to have had
some ships of his own. One of the entries in the Libe-
rate Roll of the tenth year of his reign is as follows ; —
" Henry, by the grace of God, &c. — Pay out of our
treasury to Reynold de Bernevall and Brother Thomas,
of the Temple, twenty-two marks and a half, for repairs,
&c. of our great ship ; also pay to the six masters of
our great ship, to wit, to Stephen le Vel, one mark ;
Germanus de la R-ie, one mark ; John, the son of Samp-
son, one mark ; Colmo de Warham, one mark ; Robert
Gaillard, one mark ; and Simon Westlegrei, one mark.
Witness ourself at Westminster, the 17th day of May,
in the tenth year of our reign. For the mariners of the
great ship." * The vessel here referred to is, we sup-
pose, the lai'ge ship called the Queen, which, in 1232,
Henry chartered to John Blancbally, for the life of the
latter, for an annual payment of fifty marks. f In an
order of the same king to the barons of the Cinque Ports,
in 1242, mention is made of the king's galley of Bristol,
and of the king's galleys in Ireland. Edward I. probably
had a much more numerous navy. When he was pre-
paring for his war with France, in 1294, this king
divided his navy into three fleets, over each of which he
placed an admiral, this being the first time that that title
IS mentioned in English history. We are not, however,
to suppose that all the ships forming these three fleets
* Issues of the Exchequer from Henry HI. to Henry VI,
inclusive. By Frederick Devon. 4to. Lon. 1S37,
t Madox's Hist, of Exclieq., c. 13, § 11.
140 HISTORY OF
M^ere the property of the king ; the royal navy was still,
as it had heretofore been, chiefly composed of vessels
belonging to private mercliants which were pressed for
the public service. The names of the following king's
ships are mentioned in an Issue Roll of the ninth ot
Edward II. : — the Peter, the Bernard, the Marion, the
Mary, and the Catherine ; all of Westminster.* In the
reign of Edward III. we find many ships' belonging to
Yarmouth, Bristol, Lynnc, Hull, llavensere, and other
ports, distinguished as ships of war ; but this designation
does not seem to imply that they were royal or public
property.
The dominion of the four seas appears to have been
first distinctly claimed by Edward III. At this time
the Cinque Ports were bound by their charter to have
fifty-seven ships in readiness at all times lor the king's
service ; and Edward also retained in his pay a fleet of
galleys, supplied, according to contract, by the Genoese.
By far the greater number, however, of the vessels em-
ployed in every considerable naval expedition of those
times consisted, as we have said, of the private merchant-
men. The English mercantile navy was now very con-
siderable. When Blenry III., in 1253, ordered all the
vessels in the country to be seized and employed in an
expedition against the rebel barons of Gascony, the
number of them, Matthew Paris tells us, was found to be
above a thousand, of which three hundred were large
ships. The foreign as well as the English vessels, how-
ever, are included in this enumeration ; the former as
well as the latter were subject to be thus pressed. Ac-
cording to an account given in one of the Cotton manu-
scripts of the fleet employed by Edward III. at the siege
of Calais in 1346, it consisted of 25 ships belonging to
the king, which carried 419 mariners ; of 37 foreign ships
(from Bayonne, Spain, Flanders, and Gueldorland),
manned by 780 mariners ; of one vessel from Ireland,
caiTving 25 men ; and of 710 vessels belonging to Eng-
* Issues of Excheq. ut supra. The editor adcls — " The
names of other ships are also meutioued."
BEITISII COMMERCE. 141
Jish ports, the crews of which amounted to 14,151 per-
sons. These merchantmen were divided into the south
and the north fleet, according as they belonged to the
ports south or north of the Thames. The places that
supplied the greatest numl:)ers of ships and men were
the following: — London, 25 ships with 6G2 men; Mar-
gate, 15 with 160; Sandwich, 22 with 504; Dover, 16
with 336; Winchelsea, 21 with 596; Weymouth, 20
with 264; Newcastle, 17 with 414; Hull, 16 with 466:
Grimsby, 11 with 171; Exmouth, 10 with 193; Dart-
mouth, 31 with 757 ; Plymouth, 26 with 603 ; Looe,
20 with 325; Fowey, 47 with 170; Bristol, 24 with
608 ; Shoreham, 20 with 329 ; Southampton, 21 with
572; Lynne, 16 with 482; Yarmouth, 43 with 1095;
Gosport, 13 with 403 ; Harwich, 14 with 283 ; Ipswich,
12 with 239; and Boston, 17 with 361. These, there-
fore, it may he assumed, were at this time the principal
trading tov/ns in the kingdom.
It will be perceived that the vessels, if we may judge
from the numbers of the men, were of very various sizes ;
and none of them could have been of any considerable
magnitude. A ship, manned by thirty seamen, which
the people of Yarmouth fitted out, in 1254, to carryover
Prince Edward, afterwards Edward I., to the Continent,
is spoken of with admiration by the writers of the time
for its size as well as its beauty. Some foreign ships,
however, were consideraJbly larger than any of the
English at this period. Thus, one of the vessels which
were lent by the Republic of Venice to St. Louis, in 1270,
when he set out on his second crusade, measured 125
feet in length, and carried 110 men ; but this was reck-
oned a vessel of extraordinary size even in the ^lediter-
ranean. In 1360, Edward III., in an order for arresting
all the vessels in the kingdom for an expedition against
France, directed that the largest ships should carry 40
mariners, 40 armed men, and 60 archers. A ship which
was taken from the French in 1385 is said to have been,
a short time before, built for the Norman merchants in
the East Country at a cost of 5000 francs (above 830/.
€terling), and to have been sold by them to Clisson. the
142
HISTORY OF
constable of France, for 3000 francs. This v/as one of
eighty vessels of various kinds — ships, galleys, cogs, car-
racks, barges, lines, ballingars, &c. — w^hich were cap-
tured this same year by the governor of Calais and the
seamen of the Cinque Ports, " There were taken," says
the historian Walsingham, " and slain in those ships,
226 seamen and mercenaries. Blessed be God for all
things." One ship taken by the Cinque Port vessels
was valued (her cargo no doubt included) at 20,000
marks. But half a century before this we read of Genoese
galleys, laden v/ith wool, cloth, and other merchandize,
which were reckoned to be worth 60,000/. and 70,000/.
in the money of Genoa.
Some notices that have been preserved of the shipping
of Scotland during this period prove its amount to have
been more considerable than might be expected. Indeed,
that country seems to have had some reputation for ship-
building even on the Continent. Matthew Paris relates
that one of the great ships in the fleet that accompanied
St. Louis on his first crusade, in 1249, had been built at
Inverness, for the Earl of St. Paul and Blois. The his-
torian calls her " a wonderful ship," in allusion, appa-
rently, to her magnitude. Mention is made in an ancient
charter of one ship which belonged to the Scottish crown
in the reign of Alexander III., who died in 1286; and
Fordun states that, at this time, the King of Man was
bound to furnish his liege lord, the King of Scots, when
required, with five warlike galleys of twenty-four oars,
and five of twelve oars ; and that other maritime vassals
contributed vessels in proportion to their lands. One of
Alexander's commercial laws was of a singular character,
if we may believe this historian. In consequence of
several mercliant-vessels belonging to his subjects having
been taken by pirates or lost at sea, while voyaging to
foreign parts, he prohibited the merchants of Scotland
from exporting any goods in their own vessels for a
certain time. The consequence, it is affirmed, was, that
before the end of a year numerous foreign vessels arrived
witli goods of all kinds ; and the kingdom obtained a
cheaper and more abundant supply of the produce of
CRITISII COMMERCE. 143
other countries than it had ever before enjoyed. If any
such effect as this was produced, the law, at the same
time that it restrained the native ship-owners from ini-,
porting goods, probably removed some restrictions that
had previously been imposed on the entry into the king-
dom of foreign merchants. In the wars between Eng-
land and Scotland, in the reign of Edward III., the
latter country frequently made considerable naval exer-
tions, sometimes by itself, sometimes in conjunction with
its allies. In 1335, a vessel belonging to Southampton,
laden with wool and other merchandise, was taken by
some Scottish and Norman privateers in the mouth of
the Thames ; and in the following year a numerous fleet
of ships and gdleys, equipped by the Scots, attacked and
plundered Guernsey and Jersey, and captured several
English vessels lying at anchor at the Isle of \yight. In
the autumn of 1357, again, three Scottish ships of war,
carrying 300 chosen armed men, are stated to have cruised
on the east coast of England, and greatly annoyed the
trade in that quarter, till the equinoctial gales drove them,
along with a number of English ve^els, into Yarmouth,
where they were taken. These appear to have been un-
authorised private adventurers, there being at this time a
truce between the two countries. The bold enterprise
of the Scottish captain, John Mercer, in 1378, till a stop
was put to his career by the public spirit of a citizen of
London, John Phil pot, is famous in our annals. Mercer
is said to have been the son of a burgess of Perth, one of
the most opulent merchants of Scotland, who, the year
before, when returning from abroad, had been driven by
stress of weather upon the English coast, and there seized
and confined for some time in the castle of Scai'borough.
It was to revenge this injury that the son fitted out his
anr.ament. A few years after this, some privateers of
Hull and Newcastle captured a Scottish ship, the cargo
of which, according to Walsingham, was valued at 7000
marks.
The most ancient record which presents a general view
of the foreign trade of England is an account, preserved
in the Exchequer, of the exports and imports, together
144 HISTORY OF
with the amount of the customs paid upon thom, in the
year 1354. The exports here mentioned are, 31,651i
sacks of wool at 6/. per sack; 8036 cwt. (120 lbs.) of
wool at 40s. per cwt. ; 65 woolfels, total value 21 5. Sd. ;
hides to the value of 89/. 5s. ; 4774:|- pieces of cloth at
40s. each; and 8061^ pieces of worsted stuff at 16s. 8d.
each: total value of the exports, 212,338/. 5s., paying
customs to the amount of 81,846/. 12s. 2d. Wool there-
fore would a])pcar, by this account, to have constituted
about thirteen-fourteenths of the whole exports of the
kingdom. The customs would seem to have been almost
entirely derived from wool : the amount paid by the hides
and cloth exported amounts only to about 220/. The
duty on the export of wool exceeded 40 per cent, on the
value. The imports mentioned are, 1831 pieces of fine
cloths at 6/. each ; 397f cwt. of wax at 40s. per cwt. ;
1829| tuns of wine at 40s. per tun ; and linens, mercery,
grocery, &c., to the value of 22,943/. 6s. 10^. : — making
a total value of 38,383/. 16s. lOd. The great excess,
according to this statement, of the exports over the im-
ports, has been regarded as c' incing the moderation and
sobriety of our ancestors. " Eut when we look at the
articles," it has been well observed, " and find that of
raw materials for manufactures, which constitute so great
a part of the modern imports, there was not one single
article imported, and that, on the other hand, the exports
consisted almost entirely of the most valuable raw mate-
i-ials, and of cloths in an unfinished state, which may
therefore also be classed among raw materials, mo must
acknowledge that it affords only a proof of the low state
of manufactures and of commercial knowledge among a
peo])lc who were obliged to allow foreigners to ha^e the
proht of manufacturing their own wool, and finishing
their own cloths, and after\^'ards to repurchase both from
thom in the form of finished goods." *
This account is probably to be considered as compre-
hending only those articles from which the revenue of
the customs was derived. We know that several other
* INIacpherson, Ann. of Com-, i. 554.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 145
articles besides those mentioned were, at least occasion-
ally, exported. A demand for the tin of Britain, for
instance, appears to have always existed on the Conti-
nent. A Cornish miner, indeed, who had been banished
from his native country, is said to have, in the year 1241,
discovered some mines of tin in Germany, the produce of
which was so abundant that the metal was even imported
into Entrland, by which the price in this country was
considerably reduced ; but this competition certainly did
not permanently destroy either the domestic or the ex-
port trade in British tin. In 1338 we find Edward III.
ordering all the tin in Cornwall and Devonshire, in-
cluding even what might have been alread}^ sold to
foreign merchants, to be seized and sent to the Conti-
nent, there to be sold on his account, the owners being
oliliged to accept of a promise of payment in two years.
In 1348, it is recorded that the merchants and others
complained to the parliament that all the tin of Cornwall
was bousrht and exported by Tidman of Limburgh, so
that no Englishman could get any of it; they therefore
prayed that it might be freely sold to all merchants ; but
they received for answer that it v/as a profit belonging
to the prince, and that every lord might make his profit
of his own. Cornwall had in 1337 been erected into a
duchy in favour of the Black Prince, and settled by act
of parliament on the eldest son of the king, as it still re-
mains. The export of tin is mentioned, in 1390, in the
statute 14 Rich. II. c. 7, vrhich declares Dartmouth the
only port at which it shall be shipped ; and also in the
following year, in the loth Rich. II. c. 8, which repeals
the last-mentioned act, and allows the exportation of the
commodity from any port, but provides that it shall bo
carried only to Calais, so long as wool shall be carried to
that place. Lead, butter, and cheese are likev/ise, as we
have seen, enumerated among the " commodities of the
land," in which foreign merchants were compelled, by
the 14th Rich. II. c. 1, to invest half the money which
they should receive for the commodities they imported.
The exportation of lead in particular is repeatedly alluded
to in the regulations respecting the staple, and other actii
146 HISTORY or
of parliament ; and considerable quantities of that metal
arc supposed to have been now obtained from the Welsh
mines. It may be presumed, also, that iron was occa-
sionally exported during this period, from the statute 28
Edw. III. c. 5 (passed in 1354), which enacts that no
iron, whether made in England or imported, shall be
carried out of the country. Salted fish, and cs})ecially
herrings, formed another article of export, at least from
the commencement of the thirteenth century, and pro-
bably from a much earlier date. Corn appears to have
been sometimes exported, sometimes imported, but a^^pa-
rently never without the sjjecial licence of the cro\An.
Thus we find Edward III., in 1359, granting liberty to
the Flemings to trade in England, and to export corn
and other provisions from the country on obtaining his
special licence and paying the customs. In 1376, on the
other hand, a permission is recorded to have been granted
to import 400 quarters of corn from Ireland to Kendal
in Westmoreland. In 1382 a general proclamation was
issued, prohibiting, under penalty of the confiscation of
the vessel and cargo, the exportation of corn or malt to
any foreign country, except to the king's territories in
Gascony, Bayonne, Calais, Brest, Cherbourg, Berwick-
upon-Tweed, and other places of strength belonging to
the king. But twelve years afterwards, by the statute
17 Rich. II. c. 7, all English subjects were allowed to
export corn to any country not hostile, on i)aying tlie due
customs — a power, however, being still reserved to the
king's council to stop the exportation if necessary. The
introduction of the use of coal as an article both of foreign
trade and of domestic consumption is probably to be
assigned to this period, though some have been disposed
to carry it farther back. The earliest authentic docu-
ment in which coal is distinctly mentioned is an order of
Henry III., in 1245, for an inquisition into trespasses
committed in the royal forests, in which inquiry is directed
to be made respecting sea-coal (" de carbone maris")
found in the forests. This expression a))pears to imply
that coals had before this time been brought to London by
sea, probably from Newcastle. Sea-coal Lane (between
BRITISH COMMERCE. 147
Skinner Street and Farringdon Street) is mentioned by
that name in a charter of the year 1253. Regulations
are laid down for the sale of coals in the statutes of
the guild of Berwick-upon-Tweed, which M'ere esta-
blished in 1284. There is extant a charter of William
of Obervell, in 1291, granting liberty to the monks of
Dunfermline, in Scotland, to dig coals for their own use
in his lands of Pittencrief, but prohibiting them from
selling any. It is probable, however, that this descrip-
tion of fuel was not as yet much used for domestic jiur-
poses ; for the smoke, or smell, of a coal fire was at first
thought to be highly noxious. " This same year (130G),"
says Maitland, in his History of London, " sea-coals being
very much used in the suburbs of London by brewers,
dyers, and others requiring great fires, the nobility and
gentry resorting thither complained thereof to the king
as a public nuisance, whereby they said the air was in-
fested with a noisome smell, and a thick cloud, to the
great endangering of the health of the inhabitants ; where-
fore a proclamation was issued, strictly forbidding the use
of that fuel. But, little regard being paid thereunto, the
king appointed a commission of Oyer and Terminer to
inquire after those who had contumaciously acted in open
defiance to his proclamation, strictly conmianding all such
to be punished by pecuniary mulcts ; and lor the second
offence to have their kilns and furnaces destroyed."
What would these sensitive alarmists of the fourteenth
century have said if they could have been informed that
the day would come when London should have constantly
some ten or twelve tons of coal-dust suspended over it?
The prejudice against coal fires, however, seems to have
in no long time died away. In 1325 we find mention
made of the exportation of coals from Newcastle to
France ; and the first leases of coal- works in the neigh-
bourhood of that town of which there is any account are
dated only a few years later. They were granted by the
monks of Tynemouth to various persons at annual rents,
^'arying from two to about five pounds. Ten shillings'
Vtorth of Newcastle coals are recorded to have been pur-
chased for the coronation of Edward III. in 1327. Before
148 HISTORY OF
the end of the fourteenth century there is reason to be-
lieve that an active trade was carried on in the conveyance
of Newcastle coal by sea to London and elsewhere.
Wool, however, was during the whole of this period,
as for a long time afterwards, the g-reat staple of the
king-dom. In 1279, in a petition to Edward I., the
nobles asserted that the wool produced in England, and
mostly exported to Flanders, was nearly equal to half the
land in value. English wool appears also to have been
in gi-eat request in France, in which country, as well as
in Flandei's, the manufacture of woollen cloth was early
established. Little cloth, as we have already had occa-
sion to observe, was made in England, and that little
only of the coarsest description, till the wise policy of
Edward IIL, by a grant dated in 1331, invited weavers,
dyers, and fullers, from Flanders, to come over and settle
in the country, })roniising them his protection and favour
on condition that they should carry on their trades here,
and communicate the knowledge of them to his subjects.
The first person who accepted of this invitation was John
Kempe, a weaver of woollen cloth : he came over with
his goods and chattels, his ser\ants and his apprentices.
Many of his countrymen soon followed. A few years
later other weavers came over from Brabant and Zealand ;
and thus was established certainly the first manufacture
o1 fine woollen cloths in England. It was many years,
however, as we have seen, before this infant manufacture
was able even to sup})ly the domestic demand, far less to
maintain any export trade in woollens. The cloths of
the Continent, in spite of various legislative attempts to
exclude them, long continued to be imported in consider-
able quantities. The 4774^ pieces of cloth exported in
1354 were evidently, from their price, of the old coarse
fabric of the conntiy. Large quantities of the English
wool also continued annually to go abroad. With the
view of keeping uj) the ])rice of the article,* it was
enacted by the statute 14 Rich. II. c. 4, passed in 1390,^
that no denizen of England should buy wool except of
* Per meutz garder le liaut pris des leyns.
BRITISH COMMERCE, 149
the o\Yncrs of the sheep, and for his own use. In other
%vords, the entire export trade in the commodity was
made over to the foreign merchant, and he was at the
same time confined to the export trade. The object
obviously was to secure to the grower not only his jn'oper
profits, iDut in addition those of the wool-merchant and
retailer, in so far as regarded the domestic consumption.
But, besides the injury to the native mercliant by his
exclusion from the export trade, it was strangely forgotten
that the monopoly of that trade secured to the foreigner
must have deprived the grower of perhajjs half his cus-
tomers, —namely, of all the English dealers who would
have purchased the article for exportation ; and must
thus, hy diminishing comp^jtition, have tended to de-
l>rcss })rices instead of raising them. Such, accordingly,
is stated to have been the efFect ])roduccd. The con-
temporary historian Knyghton tells us that, in conse-
quence of this prohibition of the export of wool by
English merchants, the article lay unsold in many places
lor two and three years, and many of the growers were
reduced to the greatest distress. In 1391, however,
although the quantity of wool exported is affirmed to
have been that year much less tlian formerly, the customs
on it amounted to 160,000/. According to Robert of
Avesbury, who is supj)Osed to have died about 1356, the
annual exportation of wool from England had, in his day,
reached to above 100,000 sacks, the customs on which,
at the duty of 505. on the sack, would produce a revenue
of above 250,000/, This estimate, however, is very in-
consistent with the official account already quoted of the
entire exports and imports for 1354, If it is to be at aii
received, it ought probably to be assigned to a date con-
siderably later than that at which Avesbury is commonly
assumed to have died.
The principal society of foreign merchants at this time
established in England appears to have been that of tlie
merchants of Cologne, They had a hall or factory in
London called their Gildhall, for the saisine (or legal
possession) of \\hich they paid thirty marks to the crown
ill A,D. 1220. " It seems probable," says Macpherson,
150 HISTORY OF
'' that this Gildhall, by the association of the merchants
of other cities with those of Cologne, became in time the
general factory and residence of all the German mer-
chants in London, and was the same that was afterwards
known by the name of the German Gildhall (Gildhalla
Teutonicontni). It appears that the merchants of Cologne
were bound to make a payment of two shillings, pro-
bably a reserved annual rent (for we are not told upon
what occasions it was payable) out of their Gildhall, be-
sides other customs and demands, from all which they
were exempted in the year 1235, by King Henry III.,
who moreover gave them permission to attend fairs in
any part of England, and also to buy and sell in London,
saving the liberties of the city." * The principal part of
the foreign trade, however, seems to have been in the
hands of the Merchants of the Staple, otherwise called
the Merchants of England, who, as noticed above, were
incorporated at least as early as the year 1313. This
society was composed of native merchants.
It has also been atfirmed that there existed, so early as
the middle of the thirteenth century, an association of
English merchants for trading in foreign parts, called the
Brotherhood of St. Thomas Becket of Canterbury, from
which originated the afterwards celebrated company of
the Merchant Adventurers of England ; but this story
does not rest on any sufficient authority. f
The historian Walsingham has preserved the record of
a remarkable proposal which was made in 1379 to Richard
II. by an opulent merchant of Genoa. This foreigner,
it is said, submitted to the English king a plan for raising
the port of Southampton to a pre-eminence over every
other in the west of Europe, by making it the deposit
and mart of all the Oriental goods which the Genoese
used to carry to Flanders, Normandy, and Bretagne,
whicn countries v/ould thenceforth be supplied with these
commodities from England. All that the Genoese mer-
* Amials of Com. i. 383.
t See Wheeler's Treatise of Commerce, pp. 10 and 14
and Macpherson, i. 397 and 560.
J
BRITISH COMMERCE. 151
chant asked, according to Walsingham, was, that ho
should bo allowed to store his goods in the royal castle
of Southampton. It is probable, however, that this was
only one of the minor features of his plan, which must
have been chiefly dependent for its success u])on the
resources and connexions of its author, the spirit with
which it was taken up and supported by the English
king, and the natural aptitude of the port of Southamjjton
to serve as a reservoir of the Oriental trade. As yet, it
is to be remembered, no direct trade existed between
India and Europe ; all the produce of the former that
found its way to the latter was procured by the mer-
chants of Venice, Genoa, and other cities of Italy, from
the emporia in the eastern parts of the Mediterranean,
of which the principal at this time were Acre, Constan-
tinoj)le, and Alexandria. It is not very obvious what
advantage the Italian importers were to expect from
bringing all their goods in the first instance to South-
ampton, instead of proceeding with them directly to the
continental mai'kets. Walsingham says it was expected,
if the plan had been carried into execution, that pepper
would have been sold in England at four pennies a
j30und, and other spices at a ])roportionably low rate.
Silk was now manufactured, and the silk-worm reared, in
Italy and other countries of the south of Euroj^e, and
little, if any, was brought from Asia ; so that spiceries
and fruits seem to have been the principal commodities
which were received from the eastern trade. The cargo
of a Genoese ship, which was driven ashore at Dunster,
in Somersetshire, in 1380, consisted of green ginger
cured with lemon-juice, one bale of arquinetta,* dried
gi'apes or raisins, sulphur, 172 bales of wadde (perhaps
woad), 22 bales of writing-paper, white sugar (perhaps
sugar-candy), 6 bales of empty boxes, dried prunes, 8
bales oi riscB (probably rice), 5 bales of cinnamon, 1 pipe
* Both Anderson and Macpherson quote this term from
the original statement iu the F^dera (vii. 233), without
either explanation or question. We have not been able to
discover the meaning of the word.
152 HISTORY OF
*' pulseris salvistri," the meaning- of which is unknown,
and 5 bales of bussus (probably fine Egyptian flax).
Some Genoese cogs and carracks, however, bound for
Flanders, that were seized on the coast of Kent in 1386,
are said to have been laden not only with spices, but with
wines, stuffs of gold and silk, gold, silver, precious
stones, &c. The scheme of the Genoese merchant with
regard to Southampton was put an end to by its author
being murdered in the streets of London by ai?sassins,
whom some English merchants are charged with having
liired, in the apprehension that his proposal was calcu-
lated to be injurious to their interests. It seems to have
been one of those bold designs wliich have more in their
character of the prophetic than of the practical ; it was a
conception that shot ahead of the age, and the attempt to
realise it at that time would probably, in the most favour-
able circumstances, have proved a failure ; but this selec-
tion of Southamjjton for a great European emporium in
the fourteenth century may be regarded as in some degree
an anticipation of the project which has been accom-
plished in the nineteenth, of bringing that place within
a few hours' distance of London by means of a railway,
an improvement which in course of time may have the
effect of turning the natural advantages of its position to
full account by making it one of the ports of the metro-
polis.
A few facts remain to be added respecting the com-
merce of Scotland during this period, in addition to those
that have already been incidentally noticed. The chief
seat of the Scottish foreign trade continued to be at Ber-
v/ick till the capture of that town by Edward I. in 1296.
A society of Flemish merchants, similar, apparently, to
the Teutonic Gildhall of London, was established in that
place ; they greatly distinguished themselves by the gal-
lantry with which they defended a strong building, called
the lied Hall, which was their factory, in the siege.
BervAick, before this catastrophe, is described in the con-
temporary chronicle of Lanercost as a second Alexandria,
for the number of its inhabitants and the extent of its
conmiercc. The sea, it is added, was its wealth ; the
BRITISH COMMERCE. 153
waters were its walls ; and the opulent citizens were very
liberal in their donations to religious houses. The cus-
toms of Berwick were rented from Alexander III. by a
merchant of Gascony for 2197/. 8s., a simi which would
in those days have bought about 16,000 quarters of
wheat. " By the agency of the merchants of Berwick,
the wool, hides, woolfels, and other wares, the produce
of Roxburgh, Jedburgh, and all the adjacent country,
were shipped for foreign countries, or sold upon the spot
to the Flemish company. The exportation of salmon
appears to have been also a considerable branch of their
trade, as we find it some time after an object of attention
to the legislature of England, and the regulation of it
entrusted to the great officers of the government. When
Edward III. wanted two thousand salmon for his own
use in the year 1361, he sent orders to procure them for
him at Berwick (then belonging to England) and New-
castle — no doubt the places most famous for them in his
dominions."* Berwick, however, never recovered from
the blow given to its prosperity by the destractive sack of
1296. In the middle of the following century we find
the Scottish pearls still exported to the continent. In
the statutes of the goldsmiths of Paris, drawn up in 1355,
it is ordered that no worker in gold or silver shall set any
Scottish ])earls along with oriental ones, except in large
jewels (that is, figures adorned with jewellery) for
churches. The Scottish greyhounds were also at this
time in request in other countries. " The trade of
driving cattle from Scotland for sale in England, which
has continued down to the present day," Mr. Macpherson
observes, " is at least as old as the times now under our
consideration ; for we find a letter of safe conduct granted
(12th January, 1359) to Andrew Moray and Alan
Erskine, two Scottish drovers, with three horsemen and
their servants, for travelling through England or the
king's foreign dominions for a year, with horses, oxen,
cows, and other goods and merchandise. "f An act of
the Scottish parliament in 1367 orders the strict levying
* Macpherson, i. 44G. t Ibid., i. 561.
VOL. I. H
154 IIISTOST OF
of the duties formerly imposed of forty pennies in the
pound on the price of all horses, and twelve pennies on
that of all oxen and cows carried out of the country.
Jioth corn and malt were often imported into Scotland at
this period i'rom England and other countries.
From Ireland there was now a considerable exporta-
tion both of raw produce and of manufactured goods.
In the records of the Exchequer for the first year of
Edward I. a notice occurs of some cloth of Ireland
having been stolen at Winchester in the })receding reign,
along with some cloth of Abingdon, and some cloth of
London called burrel. Mention has been made above
of the supplies of corn that appear to have been occa-
sionally obtained from Ireland. It seems to have been
exported to the continent as well as to England, till an
ordinance was issued in 1288, prohibiting corn and other
victuals and merchandise from being carried from Ireland
anywhere except to England and Wales. Yet, in 1291,
we find some Flemish merchants mentioned as being in
the ports of Waterford, Youghall, and Cork. In 1300,
■while Edward I. was in Scotland, the ])eople of Drogheda
sent him a present of eighty tuns of wine to Kirkcud-
bright in a vessel belonging to their own port ; and the
same year several cargoes of Irish wheat, oats, malt, and
ale Avere brought to him, and mostly by the merchants
of Ireland and in Irish vessels. In 1322, we find Ed-
ward II., when j)reparing to march into Scotland, giving
orders for 9000 quarters of wheat and other grain to be
sent from Ireland. By the statute 34 Edward III. c. 17,
passed in 1360, liberty was given to all merchants
and others, whether aliens or natives, to trade freely to
and from Ireland, on paying the ancient customs and
duties. " At this time," says Macpherson, '' there were
some considerable manufactures in Ireland. The stuffs
called soj/es made in that country were in such request,
that they were imitated by the manufacturers of Cata-
lonia, who were in the practice of making the finest
woollen goods of every kind ; they were also esteemed
in Italy, and were worn by the ladies of Florence, a city
abounding with the richest manufactures, and in which
BRITISH COMMERCE. 155
the luxury of dress was carried to the greatest height.
The annual revenue derived from Ireland, which amounted
to nearly 10,000/., gives a very respectable idea of the
balance drawn into that country by its commerce and
manufactures, though we know next to nothing of the
particular nature of them ; unless we suppose a great
part of the money to have been drawn from the mines,
for which, I believe, there is neither authority nor pro-
bability. ""^ This year King Edward understanding, as
the record in the Fcedera says, that there were various
mines of gold and silver in Ireland, which might be very
beneficial to himself and the people of that country, had
commissioned his ministers there to order a search for
the mines, and to do what would be most for his advan-
tage in the matter. The statute 50 Edw. III. c. 8 (a.d.
1376) makes mention of cloth called frise as being made
in Ireland, and also of cloth manufactured in England
from Irish wool.
The denominations and relative values of the different
kinds of English Money continued the same in this as in
the preceding period. The coinage had been greatly
corrupted, partly by clipping, partly by the issue of
counterfeits, in the early part of the reignof Henry III. ;
in consequence of which that king, in the year 1247,
called in the old coin, and issued a new penny of a dif-
ferent stamp. In the exchange a deduction of thirteen
pence in the pound was made from the nominal value of
the old coin, which occasioned great complaints ; but the
new coin was not depreciated, or made of a less quantity
of silver than formerly. The pennies of Henry III. are
very common, and there also exist silver halfpence and
farthings of his coinage. All the money was now made
round. It is also said that, in 1257, Henry issued a gold
coin of the weight of two silver pennies, which was or-
dered to pass for twenty pennies of silver. It was how-
ever soon recalled, on the complaint of the citizens of
London that gold was rated above its value, in being thus
made equal to ten times its weight in silver; and no spe-
• ■* Macpherson, i. 562, where the authorities are quoteJ.
H 2
15G HISTORY OF
cimens of this earliest English coinage of gold are now
known to exist.
Soon after the accession of Edward I. the country was
again found to be inundated with base or light money,
consisting chiefly of pieces fabricated on the continent,
and known, from their impresses, by the names of
mitres, lionines, pollards, crockards, rosaries, staldings,
steepings, and eagles, — some being imitations of English
money, others professing to be foreign coins. Various
laws were made both against the importation of this
counterfeit money, and against the clipping of the proper
coinage of the realm. The severity with which these
crimes were visited upon the Jews in particular has been
already recorded. Edward himself, however, in the
latter part of his reign began the pernicious practice of
depreciating the coin by dimini'shing its legal weight.
In 1301 he issued a coinage of pennies, of which 243
(instead of 240, as formerly) were coined out of the
pound of silver. In 1279 Edward had issued a new
silver coin in imitation of one which had been introduced
in France, being of the value of four pennies, and called
a gross or groat, that is, a great penny. This coinage
of groats seems to have been a small one, but some spe-
cimens are still extant.
No coins of Edward II. are certainly kno^^^l to exist,
though it is possible that some of those that have been
attributed to his father may be of his coinage ; for it was
still usual to omit on the legend the numerical distinction
of the king's name.
Edward III., in 1344, issued no fewer than six dif-
ferent ■ gold coins, — namely, by one coinage, pieces
marked with two leopards to pass for six shillings, others
of half that weight and value marked with one leopard,
and others marked with a helmet of half the value of the
last ; and, by a second, nobles of the value of six shillings
and eight pence, and halves and quarters of nobles. The
second coinage was made necessary by the refusal of the
people to take the coins first issued at the value placed
upon them. This king also carried the depreciation of
grandfather had done, by
BRITISH COMMERCE. 10/
an issue this same year of silver pennies, of which 266
were made out of the pound. Two years after he coined
270 pennies out of the pound of silver; and in 1351 he
issued a new groat to be current at the old rate of four-
pence, although it scarcely weighed more than three
pennies and a half even of his last diminished money.
There are two groats of Edward III., one with the title
of King of France, the other without. It is upon his
coins also that we first read the motto Dieu et mon droit
(God and my right), which was originally adopted in
allusion to the claim to the French crown. He also
coined half groats.
The coins of Richard II., which are nobles, half
nobles, quarter nobles, groats, half-groats, pence, and
halfpence, are of the same real values with those last
coined by his grandfather. It is sometimes difficult to
distinguish his silver money, from the want of the nume-
rals, from that of Richard III.
The Scottish money was deteriorated in the course of
this period to a still greater extent than the English ;
the parliament in 1367 having ordered that 352 pennies
should be made out of the pound of silver. It is sup-
posed that gold money was first coined in Scotland in the
reign of Robert II. (a.d. 1371—1390). There were
repeated coinages of money in Ireland ; but in 1339 we
find a species of coin of inferior quality, and apparently
of foreign fabrication, authorised to pass current in that
country, on the ground of the insufficient amount of good
money. These base pieces were called turncys, or
black-money, or sometimes black-mail, from the French
word maille^ anciently used for a piece of money.
Even the legal coins of this period are generally rude
in v.orkmanship, and by no means of uniform Mcight.
The standard of weight at this time was scarcely more
artificial than that which Henry I. established for mea-
sures of length, M'hen he ordered that the ell should be
as long as the royal arm. The statute called the Assize
of Weights and Measures, which is attributed, in some
copies, to the reign of Henry III., in others to that of
Edward I., states that, " by consent of the whole realm,
158 HISTORY OF
the king's measure was made so that an English penny^
which is called the sterling, round without clipping, shall
weigh thirty-two grains of ivheat dry in the midst of the
ear.'' This is the origin of the weight still called a
pennyweight, though it now contains only twenty-four
grains. The process of coining was equally rude. First,
the metal, as appears from an entry in the Red Book of
the Exchequer in the reign of Edward I., " was cast
from the melting-pot into long bars ; those bars were cut
with shears into square pieces of exact weights ; then
with the tongs and hammer they were forged into a round
shape ; after which they were blanched, that is, made
white or refulgent by nealing or, boiling, and afterwards
stamped or impressed with a hammer, to make them
perfect money. And this kind of hammered money con-
tinued through all the succeeding reigns, till the year
1663, when the milled money took place."*
* Leake's Historical Account of English INIouey, 2nd
edit. p. 77.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 159
CHAPTER V.
FROM THE ACCESSIOX OF HENRY IV. TO THE EXD OF THE
REIGN OF RICHARD III. A.D. 1399 — 14S5.
The rule of the House of Lancaster, with whatever
ultimate benefits it may have been fraught in this as well
as in other respects, could not, while it lasted, have
proved favourable, on the whole, to the interests of the
national industry, productive as it was of long and ex-
pensive foreign wars in the first instance, and, as soon as
they were ended, of the still more wasteful calamity of
domestic discord, bloodshed, and confusion. The reign
of the first of the three princes of that house, hoNAever,
was, after the two or three first years, a time of general
tranquillity both at home and abroad ; and during that
interval the trade and few manufactures of the country
probably flourished as much as at any former period.
Henry IV. appears to have felt the importance of pro-
tecting and promoting the commerce of his subjects ; or,
at all events, the public mind was now so much awake to
these objects that he could not aftbrd to disregard them.
The history of his government aflfords many instances of
his interference being called for and exerted to open new-
facilities for the intercourse of the kingdom with other
countries, or to obtain redress for injuries which his sub-
jects had sustained in their commercial dealings with
foreigners. Thus, in the very first year of his reign, we
find him granting letters of marque and reprisal against
the Earl of Holland, and issuing orders to his admirals to
detain all vessels and property in England belonging to
the people of Holland and Zealand, till the carl should
take m.easures to compel the payment of certain debts,
due by his subjects to English creditors. The same year
he summoned the governors of several of the Hanse
160 HISTORY OF
Towns and their protector, the Grand Master of the
Teutonic Order, to appear in person or by deputy before
his council, to answer the complaints of the merchants of
England, that they were not treated in those places so
well as the merchants from them were treated in Eng-
land, notwithstanding the ex])ress stipulations of the
treaty which secured to the foreign merchants the privi-
leges they enjoyed in this country. This dispute with
the famous association of the Hanse Towns, already the
most powerful commercial community in Europe, was
protracted through a long course of subsequent transac-
tions, which it is unnecessary to detail. The foreign
merchants alleged that they had more reason for com-
plaint against the English than the English had against
them ; that their privileges were infringed upon by the
corporations of London and other places ; that they were
subjected to the grossest impositions by Henry's custom-
house officers ; and that their ships had been repeatedly
attacked and plundered at sea by his subjects. In the
end, it seems to have been admitted that these represen-
tations were well founded ; for it was finally agreed, in
1400, by commissioners appointed on both sides, that all
differences should be settled by Henry paying above
30,000 English nobles to the Grand Master and the
magistrates of Hamburgh ; while the Grand Master, on
the other hand, v.as let oft' on the payment of only
7C6 nobles to the English sufferers. A new treaty was
then concluded, on the basis of mutual fi'eedom of trade,
and oblivion of past injuries. In case of any future out-
rages, the respective sovereigns bound themselves to
make satisfaction for the aggressions of their subjects ;
failing which, the sovereign of the party injured was to
have the right of arresting any subject of the other power
ibund in his dominions within six months after preferring
the complaint.* Repeated treaties on the same basis of
mutual freedom of intci'course were made in the course
of the reign with Castile, Portugal, Flanders, Britany,
and other countries. The growing importance of the
* r^Iacphersor/s Annals of Commerce, i. G2".
BRITISH COMMERCE. 161
foreign trade of England at this period is further indi-
cated by the frequent apphcations which are noticed as
having been made to Henry by those of his subjects in-
terested in particular branches of it for their se[)arate
incorporation, or, at least, the public recognition of them
as associated for a specific object. Thus, in 1404, the
English merchants trading to Prussia and the Hanse
Towns were empowered to elect a governor, who should
exercise a general authority over their body, and in the
settlement of disputes between them and foreigners.
Three years after, the same privilege was granted to the
merchants trading to Holland, Zealand, Brabant, and
Flanders ; and in 1408, to those trading to Norwav,
SM'cden, and Denmark. These governors of the English
merchants, whose functions somewhat resembled those of
consuls in modern times, appear usually to have resided
in the foreign country to which the merchants resorted.
It soon became customary to appoint such a governor for
every country with which any commercial intercourse
was carried on.
Some very curious notices of the productions and
commerce of the principal countries of Europe at the
commencement of the fifteenth century are found in the
recital given by the Byzantine historian, Laonicus
Chalcondyles, of the observations made by Manuel, the
unfortunate Emperor of Constantinople, who, in the year
1400, visited Italy, France, England, and other parts of
the \yest, to solicit the aid of the monarchs of Christen-
dom against the Turkish barbarians, now all but masters
of the imperial capital itself. The following abstract of
so much of the Greek writer's account as belongs to the
present subject is presented by the modern Historian of
Commerce: "The natives of Germany excel in the
mechanic arts, and they boast of the inventions of gun-
powder and cannons. Above two hundred free cities in
it are governed by their own laws. France contains
many flourishing cities, of which Paris, the royal resi-
dence, is pre-eminent in wealth and luxury. Flanders
is an opulent province, the ports of which ai'e frequented
by merchants of our own sea (the Mediten-anean) and
H 3
162 HISTORY OF
the ocean. Britain (or rather England) is full of towns
and villages. It has no vines, and but little fruit, but it
abounds in corn, honey, and wool^ from which the
natives make great quantities of cloth. London, the
capital, may be prefei'red to every city of the West for
population, opulence, and luxury. It is seated on the
river Thames, which, by the advantage of the tide, daily
receives and despatches trading vessels from and to
various countries."*
The establishment of Banks, which now began to take
place in various parts of Europe, affords an unquestionable
indication of the general extension of commercial trans-
actions. Bills of exchange, as already noted, had been
in use from the early part of the thirteenth century ; and,
at least by the beginning of the fifteenth, if not earlier,
the form in which they were drawn out, and the usages
observed respecting their negotiation and non-payment,
had come to be nearly the same as at the present day.f
Although, however, the origin of the Bank of Venice is
carried back to the institution of the Cainera degV Im-
prestiti (or Chamber of Loans), being an office for the
payment of the annual interest on the debts of the re-
public, in 1171, the Taula de Camhi (or Table of Ex-
change) opened at Barcelona, by the magisti'ates of that
city, in 1401, is generally considered to have been the
earliest European establishment properly of the nature of
what is now called a bank. The Bank of Genoa ori-
ginated in the establishment, in the year 1407, of the
Chamber of St. George, which at first, however, was
merely an office for the management of the debts of the
republic, similar to the Venetian Chamber of Loans.
The liilse notions on the subject of money to which we
had occasion to advert in the preceding Chapter, as hav-
* Macpherson, i. 611. The whole of the information
respecting these countries of the West, preserved by Chal-
condyles, has been collected and Avoven into a spirited sketch
by Gibbon, Decline and Fall of Kom. Emp. ch. 66.
t Copies are given by Capmany, in his History of Barce-
lona, of two bills of Exchange, dated in the year 1404,
ivhicli it is believed are tlie oldest that have been preserved.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 163
ing given rise in England to so much absurd and mis-
chievous legislation, were not yet corrected by the
enlarged commercial experience of the present period.
In 1402, we find the parliament enacting, in the spirit of
former statutes, that all merchants, whether strangers or
denizens, importing commodities from abroad, and selling
them in the country for English money, *' shall bestow
the same money upon other merchandise of England, for
to carry the same out of the realm of England, without
carrying any gold or silver in coin, plate, or mass, out of
the said realm, upon pain of forfeiture of the same, saving
always their reasonable costs."* There can be no doubt
that the main motive of this and other prohibitions of the
same kind was far more to prevent the purely imaginary
evil of the export of English money than even to pro-
mote the really desirable, however unwisely pursued
object, of the export of English produce or manufactures.
The law, however, entirely failed of its intended effect.
The statute of 1402 was confirmed the following year,f
with additional provisions for its more eftective execution
— a fact which is itself sufficient evidence that it had
proved useless, or been generally evaded ; but this new
attempt to compass an impossibility was not more suc-
cessful than the former ; for, in a few months after their
enactment, we find the principal part of the recent more
stringent regulations abandoned, and declared " utterly
void and annulled for ever," as having been seen by the
king and his parliament to be '' hurtful and prcjudicia!
as well for himself and his realm, as for the said mer-
chants, aliens, and strangers. "J From other recorded
facts, also, it appears that, notwithstanding all these pro-
hibitions, English money constantly found its way to the
continent, and was commonly current in every country
of Europe. Thus, when Eric, King of Sweden, in 1408,
bought the Isle of Gothland, with its great commercial
emporium of Wisbuy, from the Grand jNIastcr of the
Teutonic Order, he is stated to have jiaid for it in.
* Stat. 4 Hen. IV. c. 15. f Stat. 5 Hen. IV. c. 9.
X Stat. 6 Hen. IV. c. 4.
164 HISTORY OF
English nobles. So, on the settlement, as mentioned
above, of the differences with Prussia and the Hanse
Towns, in 1409, it was arranged that all the payments
on both sides should be made in the same coin, as if it
were a common European currency. On another occa-
sion, indeed — the payment of 100,000 English nobles to
the Duke of Burgundy, in 1431 — it is expressly noted
that the money was estimated at its current rate.*
A few years before the commencement of the present
period, all export or import of merchandise in any other
than English ships had been prohibited, under pain of
the forfeiture of vessel and cargo. f Like many of
the other mercantile laws of those times, however, this
first navigation act passed by the English parliament
seems to have been by no means strictly enforced. In
the documents relating to the quarrel with the Hanse
Towns and Prussia, foreign ships are repeatedly men-
tioned as being laden with goods M'hich were the pro-
perty of English merchants, and, apparently, exports
from England. Woollen cloth is the article that most
frequently occurs ; another is wine, which, however,
could only be legally exported under the royal licence.
A considerable trade was now carried on with Venice.
In 1409 permission was granted by King Henry to the
merchants of Venice to bring their carracks, galleys, and
other vessels laden with merchandise, into the ports of
England and his other dominions, to transact their busi-
ness, to pass over to Flanders, to return to his dominions,
to sell their goods without impediment or molestation
from his officers, to load their vessels with wool, cloth, or
other English merchandise, and to return to their own
country. This licence, which was often renewed, shows
us what was the nature of the Venetian trade with Eng-
land at this time. It was in part what is called a carry-
ing trade, one of its objects being the interchange of the
commodities of England and Flanders. The Byzantine
*vSee'these instances quoted with the authorities in Mac-
pherson, i. 619 and G23.
t 5 Kich. II. St. i. c. 3.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 165
historian Chalcondyles has recorded some particulars
respecting the commerce of Venice, in relating the visit
of the Emperor John Palaeologus to that city in 1438.
It is described as excelling all the other cities of Italy in
the magnificence of its buildings and the opulence of the
inhabitants. According to this account, twenty-two of
their largest vessels, under the command of the sons oi
the nobles, were employed in trading to Alexandria,
Syria, Tanais, the British Islands, and AMca. A few
years before this time, it was asserted, in a speech ad-
dressed by the Doge Tommas Mocenigo to the senate,
that the total value of the annual exports from Venice to
all parts of the world was not less than ten millions of
ducats. The shij^ping belonging to the citizens of the
republic consisted of" 3000 vessels, manned by 17,000
seamen ; 300 ships, carrying 8000 seamen ; and 45
galleys, of diiferent sizes, but carrying, in the whole,
11,000 men, or, on an average, nearly 250 each. In the
trade with England the balance was what is called against
the republic ; the money-payments made to England
amounted annually to 100,000 ducats — which was one-
fifth of the sum sent every year into Syria and Egypt,
the latter being probably very nearly the whole cost
price of the oriental productions imported by the re-
public*
Henry V. also began his reign by giving evidence of
his disposition to favour and encourage commerce. One
of his first acts was to confirm the privileges that had been
granted by his father and preceding khigs to the Vene-
tians, and to other foreign merchants. The splendid
illusion of the conquest of France, however, soon drew
off his attention from this as well as from all other sub-
jects of domestic interest ; and the history of his reign
furnishes scarcely a fact worth referring to for our present
purpose. It is to be feared, indeed, that the prosperity
which had been springing up during several years of
peace was now struck with a blight from which it did not
'" * Macpherson, i. 634, on the authority of Sanuto, Vite de'
Duche di Venezia, ap. IMuratori.
166 HISTORY OF
recover for many a daj^, and that every branch of social
industry in the kingdom paid dear for the glory with
which Henry's victories crowned the Enghsh name.
These victories drained the land both of men and of
money, and then spread among all classes of the people a
spirit of restless and impatient aversion to every peaceful
])ursuit. Still it appears, from the account of the
Treasurer for the year 1421,* that even in this anti-
commercial reign the greater part of the public revenue
W'as derived from the trade of the country. Among the
new articles of English manufacture, and occasionally, as
it would appear, of export, that now appear, may be
mentioned both gunpowder and guns. The manufacture
and export of guns are mentioned in a licence granted in
1411, for sending two small guns for a ship, along with
the king's great gun, to Spain.
The misgovernment and political misfortunes of the
greater part of the reign of Henry VI. probably did not
oppress and injure the commei'ce of the kingdom nearly
so much as the successful wars of his great father, which,
by the very intoxication they produced in the public
mind, dried up the spirit of mercantile industry and
enterprise, and carried off the whole current of the
national feelings and energies in an opposite direction.
The loss of France, which was accounted at the time the
great calamity and disgrace of the reign, was no loss to
the trade of England. Even the weakness of the govern-
ment did not operate so unfavourably as might be sup-
posed upon that interest, which was now strong enough,
if let alone, in a great measure to protect itself, or was,
at least, pretty sure of receiving what facilities it needed
in the shape of privileges or conventional stipulations from
the general feeling of its importance and the mutual
wants which bound one country to another. It is re-
markable, that in this age a free commerce was not
iinfrequently continued between two countries even while
their governments were at war, and treaties were made
between them in contemplation of this state of things.
* Printed in Rymer, x. 113.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 167
The trade between England and Flanders in particular
was so indispensable to the people of both countries, that
it was never long interrupted by any quarrel between the
two governments.
A very curious general review of the commerce of
Europe in the earlier part of the fifteenth century is
contained in a poem published by Hakluyt, called ' The
Libel of English Policy,' which appears to have been
written in the year 1436 or 1437.* We will extract the
most remarkable particulars that have any relation to
England, introducing, as we go along, a few notices
from other sources. In the first place, it appears, both
from this poem and from other evidences, that the
English wool of the finest quality was now superior to
any produced even in Spain, wliich had already long
been the greatest wool-growing country in Europe. It
is stated that, although the Flemings obtained the greater
part of their wool from Spain, they could not Uiake good
cloth of the Spanish wool by itself, but were obliged to
mix it with the English. In Spain itself, in making the
finest cloths, the mixture of any other wool with the
English was strictly prohibited by a code of laws drawn
up about this time by the magistrates of Barcelona, ex-
pressly " for the regulation of the manufacture of cloths
made of fine English wool,"! The cloths of England,
however, were still very inferior in fineness of texture to
those both of Spain and the Netherlands ; so that the
fine English wool was sometimes carried to those
countries, there to be manufactured into cloth, which was
then sent back to the English market. In the coarser
fabrics, on the other hand, the English appear to have
already attained considerable excellence ; for we find
imitations of English cloth soon after this mentioned
among the products of the looms of Barcelona.:]: Ac-
cording to the poem, whatever trade England had at this
time with Spain was all carried on indirectly through
the medium of the great Flemish emporium of Bruges,
'. * See Macpherson, i. 651. f Ibid., i. 654.
^ . :J; Capmany, Hi>t. de Barcelona.
168 HISTORY OF
that being the place to which all the Spanish exports
were sent in the first instance. These consisted of figs,
raisins, bastard wine, dates, liquorice, Seville oil, grain,
Castile soap, wax, iron, wool, wadmole, skins of goats
and kids, saffron, and quicksilver. With Portugal there
was a direct intercourse, which was already considerable
— wine, wax, grain, figs, raisins, honey, cordovan, dates,
salt, and hides, being among the commodities imported
from that country. A direct trade was also carried on
with the Genoese, who resorted to England in great
carracks, to purchase wool and woollen cloths of all
colours, bringing to the country cloth of gold, silks, black
pepper, great quantities of woad, wool, oil, wood-ashes,
cotton, alum, and gold for paying their balances. Europe
w^as now principally supplied with alum by the Genoese,
who had obtained from the Greek emperor, Michael
Palaeologus, the lease of a mountain on the coast of Asia
Minor, containing a mine of that substance, and where a
fort which they built became the origin of a town called
New Phocaea, after a city which had anciently stood on
the same site. Gibbon, however, appears to be mistaken
in asserting that the different nations of Europe, and
among others the English, resorted to New Phocaea.*
The alum was carried by the ships of the Genoese them-
selves to the ports of England, France, Germany, Italy,
Spain, Arabia, Egypt, and Syria.f In 1450, we find
Henry VI. making a purchase of alum to the amount of
4000/. from some merchants of Genoa, and afterwards
selling it lor twice that sum. J This transaction curiously
illustrates the manner in which trade was at this period
carried on by kings. The Genoese merchants Avere only
paid in part by the money which they received, or rather
which was promised them ; for the bargain Mas, that
their claim was to be discharged by the remission of that
amount of custom-duties upon the goods brought and
carried away by them : meanwhile, they were licensed by
* Decline and Fall of Rom. Emp. c. Ixv.
f See Macpherson, i. 637.
X Cotton's Abridgment of the Kolls of Parliament, p. 647.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 169
parliament to export from the south part of England any-
staple wares whatever, till the debt due to them should
be |)aid. Out of this permission they would, no doubt,
contrive amply to reimburse themselves for any sacrifice
they may have made in the price at which they had dis-
posed of the alum to the king. Then, on the other
hand, to the merchants to whom his purchase was imme-
diately resold by the king for ready money, and at so
immense an advance of price, the parliament also gave
what \A"as, we may be certain, deemed sufficient compen-
sation, in a grant of the monopoly of the wliole trade in
the article for the next two years — all persons being pro-
hibited during that period from importing, buying, or
selling any other ahmi. So that the king's profit of
4000/. was really extracted out of the pockets of his own
subjects, partly in the shape of an imposition upon all
consumers of alum, partly by the still more oppressive
method of an invasion of the equal rights of all the native
importers and exporters of that and every other com-
modity in which the Genoese traders dealt. The
Genoese soon lost their establishment of Phocsea ; but in
1459 they found new alum mines in the Isle of Ischia, by
means of which they were enabled to continue their
former commerce.
The balance of the trade of England with Venice and
Florence would seem, according to the author of the
' Libel of English Policy,' to have been what is called
favourable to the Italian communities; that is— con-
trary, as we have seen, to what other authorities assert to
have been the case, at least in so far as Venice was con-
cerned — it left a certain amount of money to be paid
every year by England. He complains that these
foreigners " bear the gold out of this land, and suck the
thrift out of our hand ^ as the wasp sucketh honey of the
bee." ^ Their imports, which were brought in large
galleys, consisted in spiceries and groceries, sweet wines,
apes and other foreign animals, and a variety of other
articles of luxury. In return for these, besides money,
they carried away wool, cloth, and tin, which they were
accustomed to travel to Cotswold and other parts of
170 HISTORY OF
England to buy up. They sometimes, it is asserted,
would buy on credit, and then sell the goods at Bruges,
for ready money, five per cent, under what they had
cost, for the sake of having the money to lend out at
usury during the interval before their payments should
become due. It appears, from some expressions of the
author, that at this time English merchants also traded
to Venice.
The English, according to this writer, bought greater
quantities of goods in the marts of Brabant, Flanders,
and Zealand, than all other nations together ; though
these marts or fairs were also frequented by the French,
the Germans, the Lombards, the Genoese, the Cata-
lonians, the Spaniards, the Scots, and the Irish. The
purchases of the English consisted chiefly of mercery,
haberdashery, and groceries ; and they were obliged to
complete them in a fortnight — a previous space of the
same length having been allowed them for the sale of
their cloth and other imports. The merchandise of
Hainault, France, Burgundy, Cologne, and Cambra}'-,
was also brought in carts over-land to the markets of
Brabant.
A trade to Iceland for stock-fish had been long carried
on from the port of Scarborough ; but for about twelve
years past a share had been taken in it by Bristol and
other ports. The author of the poem, however, states
that, at the time when he wrote, the vessels could not
obtain full freights. The Danish government in this age
repeatedly attempted to prevent the English from trading
to the coasts of Iceland.*
A curious fact is mentioned in this poem respecting
the people of Britany. The inhabitants of St. Malo
especially, it is affirmed, were still accustomed to roam
the seas as pirates, very little regarding the authority of
their duke, and often made descents upon the eastern
coast of England, jjlundering the country, and exacting
contributions or ransoms from the towns.
Among the documents in the Fcedera occur various
* See Macphersou, i. G29, 650, GG6.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 171
lists of articles ordered to bo purchased in England for
foreign potentates, or permitted to be exported for their
use without paying custom. One of these lists, dated in
1428, enumerates the following articles as then shipped
for the use of the King of Portugal and the Countess of
Holland. For the king, 6 silver cups, gilded, each of
the weight of 6 marks (or 4 pounds) ; 1 piece of scarlet
cloth ; 1 piece of sanguine, dyed in grain ; 1 piece of
blood colour ; 2 pieces of mustrevilers ; 2 pieces of marble
colour ; 2 pieces of russet mustrevilers ; 2 pieces of black
cloth of lyre ; 1 piece of white woollen cloth ; 300 pieces
of Essex straits lor liveries ; 2000 platters, dishes, sau-
cers, pots, and other vessels, of electrum (some unknown
substance — perhaps a kind of crockery) ; a number of
beds of various kinds and sizes, with curtains, &c. ; 60
rolls of worsted ; 12 dozen of lances; and 26 ambling
horses. For the countess, quantities of various woollen
cloths ; 1 2 yards of red figured satin ; 2 pieces of white
kersey; 3 mantles of rabbits' fur; 1^ timber of martens'
fur; and a quantity of rye, whole and ground, in casks.
All these articles, therefore, were at least to be now
purchased in England ; but it is probable that almost all
of them were also the produce or manufacture of the
country.
Another indication of the growing extension of the
commerce of the kingdom is furnished by the instances
now beginning to be of frequent occurrence of individuals
rising to great wealth, and sonietimes to rank and })Ovver,
through the successful pursuit of trade. The most re-
markable example of this kind of elevation is that of the
De la Poles, successively Earls, Marquises, and Dukes
of Suffolk, and eventually ruined by a royal alliance and
a prospect of the succession to the crown. The founder
of the greatness of this family, which shot so rapidly to
so proud a height, and filled for a century so large a
space in the history of the country, was a merchant ori-
ginally of Ravensere (supposed to be the same with Ra-
venspur, on the east coast of Yorkshire, now obliterated),
and afterwards of the neighbouring town of Hull, named
William de la Pole, who flourished in the time of Ed-
172 HISTORY OF
ward III. He was esteemed the greatest merchant in
England, and must have possessed immense wealth for
that age, since on one occasion he lent King Edward no
less a sum than 18,500/. Edward made the opulent
merchant the chief baron of his Exchequer, and a knight
banneret ; and in the course of that and the following
reign he was often employed in embassies and in other
important affairs of state along with the most distin-
guished men in the kingdom. His political employ-
ments and honours, however, do not appear to have
withdrawn him from commerce. His son Michael also
began life as a merchant. This was he whom Richard II.
created Earl of Suffolk, and made his lord chancellor,
but who was soon afterwards driven from office, and de-
prived of property, rank, and everything except his life,
which he saved by taking flight to France, in the sweep-
ing reform of the court by the king's uncle, the Duke of
Gloucester, and his " wonderful parliament." Michael's
son of the same name, however, was recalled, and re-
stored to his father's dignities a year or two before the
deposition of Richard : it was his son, also named Michael,
v.dio fell in 1415 at the battle of Azincourt. The uncle,
again, and heir of this last, William de la Pole, was the
celebrated Earl of Suffolk who commanded at the siege
of Orleans in 1429, when that place was relieved by
Joan of Arc, and who afterwards becomes more conspi-
cuous in the annals of the disastrous reign of the sixth
Henry, as the favourite of the queen, Margaret of Anjou,
through whose influence he was flrst created Marquis and
afterwards Duke of Suffolk, and made lord chancellor,
lord high admiral, and prime minister, or rather dictator
of the kingdom — honours, however, which only con-
ducted him after a few years to a bloody death. But
this catastrophe did not put an end to the still buoyant
fortunes of the family. Soon after the accession of Ed-
ward IV., John de la Pole, the son of the late duke,
Was restored by the Yorkist king to the same ])lace in
the first i-ank of the peerage to which his father had been
raised by the House of Lancaster ; and this second Duke
of Suffolk eventually married the Princess Elizabeth, the
BRITISH COMMERCE. 173
sister of King Edward. Their eldest son John, who
had Ijeen in 1467 created Earl of Lincoln, was declared
by Richard III. his presumptive heir, on the death of
his son Edward Prince of Wales in 1484; and a marriage
was also arranged at the same time between their daughter
Ann and James Duke of Rothsay, afterwards James IV.
of Scotland. But the family had now reached the sum-
mit of its greatness. In the change of circumstances
that followed the overthrow of Richard, the Scottish
marriage never took place ; and the Earl of Lincoln died
in 1487, a few years before his father, without having
enjoyed either crown or dukedom. To the latter his
younger brother Edmund succeeded, and was the last of
the noble house of De la Pole. lie was put to death
by Henry VII., in 1513 — his claim to the crown through
his relationship to the House. of York being, as is generally
believed, the true cause of his destruction. It may be
added, that letters as well as commerce were brought
near to the crown by the De la Poles, if we may dei)end
upon the common account ; for the first Duke of Suffolk
married Alice, daughter of Thomas Chaucer, Speaker of
the House of Commons, who is believed to have been
the son of the poet ; and she became the mother of John,
the second duke, who married the sister of Edward IV.
One of the greatest of the English merchants in the
reign of Henry VI. was William Cannyng, or Canyngs,
of Bristol — a name made familiar to modern readers by
the famous forgeries of Chatterton. Two letters of King
Henry, addressed in 1449 to the Grand Master of Prussia
and the magistrates of Dantzic, recommending to their
good offices two factors resident within their jurisdictions
of his " beloved and honourable merchant William Ca-
nyngs," are printed in the Foedera. On Canyngs's mo-
nument in the magnificent church of St. Mary lladcliff,
in Bristol, of which he was the founder, it is stated, that
on one occasion shipping belonging to him to the amount
of 2470 tons was seized by Edward IV., in which were
included some vessels of 400, of 500, and even of 900
tons. Canyngs was one of those merchants who took
part in the Iceland trade after it was extended beyond
174 HISTORY OF
its original seat at Scarborough ; he was probably the
first who brought it to Bristol. In 1450 we find per-
mission granted to him by King Henry to employ two
ships of whatever burden for two years in the trade to
Iceland and Finmark, and to export in them any species
of goods not restricted by law to the staple at Calais.
This licence became necessary in consequence of the
existing law which prohibited all English subjects from
trading to Iceland without permission both of their own
sovereign and of the King of Denmark.* Canyngs had
previously obtained letters from the Danish king, autho-
rising him to load certain vessels with lawful English
merchandise for Iceland and Finmark, to take in return
fish and other merchandise, and to make as many voyages
as he should think proper during a limited term, in order
to recover debts due to him in those countries. King
Henry's licence is stated to have been granted in consi-
deration of the good services granted to him by Canyngs
while mayor of Bristol — an office to which the great
merchant was elected by his fellow-citizens no fewer
than five times.
Another of the opulent commercial men of this age,
who is especially famous in story, is Richard Whytington,
the history of whose cat, however, must be held to be-
long to the region of poetry and fable ; for, instead of
being originally a poor scullion-boy, he was the son of Sir
William Whytington, knight, as is stated in the ordi-
nances of his college of St. Spirit and St. Mary, yet
preserved in the custody of the Mercers' Company of
London. Whytington was elected lord mayor of London
in 1397; again in 1406; and a third time in 1419.
During his second mayoralty wc find him lending
Henry IV. the sum of 1000/. on the security of the
subsidies on wool, hides, and woolfels, while one of the
greatest princes of the church, the Bishop of Durham,
advanced only 100 marks, and the most opulent of the
lay nobility that contributed, no more than 500/.f The
* By the stat. 8 Hen. VI. c. 2.
t SiQ the list of subscriptions in Rymcr, viii. 488.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 175
above-mentioned college was suppressed in the reign of
Edward VI. ; but another foundation of Whytington's,
his ahnshouse near Ilighgate, still remains a monument
of the wealth and munificence of this " worthy and no-
table merchant, the which while he lived had right liberal
and large hands to the needy and poor people," to make
use of the terms in which he is described by his exe-
cutors, in the body of rules established by them for the
management of the latter charity. Among the sub-
scribers along with Whytington to the loan to Henry IV.,
are two other London merchants, John Norbury and
John Hende, whose opulence appears to have at this
time exceeded his ; for they advanced the sum of 2000/.
each. Hende was mayor in 1391 and 1404; and both
he and Norbury were the founders of several churches,
colleges, and other charitable institutions. Another emi-
nent English merchant and mariner of those times was
John Taverner of Hull, who, in a royal licence granted
in 1449, is said to have, " by the help of God and some
of the king's subjects," built a ship as large as a great
carrack (that is, one of the first class of the Venetian
traders), or even longer, which the king directed should
be called the Carrack Grace Dieu — authorising Taverner
at the same time to take on board his carrack wool, tin,
lamb-skins, woolfels, passelarges, and other hides, raw or
tanned, and any other merchandise, in the ports of Lon-
don, Southampton, Hull, or Sandwich, and, on paying
aliens' duty, to carry them direct to Italy, from which
he might bring back bow-staves, wax, and other foreign
produce necessary for the country, to the great benefit
of the revenue and of the nation.* " The exemption of
an English subject," observes JNIacpherson, " from the
law of the staple, in consideration of the extraordinary
size of his ship, is a clear proof that no such vessel had
hitherto been built in England." Henry V., thirty or
forty years before this time, had built some dromons, or
large ships of war, at Southampton, such, according to
the author of the ' Libel of English Policy,' as were
* Eymer, xi. 258.
176 HISTORY OF
never seen in the world before, to match those which his
enemies the French had obtained from the Genoese and
Castihans. Three of these ships of Henry V. were
called the Trinity, the Grace de Dieu, and the Holy
Ghost. Another contemporary writer mentions two ships
belonging to the fleet Mith which this khig made his se-
cond invasion of France — one called the King's Chamber,
the other the King's Hall, — both of which were fitted
up with extraordinary sumptuousness. That called the
King's Chamber, in which Henry himself embarked, is
said to have carried a sail of purple silk, with the arms
of England and France embroidered on it.
To these instances of commercial opulence in England
in the fifteenth century may be added another of a mer-
chant of France of the same era, which is still more
remarkable, both in itself, and especially if we take into
account the then calamitous circumstances of tliat country.
Mr. Macpherson has drawn up from various sources the
following account of Jacques CcEur, " who, at a time
when trade was scarcely known in France, is said to have
employed 300 factors to manage his vast commerce,
which extended to the Turks and Persians of the East,
and the Saracens of Africa ; the most remote nations then
known to the merchants of Europe. His exports con-
sisted chiefly of woollen cloths, linens, and paper — then
the principal manufactures of France ; and his returns
were silks, spiceries, &c. But some say that his dealings
were chiefly in gold, silver, and arms. This illustrious
merchant was treasurer {argeniier) to the King of France,
and lent him 200,000 crowns ; without which he could
not have undertaken the reduction of Normandy. Being
senl» on an embassy to Lausanne, his enemies took the
opportunity of his absence to bring false charges against
him ; and the king, regardless of his multiplied services
and zealous attachment, abandoned him to their malice.
Though nothing could bo proved against him, in a trial
conducted by his enemies with acknowledged unfairness,
he WAS condemned, the 19th of May, 1453, to the
amende honorable, to confiscation of all his property, and
imprisonment. Having escaped from confinement by
BRITISH COMMERCE. 177
the grateful assistance of one of his clerks, he recovered
some part of his property which was in foreign countries ;
and, being aj)pointcd by the pope to coninumd a division
of his fleet, he died in that service at Chio in the year
1456."*
In this age, both in our own and in other countries,
commerce was not only carried on by kings and nobles
as well as by the regular merchant, but among the most
active traders were some of the higher clergy. In Eng-
land, indeed, it had long been customary for the greatest
dignitaries in the church to engage in mercantile pursuits.
Matthew Paris tells us that William of Trumpington,
abbot of St. Alban's, in the reign of Henry III., traded
extensively in herrings, for the purchasing of which at
the proper season he had agents at Yarmouth, where he
had bought a large house for fifty marks, in which he
stored the fish till they were sold, "to the inestimable
advantage," says the historian, " as well as honour of his
abbey." Frequent mention is made in those early times
of trading-vessels which were the property of bishojis
and other ecclesiastics of rank. Nor did these eminent
persons sometimes disdain to take advantage of very irre-
gular and questionable ways of pursuing their extra-pro-
fessional gains. One transaction in which two bishops
of Iceland figure the Historian of Coamierce does not
hesitate to designate as a scheme of smuggling. They
were in the habit, it seems, of requesting and obtaining
licences from Henry VI. for sending English vessels to
Iceland on various pretences, which have all the look of
being collusive arrangements between them and the
owners of the vessels for carrying on an illicit trade. f
Iceland, it may be observed, in passing, is stated, at this
time, to have possessed neither cloth, wine, ale, corn,
nor salt ; almost its only produce seems to have been fish.
Licences were often obtained from the English kings by
popes, cardinals, and other foreign ecclesiastics, to export
wool and other goods without payment of the usual
Macplierson, Annals of Commerce, i. G70.
t Ibid., i. G57 and 0G2.
VOL. I. I
178 HISTORY (3F
duties. The religious persons of aii kinds resident in
the country were not considered subject to the i)ayment
of custom-duties, any more than of almost any other
public burdens; and, taking advantage of this privilege,
the Cistercian monks had become the greatest wool-
merchants in the kingdom, until, in 1344, the parliament
interfered, and prohibited them for the future from prac-
tising any kind of commerce. The evil, however, of eccle-
siastical communities and iudividuals engaging in trade
long continued, in England and elsewhere, to defy the
edicts both of the temporal and the spiritual authorities.
Commercial legislation in England in the reign of
Henry VI. was still as short-sighted and barbarous as
ever, especially on the great subject of national jealousy
— the treatment of foreigners. In 1429 a law was passed
that no Englishman for the future should sell goods to
any foreign merchant except for readj^ money, or for
other goods delivered on the instant.* The penalty for
the violation of this enactment was to be the forfeiture of
the merchandise. The very next year, however, we
find the parliament complaining, that, because of this
ordinance, " the English merchants have not sold, nor
cannot sell nor utter, their cloths to merchants aliens,
whereby the king hath lost his subsidies and customs,
which he ought to have had if the said cloths had been
sold as they were, and were wont heretofore, and Eng-
lish merchants, clothworkers, and other the king's liege
l>eople, in divers parts of his realm, greatly annoyed and
endamaged;" whereupon, at the solicitation of the com-
mons, the lato law is so far relaxed as to permit sales at
six months' credit.f Some years after this, the wisdom
of the legislature displayed itself in another attempt of a
still stranger kind. In 1439 it was ordained that no
foreign merchant should sell any goods to another fo-
reigner in England, on pain of the forfeiture of the goods
so sold ; the reason assigned for this law being, that
' ' great damages and losses daily come to the king and to
his people by the buying and selling that the merchants,
* Stat. 8 Heu. VI. c. 2 4. f Stat. 9 11 n. VI. c. 2.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 179
aliens and strangers, do make at their proper ^viIl and
liberty, as by such buying and selling', which they use
together, of all manner of merchandises, any of them
with other, and also by covins and compassings that they
do, to impair and abate the price and valne of all manner
of merchandises of this noble realm, and increase and
enhance the pnceof all their own merchandises, whereby
the said merchants aliens be greatly enriched, and the
king's subjects, merchants denizens of the same realm,
grievously impoverished, and great treasure by the same
aliens brought out of this realm, the customs and sub-
sidies by them due to the king greatly diminished, and
the navy of the said realm greatly destroyed and hin-
dered."* Happy, says the Roman poet, is the man who
is able to tell the causes of things ! It is very difficult,
however, to understand this parliamentary logic, or to
see how either the consequences alleged, or any others
of a pernicious sort, could flow from London or any other
town in England being made, what Bruges, and Calais,
and other continental emporia were, a place to which
foreigners of all nations brought the produce of their
respective countries for exchange with one another, as
well as for the supply of the resident inhabitants. The
only eiFect of prohibiting the former of these two kinds
of traflic would be to prevent the foreign merchants from
bringing wath them so large a quantity of goods as they
would otherwise have done.
The calamitous circumstances of the last eight or ten
years of tlie nominal reign of Henry VI. — during the
greater part of which period the kingdom was almost
without a government, and the land a great battle-fiold--
could not fail to be keenly felt by the 'tender plant of our
rising foreign commej'ce. Although its growth v.ag
checked, however, by the storais with which it had now
to contend, it was already too strong to receive more than
a temporary injury ; and it began to recover its former
activity and prosperity as soon as some degree of tran-
quillity was restored. The reign of Edward IV. is
* Stat. 18 Hen. VI. c. 4.
I 2
180 mSTOKY OF
marked by many commercial treaties with foreign
powers, which are to be considered as evidences, not so
much of any pecuHar attachment to the interests of trade
in that prince — aUhough, as we have seen, it was a pur-
suit which he did not disdain to follow on his own ac-
count — as of the importance which it had now acquired
in the public estimation, and the manner in which it was
consequently enabled to comjjcl attention to its claims.
Such treaties were made in 1465 with Denmark ; in
1466 withBritany; the same year with Castile ; in 1467
with the Netherlands ; in 1468 with Britany again ; in
1475 with the Ilanse Towns ; in 1478 with the Nether-
lands again ; in 1482 with the Guipuscoans in Spain, &c.
The only one of these conventions that requires parti-
cular notice is that with the Hanse Towns, which was
concluded at Utrecht, after a great deal of negotiation,
by commissioners appointed on both sides. At this time
the great trading community of the Hanse comprised
nearly seventy cities and towns of Germany, which were
divided into the districts, or regions, as they were
called, of Lubeck, Cologne, Brunswick, and Dantzic —
the city of" Lubeck standing at the head of the whole
confederacy. Of the fiictories of the Hanse merchants
in foreign countries, four were accounted of chief dignity
— namely, those of Novogorod, in Russia ; London, in
England ; Bruges, in Flanders ; and Bergen, in Norway.
It is probable that, of these, London was the most an-
cient, as well as the most important.* The Hanse
merchants resident in and trading to London had early
received important privileges from the English kings,
which, however, had commonly been granted only for
short terms, and had of late especially been held upon
a still more precarious tenure than usual, and even sub-
jected occasionally to curtailment or total suspension.
The object of the present treaty was to remedy this state
of things, which was found to be fraught with inconveni-
ence to all parties, and to establish the Hanse factories
in England upon a foundation of permanent security. It
* Macpherson, Ann. of Com. i. G94.
BRITISH COMMKRCE. 181
was asfreed that all past injuries or complaints on both
sides should be buried in oblivion, and that a full settle-
ment of conflicting: claims should be effected by a pay-
ment to the Ilanse merchants of 10,000/. sterling, which
they consented to receive in the shape of customs re-
mitted upon their subsequent imports and exports. It
was also arranged that the king should ai)point two or
more judges, who, without any legal formalities, should
do justice between the parties in all civil or criminal
causes in which the Hanse merchants might be con-
cerned in England ; a similar provision being made for
the settlement of disputes involving the English residents
in the Ilanse countries. It is in this treaty, we believe,
that the first mention is made of the London Staelhof, or
Steelyard, which is described as a court-yard extending
to the Teutonic Guildhall. It was not, therefore, as has
been generally assumed, the same with the Teutonic
Guildhall, although both buildings seem to have eventu-
ally come into the possession of the Ilanse merchants, if
the latter did not originally belong to that confederacy.
The Steelyard, by the present treaty, was conveyed to
the Hansards by the king in absolute property, as were
also a court-yard called by the same name in the town of
Boston, and another house in Lynne, they becoming
bound to bear all the burdens for pious purposes to which
these several buildings were liable by ancient foundation
or the bequests of the faithful, and having full power to
pull down and rebuild, as they might find convenient.
The London Steelyard, or Steel-house, as it was some-
times called, stood between Thames-street and the river,
where there is a street still known by the name of Steel-
yard-street, a little to the east of Dowgate Wharf. The
name seems to have no connexion with steel, but to mean
the place where cloths, and perhaps also other goods,
were sealed or stamped.
Besides the gain which he made by his own com-
mercial undertakings, Edward IV. obtained large pe-
cuniary supplies at various times in the form of loans
from the merchants and mercantile communities both of
his own kingdom and of other countries. The amount
IS2 HISTORY OF
of these advances evinces the opulence which was now
not unfrequent among- the followers of commerce. In
the preceding reign, according to the statement in an act
of parliament passed in 1449,* the annual revenue de-
rived from the customs at the great staple of Calais,
which in the reign of Edward III. had amounted to
68,000/., had then fallen to 12,000/. ; under which state
of things the commons of the land, it is affirmed, were
" not enriched by their wools and woolfels and other
merchandise, as they were wont to be, the merchants
greatly diminished as well in number as in goods, and
not of power nor of comfort to buy the wools and wool-
fels and other merchandises, as they have done of old
time, the soldiers of Calais and of the marches there not
paid of their wages, and the town of Calais by default of
reparation likely to be destroyed." Within a few years
from this date, however, the merchants of Calais were
wealthy enough to lend King Edward what was a large
amount of money in those days. In 1464 he is stated,
in the Rolls of Parliament, to have owed them 32,861/.,
for payment of which they were assigned a yearly instal-
ment out of the subsidies on wool. He continued, how-
ever, to borrow largely in subsequent years ; so that in
1468 he was still owing them about 33,000/., a debt
which he increased the next year by 10,000/., borrowed
of them for payment of a part of his sister's portion to
the Duke of Burgundy. On many other occasions he
resorted for pecuniar}^ assistance to the same quarter.
Another quarter to which he repeatedly had recourse
was that of the famous Medici, the princely merchants of
Florence. Comines assures us that one of the agents of
Cosmo de' Medici was chiefly instrumental in enabling
him to mount the throne, by furnishing him at one time
with a sum of not less than 120,000 crowns. Florence,
we may remark, was now growing rich by the Oriental
trade, which had nearly left Genoa, torn as the latter
re{)ublic was by internal dissensions, as well as deprived
of all its possessions in the Eiist by the conquests of the
Turks.
* 27 Hen. VI. c. 2.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 183
Some documents, printed by Rymer, relating- to an
a])plication made to King Edward by some Spanish mer-
chants in 1470, for compensation on account of the loss
of several vessels and cargoes which they alleged had
been piratically taken from them by the people of Sand-
wich, Dartmouth, Plymouth, and Jersey, furnish some
information respecting the ordinary size of the trading-
vessels of those times, and the value both of the ships
and their cargoes. The ships in question were laden
with iron, wine, wool, raisins, liquorice, spicery, in-
cense, oranges, marfac, and a small quantity of cheese —
all the produce of the north of Spain. Tliey were seven
in number, of which one, called a carvel,* of 110 tons,
valued at 150/., and having wool, iron, &c. on board, to
the amount of 2350/. more, was bound for Flanders : the
cargoes of the others, whose destination was England,
were all of much less value. They were, a carvel of 120
tons, valued at 180/., with a cargo valued at 270/. ; a
sliip of 120 tons, valued at 110/., with a cargo valued at
190/. ; a carvel of 110 tons, valued at 140/., with a cargo
valued at 240/. ; a ship of 100 tons, valued at 107/. lO.s-,,
wdth a cargo valued at 457/. 106". ; a ship of 70 tons, va-
lued at 100/., with a cargo valued at 250/. ; and a carvel
of 40 tons, valued at 70/., with a cargo valued at ISO/.f
These statements may be compared with those in the
documents contained in a j)receding volume of the same
collection relating to the dispute with the Ilanse Towns,
Avhich was at length settled, as mentioned abo\e, by the
treaty of 1409. In the latter we find mention made of
a Newcastle ship of 200 tons, valued at 400/. ; of a cog
belonging to Hull, which, v.ith its cargo of cloth, was
valued at 200/. ; of another, laden with oil, wax, and
wcrke (?), valued at 800/. ; of a barge belonging to Fal-
mouth, laden with salt and canvass of Britany, valued at
333/. 6?. 8d. ; of another Yarmouth vessel, laden with
salt, cloth, and salmon, valued at 40/. ; of four vessels
* Carvel, or Caravel, from the Spanish Caraveht, is ex-
plained by Johnson to be a kind of ship, with a square poop,
formei'ly used in Spain.
t Foedera, xi. C71, G72.
184 lilSTOKY OF
belonging to Lynne, carrying cloth to the value of
3623/, 5.^. lit/., besides wine and other goods; and of a
crayer* belonging to Lynne, laden -with osmunds and
other goods to the value of 643/. 14-9. 2(/. ToM^ards the
close of the reign of Edward IV., it appears, from the
orders issued for the manning of the fleet on the break-
ing out of the war with Scotland in 1481, the crown was
])0sscssed of no lewer than six ships of its o\?n ; which
was probably the greatest royal navy that had existed in
England since the reign of William the Conqueror.
The foreign trade of the country, as one of its most im-
portant interests, occupied much of the attention of the
parliament called together by Richard III., in the first
year of his reign. ()f the fifteen acts passed by it, seven
relate to commerce and nianufactures. The subject of
the first was chiefly the fabrication and dyeing of woollen
cloths ; and the preamble slates that it had been custo-
mary for the foreign merchants in their purchases of
wool, to procure it sorted and jiicked, and to leave the
locks and other refuse — by reason of which, it is added,
there had come to be no manufacture of fine drapery in
England. To remedy this evil, it was provided that, for
the future, no wool should be sold to strangers cleaned
from the locks or refuse, or in any other state than as it
was shornf — an enactment conceived in the spirit of the
very inlancy and rudest barbarism of commercial legis-
lation. The next cha])ter of the statute, entitled ' An
Act touching the Merchants of Italy,' is very interesting
ibr the information which it incidentally furnishes re-
s})ecting the trade then carried on in this country by
Ibreign merchants. The preamble rc])rescnts, that mer-
* Crayer, Crare, or Cray, a small sea-vessel, from the
Old French, Crater.
" O IMelanchoIy !"
says Belarius, in ' Cymbeline,' —
^•' Whoever yet could soimd thy bottom ? fir.d
The ooze to show Avliat coast thy sluggish crare
Might easiliest harbour in !"
t 1 la chard III. c. 8.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 185
chant strangers of the nation of Italy — under which name
are included not only the Venetians, Genoese, Floren-
tines, Apulians, Sicilians, and Lucaners, or people of
Lucca, but also the Catalonians "and other of the same
nation," according to the fashion of speaking in that age^
which was to consider all the countries bordering on the
Mediterranean as belonging to Italy, — were resident in
great numbers both in London and in other cities of
England, and were in the habit of taking warehouses and
cellars in which to store the wares and merchandises,
they imported, "and them in their said warehouses
and cellars dcceivably pack, meddle (niix), and keep
unto the time the prices thereof been greatly enhanced,
for their most lucre, and the same wares and merchan-
dises then sell to all manner of people, as well within the
ports whereunto they bring their said wares and mer-
chandise, as in other divers and many places generally
within this realm, as well by retail as otherwise." An
extensive and active internal trade, therefore, was car-
ried on by these foreign residents : it is probable, in-
deed, that, besides their business as importers and ex-
porters, the greater part of the domestic sale of commo-
dities brought from beyond seas ^^as in their hands.
This is the second condition in the natural commercial
progress of a country ; first, its poverty and barbarism
invito only the occasional resort of foreigners, without
offering any temptation to them to take up their resi-
dence within it ; then, as its wealth increases, foreigners
find even its home trade an object worth their attention,
and one which they easily secure by the application of
their superior skill and resources ; lastly, in the height
of its civilization, and when the energies of its inhabit-
ants have been fully developed— in a great measure by
the impulse received from these stranger residents — its
trafhc of all kinds, as well as all the other business car-
ried on in it, naturally falls into the almost exclusive
possession of its own people. England, then, at the end
of the fifteenth century, was only yet making its way
through the intermediate or transition stage in this ad-
vance from having no commerce at all to having a com-
I 3
186 HISTORY OF
merce properly its own. The act goes on to recite, that
the foreign merchants not only traded in the manner that
has been described in the goods imported by themselves
from abroad, but also bought, in the ports where they
were established and elsewhere, at their free will, the
various commodities which were the produce of this
realm, and sold them again at their pleasure within the
country, as generally and freely as any of the king's sub-
jects, "And the same merchants of Italy and other
merchants strangers," it is added, " be hosts, and take
unto them people of other nations to sojourn with them,
and daily buy and sell, and make many privy and secret
contracts and bargains with the same people." They are
farther specially charged with buying up in divers places
within the realm great quantities of wool, woollen cloth,
and other merchandises, part of which they sold again
both to natives and aliens, as they found it most for their
profit, delivering a great part of the wool to clothiers, to
make into cloth "after their pleasures." "Moreover,
most dread sovereigii lord," continues the recital, "arti-
ficers and other strangers, not born within 3'our obei-
sance, daily resort and repair unto your said city of
London, and other cities, boroughs, and towns of your
said realm, in great number, and more than they have
used to do in days past, and inhabit themself within
your said realm, v.ith their wives, children, and house-
hold, and will not take upon them any laborious occu-
pation, as carting and ploughing, and other like busi-
ness, but use making of cloth and other handicrafts
and easy occupations, and bring and convey from the
parts of beyond the sea great substance of wares and
merchandises unto fairs and markets, and all other places
of your realm, at their pleasure, and there sell the same
as well by retail as otherwise, as freely as any of your
said su])jects uscth for to do, to the great hurt and im-
poverishing of your said subjects, and in nowise will
suffer nor take any of your subjects to work with them,
Ijut only take into their service people bom in their
own countries, whereby your said subjects for lack of
occupation fall to idleness, and been thieves, beggars,
BRITISH COMMERCE. 187
vagabonds, an<J people of vicious living-, to the ereat
trouble of your highness and of all your said reahn."
We need not transcribe the enacting part of the statute ;
its historical interest, and its value for our present pur-
pose, lie in the above })rcamble, which furnishes so full
and clear an account of the manner in which the com-
merce of the country was at this time conducted. The
evils, or supposed evils, so strongly comjilained of, were
of course attempted to be remedied by all sorts of restric-
tions on the operations of the foreign dealers — restrictions
which were one and all absurd and of mischievous ten-
dency, as well as, fortunately, in their very nature of
impracticable enforcement. Their almost avowed object
was to check the importation of foreign commodities of
all kinds. While shackles, ho\^ever, are imposed upon
the trade in all other commodities, it is interesting to
find an exception made in favour of the new-born trade
in books, the creation of the great art recently invented
of growing them as it were in crops, even as the mani-
fold produce of the corn-fields is rmsed from the scattered
seed. " Provided always," the statute concludes, '' that
this act, or any part thereof, or any other act made or to
be made in this present parliament, in no wise extend
or be prejudicial, any let, hurt, or impediment to any
artificer or merchant stranger, of what nation or country
he be, or shall be of, for bringing into this realm, or
selling by retail or otherwise, of any manner books
written or imprinted, or for the inhabiting within the
said realm for the same intent, or to any writer, limner,
binder, or imprinter of such books as he hath, or shall
have, to sell by way of merchandise, or for their abode
in the same realm, for the exercising of the said
occupations, this act or any part thereof notwithstand-
ing." *
Two other acts of this parliament continue for ten years
longer prohibitions passed in the preceding reign against
the importation of a great number of foreign manufac-
tured articles. Intervening between these non-im}X)rta-
1 Rich. III. c. 9.
188 HISTORY OF
lion acts is another of a directly 0})posite character,
ordaining that, for the future, along with every butt of
either Malvesy (Malmescy) or Tyre wine brought to the
country by the Venetians or others should be imported
ten good and able bowstaves. Formerly, it is alleged,
bowstaves used to be sold at 40s. the hundred, or
46s. fid. at most ; but now, by the seditious confederacy
of the Lombards trading to this country, they had risen
to the "outrageous price" of 8/. the hundred.* This,
it may be observed, was the second attempt that had
been made to remedy the grievance in question. The
way in which it was first attacked was more direct. In
1482 it was ordained that, whereas the bowyers in every
part of the realm sold their bows " at such a great and
excessive price, that the king's subjects properly disposed
to shoot be not of power to buy to them bows ;" there-
fore, from the feast of Easter next coming, no bowman
should take from any of the king's liege people for a
long bow of yew more than 3,9. 4d.-\ This was certainly
carrying faith in the virtue of an act of parliament as far
as it could well go.
Here, then, were two legislative modes of keeping
down prices. The last of the acts of Richard's parlia-
ment which it remains for us to notice furnishes an
example of a third. The evil against which this act is
directed is the high price of Malmesey wine — a public
calamity which is both pathetically and indignantly be-
wailed. Butts of wine called Malvesy, it is affirmed,
were wont in great plenty to be brought into this realm
to be sold " before the 27th and 28th years of the reign
of Henry IV., late in deed and not of right king
of England, and also in the same years ;" at which
time they held from 140 to 126 gallons a piece ; "and
then a man might buy and have of the merchant stranger,
seller of the said Malvcseys, by mean of the said plenty
of them, for 50s., or 53s. 4d. at the most, a butt of such
wine, he taking for his payment thereof two parts in
woollen cloth wrought in this realm, and the third part
* 1 Rich. III. c. 11. , t 22 Edw. IV. c. 4.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 189
in ready money." But now, the act proceeds to com-
plain, the dealers in these wines have, "by subtle and
cral'ty means," so contrived it that the butts of Malniesey
lately imported scarcely hold 108 gallons ; " and be-
sides," it is added, "they knowing, as it seemeth, what
cjuantity of such wine may serve yearly to be sold within
this realm, where they were wont to bring hither yearly
great quantity and plenteously of such wine to be sold
after the prices aforesaid, of their craftiness use to bring
no more hither now in late days but only as will scantily
serve this realm a year, wherethrough they have en-
hanced the price of the same wines to eight marks
(5/. 6s. Sd.) a butt, readi/ money, and no cloth, to the
great enriching of themself, and great deceit, loss,
hurt, and damage of all the commons of this realm."
The plan adopted for reformation of this inconvenience
was simply to ordain that the butt of Malmesey should
be again of the old measure. It seems to have been
thought that the old measure was the cause of the old
price, and that, the one being restored, the other would
Ibllow of course.
Little, it is ])lain, can be said in commendation of the
enlightened wisdom of any part of this system of com-
mercial policy. The various facts and statements that
have been quoted, however, all go to attest the actual
commercial advancement of the country in despite of
vicious legislation. The subject of trade is seen filling a
constantly enlarging space in the public eye ; and even
the misdirected efibrts of the law show hd^- strongly and
generally men's minds were now set upon the cultivation
of that great field of national industry.
In Scotland also, as well as in England, the manufac-
tures and commerce of the country appear, on the whole,
to have made considerable advances in the course of the
fifteenth century. It is recorded that the English vice-
admiral. Sir Robert Umfraville, in an expedition upon
which he sailed to the Frith of Forth in 1410, besides
plundering the country on both coasts of that arm of the
sea, carried off as prizes fourteen " good ships " laden with
woollen and linen cloth, pitch, tar, woad, meal, wheat,
190 HISTORY OF
and rye, in addition to many which lie burned.* This
shows that even in the earlier part of the present period
Scotland was by no means destitute of trade and shipping.
Some of the vessels taken by Umfraville, however, might
belong to foreigners ; the Lombards, in particular, accord-
ing to Fordun, already carried on a considerable Scottish
trade, and some of the ships in which they resorted to the
country were of large burden. The usual staple of the
Scottish continental commerce was at Bruges, in Flan-
ders. James I., in 1425, removed it to Middleburgh, in
Zealand ; but, on an embassy arriving the same year from
the Flemings, with concessions on some points as to which
the Scottish merchants had felt aggrieved, he agreed to
restore the former arrangement. In ' The Libel of Eng-
lish Policy,' however, written nearly twenty years after
this, we are informed that the exports of Scotland then
consisted only of wool, woolfels, and hides. The Scottish
wool, it is added, used to be mixed with the English, and
manufactured into cloth, at the towns of Fopering and
Bell, in Flanders. It seems to have been exported to
Flanders in Scottish vessels, which returned home with
cargoes of mercery, haberdashery, and other manufactured
goods of various kinds, among which are specified cart-
wheels and barrows. But the most ample information
respecting the commerce and manufactures of Scotland
during this period is supplied, as in England, by the- sta-
tute-book. A long succession of enactments relating to
this subject commences from the return of James I., in
1424 ; from w4ich date, it is worthy of remark, the Scot-
tish laws, which had been hitherto in Latin, are written,
with a very few exceptions, in the language of the coun-
try — an improvement which was not adopted in England
till more than sixty years afterwards. We can here, how^-
evcr, only notice, in their chronological order, a few
of the more remarkable particulars to be collected from
this source. In 1425 it was, among other things, or-
dained that the merchants returning from foreign coun-
tries should always bring back, as ])art of their returns,
* Stov,-.
BRITISir COMMERCE. 191
harness (or defensive armour), spears, shafts, bows, and
staves. The same pai'liament also passed a law for esta-
})lishinQ: a uniformity of weights and measures. From a
law of 1428, permitting merchants, for a year ensuing, to
ship their goods in foreign vessels where Scottish ones
were not to be found, it would appear that a Scottish na-
vigation act existed before this time, although no record
of it has been preserved. In 1430, a law was passed to
which the epithet of anti-commercial may be applied, or-
daining, that cloths made of silk, or adorned with the finer
furs, should not be worn by any person under the rank
of a knight, or whose annual income was less than 200
marks. This proves, however, that these expensive kinds
of dress were then well known in the country, and were
even in use among those who did not belong to the
wealthiest classes. This same year King James im-
ported from London for his own use the following articles
— which it may therefore be j^resumed he could not pro-
cure at home so readily or of so good a quality : — 20 tuns
of wine; 12 bows; 4 dozen yards of cloth of diiierent
colours ; 12 yards of scarlet ; 20 yards of red worsted ;
8 dozen pewter vessels; 1200 wooden bowls, packed in
four barrels ; 3 dozen coverels, a basin, and font ; 2 sum-
mer saddles, 1 hackney saddle, a woman's saddle v.ith
furniture ; 2 portmanteaus ; 4 yards of motley ; 5 yards
of morrey ; 5 yards of black cloth of lyre ; 12 yards of
kersey ; and 12 skins of red leather. These goods were
shipped for Scotland in a vessel belonging to London,
accompanied by an order of King Henry, securing them
from molestation by English cruizers.* In 1435 we find
James purchasing 30 fodders of lead from the Bishoj) of
Durham ; for the export of which, either by land or
water, on payment of the usual customs, an order was
granted by the English council. A law of the Scottish
parliament in 1424 had declared all mines to belong to
the crown that yielded three halfpennies of silver in tlie
pound of lead ; and Mr, ]Macpherson thinks that the im-
port of lead from England probably became necessary in
* Rymer, x. 470.
192 HISTORY OF
consequence of the check which this enactment put upon
the operations of mining. A scarcity of the precious
metals also seems to have been about this time felt, if we
may judge by a law of the year 143G, which enacted that
the exporters of native produce should give security to
bring home, and deliver to the master of the mint, a cer-
tain quantity of bullion for every sack of wool, last of
hides, or measure of other goods which they carried
abroad.
One of the most eminent of the Scottish merchants of
this age was William Elphinstone, who is regarded as the
founder of the commerce of Glasgow, as his son Bishop
Elphinstone, towards the close of the century, was of the
University of Aberdeen. Elphinstone's trade is supposed
to have consisted in exporting pickled salmon. Two
Scottish merchants, George Faulau and John Dalrymple,
repeatedly appear soon after this as employed by James
II., in embassies and other public business, along with
noblemen and clergymen. A law was passed in 1458,
prohibiting any person from going abroad as a merchant,
unless, besides being a person of good credit, he either
possessed or had consigned to him property to the amount
of three serplaiths — the serplaith being, according to the
common account, eighty stones of wool. Merchants
were at the same time forbidden to wear silk, scarlet, or
fur of martens, unless they w^ere aldermen, bailies, or in
some other capacity members of a town council. The
social estimation in which commercial men were at this
time held in Scotland may in some degree be gathered
from another clause of the act, which commands that poor
gentlemen living in the country, having estates of more
than 40/. a-year of old extent, should dress as merchants.
The dress of the wives of merchants, as well as their own,
w^as regulated by this statute : they are directed to take
especial care to make their wives and daughters be ha-
bited in a manner correspondent to their estate ; that is to
say, on their heads short curches, with little hoods, such
as aroused in Flanders, England, and other countries ;
and gowns without tails of unbefitting length, or trimmed
with furs, except on holidays. Further, as if it had been
BKITISH COMMERCE. 193
intended to discriminate the several ranks of the commu-
nity by so many different colours, like the enchanted fish
in the Eastern tale, while merchants were prohibited from
wearing scarlet, all hues excqpt grey or white were inter-
dicted to labourers on workins: days, and on holidays all
except red, preen, or light blue. So much may serve
for sample suiiicient of this fantastic piece of legislation.
Meanwhile, the growth of the trade of the country is
indicated by occasional notices of conuiiercial treaties with
foreign governments, — with England, with Denmark,
with Flanders, and other continental states. In 1467
various new restrictions were imposed, with what view it
is not easy to imagine, upon the pursuit of foreign com-
merce. It was ordained that no persons should go abroad
as merchants except free burgesses, resident within burgh,
or their factors and servants ; and that even no burgess
should have that liberty unless he was "a famous and
worshipful m.an," having at the least half a last of goods
in property or trust. Handicraftsmen or artisans, in par-
ticular, were debarred from engaging in trade unless they
obtained special licences, and renounced their crafts with-
out colour or dissimulation. These prohibitions look
very much as if they had been obtained by the influence
of the mercantile body, wishing to preserve the monopoly
of the foreign trade in their own hands. By another re-
gulation all vessels were prohibited from sailing to any
foreign country between the end of October and the be-
ginning of February. Rochelle, Bordeaux, and the ports
of France and Norway, are all mentioned in this act as
places to which the Scottish merchants were then accus-
tomed to resort. The regulation requiring every merchant
to be a burgess made an exception in favour of the nobi-
lity and clergy, who were permitted to export their own
goods, and import what they had occasion for, by the
agency of their servants. In Scotland as well as in Eng-
land many, both of the nobility and the bishops, had
long been accustomed openly to pursue trade as a source
of gain. In the beginning of this century, for instance,
mention is made of a vessel carrying two surpercargoes
and a crew of twenty men, which was freighted by the
194 HISTORY OF
Earl of Douglas to trade with Normandy and Rochelle,
and of another navigated by a master and twenty-four
sailors, and laden witii six hundred quarters of malt, of
which the Duke of Alban;^was proprietor.* In 1404
a richly-laden vessel, belonging to Wardlav/, Bishop of
St. Andrew's, was taken by the English. In 1473 an-
other, called the Salvator, the property of his successor,
Bishop Kennedy, being the finest vessel that had ever
been built in Scotland, was wrecked at Bamborough,
when the cargo was plundered, and the crew made pri-
soners by the people of the country, — an outrage for
which redress was soon after demanded by the Scottish
parliament, and which it was finally agreed should be
compensated by the King of England paying the mer-
chants to whom the goods belonged a composition of
five hundred marks.
Very few notices respecting the trade of Ireland occur
during this period. The exports from that country, ac-
cording to the author of the ' Libel of English Policy,'
were hides, wool, salmon, hake (a kind of fish), herrings,
linen, falding (a kind of coarse cloth), and the skins of
martens, harts, otters, squirrels, hares, rabbits, sheep,
lambs, foxes, and kids. Some gold ore had also lately been
brought thence to London. The abundant fertility and
excellent harbours of Ireland are celebrated by this writer.
In connexion with the subject of trade and commerce
it may be mentioned, that to the close of this period we
owe the first establishment in England of public posts for
the conveyance of intelligence. The plan was first car-
ried into efi'ect in France by Louis XI., about the year
1476, and was introduced in England by the Duke of
Gloucester (afterwards Richard III.), while conducting
the Scottish war in 1481. By means of post-horses
changed at every twenty miles, letters, we are told, were
forwarded at the rate of a hundred miles a day. Both in
France and in England, however, the ])ost in this, its ear-
liest form, was exclusively for the use of the government.
The English coins of this period were, with one excep-
* See Tytler, Hist, of Scotland, iii. 238.
liillTISH COMMERCE. 195
tion, to be presently noticed, gold and silver pieces of
the same denominations that have been already described.
Although, however, the names, and also the relative
values, of the coins continued unchanged, their positive
values, or the actual quantities of metal of which they
were formed, underwent a succession of diminutions. It
has been stated that, whereas, originally, 240 pennies
were coined out of the Tower pound of silver, weighing
5400 grains troy, Edward III. coined out of the same
quantity of silver 270 pennies ; thus reducing the quan-
tity of silver in each penny from 22^ to 20 grains. The
effect of this would be to depreciate the penny by the
amount of about one-third of a farthing, and the nominal
pound (which was still held to contain 20 shillings, or
240 pence) by about 6s. 6d. in our present money ; thus
reducing it from about 56s. Sd. to somewhat less than oOs.
The groats, or fourpenny pieces, afterwards issued by Ed-
ward III., carried the depreciation still farther than this ;
each of these cx)ins weighing only 72 grains instead of 90,
whicli they ought to have done according to the original
scale, or 80, which even the lately reduced rate would
have demanded. A shilling paid in these groats was
worth only about 2s. 3d. of our present money, instead
of about 25. 9^d., its original value ; and a pound paid in
the same coin was only about 46 of our [>resent shillings.
Such, then, were the values of the several silver coins
at the accession of Henry IV. That king, in 1412, de-
preciated the currency still more by coining the Tower
pound into 30 shillings by tale — that is to say, into S60
pennies ; the effect of which was to reduce the amount of
silver in each penny to 15 grains, and the value of the
penny to not quite ^d., of the shilling to about Is. lOkd.,
and of the pound to 11. I7s. 9d. of our present money.
The strange reason iissigned for this alteration was ' ' the
great scarcity of money in the realm," — as if money, or
anything else of intrinsic value, could be made more plen-
tiful by the easy process of cuttmg each piece into two.
The ordinance, which stands on the rolls of parliament,
however, betrays a consciousness that the ingenious expe-
dient was not likely to succeed. The new mode of coin-
196 HISTORY OF
age was directed to be tried only for two years ; and if,
at the end of that time, it should be found against the
profit of the king and his realm, then to cease. It must,
in fact, even then have been plain to all the world that
the measure, the evil effects of which had already been
repeatedly experienced, was nothing else than a robbery
of the public for the benefit of the royal exchequer.
Even to the crown, indeed, the benefit was only tem-
porary ; but this deeper truth may not have been so
clearly perceived. In the first instance, of course, and
for the moment, the base coinage was profitable to the
utterer. The different pieces coined by Henry IV. were
halfpennies, pennies, and groats of silver, and nobles, half
nobles, and quarter nobles of gold. In the last year of
his reign he reduced the quantity of gold in the noble
from its original amount of 120 grains to 108 grains ; in
other words, he diminished its intrinsic value by one-
tenth. Henry's gold coins exactly resemble those of his
predecessor, the only difference being the substitution of
the name Henricus for Richardus. His silver coins
are also principally distinguished by the name.
The values of the several denominations of English
money continued without further reduction during the
two next reigns. The silver coins of Henry V. are sup-
posed to be distinguished from those of his father by two
little circles on each side of the head, which are thought
to have been intended for ey let-holes, — " from an odd
stratagem," says Leake, " when he was prince, whereby
lie recovered his i'ather's favour, being then dressed in a
suit full of eylct-holes : from that time may likewise be
dated his extraordinary change of manners, which proved
so much to the honour of himself and the kingdom, and
therefore not an improper distinction of the money of this
prince from the others of the same name." * The story
in question, which is told at great length by Ilolinshed,
Speed, Stow, and other chroniclers of that age, is, briefly,
that, when the worst suspicions of the conduct of his son
liad been infused into the mind of Henry IV., the prince
• * Leake's Historical Account of English Money, p. 139. '
BRITISH COMMERCE. 197
regained his father's favour by appearing before him, and
offering the king his dagger, that he might, if he pleased,
take his life on the spot. On this occasion, it seems, ," he
was appareled in a gown of blue satin, full of small ey let-
holes, at every hole the needle hanging by a silk thread
with which it was sewed : about his arm he ware a hound's
collar set full of S S of gold, and the tirets likewise being
of the same metal." * But what particular part in the stra-
tagem this fantastic dress was intended to play does not
appear. The story looks at the best as if we had got only
the half of it ; but it is probably altogether an invention
of a later age, and, instead of having been the origin of
the eylet-holes on the coin, it is most likely itself the off-
spring of that device. Henry V. also struck various
French coins, among which were muttons (so called from
bearing the impression of a lamb, or Agnus Dei) of gold,
and groats, half groats, quarter groats, mancois, and petit
deniers, of silver. After the treaty of Troyes he coined
others called saluts, demi-saluts, blancs, &c., in the legend
of w hich he took the title of Ilaeres Francioe, or Heir of
France.
The English coins of Henry VI. are supposed to be
distinguished from his father's by the arched crown called
the imperial, surmounted with the orb and cross. He
also issued, as King of Franco, saluts, angelots, franks,
and nobles of gold, and groats, bliuiks, deniers, &c., of
silver.
The English money was again depreciated by Ed-
ward IV., who, in 1464, ordered the Tower pound of
silver to be coined into S7s. 6d. by tale, that is, into 450
pennies. The penny now, therefore, contained only 12
grains of silver, and its value was little more than Ihd. of
our present money ; that of the shilling was about Is. 6d. ;
and that of the nominal pound about 30^. Edward IV.,
in 1466, also struck two new gold coins, called angels
and angelots, from the figure of an angel on the reverse.
These were intended as substitutes ibr the noble and the
half noble, and were, like them, ordered to pass respect-
* HolinslieJ.
198 HISTORY OF
ively for 6s. Sd. and 3s. 4cL ; but they were considerably
inferior in intrinsic value even to the nobles that had been
struck since the last year of the reign of Henry IV. ; for,
instead of 108 grains, the angel contained only 80 grains.
It was, therefore, really worth little more than three-
fourths of the late noble, or exactly two-thirds of the ori-
ginal coin of that name. Henry VI. also, during his
short restoration to power in 1470, coined angels of gold,
and groats and half groats of silver, all after the depre-
ciated standards that had been established by Edward IV.
It is not probable that Edward V. coined any money.
The gold coins of Richard III. were angels and half
angels, of the same weight as his brother's, and bearing
Richard's cognizance of a boar's head ; his silver money
is distinguished from that of Richard II. by being a third
lighter.
The depreciation of the coin in Scotland during the
present period proceeded much more rapidly, and was
carried to a nuich greater extent, than in England. When
James I. returned home, in 1424, he found the real value
of the Scottish money very considerably less than that of
the English of the same denominations ; on which he
immediately got an act of parliament passed for restoring
the coin to the same weight and fineness with that of
England ; but it proved of no effect, — the depreciation
was carried farther and farther, till at length, at the close
of the present period, the Scottish coins were scarcely
more than one-fourth of the weight of the English. The
pound of silver, which had been originally coined, as in
England, into 20 shillings, was coined in 1424 into
37s. 6d. ; in 1451 into 645. ; in 1456 into 966'. ; and in
1475 into 1445. The value of the Scottish shilling at this
last-mentioned date, therefore, was little more than 4hd.
of our present money. We shall find, however, that it
afterwards declined to a much lower point than this.
BEITISH COMMKRCE. 199
CHAPTER VI.
FROM THE ACCESSTOX OF IIFXRY VII. TO THE END OF THE
KEIGX OF EEIZABETn. A.B. 1485 — 1603.
The present period was an age of great revokitions and
remarkable progress in the commerce and general in-
dustry, not only of this country, but of the world. But
in England especially the sixteenth century is distin-
guished from the fifteenth almost as the day is from the
night, in respect to the activity and advancement of the
nation in every field of exertion and enterprise where
those accumulated results are to be achieved that con-
stitute civilization.
The encouragement of the trade of the kingdom, being
an object in which he saw much profit to himself as well
as to his subjects, engaged much of the attention of
Henry VII. during his whole reign. It cannot, however,
be said that this sagacious king was much beyond his age
in some of the notions on which he proceeded in this
matter. His general views may be considered to be
explained in the speech which his minister, Cardinal
Morton, addressed, as Lord Chancellor, to the parlia-
ment which met in November, 1487. After having ex-
pressed his majesty's anxious desire to restore peace and
order to his kingdom by good and wholesome laws, — by
which alone, he observed, sedition and rebellion were to
be truly put down, and not by the blood shed in the
field or by the marshal's sword, — the eloquent chancellor
went on; — ''And, because it is the king's desire that
this peace, wherein he hopeth to govern and maintain
you, do not bear only unto you leaves for you to sit
under the shade of them in safety, but also should bear
you fruit of riches, wealth, and plenty, therefore his
200 HISTORY OF
grace prays you to take into consideration matter of
trade, as also the manufactures of the kingdom, and to
repress the bastard and barren employment of moneys
to usury and unlawful exchanges, that they may be, as
their natural use is, turned upon commerce and lawful
and royal trading." That is to say, commerce was to be
promoted by the destruction of credit ; for a chief branch
of commercial credit is the lending and borrowing of
money on interest, which is what is here called usury.
The next of the cardinal's recommendations also partook
of the twilight views of the time, — a twilight, however,
which the space of three centuries and a half that has
since elapsed has not wholly dissipated. After calling
upon them to take measures that the " people be set on
work in arts and handicrafts, that the realm may subsist
more of itself ; that idleness be avoided, and the draining
out of our treasure for foreign manufactures stopped ;" he
continued : — *' But you are not to rest here only, but to
provide further that whatsoever merchandise shall ^be
brought in from beyond the seas may be employed upon
the commodities of this land, whereby the kingdom's
stock of treasure may be sure to be kept from being di-
minished by any overtrading of the foreigner." So that
the old system of encouraging foreign trade by shutting
out foreign merchants and foreign commodities was still
the only plan that was thought of, and the sole end and
design of all commercial intercourse with other nations
was held to be, to take produce and manufactures out of
the country and to bring gold into it.
The conclusion of the chancellor's oration is worth
quoting for its curious argument, intended to prove how
the country would enrich itself by making the king as
rich as possible. " And, lastly," said Morton, " be-
cause the king is well assured that you would not have
him poor that wishes you rich, he doubteth but that you
will have care as well to maintain his revenues of customs
and all other natures, as also to supply him with your
loving aids, if the case shall so require. The rather for
that you know the king is a good husband, and but a
steward^ in effect^ for the public ; and that what comes
BRITISH COMMERCE. 201
from you is biit as moisture drawn from the earth, ichich
gathers into a cloudy and falls back upon the earth
again."* All this, too, however (only substituting the
government for the king, who in that age was the whole
government), is still the faith of many people in our own
day, when the spark of truth that lies in the heart of the
error, and has kept it so long alive, is hardly so con-
siderable a particle as it was in the circumstances in
which Cardinal Morton propounded his ingenious meta-
phor. The economical evil of a large diversion of the
public wealth into the hands of the government is not
that the money so paid over is absorbed or lost to the
public, as if it were bm'ied in the ground or thrown into
the sea ; in so far at least as it is expended in the country,
which nearly all of it usually is, it does undoubtedly de-
scend again to the sources from which it was drawn, as
the moisture that rises from the earth in vapour falls back
upon it in showers. The objection is, not that any part
of it is absolutely lost to the country, but that, as ex-
pended by the government, it is not expended so advan-
tageously for the interests of industry and production as
it would have been if it had been left in the pockets of
the people. There is nothing lost ; but there is not so
much gained in the one case as there would have been in
the other. The reproduction is less ; the accumulation
of the capital of the community does not go on so fast.
However, there may perhaps be a state of circumstances
in which it is for the general advantage that a portion of
the public wealth should be impelled by force in a certain
direction, for the sake of forming and maintaining some-
where a larger reservoir of capital than would otherwise
anywhere exist : the general rule may be that capital
should be allowed to ditfuse itself freely, because in that
M'ay the increase will, upon the whole, be the largest ;
but there may be an exception for tlie case of an early
society, which would labour under the disadvantasre of
having no capital but what was distributed in driblets
unless some system of artificial drainage were put in
"-■' Bacon's Henry VII.
202 HISTORY OF
action to collect a number of the puny rivulets into one
efficient stream. Even the rapacity of a king or a go-
vernment, whatever counterbalancing evils it may be
attended with, may in some sort answer this purpose ;
and Cardinal Morton's metaphoric logic, therefore,
though not the whole truth, in regard to Henry VII.
with his riches being but a cloud made for the refresh-
ment of his people, was not perhaps without a smack of
reason as well as of poetry.
Agreeably to the spirit of one of the chancellor's com-
mercial princii)les, the parliament now passed an act
against usury (3 Henry VII. c. 6), that is, against all
lending of money on interest, and took much pains to
provide against the various ways in which attempts were
likely to be made to evade the prohibition. The punish-
ment for ofienders was the annulment of the usurious
bargain, and a fine of a hundred pounds — " reserving to
the church," it was added, "this punishment notwith-
standing, the correction of their souls according to the
laws of the same." The objection to usury was in its
origin purely a religious feeling, derived from the general
antipathy to the Jews, the great money-dealers of the
middle ages.
In another of the acts of the parliament of 1487-8^
passed for annulling an ordinance of the lord mayor and
aldermen of London, prohibiting any of the citizens from
resorting with their goods to any fair or market out of
the city, there occurs incidentally an enumeration of the
principal places where fairs were then held throughout
the country, and also of the articles sold at them. The
London ordinances, if allowed to stand good, the Com-
mons represent to his Majesty, " shall be to the utter
destruction of all other fairs and markets within this your
realm, which (lod defend [forbid]; for there be many
fairs for the conmion weal of your said liege people, as at
Salisbury, Bristow, Oxenforth, Cambridge, Nottingham,
Ely, Coventry, and at many other places, where lords
si)iritual and temporal, abbots, priors, knights, squires,
gentlemen, and your said conmions of every country,
hath their common resort to buy and purvey many things
BRITISH COMMERCE. 203
that be good and profitable, as ornaments of holy church,
chalices, books, vestments, and other ornaments for holy
church aforesaid ; and also for household, as victual for
the time of Lent, and other stuff', as linen cloth, woollen
cloth, brass, pewter, bedding-, osmund, iron, flax, and
wax, and many other necessary things, the which might
not be forborne among your liege peo{)le," At this time
most purchases, except of articles of daily consumj)tion,
were probably made at these markets periodically held
in the great towns. The act attests the commercial pre-
eminence which London had now acquired, the country
markets, it appears, being principally dependent for their
supplies upon the resort to them of the dealers from the
capital.
Of several commercial treaties made with foreign
countries in the reign of Henry VIL, we may notice one
that was concluded with Denmark in 1490, being an ex-
tension of one that had been entered into the preceding
year. Among other regulations it was provided by this
compact that the English should freely enjoy for ever the
property of all the lands and tenements they possessed at
Bergen in Norway, Lunden and Landscrone in Schonen,
Dragor in Zealand, and Loysa in Sweden. At all these
places, therefore, there were English residents and com-
mercial establishments. The English settlers in each of
these towns, and wherever else there might be an}', were
to have full liberty, according to custom, to erect them-
selves into societies, and to elect one of their number as
governor or alderman to administer justice among them
according to laws agreed upon among themselves, the
Danish government engaging to supjjort his authority.
On the other hand, there is no mention of any privileges
to be enjoyed by subjects of Denmark resident in Eng-
land, from which we may conclude that there were no
Danes settled here. It also appears that all the trade
between the two countries was carried on in English
vessels. The only commodities specified in the treaty
are woollen cloths brought from England, and fish pur-
chased in Denmark, though mention is made of other
merchandise in general terms.
204 HISTORY or
Another important treaty of the same kind was made
the same year with the repubhc of Florence, which also
contains some things deserving of notice. In 1485
Richard III. had, on the application of some English
merchants who proposed engaging in the trade to Pisa,
appointed a Florentine merchant to be governor of his
subjects who might become resident in that city, or what
we should now call English consul there ; and from that
date in all probability is to be counted the commencement
of the trade to Florence in English vessels. From the
present treaty it appears that such a trade was now fairly
established ; and the English settled at Pisa are also
spoken of in such terms as should seem to show that they
already formed a considerable community. They were
to have a right to hire or otherwise procure houses for
their residence, and to form themselves into a corporate
body, with a governor and other officers according to
their own regulations ; and were not only to enjoy all the
privileges enjoyed by the citizens of Pisa or of Florence,
but were even to be exempted from municipal taxation in
all parts of the state except in Florence. For these ad-
vantages, it is true, they were to pay a good price ; for it
was stipulated by this treaty — which was to last for six
years — both that the English should every year bring as
much wool to Florence as had on an average been used to
be brought, and that no wool should be allowed to be
exported by foreigners from any part of the English
dominions, except six hundred sacks annually by the
Venetians. The treaty, therefore, secured to the Flo-
rentines as much English wool as they required, and of
course at no higher prices than they had been accus-
tomed to pay, unless their own demand should become
an increasing one — for, with neither a rise in the demand
nor a falling off in the supply, there could be no rise in
the price ; and it also tended to reduce the price of wool
in the English market by checking the purchase of it by
all other foreigners. This latter regulation, however, was
also of the nature of a monopoly granted to the English
shipowner — though at the expense of his fellow-country-
man, the sheepowner. ^
BRITISH COMMERCE. 205
The affair of Perkin Warbeck, and the encouragement
given to that adventurer by the Duchess Dowager ot*
Burgundy, had the cflect of interrupting for some years
of this reign the most important branch of the foreign
commerce of England — the trade with the Netherlands.
Henry first, in 1493, banished all the Flemings out of
England, and ordered all intercourse between the two
countries to cease ; on which the Archduke Philip, the
sovereign of the Netherlands, expelled in like manner all
the English subjects resident in his dominions. This
state of things continued for nearly three years, \^ hen the
interruption of trade '' began," says Bacon, " to pinch
the merchants of both nations very sore, which moved
them by all means they could devise to affect and dispose
their sovereigns respectively to open the intercourse
again. Wherein time favoured them ; for the archduke
and his council began to see that Perkin would prove but
a runagate and a citizen of the world, and that it was the
part of children to fall out about babies. And the king,
on his part, after the attempts upon Kent and Northum-
berland, began to have the business of Perkin in less
estimation, so as he did not put it to account in any con-
sultation of state. But that that moved him most w^as,
that, being a king that loved wealth and treasure, he
could not endure to have trade sick, nor any obstruction
to continue in the gate-vein which disperseth that blood."
At last, commissioners from both sides met at London,
and soon arranged a treaty for the renewal of the trade.
*' After the intercourse thus restored," adds the historian,
'' the English merchants came again to their mansion at
Antwerp, where they were received with procession and
great joy." All the while that the stoppage lasted, the
merchant adventurei-s, he says, " being a strong company
at that time, and well under-set with rich men, did hold
out bravely ; taking off the commodities of the kingdom,
though they lay dead upon their hands for want of vent."
This they must have done out of a ])atriotic zeal in the
support of the government, or perhaps they may have
been in some measure forced by the urgent solicitations
or threats of the king to incur the loss they did. The
206 HISTORY OF
treaty made upon this occasion M'ith the Flemings was
distinguished by the name of the " Intercursus Magnus,"
or great treaty.
The merchant adventiu'ers here spoken of by Bacon
appear to liave been the Company of jNIerchant Adven-
turers of London, an association which can be traced back
nearly to the beginning of the fourteenth century, and
which a few years alter this time (in 1505) was incorpo-
rated by royal charter under the title of the Merchant
Adventurers of England. Presuming perhaps upon the
aid they had afforded to the crown on this occasion, these
London merchants appear to have now made an attempt
to take possession of the whole foreign trade of the
country, by asserting a right to prevent any private ad-
venturers from resorting to a foreign market without their
licence. This gave occasion to the passing of an act of
parliament in 1497 (the 12th Henry VIL c. 6), which
aftbrds a general view of the foreign commerce of Eng-
land at that date, as stated in the petition, which the
preamble recites, of the merchant adventurers inhabiting
and dwelling in divers parts of the realm out of the city
of London. The petitioners represent that they had been
wont till of late to have free course and recourse with
their merchandises into Spain, Portugal, Britany, Ireland,
Normandy, France, Seville, Venice, Dantzic, Eastland,
Friesland, " and other divers and many places, regions,
and countries, being in league and amity with the king
our sovereign lord," where in their sales and purchases
every one used freely to proceed in the manner he
deemed most for his individual advantage, "without ex-
action, fine, imposition, or contribution to be had or
taken of them, or any of them, to, for, or by any English
person or persons ;" and in like manner they had till
now been used to have free passage and resort " to the
coasts of Flanders, Holland, Zealand, Brabant, and other
places thereto nigh adjoining, under the obeisance of the
Archduke of Burgoyne (or Burgundy), in which places
the universal marts be commonly kept and holden four
times in the year, to which marts all Englishmen and
divers other nations in time past have used to resort, there
BRITISH COMMERCE. 207
to sell and utter the commodities of* their oomitries, and
freely to buy again such thing's as seemed them most ne-
cessary and expedient for their profit and the weal of" the
country and \)a.Yts that they be come from." Now, how-
ever, " the fellowship of the mercers and other merchants
and adventurers dwelling and being free within the city
of London," had made an ordinance and constitution that
lio Englishman resorting to the said marts should either
buy or sell any goods or merchandises there, unless he
first compounded and made fine with the said fellowship
of merchants of London at their pleasure, upon pain of
forfeiture of the goods so by him bought or sold; " which
fine, imposition, and exaction," the petition goes on, *'at
the beginning, when it was first taken, was demanded by
colour of a fraternity of St. Thomas of Canterbury, at
which time the said fine was but the value of half an old
noble sterling {3s. 4d.), and so by colour of such feigned
holiness it hath be suffered to be taken for a few years
past ; and afterward it was increased to a hundred shil-
lings Flemish ; and now it is so that the said fellowship
and merchants of London take of every Englishman or
young merchant being there, at his first coming, twenty
pounds sterling for a fine, to suffer him to buy and sell
his own proper goods, wares, and merchandises that he
hath there." It is asserted that the effect of this imposi-
tion had been to make all merchants not belonging to the
London company withdraw themselves from the foreign
marts, whereby the woollen cloth, which was one cf the
great commodities of the realm, " by making whereof the
king's true subjects be put in occupation, and the poor
people have most universally their living," and also other
commodities produced in diiTerent parts of the kingdom,
were not disposed of as formerly, " but, for lack of
utterance of the same in divers parts where such cloths
be made, they be conveyed to London, where they be
sold far under the price that they be worth, and that
they cost to the makers of the same, and at some time
they be lent to long days, and the money thereof at
divers times never paid." On the other hand, foreign
commodities, the importation of which was now wholly
208 HISTORY OF
in the hands of the London company, were sold at so high'
a price that the buyer of the same could not live there-
upon — that is to say, could not retail them at a living
profit. " By reason whereof," the petition concludes,
" all the cities, towns, and boroughs of this realm in
effect be fallen into great poverty, ruin, and decay ; and
now in manner they be without hope of comfort or relief,
and the king's customs and subsidies and the navy of the
land greatly decreased and minished, and daily they be
like more and more to decay, if due reformation be not
had in this behalf," Although, however, the act seems
to adopt this representation as correct, it does not go the
length of putting down the privilege claimed by the
London company : the company, it would appear, was
too formidable for that ; all that was done, therefore, was
to limit the fine they should be entitled to exact for the
future to the moderate amount of ten marks, or 61. 1 3s. 4d.
To that extent the act sanctioned the hitherto doubtful
and disputed pretensions of the London merchant adven-
turers, and gave them so far a legal right of control over
the whole foreign trade of the country. We shall find
that the powers which they thus acquired formed a fertile
source of controversy and contention for ages afterwards.
An act of parliament made in 1504, to regulate the
importation of foreign silk (19 Hen, VII, c. 21), indi-
cates what branches of the silk manufacture were now
established in England, by prohibiting all persons for
the future from bringing into the realm to be sold " any
manner of silk wrought by itself, or with any other stuff,
in any place out of this realm, in ribbons, laces, girdles,
corses, cauls, corses of tissues, or points." All these
articles of knit silk, " the people of England," as Bacon
expresses it, " could then well skill to make." But the
importation of " all other manner of silks" was freely
permitted ; " for that the realm," observes Bacon, " had
of them no manufacture in use at that time." The
historian praises this law as having the stamp of the king's
wisdom and policy ; and it " pointed," he says, " at a
true principle, that, M'here foreign materials are but
superfluities, foreign manufactures should be prohibited ;
BRITISH COMMERCE. 209
for that will either banish the superfluity or arain the
manufacture." But where would be the liarm of having
the superfluity, even without the manufacture '? The
superfluity could not be brought from abroad without the
money to purchase it being- acquired by some species of
industry or other exercised within the realm. For the
encouragement of the national industry, therefore, the
acquisition of the superfluity by purchase comes to the
same thing with its acquisition by the introduction of the
manufacture. From the title of this act, " For Silkwo-
men," it may be inferred that the trifling branches of the
silk manufacture, consisting merely of knitting, that had
as yet been introduced into England were exclusively in
the hands of females.
In January, 1506, the Archduke Philip, sailing from
Flanders to Spain with his wife, now, by the death of
her mother, become Queen of Castile, was driven by
stress of weather into Weymouth, and found himself at
once the guest and the prisoner of the English king. On
this occasion a treaty was wrung by Henry from the
captive sovereign of the Netherlands which was called
by the Flemings the Intercursus Malus, or evil treaty,
by way of contrast with " the great treaty" of 1496.
The terms of the new arrangement, however, are now of
no interest ; it is sufficient to state that they -^^ere some-
what more favourable to the English merchant than those
of the former treaty.
A sort of charter of indemnity granted to certain Venetian
m.crchants by Henry in 1507, with the view of screening
them, it is conjectured, from prosecutions to which they
had exposed themselves by the advantage they had taken
of previous illegal grants made to them by the king, is
preserved in Rymer, and may be noticed as containing
an enumeration of the principal foreign nations then
carrying on trade with and in this country. The Vene-
tians are authorised to buy and sell, for ten years to
come, at London and elsewhere, in England, Ireland,
and Calais, woollen cloth, lead, tin, leather, &c., with
the English, Genoese, Venetians, Florentines, Luccans,
Spaniards, Portuaucse, Flemings, Hollanders, Brabanters,
K 3
210 HISTORY OF
Burgimdians, German Ilanseatics, Lombards, and P^astcr-
lings, and all other foreigners. The Scots and French
arc omitted in this list, probably because there were no
merchants of those nations resident in England, though
some trade was, no doubt, carried on with both.
A document of the following year, found in the same
repository, affords us a list of ^hat were then accounted
the wealthiest and most important cities and towns in
England— the security for the marriage portion of two
hundred and fifty thousand gold crowns to be paid with
Henry's daughter Mary, when it was proposed to marry
her to the Emperor Maximilian's grandson, Charles
(afterwards the Emperor Charles V.). On this occasion
the towns that became bound for Henry's performance of
his engagement were, London, Coventry, Norwich,
Chester, Worcester, Exeter, York, Bristol, Southampton,
Boston, Hull, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne.
The short space of time comprehended in the reign of
Henry VII. of England is memorable for the two greatest
events in the history of nautical discovery and of modern
commerce, — the achievement of the passage to India by
tho Cape of Good Hope, and the revelation of the new
world of America by the voyage of Columbus. Both
these great discoveries were made in the search after the
same object, a route to India by sea, which serves in
some degree to account for the two having been so nearly
coincident in point of time. Bartholomew Diaz returned
to Portugal from the voyage in which he had rounded
the southern extremity of Africa in December, 1487.
Some years before this date, however, Columbus had
conceived his more brilliant idea of reaching the oriental
world by sailing towards the west ; a course which, on
his conviction of the earth's rotundity, he calculated would
bring him to the eastern confines of the same golden
continent the western parts of which w^ere gained by
proceeding in the opposite direction. Among the various
states and crowned heads to which the illustrious Genoese
proposed the glory of his great enterprise before he found
a patroness in Isabella of Spain, one was our Henry VII.,
to whom he sent his brother Bartholomew in 1488. In
BRITISH COMMERCK. 211
his passapre to England, Bartholomew was captured by
pirates, plundered of everything, and made a slave.
After some time he made his escape, and reached this
country, but in such a state of destitution that he was
oblitred to apply himself to drawing sea-charts for a liveli-
hood, and for the means of procuring himself decent
clothes, before he could appear in the royal ])resence.
King Henry so far listened to his proposals as to desire
him to bring his brother to England ; and he was on his
way to Spain for that purpose, when, on reaching Paris,
he learned that Columbus had already set out on his
voyage under the patronage of the Spanish court. The
capture of Bartholomew by pirates, it is remarked by the
historian of our commerce, " thus turned out, mider the
direction of Providence, the means of preserving the
English from losing their industry and commercial spirit
in the mines of Mexico and Peru." Columbus sailed on
his memorable voyage, from the bar of Saltes, near Palos,
in Andalusia, on Friday, the 3rd of August, 1492, and
reached the island of San Salvador on the Tith of Octo-
ber. He afterwards discovered Cuba, Hispaniola, and
others of the West Indian islands: and on the loth of
March, 1493, he again landed at Palos, bringing back to
the astonished nations of Europe the tidings of his suc-
cess, in having reached what he continued to believe to
his dying day to be the eastern shore of the Indies — for
it \\as not till twenty years after this time, and seven
years after the original discoverer of the new world had
been laid in his grave, that the Pacific was first seen
from the mountains near Panama by Balboa. On the
25th of September, 1493, Columbus sailed from Cadiz
on his second voyage, from which he returned to the
same port on the 11th of June, 1496, after having disco-
vered the Caribbee Islands, Puerto Rico, and Jamaica.
Meanwhile, the spirit of enterprise in the new direc-
tion thus pointed out had spread among the navigators
and governments of other countries ; and on the 5th of
March, in this last-mentioned year, the King of England
granted a patent to John Cabot, or Gabotto, a Venetian,
then settled at Bristol, and to his three sons, Lewis,
212 HISTORY OF
Sebastian, and Sanchcs, authorising them to navigate the
eastern, western, and northern seas, under the English
flag, with five ships, and as many men as they should
judge proper, at their own sole costs and charges, to dis-
cover the countries of gentiles or infidels, in whatever
part of the world situated, which had hitherto been un-
known to all Christians ; " with power to them, or any
of them," continued the patent, " to set up our banners in
any town, castle, island, or contment, of the countries so to
be discovered by them ; and such of the said towns, castles,
or islands, so found out and subdued by them, to occupy
and possess, as our vassals, governors, lieutenants, and
deputies ; the dominion, title, and jurisdiction thereof,
and of the terra firma or continent so found out, remain-
ing to us." Henry characteristically added a provision
to the effect, that, out of the profits of their discoveries
under this charter, the Cabots should be obliged to pay
to him, after each voyage, one-fifth part, either in mer-
chandise or in money. He is, therefore, entitled to very
little credit for having promoted this expedition, in
regard to which he merely interfered to secure to himself
the lion's share in the results, without having contributed
anything to the expense of the outfit. The Cabots — at
least the father and his second son, Sebastian, the most
scientific and enterprising of the family, although at this
time only in his nineteenth year — sailed from Bristol in
the beginning of May, 1497, in a ship of their own,
called the Matthew ; " with whom," according to Bacon,
*' ventured also three small ships of London merchants,
fraught with some gross and slight wares, fit for com-
merce with barbarous people." On the 24th of June,
they discovered what they supposed to be an island, but
what appears to have been the coast of Labrador, in
about latitude 56°. From this point they are said to
have sailed northwards — in the hope of finding a passage
to India or China— as far as latitude 67^°. Then, from
an entry under date of 10th August, 1497, in the privy-
purse expenses of Henry VIL, of a donation of 10/.,
" to him that found the new isle," it is conjectured that
the Cabots immediately returned to England, To the
BRITISH COMMERCE. 213
country they had discovered they gave the name of
Prima Vista (First View), which, however, it soon lost,
having been since successively called Corterealis, from
Gaspar Cortereal, a Portuguese, who fell in with the
same coast in 1500 ; Estotiland, from its having been
supposed to be the country so denominated in the
(possibly fabulous) account of the voyage of the Zeni,
about 1350 ; New France, after Canada was taken pos-
session of and settled by the French ; New Britain, by
the English after their discoveries, in the early part of
the seventeenth century, along the coasts of Hudson's
Bay ; and by the Portuguese Labrador, or Tierra di
Labrador, said to be a corruption of Laborador (labour),
from some traces of cultivation which the part of the
coast they first saw seemed to present.
Sebastian Cabot appears to have made two more
voyages in the two following years, in the second of
which, taking a course declining towards the south, he
reached the Gulf of Mexico.* Columbus also, on the
30th of May, 1498, sailed from San Lucar de Ban-ameda,
on his third voyage, in which he discovered the island of
Trinidad and the country adjacent to the mouths of
the Orinoco — his first view of the American continent,
the northern coast of which, as we have just seen, had
been reached about a year before by the Cabots. And
contemporaneously with these voyages towards the west,
by the Spanish and English navigators, those of Portugal
were prosecuting the passage towards the e^st around the
extremity of Africa, which had been laid open by
Bartholomew Diaz. On the 8th of July, 1497, Vasco
de Gama sailed from the Tagus on the first voyage by
that route to India, the western coast of which, at Cali-
* In the notice of Remarkable Occurrences in the reign
of Henry VII., in Rennet's Complete History, it is said,
without any authority being given, that, in the seventeenth
year of the reign, Sebastian Cabot brought three Indians
hito England, who were clothed in beasts' skins, and eat
raw flesh. " Two of them," it is added, " were seen two
years after, dressed like Englishmen, and not to be distin-
guished from them."
214 HISTORY OF
cut, in Malabar, he reached on the 22nd of May, 1498.
Gania returned to Lisbon in September, 1499. Finally,
in the following year, 1 500, the coast of Brazil was acci-
dentally discovered, by the Portuguese admiral, Pedro
Alvarez de Cabral, being driven upon it by a storm,
while following the course of Gama to Calicut, at the
head of a fleet of thirteen ships, carrying a force to effect
a settlement in Malabar — a circumstance, as has been
remarked, which shows that America, even if Columbus
had never existed, could not possibly have long remained
concealed after the Portuguese began to navigate the
southern part of the Atlantic Ocean.
Bacon states that, besides the patent to the Cabots,
Henry, " again, in the sixteenth year of his reign (1500),
and likewise in the eighteenth (1502), granted forth new
commissions for the discovery and investing of unknown
lands." The commission ot" 1500 has not been pre-
served ; but that of 1502 is in Rymer, and it refers to
the former as having been granted to Hugh Elliot and
Thomas Ashurst, merchants of Bristol ; to John Gun-
salus and Francis Fernandus, natives of Portugal ; and
also to Richard Ward, John Thomas, and John Fernan-
dus. In the second licence the three last names are left
out. In other respects the licence is nearly of the same
tenor with that granted some years before to the Cabots,
except that it forbids the adventurers to concern them-
selves with or to offer to molest such heathen and infidel
countries as were already discovered and reduced to the
obedience of the King of Portugal, or of any other prince
the friend or ally of the king. This was all the respect
that Henry chose to pay to the famous award of Pope
Alexander VI. in 1493, by which, drawing a line from
pole to pole through the middle of the Atlantic and the
southern continent of the new world, he bestowed all the
countries that should be discovered to the west of that
boundary on the King of Spain, and all those to the
east of it on the King of Portugal. None of these ex-
peditions of discovery, however, patronised (if that term
can be used) by Henry, were attended with any success
— the natural consequence of the parsimony which made
BRITISH COMiMERCE. 215
him refuse all pecuniary assistance to the adventurers,
who were all apj)arently as ill able as projectors usually
are to prosecute their ingenious schemes from their own
resources. This very wary king was not to be induced
to spend his money even in taking possession of a new
country when it was discovered for him ; no attempt
seems to have been made to turn to account the discovery
of North America by the Cabots ; and, as for the other
adventurers he afterwards sent forth, none of them is
recorded to have ever caught a glimpse of anything new
in the shape of either continent or isle.
The more easy intercourse opened with India, by the
discovery of the passage round the Cape of Good Hope,
produced almost immediately considerable changes in the
current of European commerce. The Venetians, bring-
ing home the spices and other productions of the East by
land carriage, soon found themselves unable to compete
with their rivals, the Portuguese, now enjoying the ad-
vantxige of the much cheaper conveyance by sea ; and
Lisbon became what Venice had been— the great source
of the supply of these commodities, and the resort of
traders from every part of Europe. The Lisbon mer-
chants also carried the productions of India in so much
larger quantities than had ever before been known to the
great intermediate mart of Antwerp, that the wealth and
grandeur of the latter city also may be said to have com-
menced with this date. The reduction of price so j)ro-
digiously extended the consumption of these commodities
all over Europe, that they now formed one of the chief
branches of the Antwerp trade. The Italian historian of
the Low Countries, Ludovico Cuicciardini, writing not
long after the middle of the sixteenth century, calculates
that the value of the spices alone brought to Antwerp
from Lisbon exceeded a million of crowns yearly. Tempted
by the new trade, many German and other foreign mer-
chants came to settle at Antwerp, and to contribute to its
rising fortunes the aid of their resources and enterprise.
Marked effects, also, were not long in beginning to
flow from the discovery of America and the West Indies.
Herrera, the historitm of the Spanish Indies, relates that,
216 HISTORY OF
a few years after the commencement of the sixteenth
century, the gold brought home by the Spaniards from
Hispaniohx amounted annually to about 460,000 pieces
of eight, or above 100,000/. sterling. This, however,
was an influx of wealth which did not tend to invigorate
the nation that received it, or to give life to its industry,
like that gathered by the busy hand of commerce. But
the import of the cotton, sugar, ginger, and other pro-
ductions of her West Indian possessions, also created a
new branch of trade which Spain monopolised, and
which gave employment to a considerable quantity of
shipping.
In the benefit of all these new channels, along which
the productions of distant parts of the earth were made
to flow towards Europe, the English, though they had
not yet embarked in the trade either to the cast or to the
west, could not fail indirectly to share. Accordingly, we
find our historians testifying to the decided augmentation
of the wealth of the country, and the more general diifu-
sion of luxuries among all classes, in the course of the
reign of Henry VII. Some of them, indeed, ascribe the
improvement chiefly, or in great part, to the active en-
couragement given by that king to commercial enterprise.
" This good prince," says Hall, the chronicler, " by his
high policy, marvellously enriched his realm and himself,
and left his subjects in high wealth and prosperity, as is
apparent by the great abundance of gold and silver yearly
brought into the realm, in plate, money, and bullion, by
merchants passing and repassing, to whom the king, of
his own goods, lent money largely, without any gain or
profit, to the intent that merchandise, being of all crafts
the chief art, and to all men both most profitable and
necessary, might be the more plentifuller used, haunted,
and employed in his realms and dominions." The latter
part of this statement (which is translated from Polydore
Virgil) may warrant some scepticism ; but it is possible
that, seeing the taking of interest was forbidden by the
law, Henry may have sometimes advanceti money, on
good security, to assist in adventures, of vA'hich he was
merely to have his corresponding- share in the profits.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 217
The increase of the foreign trade of the country, and
of the wealth of the people and their command over the
conveniences and luxm'ies of life, proceeded at an accele-
rated rate during the early part of the next reign. Of
this there are various indications both in the notices of
the chroniclers and in the pages of the Statute-book. An
act, for instance, of 1512 (4 Henry VIII. c. 6), for
regulating the sealing or stamping at the Custom-house
of cloths of gold and silver, of " bawdekin," velvet,
damask, satin, sarcenet, " tartron," camblet, and every
other cloth of silk and gold brought from beyond the
seas, incidentally mentions that it was not unusual for
3000 or 4000 pieces of these fabrics to be brought over
in one ship. Most of the artificers of the more costly
description of articles, and also many of the persons who
traded in these and other commodities, appear still to
have been foreigners settled in England ; and from the
details that are given of a great insurrection of the native
Londoners on May-day, 1517, against these strangers,
we have some curious particulars of the branches of in-
dustry then carried on in the capital. The pojjular
complaints against the foreigners were, according to Hall,
" that there were such numbers of them employed as
artificers that the English merchants had little to do by
reason the merchant strangers bring in all silks, cloths of
gold, wine, oil, iron, &c., that no man almost buyeth of
an Englishman ; they also export so much wool, tin, and
lead, that English adventurers can have no living ; that
foreigners compass the city round about, in Southwark,
Westminster, Temple Bar, Ilolbom, St. iSIartin's [Le
Grand], St. John's Street, Aldgato, Tower Hill, and St.
Catherine's ; and they forestall the market, so that no
good thing for them cometh to the market ; which are
the causes that Englishmen want and starve, whilst
foicjgners live in abundance and pleasure." The im-
portation of various articles from abroad, that interfered
with home produce and manufactures, was also loudly
cried out against ; the Dutchmen in particular, it was
asserted, brought over " iron, timber, and leather, ready
manufactured, and nails, locks, baskets, cupboards, stools,
218 HISTORY OF
tables, chests, girdles, saddles, and painted cloths."
This proved a very serious tumult. Its chief instigator
was one John Lincoln, styled a broker, by whom a Dr.
Bell, a canon of the Spital, was prevailed upon in the
first instance to read from fhe pulpit at the Spital, upon
the Tuesday in Etister week, a bill or written detail of
the, popular grievances, and to follow up that text with
a sermon, well adapted to blow the feelings it had
kindled into a blaze. " Ccelumcceli Domino," he began,
'' terram autem dedit filiis hominum :" — " the heavens
to the Lord of heaven, but the earth he hath given to
the children of men." " And then he showed," says
the chronicler, '* how this land was given to English-
men ; and, as birds defend their nests, so ought English-
inen to cherish and maintain themselves, and to hurt and
grieve aliens, for respect of their commonwealth." It
now began to be whispered about that, on the coming
1st of May, there was to be a general massacre of the
foreigners ; in terror of which, many of the latter left the
<city. On this coming to the cars of the council, Wolsey
sent for the lord mayor on May-eve, and ordered him to
take measures to preserve the peace ; whereupon a meet-
ing of the aldermen was held ; and, about half- past eight,
■each sent to his ward directing that no man after nine
o'clock should stir out of his house, but keep his doors
shut, and his servants within, until nine o'clock in the
morning. " After this command was given in the
evening," proceeds the account, " as Sir John Mundy,
iilderman, came from his \Aard, he found two young men
in Cheaj), playing at the bucklers, and a great many
joung men looking on them — for the command seemed
to be scarcely j3ublished. He ordered them to leave oti";
and because one of them asked ' Why V ' he would have
them sent to the Compter. ]3ut the prentices resisted
the alderman, taking the young man from him, and cried,
* Prentices ! Prentices ! Clubs ! Clubs ! ' Then out of
every door came clubs and other weapons, so that the
idderman was put to flight. Then more people came out
-of every quarter, and forth came serving-men, watermen,
*^ourtiers, and others ; so that by eleven o'clock there were
BRITISH COMMERCE. 'J 19
in Cheap six or seven hundred ; and out of St. Paul's
churchyard came about tliree hundred." Then, while
the rioters continued to receive accessions from all
quarters, they proceeded to the Compter and Newgate,
broke open both prisons, and took out some persons that
had been committed for attacks on foreigners during the
preceding few days. The mayor and sheriffs to no pur-
pose made proclamation in the king's name ; the mob
soon fell from breaking open the prisons to plundering
private houses, especially those of foreigners, and seeking
for the owners, none of whom however they found, to
strike off their heads. But at last, towards three o'clock
in the morning, they began to return home, and then
about three hundred of them were intercepted by the
authorities, and sent to the Tower, Newgate, and the
Compters. In the height of the disturbance matters had
looked so serious that Sir Roger Cholmeley, the Lieuten-
ant of the Tower, had thought it necessary to fire off
several pieces of ordnance against the city, which, how-
ever, did not do much damage. A few days after a
number of the rioters were brought to trial, and, being-
found guilty, were condemned to be drawn, hanged, and
quartered ; *' for execution whereof ten pairs of gallows
were set up in divers parts of the city, as at Aldgate,
Blanchapleton, Grass-street, Leadenhall, before each of
the Compters, at Newgate, St. Martin's, at Aldersgate,
and Bishopgate ; and these gallows were set upon
wheels, to be removed from street to street, and from
door to door, as the prisoners were to be executed."
But, in the end, only Lincoln suffered ; he was hanged
on the 7th of May at the standard in Cheapside. About
a fortnight after a general pardon was granted to the rest
by the king, and the citizens were again received into
favour; " though, as it is thought," concludes the
chronicler, " not without paying a considerable sum of
money to the cardinal [Wolsey] to stand their friend ;
for at that time he was in such power that he did all with
the king." This day was long remembered in London
under the name of " Evil May-day ;" and it is recorded
that the ancient Mayings and May games, with the
220 HISTORY OF
triumpliant setting up of the great shaft in Leadenhall-
street before the church of St. Andrew, were never after-
wards so commonly used as had been customary belbre.
In connexion with this affair we may mention an act
of parliament, which was passed in 1525 (14 and 15
Hen. VIII. c. 2), for regulating the taking of appren-
tices by "strangers born out of the king's obeisance
using any manner of handicraft within the realm." No
such stranger, it was enacted, should in future, under a
penalty of 10/. for each offence, take any a])p:-entice who
was not a native of the country, or should keep any more
than two foreign journeymen at the same time. By a
subsequent clause, also, all aliens exercising any handi-
craft in London or the suburbs were placed each under
the superintendence— or " the search and reformation,'"*
as it is expressed — of the fellowship of his particular
craft in the city of London, to which was to be associated
for that purpose one alien householder of the same craft,
to be chosen by the wardens of the company ; and every
such foreign artificer, being a smith, joiner, or cooper,
was to receive a proper mark from his craft, which he
was to stamp upon every article he fabricated. This
clause is curious as giving us a list of the places that were
then considered to form the suburbs of London ; which
are enumerated as being, besides the town of West-
minster, the parishes of St. Martin's in the Field, of our
Lady of the Strand, of St. Clement of Danes without
Temple Bar, of St. Giles in the Field, and of St. An-
drew's in Ilolborn, the town and borough of Southwark,
Shorcditch, Whitechapel parish, St, John's-street, the
parish of Clerkenwell, St. Botolph's parish without Aid-
gate, St. Catherine's, and Bermondsey-street. Most of
these places, all of which are now included within the
metropolis, were then separated from the city by fields,
gardens, or other open spaces.
Some indications of a disposition on the part of the
English to engage in the new branches of foreign trade,
which had s})rung out of the late nautical discoveries,
begin about this time to present themselves. According
to Lord Herbert, a proposition was even made, in 1527,
BRITISH COMMERCE. 221
by the Emperor Charles V., to sell to Kino: Henry a
right, which he pretended to have as King- of Spain, to
the Molucca Islands, which, however, came to nothing.
The same year, also, this author tells us, the English
king " sent out two fair ships to discover new regions,
then daily found out by the Portuguese and Spaniard ;"
but in this attempt he met with no greater success than
his father. It appears, moreover, from a passage in
Hakluyt's Collection, that some merchants of Bristol had
now for some years been in the habit of exporting cloth,
soap, and other commodities to the Canary Islands, by
means of the ships of San Lucar in Spain, and of receiv-
ing back by the same conveyance dyeing drugs, sugar,
and kid-skins. But the chief branch of the foreign com-
merce of the country still continued to be the trade with
the Netherlands, where, at the great emporium of
Antwerp, the English merchants both found purchasers
for their native produce and manufactures of all kinds,
and were enabled to supply themselves in return with
whatever quantities they required of the productions of
all parts of the globe. Accordingly, the apprehended
interruption of this trade on Henry's declaration of war
against the emperor, in 1528, threatened to derange the
whole system of the national industry. " Our merchants,"
says Lord Herbert, " (who used not the trade to the
many northern and remote countries they now frequent),
foreseeing the consequences of these wars, refused to buy
the cloths that were brought to Blackwell Hall, in
London ; whereupon the clothiers, spinners, and carders,
in many shires of England, began to mutiny." To
appease this clamour of the manufacturing population,
Wolsey issued his commands to the merchants that they
should take the cloths at a reasonable price from the
poor men's hands, with a threat that, if they did not, the
king himself should buy them and sell them to foreigners.
This procedure may let us into the secret of the means
by which, in the quarrel with the government of the
Netherlands in the last reign, the merchants of London
were induced, as related in a preceding page, during the
three years that the quarrel lasted, to continue their pur-
222 HISTORY OF
chases in the home-market, notwithstanding the stoppage
of the usual great vent of exportation. On that occasion
the interests of peace were forced to give m ay to those of
war ; but it was difterent now. " The sullen merchants,"
Lord Herbert goes on to inform us, little moved with
the cardinal's menaces, said they had no reason to buy
commodities they knew not how to utter. Propositions
were thrown out for the establishment of a new con-
tinental mart at Calais or Abbeville; but the "sullen
merchants " would not understand any of these schemes.
At last the council, being advised with, told the king
*' that the rcsultance of war in the Low Countries could
be nothing but a grievance to his subjects, a decay of
trade, a diminution of his customs, and addition to the
greatness of Francis, who would have the advantage of
all that was undertaken in this kind ;" on which it was
resolved that the war sliould be suspended for the
present. This result shows very strikingly how com-
pletely its foreign commerce was now become part of the
very life-blood of the nation ; and it should also seem to
warrant the inference that the trade with Antwerj) had
considerably risen in importance within the last thirty
years, — the consequence, doubtless, in great part, of the
general commercial revolution that had been wrought by
the discovery of the new route to the East.
The spirit of mercantile adventure in England, how-
ever, was now turning likewise to other quarters, though
its excursions out of its accustomed track were still some-
what timid or desultory. Among the notices collected
by the industrious Haklu3't are the following : — About
1530 Captain William Hawkins, of Plymouth, made a
trading voyage to Guinea for elephants' teeth, &c,, and
thence proceeded to Brazil, where he also traded. Two
years after he is noted to have made another such voyage
to Brazil. Trading voyages, both to Brazil and Guinea,
became common soon after this date. From about 1511
to 1534 divers tall ships of London, Southampton, and
Bristol, carried on an unusually great trade to Sicily,
Candia, and Chio, and 'sometimes to Cyprus, to Tripoli,
and to Barutti in Syria. Their exports were woollen
BRITISH COMMERCE. 223
cloths, calf-skins, &c. ; their imports silks, cainblcts,
rhubarb, malmsey, muscadel and other wines, oils,
cotton-wool, Turkey carpets, galls, and Indian spices,
One of these voyages uj) the JNIediterranean usually
occupied a whole year, and was accounted exceedingly
dithcult and dangerous. Sundry foreign vessels, such as
Candiots, Ragusans, Sicilians, Genoese, Venetian gal-
leasses, and Spanish and Portuguese ships, were also
employed by the English merchants in this trade.
An important act of parliament affecting commercial
transactions was passed in 1546, the last year of this
reign (stat. 37 Hen. VIII. c. 9), which, although en-
titled " An Act against Usury," in fact repealed all the
old laws against lending and borrowing money on in-
terest, and allowed interest to be taken at the rate of
10 per cent, per annum. The ])reamble recites that the
former statutes against usury have " been so obscure and
dark in sentences, words, and terms, and upon the same
so many doubts, ambiguities, and questions have risen
and grown, and the same acts, statutes, and laws been of
so little force and efiect, that by reason thereof little or
no punishment hath ensued to the otfenders of the same,
but rather hath encouraged them to use the same." It
is most certain, indeed, that no law could prevent the
taking of interest, which did not put down the lending of
money altogether.
A few notices that have been preserved relating to the
shipping of the early part of the sixteenth century may
here be introduced. The royal navy of England, pro-
perly so called, takes its rise from the reign of Henry
VlII. At first Henry possessed only one ship of war of
his own, the Great Harry ; to which a secontl was added
by the capture from the Scottish captain, Andrew Barton,
of his ship called the Lion, in June, 1511, — an incident
which led, two years after, to the war between the two
kingdoms, the battle of Flodden, and the death of James
IV. The next year, 1512, Henry built another shi[) at
Woolwich, the Regent, weighing 1000 tons, and de-
scribed as the greatest ship that had yet been seen in
England. From an indenture drawn up between the
224 HISTORY OF
king and his admiral, Sir Edward Ilov/ard, for the vic-
tualling of the fleet fitted out this year to aid in the war
against France, it appears that the Regent was to carry
700 soldiers, mariners, and gunners.* A ship appa-
rently still larger than this, however, is described as
having been sent to sea this same year by the Scottish
king in a fleet which he equipped for the assistance of
France, but which was, in a storm, scattered and de-
stroyed on its way to that country. This Scottish ship,
called the Great Michael, the largest that had been built
in modern times, was 240 feet in length by c6 in breadth,
— dimensions, however, which, in the latter direction
especially, were materially diminished by the thickness
of the planking, which, that it might be proof against
shot, was not less than 10 feet. She carried 35 guns
(all on the upper deck), besides 300 smaller pieces of
artillery called culverins, double-dogs, &c. ; and her com-
plement consisted, besides officers, of 300 seamen,
120 gunners, and 1000 soldiers.f But Henry did not satisfy
himself with merely building ships ; he laid the necessary
foundations for the permanent maintenance of a naval
force by the institution of the first Navy Office, with
commissioners, or principal officers of the navy, as they
were styled, for the superintendence of that particular
department of the public service. He also established
by royal charter, in the fourth year of his reign, the
" Corporation of the Trinity House of Deptford," for
examining, licensing, and regulating pilots, and for order-
ing and directing the erection of beacons and lighthouses,
the placing of buoys, &c. ; to which he afterwards added
subordinate establishments of the same kind at Hull and
* Fcedera, vol. xiii.
t See note on Anderson's Hist, of Commerce, by Mac-
pherson, vol. ii. p. 42, and the authorities there referred to.
" She cumbered all Scotland," says Lindsay of Pitscottie,
" to put her to the sea ; and when she was committit to
float, with her masts and sails complete, with tows [ropes]
and anchors efFeiring [appertaining] thereto, she was counted
to the king to forty thousand pounds of expenses by her
orders and cannons whilk she bare."
BRITISH COMMERCE. 225
Newcastle. The navy-yards and storehouses at Wool-
wich and Deptford also owe their origin to this king ;
who has a very good right, therefore, to the title of the
creator of the English navy. Henry's great ship, the
llegent, was blown up, with the 700 men on board of
hor, in a battle fought with the French fleet off Brest, a
few months after she put to sea ; on which he caused
another, still larger, to be built, which he called the
Henry Grace de Dieu. Several others were afterwards
added, so that, at the close of the reign, the entire navy
belonging to the crown amounted to about 12,500 tons.
Henry, also, about 1525, erected at a great expense the
first pier at Dover ; and in 1531 an act of parliament was
passed (23 Hen. VIII, c. 8) "for the amending and
maintenance" of the havens and ports of Plymouth,
Dartmouth, Tinmouth, Falmouth, and Fowey. In the
preamble it is asserted that these ports had been, in time
l^ast, the principal and most commodious havens within
the realm for the preservation of ships resorting fi'om all
5«irts of the world, as well in peril of storms as other-
>vise ; but that, whereas formerly ships of 800 tons might
easily enter them at low water, " and there lie in surety,
■^vhat Mind or tempest soever did blow," they were now
in a manner utterly decayed and destroyed Ijy means of
certain tin-works, called stream-works, which had so
choked them up that a ship of 100 tons could " scantly
enter at the half-flood." The act, however, did not pro-
vide for the "amending" of the harbours further than
by prohibiting the working of such stream-works, except
tinder certain specified regulations, for the future.
The latter part of this reign is marked by the coni-
Kiencement of a course of public improvements intimately
connected with the internal trade of the country— the
reparation of streets and highways. The first act in the
Statute-Book on this important subject is the 14 and 15
Hen. VIII. c. 6, passed in 1523, authorising the pro-
prietor of the manor of Hempstead, in the weald of
Kent, to enclose an " old common way or street for car-
riages, and all other passages and business," on laying
out another at the least as broad and as commodious* in a
VOL. I. I,
226 HISTORY OF
different line; and also, "in consideration that many
other common ways in the said weald of Kent be so deep
and noyous by wearing and course of water and other
occasions, that people cannot have their carriages or
passages by horses upon or by the same, but to .their
great pains, peril, and jeopardy," permitting all other
persons that might be so disposed, to lay out new and
more commodious roads, by oversight and assent of two
justices of peace of the county, and twelve other discreet
men inhabiting within the hundred or the hundred ad-
joining. In 1534, by the 26 Hen. VIII. c. 7, this act
was extended to the county of Sussex. About the same
time began the paving of the streets of London, the first
act for that purpose being the statute 24 Hen. VIII,
c. 11, passed in 1532-3, " for paving of the highway be-
tween the Strand Cross and Charing Cross," — that is,
the greater part of the line of way now known as the
Strand, the Strand Cross having stood at the church of
St. Clement Danes. But this road was hardly as yet
accounted one of the streets of the metropolis ; it was
rather a country road leading to the village of Charing,
with many houses, indeed, built on both sides of it,
but yet with the line of building everywhere broken
by fields and gardens. This "common highway" is
described in the preamble of the act as ' ' very noyous
and foul, and in many places thereof very jeopardous "
to all people passing and repassing, "as well on horse-
back as on foot, both in winter and in summer, by night
and by day ;" the occasion of which is affirmed to be that
"the landlords and owners of all the lands and tene-
ments next adjoining, on both sides of the said common
highway, be and have been remiss and negligent, and also
refuse and will not make and support the said highway
with paving every of them alter the portion of his ground
adjoining to the same." It appears that the part of the
Strand between the church of St. Clement Danes and
Temple Bar was already paved ; and the act directs that
the owners of lands adjoining to the rest of the road shall
each pave in the same manner the part lying along his
lands or tenements as far as to the middle ; which it is
BRITISH COMMERCE. 227
declared will be " a great comfort," not only to all the
king's subjects thereabouts dwelling, but also to all others
that way passing and repassing, especially to all persons
coming and going between the city and the to\\n of
Westminster about the deeds of the laws there kept in
the term season. The following year another act
(25 Hen. VIII. c. 8) was passed for the repaying of
Holborn. This street is described as being the common
passage for all carriages carried from west and north-west
parts of the realm, and as having been, till of late, so
well and substantially paved that people had good and
sure passage through it ; but now, proceeds the complaint
of the inhabitants to the king, recited in the preamble of
the act, " for lack of renewing of the said paving by the
landlords, which dwell not within the city, the way is
so noyous and so full of sloughs and other incumbrances,
that oftentimes many of your subjects riding through the
said street and way be in jeopardy of hurt, and have
almost perished." A similar enactment is thereupon
made to that in the statute for paving the Strand ; and a
general power is given to the mayor and aldermen to see
the pavements maintained upon the same principle in all
the streets of the city and suburbs, and also of the
borough of Southwark. Yet a few years after this, in
1540, we find a new act (the 32 Hen. VIII. c. 17) di-
recting the repavement of part of Holborn and ^arious
other streets, which are described as still "very foul
and full of pits and sloughs, very perilous and noyous, as
well for all the king's subjects through and by them re-
pairing and passing, as well on horseback as on foot, as
also with carriage." These streets were — 1. The cause-
way or highway leading from Aldgate to Whitechapel
Church : 2. The causeway from the bridge at Holborn
Bars " unto the end of High Holborn westwards as far
as any habitation or dwelling is on both the sides of the
same street:" 3. Chancery-lane, "from the bars besides
the Rolls late made and set up by the Lord Privy Seal
unto the said highway in Holborn :" 4. Gray's Inn lane,
" from Holborn Bars northward as far as any habitation
is there :" 5. Shoe-lane : and 6. Fewter (now Fetter)
1.2
228 HISTORY OF
lane: the two last being described as "thoroughfares
and passages from Fleet-street into Ilolborn within the
liberties of the city of London." This ap])ears to have
been the first time that Ilolborn was paved to the west
of the city bars ; nor was the street all built on both sides
for' any considerable way beyond that point till many
years later. With regard to the general state of the
roads in the country about this date we have little or no
infoi-mation ; but we may be certain that the condition
of the best of them, as was the case long afterwards, was
wretched enough. It appears, however, from the diplo-
matic correspondence of the time, that, towards the end
of the reign of Henry Ylll., letters were conveyed by
the government expresses from London to Edinburgh in
about four days.
Sebastian Cabot, the discoverer, with his father, of
North America, on finding himself neglected by Henry
VII., had entered the service of the Spanish government
ill 1512, but appears to have returned to his native
country soon after the death of King Ferdinand in L516.
He is known to have been employed by Henry VIII.,
in 1517, in conjunction with a Sir Thomas Perte, to
make another attempt in quest of a north-west passage,
in the course of which he is said to have again reached
the latitude of 67^^, and to have entered Hudson's Bay,
and given English names to sundry places on its coasts.
These discoveries, however, were soon forgotten, like
those which their author had made in the same regions
twenty years belbre ; and Cabot again offered his services
to the government of Spain, by which he was for some
years employed in various distinguished capacities. He
remained abroad till the accession of Edward VI., and
then, in 1548, once more made his appearance at the
English court, where he was received with much welcome
by the young king. In the beginning of the following-
year Edward bestowed upon him a ])ension of 250 marks
(1G6/. 13,9. 4 /.), which he enjoyed during the rest of the
reign : and he continued to be consulted in all affairs re-
lating to navigation and trade. In 1553, on the sugges-
tion of Cabot, some merchants of London formed them-
BEITISir COMMERCK. 229
selves into a company, of which lie was chosen the
governor, for the prosecution of maritime discovery, with
a particular view to the anxiously desired passage by the
northern seas to China and the other countries of the
East. Three vessels were ibrthwith sent out, under the
command of Sir Hugh Willoughby, to whom Cabot gave
a paper of remarkably judicious instructions, and King
Edward letters addressed to all kings and princes, re-
questing their friendship. One of the ships is stated to
have been sheathed with thin plates of lead, a contrivance
which is spoken of as a new invention. Willoughby,
after having reached the 72nd degree of north latitude,
took refuge for the winter in a harbour in Russian
Lapland, where he and the crews of two of his ships,
seventy in number, were frozen to death ; but the third
ship, commanded by Richard Chancellor, found its way
into the White Sea, then entirely unknown to the
English, though a correct description of it had been given
to Alfred by Ohthere more than 600 years before.
Chancellor landed near Archangel, from wiience he
tra\elled on sledges to Moscow, and there obtained from
the Czar, John Basilowitz, letters for King Edward, and
valuable trading privileges for his employers. This was
the origin of the English Russia Company, which was
incorporated the next year by a charter from Queen
Mary, and soon became a very flourishing and important
association. Its affairs appear to have continued, at least
for three or four years, to be superintended by Cabot, its
originator, of whom, however, the last thing recorded is,
that in 1557 the half of his pension was given to another
person, to whom, at the same time, all his maps and
papers were delivered over, lie probably died within a
year or two after this date.
Cabot's first voyage, in 1497, may possibly have given
rise to another branch of trade, which was now carried
on to some extent — the cod-fishery of Newfoundland.
In 1517 there are said to have been about fifty Sj)anish,
French, and Portuguese ships engaged in this fisheiy ;
but the first attempt of the English to obtain a share of
the trade w as not made till 1 536. From an act of pai*-
230 HISTORY OF
liamcnt passed in 1542 (the 33rd Hen. VIII. c.'2), it
appears that fish were then commonly imported to Eng-
land from Newfoundland, or New-land, as it is called in
the act, as well as from Iceland, Scotland, the Orkneys,
Shetland, and Ireland, and also from the Flemings, the
Zealanders, the people of Picardy, and the Normans ;
from all of whom, however, the act directs that no more
fresh fish should be brought, sturgeon, porpoise, and seal
excepted, on the alleged ground of many disastrous con-
sequences that followed to the towns by the sea-side in
the counties of Kent and Sussex, and to the whole com-
monwealth, from the fishermen of the said towns
abandoning their proper craft, and, instead of filling their
boats from their own nets, ])urchasing the commodity
from the fishermen of the opposite coasts. The growing
importance of the Newfoundland fishery is attested by an
act passed in 1548 (the 2nd and 3rd Edw. VI. c. 6), by
which it is enacted, that, whereas for a few years past
there had been levied by the officers of the Admiralty,
from merchants and fishermen resorting to Iceland,
Newfoundland, Ireland, and other places commodious for
fishing, "divers great exactions, as sums of money, doles
or shares of fish, and other like things, to the great dis-
couragement and hindrance of the same merchants and
fishermen, and no little damage to the whole common-
weal," all such exactions should henceforth cease.
We are probably to reckon among the religious re-
forms of the reign of Edward VI., an act which was
passed in 1552 (5 and 6 Edw. VI. c. 20), under the
title of " A Bill against Usury." In this statute it is de-
clared that the law of the late reign, allowing the taking
of interest upon money lent to the amount of ten per
cent., " was not meant or intended for maintenance or
allowance of usury, as divers persons blinded with inor-
dinate love of themselves have and yet do mistake the
same, but rather was made and intended against all sorts
and kinds of usury as a thing unlawful ; and yet, never-
theless, the same was by the said act permitted for the
avoiding of a more ill and inconvenience that before that
time was used and exercised." " But, forasmuch," it is
BRITISH COMMERCE. 231
added, " as usury is by the word of God utterly prohi-
bited, as a vice most odious and detestable, as in divers
places of the Holy Scripture it is evident to be seen,
which thing- by no orodly teachings and persuasions can
sink into the hearts of divers greedy, uncharitable, and
covetous persons of this realm, nor yet, by any terrible
threatenings of God's wrath and vengeance, that justly
hangeth over this realm for the great and open usury
therein daily used and practised, they will foi'sake such
filthy gain and lucre, unless some temporal punishment
be provided and ordained in that behalf;" it is enacted
that the late statute be " utterly abrogate, void, and re-
pealed," and that whoever shall henceforth lend any sum
of money " for any manner of usury, increase, lucre,
gain, or interest, to be had, received, or hoped for,"
over and above the sum so lent, shall forfeit the money,
and shall besides suffer imprisonment, and make fine and
ransom, at the king's will and pleasure. The subsequent
history of this act is very instructive. Like all attempts
to force back or turn aside by statute the natural and
ordinary course of human transactions, it wholly failed
in accomplishing its object; and, like all laws that so
aim at effecting what is impracticable, it only added to
the evil it was designed to cure. Accordingly, after
nearly twenty yeai^' trial of how it worked, we find the
legislature, in 1571, declaring, in a new act (the 13th
Eliz. c. 8), that "it hath not done so much good as it
was hoped it should, hut rather the vice ofiisunj hath
much more exceedingly abounded.^' The new statute,
therefore, repeals the said act of Edward VI., and re-
vives the act of Henry VIII., allowing interest at ten
per cent. And such continued to be the law throughout
the remainder of the present period. Yet, strangely and
absurdly enough, this act of 1571 is also entitled " An
Act against U^sury," touching the iniquity of which it
actually sermonises in the usual phraseology at the very
moment of permitting and legalising it. The tenor of
the principal enacting clause is as follows : — " And, for-
asmuch as all usury, being forbidden by the law of God,
is sin, and detestable," be it enacted that all exaction of
232 HISTORY OF
usury or interest, above the rate often percent., slialJ
be punished by the forfeiture of the whole sum so ex-
acted. It would require dexterous casuistry to demon-
strate that, if to take interest at eleven per cent, was a
detestable sin, to take interest at ten per cent, was allow-
able. If there was to be a law against usury at all,
however, the penalty here denounced against the said
detestable sin was certainly not of objectionable severity,
even with the addition made by a subsequent clause, that
ofienders against the act might be further punished and
corrected in the spiritual court. But that provision, in
fact, merely went to restrain the spiritual court from
proceeding against usury when it did not exceed ten per
cent., and was really therefore protective, and not penal.
The most important measure that was taken in relation
to the foreign trade of the country by the government of
Edward VI. was the abolition of the privileges of the
Steelyard Company. We have in the two preceding
Chapters given an account of the rise and nature of this
famous association of the German or Hanseatic merchants
resident in England, and have brought down their history
to the treaty of Edward IV. with the Hanse Towns, in
1475. Since that date various causes, and especially the
new direction given to European commerce by the dis-
covery of the route by sea to India, had very greatly
reduced the eminence of that once powerful confederacy.
Antwerp had now far distanced Lubeck, and Hamburgh,
and Dantzic, in the race of commercial activity and pros-
perity ; other trading associations had arisen in various
countries, to share what was once almost the monopoly
of the Hanseatic League ; and, as order and good govern-
ment had become everywhere better established, even
individual merchants, in many cases, carried on their
operations as successfully as any company. In England,
however, the Hanse merchants of the Steelyard, from
the privileges which they enjoyed under their ancient
charters and more recent treaties, continued almost to
monopolise certain branches of trade in which they were
exempted from duties payable by other traders, and from
their superior combination and capital were even some-
BRITISH COMMERCE. - 233
times enabled to engage in other branches with such
advantages as nearly precluded all competition. Thus,
on the stoppage of the direct trade with the Nether-
lands, in 1493, it is recorded that great quantities of
Flemish manufactures were still imported into England
by the merchants of the Steelyard from their own Hanse
towns ; and that this activity of the foreigners, in a trade
irom which they were themselves excluded, so enraged
the native merchants that they incited the London jour-
neymen and apprentices to rise in a tumult, in which
they attacked and I'ifled the warehouses of the obnox-
ious Germans. In 1505, when Henry VII. granted a
charter of incorporation to tiie Company of Merchant
Adventurers of England, whose proper business was de-
scribed to be to trade in woollen cloth of all kinds to the
Netherlands, the merchants of the Steelyard, or Easter-
lings, as they were called, were ex})ress]y prohibited
from interfering with that branch of connnerce ; and the
aldermen or governors of the association were obliged to
enter into a recognisance of two thousand marks that
none of the members should carry any English cloth to
the place of residence of the English Merchant Adven-
turers in the Low Countries. Disj)utes between the two
lival interests, however, continued to arise from time to
time; and, at last, in 1520, we find King Henry ap-
])ointing commissioners to treat at Bruges with others to
be appointed by the Hanse Towns, concerning the
several privileges at any time granted to the Hanseatic
League by the king or his predecessors ; lor the removal
of the abuses, unjust usages, extensions, enlargements,
restrictions, and other misinterpretations of their rights
with which the Hanseatic merchants in England might
be chargeable, and for the conclusion of a new treaty of
commerce between England and the said Hanseatic
League. What was the issue of this congress does not
appear. jNIeanwhile the ^Merchant Adventurers, as they
grew in wealth and power, became less dis}>osed than
ever to tolerate with patience either the irregular en-
croachments of the foreign company, or even the existence
of its invidious privileges within their leeral limits. The
" L 3
234 HISTORY OF
first movement for the suppression of the Steelyard Com-
pany appears to have been made by an application of the
Merchant Adventurers to the government about the close
of the year 1551. x\n answer to this information having
been given in by the aldermen and merchants of the
Steelyard, both statements were put into the hands of
the solicitor-general and the recorder of London — upon
whose report the council, on the 23rd of February, 1552,
resolved that the Steelyard merchants had forfeited their
liberties, and should for the future be held to stand in
regard to the duties upon their exports and imports upon
the same footing with any other strangers. The alleged
grounds of this decree, as we gather them partly from
King Edward's Journal, partly I'rom other accounts,
appear to have been, that the charters of incorporation
of the Steelyard Com})any were contrary to the laws of
the realm ; that, no particular persons or towns being
mentioned in their grants of privileges, it was uncertain
to what persons or towns the said privileges extended,
by reason of which uncertainty the company admitted to
their immunities whomsoever they pleased, to the great
prejudice of the king's customs and to the common hurt
of the realm ; that they had been in the habit of colour-
ing the goods of other foreigners, that is, of getting such
goods passed through the Custom-house as their own ;
that the condition had been broken on which their pri-
vileges when formerly forfeited had been restored by
Edward IV., namely, that English subjects should enjoy
the like privileges in Prussia and other Hanseatic parts ;
that, whereas for a hundred years after the first pretended
concession of their privileges, they used to transport no
merchandise out of the realm, but only to their ov^n
countries, nor im})ort any but from their own countries,
they now not only conveyed English merchandise into
the Netherlands, but also imported into England the
merchandise of all foreign countries ; and, lastly — which
was no doubt a chief reason, though one rather stronger,
it must be confessed, in policy than in law — that, from
small beginnings, they had so increased their trade, that
it now constituted almost the entire trade carried on by
BRITISH COMMERCE. 235
foreijiners in the kingxloin ; — they began, according to
the statement in the king's Journal, by shi])i)ing not
more than 8 pieces of cloth; then they sent out 100;
then 1000; then 6000; till now there was exported in
their name no less a quantity than 44,000 pieces, w hile
no more than 1100 pieces were exported by all other
foreigners together. Not much de})endence, however,
can be placed upon the correctness of these numbers.
Other charges made against them, according to some
accounts, though not mentioned by the king, were, that
having ibr the last forty-five years had the sole control of
the commerce of the kingdom, they had reduced the
price of English wool so low as to Is. 6d. per stone ;
and that they had likewise greatly depressed the home
corn-market by the quantities of foreign grain they had
imported. In addition to the native mercantile interest,
therefore, they had arrayed against them the whole
strength of the agricultural interest, including both the
corn-grower and the wool-grower. The principal com-
modities which they were wont to import, besides grain,
are stated to have been cordage and other naval stores,
flax and hemp, linen cloth, wax, and steel.*
The immediate effect of the abolition of the privileges
of the Steelyard merchants is said to have been, that the
English Merchant Adventurers the same year shipped
off for Flanders no less a quantity than 40,000 j)ieces of
cloth. The abolition of their privileges, however, did
not extinguish the community of the Hanse merchants in
England. In 1554, after Queen Mary's marriage had
established a more intimate connexion with the empire,
their privileges were restored, on the request of the am-
bassadors of the Hanse towns. But it is affirmed, though
the fact is not quite certain, that, after a year or two,
they were again withdrawn. The Steelyard Company,
at all events, seems never to have completely recovered
* See Strype's Eccles. Mem. iii. 77, &c., where are printed
the entries respecting the affair of the Steelyard Company,
from the Council Book. — Burnet, Hist. Ref. under 1552. —
King Edward's Journal. — Wheeler's Treatise of Commerce,
1601. — Anderson's Hist, of Commerce, ii. 109, &c.
236 HISTORY OF
from its sudden unscttlement, as just related ; and, though
it continued to subsist as a trading association tlirougiiout
the greater part ot" the present period, its circumstances
were those of a struggling and gradually declining body,
till at last Elizabeth, in the year 1597, took advantage of
a mandate issued by the Emperor Rodolph for shutting
up all the factories of the English Merchant Adven-
turers in Germany, to direct the lord-mayor and sheriffs
of London to shut up the house occupied by the mer-
chants of the Steelyard, which put an end to the exist-
ence of the com})any. In this proceeding, although the
queen made a show of acting on the principle of retalia-
tion, and went through the form of demanding a revoca-
tion of the imperial decree before she took the final step
in the business, she was very well pleased that her
application was rejected, and that she was thus afforded
a fair pretext on which to get rid of an association, the
services of which, however useful they might have been
in earlier times, the country no longer stood in need of.
The company of late, indeed, had been only an annoy-
ance and a source of strife : to the last the Hanse
merchants, on the one hand, continued to clamour im-
portunately for the renewal of their ancient privileges,
while the Merchant Adventurers, on the other, were as
incessantly exclaiming against the unfairness of any asso-
ciation of foreign traders being suffered to reside in the
kingdom, and to interfere with its commerce at all. The
time was certainly now come in which native capital and
enterprise were quite vigorous enough to dispense with
any foreign aid.
The trade that had been opened with Russia in 1553
was vigorously prosecuted in the reign of Mary, from
which sovereign the Russia Company, as already noticed,
obtained its charter of incorporation in 1554. By this
charter Sebastian Cabot was appointed, during his life,
the first governor of the company, which was authorised,
to the exclusion of all other English subjects, to trade
not only to all parts of the dominions of the Russian
em|)eror, but to all other regions not already known to
English merchants. The following year two more ships
BRITISH COMMERCE. 237
were sent out, which sailed up the Dwina as far as Vo-
logda, I'roni which ])ort Chancellor, who was in com-
mand, ])roceeded again to ^loscow, and there ari"an<red a
commercial treaty with the Czar, in which all the usual
privileges were accorded to the English traders. In
1556 the company again sent out tv.o ships, which re-
turned the same year, bringing along with them the two
that had been frozen up in Lapland in 1553, in one of
which was Sir Hugh Willoughby's body. They also
brought an ambassador to the King and Queen of Eng-
land from the Czar ; but, the vessel in which he sailed
being shipwrecked on the coast of Scotland, he lost
nearly the whole of the valuable presents for their ma-
jesties of which he was the bearer. The next year four
vessels were dispatched, one of which carried back the
ambassador, and along with him Mr. xVnthony Jenkin-
son, as agent for the company, the interests of which
were afterwards greatly promoted by his exertions. After
reaching Russia, Jenkinson set out on a voyage down the
Volga to Astracan, from whence he crossed the Caspian
Sea to Persia, and made his way to the city of Bokhara,
or Boghar, as he calls it, which he found to be the resort
of merchants not only from Russia, Persia, and India,
but from Cathay or China, from which last country the
journey occuj)ied nine months. Jenkinson, whose object
was to establish a trade between the company's Russian
factories and Persia, returned from this journey in 1560,
and, coming home to England the same year, published
the first map of Russia that had ever been made.* He
is said to have made no fewer than six subsequent voyages
to Bokhara by the same route ; yet the prospect of the
trade which he thus opened to the company, Anderson
remarks, " was dropped some few years after, and re-
mained as if it had never been thought of, until the reign
of King George II. in 1741, when it was revived by an
act of parliament enabling the Russia Company to trade
into Persia ; upon which considerable quantities of raw
silk were brought home by the very same way that
* See Jeukinson's Voyage in Purchas and Hakluyt.
238 HISTORY or
Jenkinson took from Persia to Russia, and from thence
to England." "Yet," adds the historian, " the conti-
nual troubles and ravages in Persia have since suspended
the good effects of this law." In 1566 the Russia Com-
pany obtained from the Sophi of Persia immunity from
tolls and customs for their merchandise in that kingdom,
and full protection for their goods and persons. The
same year also their charter was ratified by an act of
parliament, said to have been the first English statute
which established an exclusive mercantile corporation.*
In 1571 Jenkinson went out to Russia with the appoint-
ment of ambassador from Queen Elizabeth to the Czar,
and succeeded both in obtaining the restoration of the
company's privileges, which the Czar had suspended, and
in reinstating its afiairs, which, from losses and misma-
nagement, had fallen into great disorder.
The event in the reign of Mary which most afiected
the foreign commerce of the country was the loss of
Calais in"l558. This continental town, which England
had held for two hundred and eleven years, however
useless, or worse than useless a possession it m.ight be,
politically considered, was, as Anderson remarks, *' ex-
tremely well situated for a staple port, to disperse, in
more early times, the Mool, lead, and tin, and in later
times the woollen manufactures of England, into the in-
land countries of the Netherlands, France, and Ger-
many." The staple for the above-mentioned articles of
native produce was now transferred to Bruges, and
helped somewhat to check the decline of that famous
emporium, whose ancient grandeur had been for some
time fast becoming pale under the overshadowing ascend-
ancy of Antwerp.
We may consider as an indication of the growing in-
ternal trade of the country in this reign the passing of
the first general statute for the repair of the highways
(the 2 and 3 Phil, and Mary, c. 8). This act directs
* Of this act the title only is printed among the Statixtes
of the Realm :— " An Act for the Corporation of Merchant
Adventurers for the Discovery of New Trades."
BRITISH COMMERCE. 239
that two surveyors of the hiofhways shall be annually
elected in every parish, as is still done, and that the pa-
rishioners shall attend four days in every year for their
re})air with wains or carts, oxen, horses, or other cattle,
and all other necessaries, and also able men Mitii the
same, according to the quantity of land occupied by each ;
householders, cottagers, and others, not having land, if
they be not hired labourers, by themselves or sufficient
substitutes giving their personal work or travail. Upon
this statute were founded all the highway acts that were
subsequently passed before the introduction of tolls or
turnpikes in the reign of Charles II. Of these there
were six in all passed in the reign of Mary, and about
nineteen in that of Elizabeth.
In the course of the long reign of Elizabeth the com-
merce and navigation of England may be said to have
risen through the whole of the space that in the life of a
human being would be described as intervening between
the close of inlancy and commencing manhood. It was
the age of the vigorous boyhood and adolescence of the
national industry, when, although its ultimate conquests
were still atar otf, the path that led to them was fairly
and in good earnest entered upon, and every step was
one of progress and buoyant with hope. In the busier
scene, however, that now opens upon us, the crowd of
recorded facts is too great to be marshalled within our
limited space, and, passing over many things that would
properly enter into a complete chronological deduction
of our commerce from the point at which we are arrived,
we must confine ourselves to a selection of a few of the
most indicative particulars.
An act was passed by Elizabeth's first parliament (the
Stat. 1 Eliz. c. 13) which is remarkable for a liberality of
view going far beyond the notions that were clung to by
our commercial legislation in much later times. The
preamble is a confession of the loss and inconvenience
that had already avenged the interference of the legis-
lature with the natural freedom of conunerce by the in-
troduction of the principle of what have been called the
navigation laws. Since the making of those statutes pro-
240 HISTORY OF
hibiting the export or import of merchandise by Enplish
subjects in any but English sliips, " other foreign princes,"
says this recital, "finding themselves aggrieved with the
said several acts, as thinking that the same were made
to the hurt and prejudice of their country and navy,
have made like penal laws against such as should ship
out of their countries in any other vessels than of their
several countries and dominions ; by reason whereof there
hath not only grown great displeasure between the fo-
reign princes and the kings of this realm, but also the
merchants have been sore grieved and endamaged."
The damage sustained by the merchants of course con-
sisted in the mono})oly freights they were obliged to pay
ibr the carriage of their goods, the effect of which was
to diminish trade by diminishing consumption, and a
share in the pressure of which was borne by every con-
sumer in the kingdom. The law was now so far relaxed
that merchandise ^^•as allowed to be exported and im-
ported in foreign bottoms upon the payment of aliens'
customs ; and the two great companies of the Merchant
Adventurers and the Merchants of the Staple were
iurthcr empowered, twice in the year, to export goods
from the river Thames in foreign vessels, on payment
only of the ordinary duties.
Many particulai-s respecting the foreign commerce of
England at the commencement of the reign of Elizabeth
have been preserved by Ludovico Guicciardini (nephew
of the great historian of Italy) in his Description of the
Netherlands, which was written about this time. The
Dutch, he tells us, were wont to import annually to
Bruges uj)wards of 1200 sacks of English wool, worth
250,000 crowns. And "it is marvellous," he adds,
" to think of the vast quantity of drapery imported by
the English into the Netherlands, being undoubtedly,
one year with another, above 200,000 pieces of all kinds,
M hich, at the most moderate rate of 25 crowns per piece,
is 5,000,000 of crowns, or 10,000,000 of Dutch guilders
(above 1 ,000,000/. sterling) ; so that these and other
merchandise bi'ought to us by the English, and carried
from us to them, may make the annual amount to be
BKITISH COMMERCE. 241
more than 12,000,000 of crowns, or 24,000,000 o4'
guilders (about 2,400,000/. sterling), to the great benefit
of both countries, neither of Nvhich could possibly, or
not without the greatest damage, dispense with this
their vast mutual commerce ; of which the merchants on
both sides are so sensible, tliat they have fallen into a
way of insuring their merchandise from losses at sea by
a joint contribution."* These last words are said to be
the earliest notice of marine insurance, which they would
seem to imply was first adopted in the trade between the
Netherlands and England. The magnitude of that
trade, as here described, greatly surpasses any conjec-
tural estimate of its extent which could reasonably have
been hazarded from the common notions entertained of
the general state of commerce at this date. In fact, if
we take into account the ditference in the value of money,
there is probably no single country, not even the United
States of America, with which England in the present
day carries on a larger connnerce than she appears, from
this statement, to have done with the Netherlands nearly
three hundred years ago.
Of all the great commercial towns of the Netherlands,
Antwerp, as we have already stated, was at this time
the most eminent. Exclusive of the French, who, next
to the native merchants, were the most numerous class of
resident traders, it contained, according to Guicciardinjy
above a thousand foreigners engaged in commerce, con-
sisting of Spaniards, Portuguese, Italians, Germans,
Danes and other Easterlings, and English, His account
of the commerce carried on by Antwerp with the British
Islands is as follows : — " To England Antwerp sends
jewels and precious stones, silver bullion, quicksilver,
wrought silks, cloth of gold and silver, gold and silver
thread, camblets, grogranis, spices, drugs, sugar, cotton,
cummin, galls, linens fine and coarse, serges, demi-
ostades, tapestry, madder, hops in great quantities, glass,
salt-fish, metallic and other merceries of all sorts to a
* Translation in Macpherson's Annals of Commerce,,
ii. 127.
242 HISTORY OF
great value, arms of all kinds, ammunition for war, and
household furniture. From England Antwerp receives
vast quantities of fine and coarse draperies, fringes and
other things of that kind to a great value, the finest
wool, excellent saffron in small quantities, a great quan-
tity of lead and tin, sheep and rabbit skins without num-
ber, and various other sorts of fine peltry and leather,
beer, cheese, and other sorts of provisions in great quan-
tities ; also Malmesey wines, which the English import
from Candia. To Scotland Antwerp sends but little, as
that country is chiefly supplied from England and
France : Antwerp, however, sends hither some spicery,
sugars, madder, wrought silks, camblets, serges, linen,
and mercery ; and Scotland sends to Antwerp vast quan-
tities of peltry of many kinds, leather, wool, indifferent
cloth, and fine large pearls, though not of quite so good
a water as the Oriental ones. To Ireland Antwerp
sends much the same commodities and quantities as to
Scotland ; and Antwerp takes from Ireland skins and
leather of divers sorts, some low-priced cloths, and other
gross things of little value." This minute, complete,
and authentic account of the chief branch of our national
commerce must be regarded as one of the most curious
and instructive records of the present period.
From other parts of Guicciardini's description of Ant-
werp, a few additional particulars may be gleaned of in-
terest in the history of English commerce. The English
Bourse or Exchange was the place where the merchants
of the several nations that were congregated in this great
mart used to meet for an hour every morning and evening,
to buy and sell all kinds of merchandise, with the assistance
of their interpreters and brokers. The English cloths,
stuffs, and mooI brought to Antwerp were exported
tlience to Venice, Naples, Milan, Florence, Genoa, and
other parts of Italy ; English cloths were sent to Ger-
many " as a rare and curious thing, and of high price."
Large quantities of the same merchandise also went to
Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Eastland, Livonia, and
Poland ; some to France ; and a small portion also to
Spain. To the last-mentioned country, indeed, is stated
BRITISH COMMERCE. 243
to have been sent everything produced by human in-
dustry and labour ; "to which," says Guicciardini, " the
meaner people of Spain have an utter aversion." A con-
siderable quantity of English viool, however, probably
still continued to be exported direct from England to
Spain, and was there worked up into finer fabrics than
the looms of this country could yet produce.
A memorable branch of English commerce is believed
to have begun in the year 1562 — the detestable African
slave-trade. It is related that Mr. John Hawkins — the
same who under the name of Sir John Hawkins was
afterwards so distinguished as a naval commander —
having learned that negroes brought a very good price
in Hispaniola, assisted by subscriptions of sundry gentle-
men, now fitted out three ships, of which the largest was
120 tons, the smallest only 40, and, proceeding to the
coast of Guinea, there made up his cargo with human
beings, and sailed with them to Hispaniola, where he
sold his Africans and his English goods, and, loading
his ships with hides, sugar, ginger, and many pearls, re-
turned home the next year, having made a very pros-
perous adventure. Other two voyages of the same kind
are recorded to have been made by Hawkins, who, in
commemoration of his priority over all his countrymen
in this line of enterprise, received as an addition to his
arms " a demi-moor proper, bound with a cord :" but
we do not hear much more of the African slave-trade as
carried on by the English, till after the close of the pre-
sent period.
It was in the year 1 566 that the building of the Royal
Exchange, in the city of London, was begun by the
famous Sir Thomas Gresham, styled the queen's mer-
chant, according to Anderson, " because he had the
management of all her remittances, and her other money
concerns with foreign states, and with her armies beyond
sea." Before this the merchants of London used to
meet in Lombard-street, in the open air. Sir Thomas
was the son of Sir Richard Gresham, also an eminent
London merchant, who is said to have been the original
author of the project of building an exchange or covered
244 HISTORY OF
walk for the merchants of his native capital, similar to
what he had seen in Antwerp and other foreign cities, ~
but who died before he could carry his design into exe-
cution. His son received a university education, having
studied at Caius (or, as it was then called, Gonville)
College, Cambridge, but was from the first intended by
his father for a commercial life, and accordingly became
a member of the Mercers' Company, the same to which
Sir Richard himself, and also his brother Sir John Gre-
sham, belonged. Sir Thomas was employed, as his father
had been, in negotiating foreign loans, and managing
other money transactions, by Edward VI., and enjoyed
the distinguished favour both of that king and of his suc-
cessors, Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth, from the
latter of whom he received his knighthood in 1559. Ten
years after, by his advice, the experiment was first tried
of raising a loan lor the crown at home, instead of re-
sorting, as had always hitherto been done, to foreign
capitalists ; and from that time the new plan continued
usually to he followed, to the great advantage both of the
crown and of the public. Sir Thomas proposed to the
lord mayor and citizens of London to erect a commodious
building for the merchants to meet in, at his own charge,
provided they would find him a site ; and, his offer be-
ing at once accepted, a piece of ground, then covered
with three streets, called New-alley, Swan-alle}', and
St. Christopher's-alley, was purchased for 3532/. The
houses, it is related, about eighty in number, being cried
by a bellman, and sold to persons who agreed to take
them down and carry away the materials, brought the
sum of 478/. ; after which the ground was levelled at the
charge of the city, and possession of it given by the lord
mayor and aldermen to Gresham, who laid the first stone
of the new building on the 7th of June, 1566; and by
November of the following year the edifice, which was
of brick, was covered with a roof of slate. It was at first
called the Bourse or Burse ; but in 1570, soon after it
was finished, as liolinshed tell us, " the three-and-
twentieth of January, the queen's majesty, accompanied
with her nobility, came from her house at the Strand,
BRITISH COMMERCE. 245
railed Somersot Place, and entered the city of London
by Temple Bar, Fleet-street, Cheap, and so, by the
north side of the Burse, to Sir Tiiomas Greshani's in
Bishopsgate-street, where she dined : after dinner her
grace returned through Cornhill, entered the Burse on
the south side, and, after her highness had viewed every
part thereof aboveground, especially the Pawn, which
was richly furnished with all sorts of the finest wares in
the city, she caused the same Burse, by an herald and
a trumpet, to be proclaimed the lloyal Exchange, so to
be called from thenceforth, and not otherwise." Gre-
sham, by his will, devised the Exchange which he had
thus erected in equal shares to the corporation of London
and to the Mercers' Company, and so the property con-
tinues to be held to the present day. The original
building, a quadrangular arcade surrounding an open
court, with galleries above containing shops, &c., pe-
rished in the "great fire of 1666; after which the stone
buikhng on a more extensive scale, that was a few years
ago burnt down, was erected by the city and the jMer-
cers' Company, at a cost of 80,000/. Sir .Thomas
Gresham, who died in 1579, and who, as we have seen,
was a scholar as well as a merchant, is also illustrious as
the founder of the civic college known by his name,
originally established in his house in Bishopsgate-street,
which stood where the Excise Office now stands.
In 1567 the series of voyages of discovery, chiefly
undertaken in pursuit of a new passage to India, which
illustrates the reign of Elizabeth, commenced with the
first voyage of Martin Frobisher, who entered upon his
adventurous expedition with two barks of only twenty-
five tons each, and a pinnace of ten tons ; in the fitting
out of which he was assisted by se\eral persons of rank,
and especially by Ambrose Dudley, Earl of Warwick
(elder brother of Leicester). The government, how-
ever, and Queen Elizabeth herself, also took a warm
interest in the expedition, upon which the sanguine and
intrepid commander is said to have set out with a deter-
mination either to discover the north-west passage, or to
perish in the attempt. Frobisher and his companions
246 HISTORY OF
sailed from Deptfbrd on the 8th of June ; the queen,
who was then at Greenwich, looking- on from a window
of the palace as they passed by, and waving her hand to
them by way of expressing her good wishes and bidding
them farewell. Proceeding along the eastern coast, they
reached Fara, one of the Shetland Islands, from whence
they directed their course westward till they came within
sight of the coast of Greenland, upon which, however,
they were not able to effect a landing. After this Fro-
bisher entered the strait leading to Hudson's Bay which
still bears his name, and landed on some of the adjacent
coasts, which he took possession of for the English
crown. The loss of some of his men, however, now
made him resolve to return home ; and, after encounter-
ing a terrible storm, he arrived at Harwich on the 2nd
of October. A circumstance that happened some years
after the return of this expedition suddenly produced a
general excitement respecting it, much greater than had
been awakened by the geographical discoveries in which
it had resulted. Among other specimens of the produce
of the lands he had added to the queen's dominions,
Frobisher had brought home with him a piece of heavy
black stone, a fragment of which the wife of a person
into whose hands it had fallen threw into the fire, when,
being taken out again, and quenched in vinegar, it glit-
tered like gold, and, it is said, was afterwards, upon
being fused, actually found to contain a portion of that
metal. As soon as this was known numbers of people
eagerly ofiered their subscriptions to enable Frobisher
to proceed on a second expedition ; the queen herself
placing at his disposal one of the ships of the royal navy,
of two hundred tons burden. With this, and t^^•o barks
of about thirty tons each, he again set out from Har-
wich on the 31st of May, 1577. This time no further
attempt was made to penetrate to India : the adventurers
had been expressly commanded to make the collection
of gold-ore their only object ; and, accordingly, after
having reached Frobisher's Strait, as before, and found
a quantity of the black stone on some of the islands
where they landed, they prepared to return to England,
BRITISH COMMERCE. 247
which they reached in the end of September. Commis-
sioners were now appointed by the queen to report on
the whole atiair ; and, although it does not appear that
anything could be got out of the pieces of black stone,
it was still deemed expedient that another expedition
should be sent out, either to make search for more
genuine specimens of gold ore, or at least to prosecute
the pursuit of the north-west passage, of which the dis-
covery of Frobisher's Strait had appeared to open a ]3ro-
spect. Accordingly, on the 31st of May, 1578, Fro-
bisher again sailed from Harwich with twelve ships in
addition to the three he had commanded on his last
voyage, that he might bring or send home an abundant
importation of the black ore. This attempt, however,
proved wholly unsuccessful ; it was only after having
been carried far out of their course by storms and cur-
rents that about^ half the number of the ships at last
reached the mouth of the strait, when the season was too
far advanced for a longer continuance in these inclement
regions ; so that, having collected as much of the black
stone as he could find, Frobisher, without having added
anything to his former discoveries, again set sail for
England, which he reached about the beginning of
October. It is unnecessary to say that the supposed ore
appears to have only proved another exemplification of
the truth of the old remark — that all is not gold that
glitters. To Frobisher, however, geography owes tlie
first penetration into these Polar seas, and the discovery
both of the strait that bears his name, and of various
islands, sounds, and points within and around it. Fro-
bisher was afterwards employed in other naval com-
mands, and ^as one of the chief captains of the fleet
fitted out against the Spanish Armada ; after one of the
engagements with which his valour was recompensed
by the lord high admiral with the honour of knighthood.
He died in 1 594 of a wound w hich he received in an
attack upon a fort near Brest, which was held by a party
of leaguers and Spaniards against Henry IV. of France,
to whose assistance he had been sent with four men-of-
war.
248 HISTORY OF
At the same time that Frobisher was engaged in his
third and last expedition of discovery in the seas to the
north of the American continent, the celebrated Francis
Drake was performing the second circumnavigation of
the globe ; the first having been accomplished more than
half a century before by the Portuguese navigator Fer-
nando de Magalhanes, the discoverer of the strait which
still bears his name. We need not advert here to the
political circumstances in which Drake's enterprise ori-
ginated ; there is little doubt that it had the secret sanc-
tion of Elizabeth, although its primary object was to
attack the possessions and plunder the ships of the
Spaniards, with whom this country was then at peace.
The vessels employed were the property of private indi-
viduals, friends of Drake ; they were five in number, the
largest, the Pelican, in which the commander of the ex-
pedition sailed, being of a hundred tons burden ; the
smallest, a pinnace of fifteen tons ; and, including se-
veral gentlemen, the younger sons of noble families, the
entire number of persons whom they carried was only
one hundred and sixty-four. The little fleet sailed from
Plymouth on the l'5th of November, 1577. After
i^iaking the coast of Brazil and entering the Rio de la
Plata, Drake's ship and two others had passed through
the Strait of Magelhanes, or Magellan, by the beginning
of September, 1578. The southern coast of Tierra del
Fuego was afterwards discovered by Drake, who then
ran up along the Avestern coast of America, as far as to
iatitude 48° north, collecting, at the same time, immense
booty by a succession of exploits against the Spaniards,
the relation of which does not belong to our present sub-
ject. Drake was the first navigator who had ever ad-
vanced to nearly so high a latitude along the North
American coast.' He afterwards sailed across the Pacific
to the Molucca Islands and Java, and, steering thence
for the Cape of Good Hope, finished his voyage round
the world by returning to Plymouth, which he reached
on Monday the 26th of September, 1580, after an ab-
sence of nearly two years and ten months. " The
queen," says Camden, " received him graciously, and
BRITISH COMMERCE. 249
laid up the treasure he brought by way of sequestration,
that it might be forthcoming if the Spaniard should de-
mand it. His ship she caused to be drawn up in a little
creek near Deptford, upon the Thames, as a monument
of his so lucky sailing round the world, where the car-
cass thereof is yet to be seen. And, having, as it were,
consecrated it as a memorial with great ceremony, she
was banqueted in it, and conferred on Drake the ho-
nour of knighthood. At this time a bridge of planks,
by which they came aboard the ship, sunk under the
crowd of people, and fell down with an hundred men
upon it, who, notwithstanding, had none of them any
harm. So that that ship may seem to have been built
under a lucky planet." Drake's ship was preserved at
Deptford till it was quite decayed ; and at last, when it
was broken up, a chair was made of one of the planks,
and presented to the University of Oxford, As for the
treasure brought home by the great navigator, it is pro-
bable that, although a considerable sum was afterwards
paid out of it in satisfaction of claims made in the name
of some Spanish merchants, the greater part of it was di-
vided among the captors. Camden goes on to tell us
that, although the common people admired and highly
commended Drake, as judging it no less honourable to
have enlarged the bounds of the name and glory than of
the empire of their country, yet "nothing troubled him
more than that some of the chief men at court refused to
accept the gold which he offered them as gotten by pi-
racy." The queen, however, stood firmly by him, and,
when Mendoza, the Spanish ambassador, complained in
passionate terms of his having so much as dared to sail in
the Indian Sea, she boldly replied, that she understood
not why her subjects, or those of any other prince, should
be debarred from the Indies (that is, the Americas), to
which she could not admit that the Spaniard had any
just title, either by the Bishop of Rome's donation or by
any other claim. She maintained that no imaginary right
of property, asserted either by the Spaniards or the Por-
tuguese, could hinder other princes from trading to those
countries, and, without any breach of the law of nations,
VOL. I. M
250 HISTORY OF
from transporting colonies into such parts of them as
were not ah^eady settled. Nor, she concluded, could
she or any other prince be with any reason prevented
from freely navigating that vast ocean, seeing the use of
the sea and air is common to all ; *' neither can a title to
the ocean belong to any people or private persons, foras-
much as neither nature nor public use and custom per-
mitteth any possession thereof." This high tone, never
before so distinctly taken by the English government,
and never afterwards lowered, was mainly inspired by
Drake's brilliant exploits.
The next voyages of discovery that fall to be men-
tioned after Drake's circumnavigation are the three made
by John Davis in quest of a north-west passage : the
first in 1585, in which he sailed as far north as the 73rd
degree of latitude, and discovered the strait to which he
has left his name; the second in 1586, in which he
made the attempt to penetrate to the Paciiic at a point
farther to the south; the third in 1587, in which he
again ascended the strait he had discovered two years
before, with no better success than at first. In these
attempts Davis was encouraged and assisted, not only by
several members of the me"cantile community, but by
Burleigh, Walsingham, and others of the queen's ministers
and the nobility.
Meanwhile another voyage round the world was per-
formed by another Englishman, Mr. Thomas Cavendish,
the son of a gentleman of property in Suffolk, who sailed
from Plymouth with three vessels on the 21st of July,
1586, and, after a course both of navigation and of hos-
tilities against the Spaniards strongly resembling that
pursued by Drake, finished his circumnavigation by re-
turning to the same port on the 9th of September, 1588,
having thus been absent little more than two years and
one month. This voyage, however, was not productive
of any geographical discoveries of importance, though it
corrected some of the statements of preceding navigators.
In a second South-Sea voyage, undertaken by Cavendish
in 1591, Captain John Davis, mentioned above, who
commanded one of the ships, had the fortune to discover
BRITISH COMMERCE. 251
the Falkland Islands.* Other South-Sea voyages, made
by Andrew Merrick in 1589, and by Sir Richard Haw-
kins in 1593, added little or nothing to geographical
knowledge ; and the same may be said of the voyage for
the discovery of a north-west passage, undertaken in 1602,
by Captain George Weymouth, at the joint expense of
tlie Russia and Turkey companies.
By this time, also, a direct commercial intercourse with
India had been opened by the English. In 1581 a
number of eminent merchants were incorporated into a
company for trading to Turkey, to which country the
charter declared that they had, at their own great costs
and charges, found out and opened a trade " not hereto-
fore in the memory of any man now living known to be
commonly used and frequented byway of merchandise."
Wishing to engage in the trade to India, this company,
in 1583, dispatched Messrs. Newbury and Fitch to Tri-
jx)li in Syria, from which they proceeded to Bagdad,
and thence down the Tigi'is and the Persian Gulf to
Ormus, where they embarked for Goa. Newbury died
in India, but Fitch, after having visited Agra, Bengal,
Pegu, Ceylon, and Cochin, returning by Goa, Ormus,
and Aleppo, arrived again in England in April, 1591.
A trade, however, carried on by this overland route,
could never have enabled the English merchants to com-
jDcte with their Portuguese rivals ; and before Fitch's re-
turn this had come to be generally felt. It appears that,
in 1589, a petition was presented to the queen from
sundry merchants, requesting permission to make a trad-
ing adventure to India by sea. On the 10th of April,
1591, nearly at the very moment at which Fitch made
his reappearance, three ships, fitted out by the chief
members of the Turkey Company, sailed from Plymouth
for the Cape of Good Hope, one of which, commanded
by Captain Lancaster, after suffering many disasters,
reached India, and took in a cargo of pepper and other
spices at Sumatra and Ceylon. But, having afterwards
set out for the West Indies, Lancaster there lost his ship,
* See Barney's Discoveries in the South Sea, vol. ii. p. 103.
M 2
252 HISTORY OF
and was left with his crew on the uninhabited island of
Mona, near Hispaniola, from which he was brought
home to Europe by a French vessel in May, 1594, after
having been absent about three years and two months.
Three other ships, sent out for India and China in 1596
by Sir Robert Dudley and some other London merchants,
were still more unfortunate. Meanwhile the war w^ith
Spain and Portugal had cut off the usual supply of Ori-
ental productions by the medium of the latter country, in
consequence of which the price of pepper is said to have
been raised from three to eight shillings per pound, and
the prices of other commodities in the same proportion,
none being to be had except from the Dutch, who had
gone into the India trade in 1595, and were already car-
rying it on with great success. In 1 599 the ■ merchants
of the Turkey Company made another attempt to esta-
blish a land trade with India by dispatching a Mr. Mil-
denhall to the court of the Great Mogul at Agra ; but he
did not reach that capital till the year 1603, and, al-
though he afterwards obtained important commercial pri-
vileges for the company from the Mohammedan emperor,
his proceedings do not belong to the history of the present
period. In the mean time the scheme of an East India
trade, to be carried on by sea, and independently of the
Turkey Company, had at last been taken up with effect.
On the 22nd of September, 1599, the lord mayor, alder-
men, and principal merchants of London, to the number
of about a hundred, assembled at Founders' Hall, and
united themselves into an association for trading to India,
for which purpose they subscribed on the spot a capital
of above 30,000/. At a subsequent meeting they drew
up a petition to the privy council, in which they repre-
sented that, stimulated by the success which had attended
the voyages to the East Indies already made by the
Dutch, who were then fitting out another voyage, for
which they had bought ships in England, the associated
merchants had resolved upon making a voyage of adven-
ture of the same kind, and for that purpose entreated
that her majesty would grant them letters patent of incor-
poration, succession, &c., seeing that the proposed trade,
BRITISH COMMERCE. 253
being so remote, could not be managed but by a joint
and united stock. This movement led, after a delay occa-
sioned by the prospect of a peace with Spain, to the
grant by the queen, on the 3 1st of Deceml)er, 1600, of a
charter to a great number of gentlemen therein named,
constituting them one body corporate and politic, by the
name of " The Governor and Company of the Merchants
of London trading into the East Indies ;" Mr. Thomas
Smith, alderman of London, one of the leading members
of the Turkey Company, being appointed the first go-
vernor. The charter, among other privileges, conferred
the exclusive right of trading, for fifteen years, to all
parts of Asia, Africa, and America, beyond the Cape of
Good Hope eastward as far as to the Strait of Magellan,
excejjting such countries or ports as might be in the
actual possession of any Christian prince in amity with
the queen. The new company lost no time in sending
out their first adventure. Four ships, the best that could
be found in England, although the largest was only of
six hundred tons burden, the smallest of not more than
two hundred and forty tons, and carrying in all four
hundred and eighty men, having been put under the com-
mand of Lancaster, who was styled Admiral of the little
fleet, and was invested by the queen with the power of
exercising martial law, dropped down from Woolwich on
the 13th of February, 1601, but did not take their de-
parture from Torbay till the 22nd of April, and did not
reach Acheen, in Sumatra, till the 5th of June in the
following year. In consequence of the time thus lost
Lancaster did not return home till after the death of
Elizabeth, so that the history of all but the mere opening
of the commerce of the English with India belongs to
the next period.*
A beginning was also made in the latter part of the
present reign in the attempt to efiect settlements in some
of the newly discovered parts of the earth, although the
proper foimdation of the colonial empire of England must
be referred to a later date. In 1576 Sir Humphrey
* Macpherson's History of the European Commerce with
India, 4to. 1812, pp. 72—82.
254 HISTORY OF
Gilbert (half-brother of Sir Walter Raleigh) had pub-
lished a treatise on the subject of the north-west passage,
and, two years after, had oljtained a patent, empowering
him to occupy and colonise such parts of the North
American continent as were not already in the possession
of any of the queen's allies. Gilbert, accordingly, ac-
companied by Raleigh, made an attempt the same year to
carry his project into execution ; but he had not long put
out to sea w^hen he was obliged to return with the loss
of one of his best ships. No better success attended a
second attempt of the two brothers in 1583 : after having
reached Newfoundland, Gilbert, who has been called
" the father of our plantations," perished with his ship
in a storm on his voyage home ; and, of four other vessels
of which the expedition consisted, only one reached
England. The next year, however, Raleigh, not dis-
couraged by this disastrous failure, having obtained
letters patent from the queen, granting to him all such
countries as he should discover in full property, with the
reservation only to the crown of a fifth part of the gold
or silver ore that might be found in them, again fitted
out two ships, and dis])atched them to the North Ame-
rican coast, with directions to take a more southerly
course than that which had been followed by Gilbert.
The result of this voyage was the discovery of the part
of the American continent which Elizabeth honoured, in
allusion to herself, with the name of Virginia.* Raleigh's
jmtent was now confirmed by act of parliament, and,
early in 1585, he sent out another fleet of seven vessels,
under the conduct of his relative. Sir Richard Grenville,
a most distinguished person, alike as a seaman and as a
soldier, to take complete possession of and effect a settle-
ment on the newly acquired territory, Grenville actu-
ally left a colony of one hundred and eight men on the
island of Roanoak, adjacent to the coast of Virginia ; but
scarcely had the ships that brought them out taken their
departure when the settlers became involved in hostilities
with the natives, in consequence of which they were
* Virginia originally comprehended both the present state
of that name and the adjoining country of North Carolina,
BRITISH COiMMERCE. 255
glad to embark in the fleet of Sir Francis Drake, who
chanced to touch at the place on his return from another
expedition against the Spanish possessions, and who
brought them home to England about the end of July,
1586.* Within a fortnight after they had sailed, Gren-
ville arrived with three ships laden with all necessaries,
which Raleigh had dispatched for their use, and, finding
them gone, he left fifteen men in the place with ])ro-
visions for two years. When the next year Raleigh sent
out three more vessels, with a governor, Mr. John White,
and twelve assistants, to whom he gave a charter, incor-
porating them by the name of the Governor and Assist-
ants of the City of Raleigh in Virginia, no remains of
these unhappy settlers were to be found, except their
bones scattered on the beach : they had all been put to
death by the savages. An attempt was made by White
and his companions to repair the buildings which had
been laid in ruins ; but new hostilities w ith the natives,
and dissensions among the settlers themselves, soon arose,
and the govei'nor e\ entually determined upon returning
for further supplies to England, where he arrived in the
beginning of November. At this moment the public
mind in England was occupied with one object — the
grand Spanish armament that was already afloat for the
invasion of the kingdom ; Raleigh himself was busy
among the foremost in devising the necessary arrange-
ments for the national defence ; he found means, in the
first instance, to send back White w ith supplies in two
* " These men," says Camden, " who were thus brought
back, were the first that I know of that brought into Eng-
land that Indian plant which they call tahacca and nicotiUf
or tobacco, which they used against crudities, being taught
it by the Indians. Certainly from that time forward it
began to grow into great request, and to be sold at a high
rate, whilst in a short time many men everywhere, some
for wantonness, some for health sake, with insatiable desire
and greediness, sucked in the stinking smoke thereof through
an earthen pipe, which presently they blew out again at
their nostrils ; insomuch that tobacco-shops are now as ordi-
nary in most towns as tap-houses and taverns."
S56 HISTORY or
vessels, which, however, were attacked by a Spanish
privateer, and so much disabled as to be incapable of pro-
ceeding on their voyage ; but after this no further attempt
was made to relieve the unhappy colonists of Virginia,
who, men, women, and children, to the number of nearly
a hundred and twenty, that had been left by White, must
all speedily have perished of want if they were not de-
stroyed by the tomahawks of the barbarous aborigines
upon whose wilderness they had intruded. And thus
terminated the work of colonization as prosecuted by the
English in the reign of Elizabeth.
We will now add a few notices respecting the navy
and commercial shipping of the kingdom in this reign.
Very soon after she came to the throne, Camden tells
us, "this wise and careful princess, in order to prevent
any hostile attempts, and secure herself and her subjects
in the fruition of a settled peace, though her treasure ran
low, yet began to stock her armoury with all necessary
ammunition, expending a vast sum for arms in Germany,
because those she bought up at Antwerp were stopped
by the Spaniard." She also, he adds, caused a great
number of iron and brass ])ieces to be cast ; and in this
she was aided by the discovery both of great abundance
of calamine, or zinc, in different parts of England, and
of a vein of copper near Keswick, in Cumberland, so
rich that it aflforded a sufhcient supply not only for the
home demand, but for exportation. She likewise intro-
duced the manufacture of gunpowder, and made the mili-
tary service popular by raising the pay of the soldiers.
Further, the historian goes on, " she rigged out her fleet
with all manner of tackling and ammunition, so that it
may be allowed to have been the best equipped navy that
was ever set out by the English. For the defence
whereof she built a castle on the banks of the Medway
near Upnore, the usual harbour for the fleet, and aug-
mented the sailors' and mariners' pay ; so that she was
justly styled by strangers the Restorer of the Naval
Glory, and the Queen of the North Seas. Neither had
she occasion to hire ships fiom Hamburgh, Lubeck,
Dantzic, Genoa, and Venice, which was her predecessors'
BRITISH COMMERCE. 257
case. The wealthier inhabitants of the sea-coasts did
likewise follow the queen's example in building ships of
war with all imaginable cheerfulness, insomuch that in a
little time the queen's fleet, in conjunction with her sub-
jects' shipping, was so potent that it was able to lurnish
out twenty thousand fighting men for sea service." The
ships thus built by private individuals were of course
merchant-ships, though liable to be pressed into the
public service in cases of emergency. In 1572 it is stated
that the entire navy of England consisted of 146 vessels
of all sizes, of which 1 carried a hundred guns, 9 from
eighty-eight to sixty, 49 from fifty-eight to forty, 58 from
thirty-eight to twenty, and the remaining 29 from eigh-
teen to six.* Of these, however, only 13 belonged to
the crown ; the rest consisted of the mercantile shipping
of the country, which was still esteemed the principal
part of its maritime force. In the year 1582 the
English merchantmen are said to have been 135 in num-
ber, many of them being of 500 tons burthen. The fleet
equipped to encounter the Spanish Armada, in 1588,
consisted, according to the most authentic account, of
117 ships, having on board 11,120 men.f Of these
vessels eighteen are stated to have been merchant adven-
turers from the river Thames, but of the rest by far the
greater number must have been merchantmen hired or
pressed for the occasion. Another account makes the
entire number of ships to have been 181 ; namely, 34
men-of-war, of which five were from 800 to 1100 tons
burthen each ; the 1 8 private adventurers ; 33 furnished
by the city of London ; 43 hired ships ; and 53 coasters,
sent by various sea-ports, f These last seem to be
omitted in the other enumeration. According to a work
published in the latter part of the seventeenth century,
the writer of which appears to have derived much of his
information from Pepys, the then Secretary of the Admi-
* Burchet's History of Transactions at Sea, as quoted by
Anderson.
t Original List in the State Paper Office, as quoted in
Tytler's Life of Raleigh, p. 84.
X Burghley, State Papers, ii. 615, &c.
m3
258 HISTORY OF
rally (and author of the well-known Diary), Queen
Elizabeth in 1588 had at sea 150 sail of" ships, of which
only 40 were the property of the crown.* Besides the
110 hired vessels, however, the mercantile shipping of the
kingdom amounted to 150 sail, measuring on an average
150 tons, and cariying 40 seamen each. Each of the
queen's own ships carried about 300 men, and each of
those hired by her about 110. It is added that, by the
end of the reign,' both the quantity of the shipping and
the number of the seamen belonging to the kingdom had
increased about a third. According to an account pre-
sented by the Navy Office in 1791, in obedience to an
order of the House of Commons, the royal navy amounted
in 1547, at the end of the reign of Henry VIII., to
12,455 tons ; in 1553, at the end of the reign of Edward
VI., to 11,065; in 1558, at the end of the reign of
Mary, to 7110 ; and in 1603, at the end of the reign of
Elizabeth, to 17,110. The largest of Queen Elizabeth's
ships at her death is said to have measured 1000 tons,
and to have carried 340 seamen, and 40 cannon.
A new species of maritime adventure in which the
English began to engage in the reign of Elizabeth was
the whale-hshery. Ilakluyt, under the year 1575, re-
ports the " request of an honest merchant, by letter to a
friend of his, to be advised and directed in the course of
killing the whale ;" with the friend's answer, stating that
there ought to be provided a ship of 200 tons burthen,
with proper utensils and instruments, and that all the
necessary hands were to be obtained from Biscay, the
people of which country appear to have been, with the
exception perhaps of the inhabitants of some of the most
northern regions, the earliest whale-fishers in Europe.
* Happy Future State of England, fol. Lon. 1689, p. 127.
For these statements the author quotes a remonstrance of
the Corporation of the Trinity House, in 1602, to the Lord
High Admiral the Earl of Nottingham, extant in Sir Julitis
Caisar's Collections. The author of the Happy Future
State of England has been said to be James Auuesley, Earl
of Anglesey; according to another account, the work was
written by Sir Peter Pet.
BRITISH COMMERCE. 259
The first notice in Ilakluyt of any actual whale-fishing
by the English occurs under the date of 1593, in which
year it is stated that some English shi])S made a voyage
to Cape Breton to fish for morse and whales ; and before
the close of the century we find the ships of the Russia
Company engaged occasionally in fishing for whales in
the seas in the neighbourhood of Spitzbergen. It appears
that the oil was the only thing for. which the whale was
then valued— at least there is no mention at this early
date of any trade in the fins or whalebone.
In 1577, according to Ilakluyt, the ships engaged in
the Newfoundland fishery were 150 from France, 100
from Spain, 50 from Portugal, and 15 from England;
the Biscayans had also 20 or 30 ships engaged in the
whale-fishery ; but the English, he says, had the best
ships, and therefore gave the law to the rest, and were
their protectors in the bays from pirates and other in-
truders, for which it was then, and had been of old, a
custom to make them a sort of acknowledgment by a boat-
load of salt or other present of that nature. The ships ot
the Spaniards were the next best to those of the English.
Hakluyt accounts for the small number of the English
ships that resorted to Newfoundland by the number em-
ployed in the Iceland fishery.
A new mercantile company was incorporated by Eliza-
beth in 1579, by the name of the Fellowship of Eastland
Merchants, with the exclusive right of trading to Nor-
way, Sweden, Poland, Prussia, and all the other countries
along the coasts of the Baltic. " This," says Anderson,
" was what is called in England a regulated company —
that is, a company trading, not on a joint stock, but every
one on his separate bottom, under certain regulations."
The exclusive privileges of this association were extin-
guished at the Revolution by the act called the Declara-
tion of Rights; but in Anderson's time the Eastland
Merchanrs, and also the Merchants of the Staple, who
were similarly circumstanced, continued to exist in name,
and to elect their annual otiicers — their capital being re-
duced to a small stock in the public funds, the interest of
which defi-ayed the expenses of their yearly meetings.
260 HISTORY OF
The once famous South Sea Company, of which this
writer was one of the officers, is now reduced to the same
condition of a merely nominal existence.
We have seen the rise of Antwerp, soon after the
commencement of the present period, to the rank of
being the most eminent commercial city in the world —
the principal impulse which carried it to this height being
originally derived from the opening of the Portuguese
trade by sea with India. In 1585 the capture and sack
of this great emporium by the Spanish commander, the
Duke of Parma, gave a shock to the whole system of
European commerce. About six thousand of the inha-
bitants perished in the devastation of their noble and
opulent city ; and of the survivors of its fall the greater
number of those whose wealth, enterprise, and industry
had hitherto chiefly sustained it, fled from its ensanguined
streets and blackened ruins. To quote the compendious
summary of Anderson, — " The ruin of this famous city
gave the finishing blow to the commerce of the Spanish
Netherlands. The fishing-trade removed into Holland.
The noble manufactures of Flanders and Brabant were
dispersed into different countries. The woollen manu-
facture settled mostly in Leyden, where it still flourishes.
The linen removed to Haerlem and Amsterdam. About
a third part of the manufacturers and merchants who
wrought and dealt in silks, damasks, tafteties, bayes, sayes,
serges, stockings, &c,, settled in England, because Eng-
land was then ignorant of those manufactures." The
rise, indeed, of the manufacturing industry of this country
may be said to date from the fall of Antwerp. In com-
mercial importance Amsterdam now became what Ant-
werp had been, the grand emporium of Europe.
A curious evidence of how much the internal trade of
England was still dependent upon the jieriodical fairs or
markets held in the great towns is afibrded by a pro-
clamation issued in 1593, prohibiting the holding of
Bartholomew fair in the usual maimer for that year in
consequence of the plague being then in London. The
proclamation speaks of there being wont to be a general
resort to the fair of all kinds of people out of every part
BRITISH COMMERCE. 2G1
of the realm, who would therefore carry the sickness
back with them o\ er the whole country, if the fair were
to be kept as usual. It was too necessary, however, to
the public convenience to be altogether suppressed even
for a single year : all that was attempted, therefore, was
to establish certain regulations with the object of dimi-
nishing, as much as possible, the concourse of people, or
the danger thence arising. These regulations give a
good view of what Bartholomew fair was two hundred
and fifty years ago. Her majesty commands, " That, in
the usual place of Smithfield, there be no manner of
market for any wares kept, nor any stalls or booths for
any manner of merchandise, or for victuals, suffered to
be set up ; but that the open place of the ground called
Smithfield be only occupied with the sale of horses and
cattle, and of stall wares, as butter, cheese, and such
like, in gross, and not by retail ; the same to continue
for two days only. And, for vent of woollen cloths,
kerseys, and linen cloths, to be all sold in gross, and not
by retail, the same shall be all brought within the Close
Yard [afterwards called the Cloth Fair] of St. Bartholo-
mew's, where shops are there continued, and have gates
to shut the same place in the nights, and there such cloth
to be offered for sale, and to be bought in gross, and not
by retail ; the same market to continue but three days.
And that the sale and vent for leather be kept in the
outside of the ring in Smithfield, as hath been accus-
tomed, without erecting any shops or booths for the same,
or for any victualler or other occupier of any ways what-
soever." From this we may gather that Bartholomew
fair was in those days a great annual mart to which mer-
chants used to come up from the various parts of the
country, and perhaps from other countries, to make their
•wholesale purchases, just as some of the continental fairs
still are. The object of the regulations was to prevent
the holding of the retail market, by which, of course, the
crowd of visitors was chiefly attracted ; but the wholesale
market was too indispensable to the general trade of the
country to be interfered with.
Our space will only allow us to add a few out of many
262 HISTORY OF
particulars that have been preserved relating to the com-
merce of Scotland during the present period. In the
early part of the period commercial legislation in that
country was directed by the same spirit and to the same
objects as in England. Thus, among the acts passed by
the first parliament of James IV., in 1488, was one en-
forcing the importation of a certain quantity of money by
every merchant exporting Scottish commodities : wool,
cloth, salmon, and herrings are the descriptions of native
produce and manufactures that are specified as being wont
to be sent abroad. At this time the general tendency of
the laws that were made was rather to check than encou-
rage foreign ti'ade. This same parliament, by another
act, prohibited vessels coming from abroad, whether
foreign or belonging to the country, from putting in at
any other ports than those of what are called the free
burghs, of which Dunbarton, Irvine, Wigton, Kirk-
cudbright, and Renfrew — all in the western part of the
country — are mentioned as the chief; and further made
it illegal for foreigners to carry on any trade whatever
except at the said burghs. Foreign merchants were also
expressly prohibited from buying any fish in Scotland
till they were salted and barrelled. The navy of Scot-
land at this time appears to have consisted of only two
vessels, the Flower and the Yellow Carvel. " They
were adapted," observes Macpherson, " chiefly for war,
being well provided with guns, crossbows, lime-pots, fire-
balls, two-handed swords, and also with good seamen,
under the command of Sir Andrew Wood, a brave and
experienced officer ; but I cannot venture to affirm
whether they belonged to the public or were Wood's
own private property." In the course of his reign, how-
ever, James made great efforts to raise the maritime
power of his kingdom ; and we afterwards find the list of
his distinguished naval commanders increased by the
names of the tvio Bartons (father and son), Alexander
Mathisson, William Merrimouth of Leith, styled King
of the Sea, and others. The ships in which .these ad-
venturers sailed, however, ap})ear to have been for the
most i)art their own property. A later writer hi\s drawn
BRITISH COMMERCE. 263
a glowing picture of the naval eminence to which their
exertions and the fostering patronage of the king raised
their country: " They were encouraged to extend their
voyages, to arm their trading vessels, to purchase foreign
ships of war, to import cannon, and to superintend the
building of ships of force at home. In these cases the
monarch not only took an interest, but studied the sub-
ject with his usual enthusiasm, and personally superin-
tended every detail. He conversed with his mariners, —
rewarded the most skilful and assiduous by ])resents, — ••
visited familiarly at the houses of his princijjal merchants
and sea-officers, — practised with his artillerymen, often
discharging and pointing the guns, — and delighted in
embarking on short voyages of experiment, in which,
under the tuition of Wood or the Bartons, he became
acquainted with the practical parts of navigation. The
consequences of such conduct were highly favourable to
him : he became as popular with his sailors as he was
beloved by his nobility ; his fame was carried by them to
foreign countries ; shipwrights, cannon-founders, and
foreign artisans of every description, flocked to his court,
from France, Italy, and the Low Countries." * The
Statute-book shows the anxiety evinced by the legis-
lature in this reign for the encouragement of one great
branch of maritime enterprise and industry. An act of
1493 directs that ships and busses should be built in all
sea-ports for the fishery, none of which were to be under
twenty tons burden ; that they should be provided with
nets and other necessary implements ; and that the ma-
gistrates of the said towns should comjjel all idle persons
to serve in them. Another act of 1499, entitled ' Anent
[concerning] the great innumerable riches that is tint
[lost] in fault of ships and busses,' renews the same regu-
lations. Other enactments, however, prompted by the
prevalent jealousy of foreigners, tended to check the ex-
tension of the fishing-trade fully as much as these did to
force it. Thus, in 1540, the parliament altogether pro-
hibited the sending of white fish beyond sea, declaring
* Tytler, Hist. Scot. v. 7.
264 HISTORY or
that strangers should only be permitted to come and buy
them of merchants and freemen of burghs with ready
gold and silver, or merchandise ; and an act of the fourth
parliament of James VI enjoined all fishers of herring,
or other white fish, to bring their fish to free ports, there
to be sold, first in common to all subjects, and afterwards
the remainder to freemen, that the king's own subjects
might be first served, and that, if abundance remained,
they might be salted and exported by free burgesses.
Here we have the spirit of the mercantile and that of the
corporation system in operation at the same time — the
exclusion of the foreign in favour of the native producer
or capitalist, and of the non-freeman in favour of the
burgess. The interest of the general class of consumers
was as little thought of as if no such class had existed.
The Danish historians record that in 1510, when Den-
mark was invaded by a squadron from Lubeck, King
John provided a fleet for himself by purchasing ships,
at a great expense, from his allies, the English, French,
and Scots, all of which nations, it is stated, had then
many vessels in the Baltic. But the most considerable
Scottish fleet of the earlier part of the sixteenth century
of which we have an account is that which is stated to
have been fitted out by James V., in 1540, for an expe-
dition to the islands on the north-west coast of his king-
dom. It consisted of twelve stout ships, with which the
king himself, attended by several of his chief nobility
and a military force (Lord Herbert says that the vessels,
which he makes fifteen in number, carried two thousand
men), landed in all the principal islands, and, carrying
away with him the chiefs as hostages for the obedience
and orderly behaviour of their clans, in that way, for the
first time, reduced those dependencies under real sub-
jection to the Scottish crown. On this occasion James
carried with him an excellent navigator and hydro-
grapher, named Alexander Lindsay, who drew from his
observations in this voyage the first known chart of Scot-
land and the adjacent islands — a work that has been re-
peatedly engraved, and is not only very accurate for
BRITISH COMMERCE. 265
that age, but much superior to some drawn at a later
date.*
Veer, otherwise called Campvere, or Terveer, in
Zealand, had now become the Scottish sta|)le in the
Netherlands, and Ludovico Guicciardini states that it
owed its principal commerce to that circumstance. The
principal foreign trade of Scotland, as of England, was,
during the whole of this period, with the Netherlands.
The office of Conservator of the nation's mercantile pri-
vileges in that country is mentioned in an act of parliament
passed in one of the first years of the sixteenth century,
and is thought to be of still earlier origin ; an act of
1579 imposes a payment of 10/. Flemish (about 61.
sterling) as entrance-money upon every person becoming
a member of the association of merchants trading to the
Netherlands ; and another act of the same year (repeated
in 1597) confiscates all the goods of non-freemen trading
thither, two-thirds to go to the crown, and the remaining
third to the conservator. This office, which was similar
to that of a foreign consul, was preserved, it may be
added, down almost to our own times. In the latter
years of the sixteenth century mention is made of Scottish
ships trading both to the Azores and the Canaries.
Wine was probably tlie principal commodity which they
brought from those islands.
The commercial legislation of the northern kingdom
continued to be of the same restrictive character as ever
to the end of the present period. In 1579 the exporta-
tion of coals and of salted meat was strictly prohibited.
In 1581 and 1582 certain sumptuary regulations were
promulgated by the parliament for the avowed purpose
of putting down or diminishing the use of foreign com-
modities, in the notion that thereby home manufactures
would be encouraged and the poor better employed.
All persons, not being dukes, earls, lords of parliament,
knights, or landed gentlemen possessed of at least 2000/.
of yearly rent (that is, 250/. sterling), were prohibited,
under heavy fines, from wearing in their clothing or lin-
* Note by Macpherson, in Annals of Commerce, vol. ii.
p. 86.
266 HISTORY OF
ing: any cloth of gold or silver, velvet, satin, damask,
taffeties, fringes, passments (a kind of lace), or em-
broidery of gold, silver, or silk ; or (x^ith the exception
of certain officers and magistrates) any lawn, cambric, or
woollen cloth made in foreign parts ; and all persons
under the above-mentioned degrees were also forbidden
tlie use of confections, foreign drugs, and costly spices,
which, it is affirmed, were wont to be lavishly used at
weddings, christenings, and other banquets, by persons
of low estate. At the same time the exportation of wool
was absolutely prohibited. The admission of represen-
tatives of shires and burghs to seats in the Scottish par-
liament, which took place in 1587, was soon followed by
the enactment of various laws for confining both trade
and manufactures, as far as possible, to the freemen of
burghs — with so quick an instinct did the new class that
had thus obtained a share in the legislature proceed to
turn the power they had secured to account in the pro-
motion of their own interests or selfish views ! Towards
the close of the present period, however, we begin to
perceive symptoms of the relaxation or giving way of the
old legislation against foreign commerce, as it may be
correctly designated. In 1597 the parliament, while it
renewed the prohibition against the exportation of wool,
found itself obliged to allow the bringing over of crafts-
men from foreign parts to work it up ; and, while it laid
a duty of five per cent, upon all cloth and other mer-
chandise imported from abroad, it permitted peers,
barons, and freeholders both to send their own goods
beyond sea without paying custom, and also to import
wines, cloths, and other furniture, duty free, provided
tliey did so, not for merchandise, but for their own par-
ticular use This was a permission which we may be
sure would be taken advantage of to introduce foreign
commodities into the country to a much greater extent
than the act professed to contemplate. Another of the
acts of the parliament of this year, however, absolutely
prohibited the importation into the country of English
woollens, which, it was pleased to say, had, for the most
part, only an outward show, and were wanting in that
BRITISH COMMERCE. 267
substance and strength which oft-times they appeared to
have, besides being one of the chief causes of the trans-
portation of gold and silver out of the realm.
The legal interest of money in Scotland was fixed in
1586 at ten per cent., or at five bolls of victual for 100/.
by the year. The average price of five bolls of victual,
that is, probably, oats, was therefore lOA, or about 25.9.
sterling. In other words, oats at this time sold in Scot-
land for about 5s. per boll, which would be about 6s. 8d.
per quarter.
The history of the Coinage in England for the greater
part of the present period exhibits a continuation of the
process of depreciation which had been going on through-
out the preceding century, with the introduction of a
new mode of debasement still more ruinous.
Henry YII. preserved the same standard which had
been fixed by Edward IV. in 1464 and adhered to by
Richard III., the pound of silver being still coined into
450 pennies, or thirty-seven nominal shillings and six-
pence. Shillings, which had hitherto been only money
of account, were first struck by this king in 1504 ; they
were at first called, also, large groats, and afterwards
testoons, the latter name (from the French teste or fete,
a head) being given to them from the royal image being
stamped upon them in the unusual form of a profile in-
stead of a full face. " This silver money of Henry YII.
with the half face," says Leake, " difliers therein from
all his predecessors after King Stephen ; and in this his
successors followed his example, for we have none after-
wards with the full face but the bad money of Henry
VIII. and the good of Edward VI. He was the first,
likewise, except Henry III., that added the number to
his name to distinguish his money from the former
Henries. He also left oft" the old Rose, as it is called,
about the head, and, instead of the pellets and place of
mintage on the reverse, he placed the arms, which is the
first time we see it upon the English silver money."*
A new gold coin appears in the reign of Henry YII.,
* Hist. Ac. of English Money, p. 177.
268 HISTORY OF
called the Sovereign, or sometimes the Rose Rial, or the
Double Rose Noble, of the value of twenty shillings ;
and there w^ere also half sovereigns and double sovereigns.
As these gold coins, however, are exceedingly scarce, the
writer last quoted thinks it probable that " they were
struck upon extraordinary occasions, only in the nature
of medals, and, perhaps, were first coined in honour of
the king's coronation, as his figure thereon, in the atti-
tude of that solemnity, seems to intimate." " We are
told," he adds, " such were distributed at the coronation
of Queen Mary, and sovereigns were coined in every
reign afterwards to King James I. inclusive."
The state of Henry VIII. 's money, Leake observes,
was, like his mind and humour, very changeable and
uncertain. At first he observed the same standard as his
father, but he afterwards debased both his gold and his
silver coins, being, Camden says, the first king of Eng-
land that mixed the money with brass, or rather copper.
Some alloy, however, was of course used before his
time ; and the fact seems to be that he merely made a
very considerable increase in the quantity, employing the
copper not merely to harden the coin and make it fit for
use, but to diminish its intrinsic value. According to
the tables drawn up by Folkes from the sure authority
of the indentures made wath the Masters of the Mint, it
appears that, whereas, hitherto, the minted pound had
consisted of eleven ounces two ]>ennyweights of silver,
and only eighteen pennyweights of alloy, Henry, in
1543, changed the jjroportions to ten ounces of silver
and two ounces of alloy. Two years after he reduced
the amount of silver to six ounces, or only one-half of the
entire metal; and in 1546 he adopted the still more
monstrous proportion of only four ounces of silver with
eight of alloy. The pieces struck in both these last-
mentioned coinages can only be justly described by the
name of base money. But in addition to this debasement
of the coinage Henry very materially depreciated it;
that is to say, he coined the pound of silver or mixed
metal into a greater nominal amount of money than it
had previously been made to produce. Instead of
BRITISH COMMERCE. 269
37s. 6d., or 450 pennies, into which it had been coined
ever since the fourth year of Edward IV., he made it
yiehl 45^., or 540 pennies, in 1527 ; and in 1543, 48s.,
or 576 pennies. So that, taking the effect of the two
operations together, he at last, instead of the former rate
of 450 ])ennies out of eleven ounces and two penny-
weights of silver, produced 576 pennies out of only four
ounces of that metal. Henry's gold coins were sove-
reigns, half-sovereigns, or rials, half and quarter rials,
angels, angelets or half angels, and quarter angels,
George nobles, forty-penny pieces, crowns of the double
rose, and half-crowns.* The George noble was so called
from its having on the reverse St. George killing the
dragon ; its value was 6s. 8d., or two forty-penny yjieces,
the old value of the angel, which in 1527 was raised to
7s. 6d., an alteration rendered necessary in order to
maintain the old relation between the gold and silver
coinage after the similar depreciation of the latter.
Gold was at this time valued, in the operations of the
English Mint, at twelve times its weight in silver. f
But the depreciation and the debasement of the coin-
age were carried still farther by Edward VI. than they
* Leake, p. 195.
t A groat and a half groat coined by Cardinal Wolsej',
as Archbishop of York, are among the curiosities of the
coinage of this reign. These pieces, on the sides of the shield
containing the royal arms, displayed the letters T. W., for
Thomas Wolsey, and underneath the cardinal's hat. " It
was an article of the cardinal's impeachment," says Leake,
" that he presumptuously imprinted the cardinal's hat under
the king's arms upon his majesty's coins of groats made at
York, vehich had never been done by any subject before.
So that his crime was not for coining mouey with the car-
dinal's hat thereon — for the smaller coins, which bore the
same stamp, are not taken notice of — but for coining groats,
which had never been done by any subject before ; but, as
to small money, it had been immemorially coined in the
bishop's mints at Canterbury, York, and Durham. But this
power dwindled away with the pope's authority here, and
was discontinued after this reign; Edward Lee, Wolsey's
successor, being the last that used this privilege."
270 HISTORY OF
had been by his father. At first, indeed, he diminished
the quantity of alloy from eight to six ounces in the
pound ; but in 1551 he increased it to nine, leaving only
tliree ounces of silver in the pound of mixed metal out
of which the different pieces of money were struck.
Then, instead of 48a\, as in the last reign, 72^. were now
coined out of the pound. That is to say, instead of the
old rate of 450 pennies out of more than eleven ounces
of silver, three ounces were now made to yield 864
pennies. The public inconvenience and confusion, how-
ever, that resulted from this prodigious depreciation
came at length to be so severely felt that, towards the
end of the reign, vigorous measures were taken to restore
the coinage to its ancient standard ; and in 1552 the alloy
in the pound of silver was reduced to nineteen penny-
w^eights, or to within one pennyweight of what it had
always been down to the thirty-fourth year of Henry
VIII. At the same time the number of shillings into
which the pound of metal was coined was reduced from
72 to 60. The gold coin, which had been as much de-
preciated as the silver, was likewise restored to the same
extent. Edward VI. was the first English king that
issued crowns, half-crowns, and sixpences of silver, if we
except a crown struck by his father, w^hich does not seem
to have been intended for circulation.
One of Queen Mary's first proceedings was to issue a
proclamation for the regulation of the coinage, in which
she dilated upon the great mischiefs that had ensued from
the base money of the two preceding reigns ; but in her
own first coinage, nevertheless, she once more slightly
reduced the fineness of the metal, making the alloy of the
pound of silver an ounce instead of nineteen penny-
weights, and adding also two pennyweights more of alloy
to the pound of gold. The coins struck after her mar-
riage bear her husband's head and name as well as her
own. Some authorities state that crowns of gold were
struck by Philip and Mary ; but no such pieces are now
known to exist.
The complete restoration of the coinage was reserved
for Queen Elizabeth. In the second year of her reign
BRITISH COMMERCE. 271
the silver coin recovered the whole of its ancient fineness
by the alloy in the pound being: reduced to eighteen
pennyweights, a proj)ortion which has ever since been
retained. The number of shillings struck out of the
pound of silver, however, was not lessened ; on the con-
trary, after having continued to be 60, as in the preceding
reign, till 1601, it was then increased to 62, as it re-
mained ever after till 1816, when it was farther increased
to 66, which it still is. The debased money of her
father and brother was also recalled and melted in the
beginning of Elizabeth's reign ; so nmch of it as was re-
ceived at the Mint is computed to have passed current
for above 638,000/., its real value being only about
244,000/. The gold coins of Elizabeth are sovereigns
and half sovereigns, crowns and half crowns, angels, half
angels, and quarter angels, nobles and double nobles.
Of the sovereigns there are some remarkable as having
milled edges, being the first English money so distin-
guished. There are also milled shillings, sixpences, and
other silver coins belonging to almost every year of this
reign. Besides the common silver money, Elizabeth
coined what were called portcullis crowns or dollars,
being imitations of the Spanish dollar or piece of eight,
and of the value of 4^. 6^/., for the use of the East India
Company. These pieces are now very scarce. It ap-
pears also that, a short time before her death, she had
intended to coin farthings and other coins of small value
of copper, a metal which had not yet been made use of
for money in this country.
The depreciation of the Scottish money, which had
already proceeded so far before the commencement of the
present period, was carried during its course farther and
farther in each successive reign. The debasement of the
metal of the Scottish coinage, however, never approached
the point to which that of the English was carried by
Henry VIII. and Edward VI. As in England, the
ancient standard of fineness had been eighteen penny-
weights of alloy in the pound of silver; in 1529, the
sixteenth year of James V., the proportion of alloy was
272 HISTORY OF BRITISH COMMERCE.
made three ounces, and in 1576 four ounces ; but three
years later it was restored to the former proportion of
one ounce, at which it remained throughout the rest of
the period. But, whereas the pound of silver had ori-
ginally, as in England, been coined into 20 shillings, or
rather into 240 pennies, and even after a century of pro-
gressive depreciation had in 1475 been made to produce
only 144s. ; in 1529 it was coined into 192s. ; in 1556
into 260s. ; in 1565 into 360s. ; in 1571 into 334?. ; in
1579 into 440s. ; in 1581 into 480s. ; in 1597 into 600s. ;
and finally, in 1601, into 720s. In other words, what
was originally only one pound had, by the steady opera-
tion of this nefarious and mischievous process, as prac-
tised by the government through the space of about three
centuries, been made at last to pass current for no less
than thirty-six pounds !
END OF VOL. I.
London : Printed by W. Clowes and Sons, Stamford Street.
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