tunate, being lost at sea. By the end of Henry's reign, ment of the navy-yards and storehouses of Woolwich and his fleet altogether amounted to 12,500 tons.

Besides building of ships, Henry seems to have planned all the necessary offices for a naval system. He established the Navy Office, with a sort of Board of Admiralty

Deptford. No monarch, in fact, had hitherto planned s efficiently and exerted himself so earnestly to found a English navy. Great merit is due to him for his advancement of the maritime interests of the nation.

The manner in which the different monarchs of the Tudor dynasty advanced or neglected the navy is well

Ladies' Head-dress of the time of Henry VII.

for its management, and he also founded, in the fourth year of his reign, the Corporation of the Trinity House, at Deptford, for managing everything relating to the education, selection, and appointment of pilots, the putting down of buoys, and erecting beacons and lighthouses. Similar establishments were by him created at Hull and Newcastle. He erected at great cost the first pier at Dover, and passed an Act of Parliament improving the

shown by the returns of the Navy Office to Parliament, in 1791. As we have stated, at the end of Henry's reign it amounted to 12,500 tons, at the end of that of Edward VI. to only 11,065 tons, and at the end of Mary's to merely 7,110 tons, but at the end of Elizabeth's to 17,110. At the time of the Armada, Elizabeth had at sea 150 sail, of which, however, only forty were the property of the Crown; the rest belonged to the merchants who were

"Intercursus Magnus," or Great Treaty of Intercourse; but, as we have related, Henry, in 1496, on intercepting the Archduke Philip at Weymouth, forced from him a less liberal treaty, which the Flemings branded as the "Intercursus Malus," or Evil Treaty.

to the fleet, and made it, in the end, the best equipped navy in Europe. She raised the pay of the sailors, as she had done that of the soldiers, and the merchants entered so readily into her service that she had no longer occasion to hire vessels, as her predecessors had done, from the Hanse Towns, or from Venice and Genoa. She built a fort on the Medway, somewhere near the present Sheerness, to protect her fleet, and justly acquired the name of the Queen of the North Seas. Many circumstances combined to give a new and wonderful development in her time to commerce: the discovery and partial settlement of the New World; the way opened by the Cape to India; the extension of commercial inquiry and enter-treaty at the same time with the great trading republic of prise into the north of Europe and to the banks of Newfoundland. But ere this stirring period arrived, commerce had had many severe restrictions, the fruit of the ignorance of political economy, to struggle with.

In the same one-sided spirit of trade, Henry, in 149, concluded a treaty with Denmark, by which Engli companies were authorised to purchase lands in Berg in Norway, Lunden and Landscrona in Schonen, Drag: in Zealand, and Loysa in Sweden, on which to erec factories and warehouses, to remain theirs in perpetu for the purposes of trade. He also renewed a similar

Venice, by which the English companies were to enjoy all the privileges of the citizens of Florence and Pe where they were established, and were privileged to export English wool, and re-ship the spices and valuable artis brought by the Venetians overland from India.

It was not long, however, before Henry was called on to check the effects of monopoly in his English companies. The Merchant Adventurers of London s showed so strongly these effects that they compelled the king to interfere.

Henry VII. is greatly praised by Hall, the chronicler, as a prince who "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 kingdom, in plate, money, and bullion, by merchants passing and repassing." But the great reason of the The markets of Europe were now fast growing in izrapid advance of commerce under Henry VII. was, un-portance and demand. The wealth of South Amer doubtedly, the quietness and stability of affairs which he introduced; for Henry was too fond of hoarding to be a very munificent patron of trade. Amongst the very first measures which he passed was one against usury, totally forbidding the loan of money on interest, which, if it could have been really carried out, would have nearly extinguished commerce altogether. In this, however, Henry was but continuing the practice of his predecessors, who, though, great warriors, were no merchants. So severe was Henry's enactment against usury, that, by the Act of the third year of his reign, every offender was, on discovery, to be fined £100, and the bargain to be made void. Henry VIII. abrogated this absurd law, and allowed usury under ten per cent.; it was again put in force by Edward VI. in terms of the utmost severity, declaring it to be "a vice most odious and detestable, and utterly prohibited by the Word of God." Elizabeth again restored the law of her father in 1571, permitting interest under ten per cent.

was flowing into Spain, in the shape of gold, to th
amount of a million sterling annually, and the spices
riches of the East Indies into Portugal, since the d
covery of the way round the Cape. Amsterdam beca
a great mercantile depôt of these commodities as cert!
in Europe, and the benefit of it was felt nowhere m
sensibly than in England. Henry VII., who had let g
the opportunity of securing South America and the W--
Indies by neglecting the offers of Columbus, now
deavoured to repair the mischief by granting patent-
the Cabots and others for the discovery of new
He could not open his heart or his coffers sufficient?
assist the adventurers with funds, but he was res
reap his share of the benefit, which was to consist of
the countries discovered, and a fifth of the imme
proceeds. Under such patents the Cabots, father
son, in the course of several voyages, discovered Labr
in 1497, and afterwards ran along the whole coast
North America, to the Gulf of Mexico.

Whilst Henry VII. endeavoured to extinguish usury, From this moment the spirit of mercantile entere he was equally jealous of foreign merchants-of their rapidly developed itself. In 1530 we find Captain H. bringing their foreign manufactures and carrying out kins trading to Guinea for elephants' teeth, and to Er English goods-lest our wealth should be drained away to which coasts voyages soon became common. Trai by them. The careful old king could not see that it to all parts of the Mediterranean was frequent du mattered little by whom the exchanges of commerce were the reign of Henry VIII.; taking out wool, cloth, made, so that merchants were left to make their own skins, and importing silks, drugs, wines, cottonbargains; whence the result would be that they would spices, and Turkey carpets. The voyages of Cabut la only purchase such things as they wanted, and sell such opened up a new trade-that of cod-fishing-on the coast as they did not want, with benefit to everybody. It of Newfoundland, which was eagerly engaged in: accorded, however, with Henry's ideas, and was so far the voyages of Willoughby and Richard Chanceller beneficial as to induce the settling of English merchants exploring the White Sea, at the suggestion of Ca in foreign countries, with the object of endeavouring to opened a new trade with Russia. A Russian condrain them of their wealth. Therefore, he was careful was formed by Edward VI., and fully incorporated to heal the breach with the Netherlands which the Mary, who vigorously prosecuted that trade; and in!" patronage of Perkin Warbeck by the Duchess of Bur- an ambassador arrived at London from the Car. J gundy had made, and the company of Merchant Adven-kinson, an agent of this company, afterwards descri turers was again established in Antwerp. The treaty on the Volga to Astracan, and crossing the Caspian Sa this occasion was termed by the rejoicing Flemings the reached Bokhara, the great resort of the merchants së

Russia, Persia, India, and China. He is said to have made six other voyages to Bokhara by that route-a striking proof of the growing enterprise of the English merchant. The loss of Calais by Mary, and her restoration of the monopoly of the Steelyard Company, who were Hanse Town merchants-the withdrawal of whose charter by Henry VIII. had been most beneficial to freedom of trade-were circumstances which acted adversely on commerce in her reign.

The earliest European trade with India was Venetian, and was conducted by way of the Black Sea. On the discovery by Vasco de Gama of the passage by the Cape of Good Hope, in 1497, the Dutch claimed the exclusive right of navigating those seas. The Spaniards again were equally exclusive with regard to their own subsequent discovery of a passage by

615

gard to "certain creatures with men's heads and the tails of fishes, who swim with bows and arrows about the fords and bays, and live on human flesh."

During the long reign of Elizabeth foreign trade made gigantic strides. Among the very first acts of this queen was one to abolish the restriction of English merchants to English bottoms in the transport of goods. The Act states that this restriction had provoked the natural adoption of like restrictions by foreign princes. This was the first acknowledgment of the mischief of meddling with the freedom of trade; and our foreign trade had now acquired an importance which demanded respect. With the Netherlands alone our trade was extraordinary, its value amounting to nearly two millions and a half sterling annually; and we find at this time the first mention of insurance of goods on their voyage. In 1562 we hear also of that detestable commerce the slave trade, which was introduced by John Hawkins, so well known afterwards as the daring compeer of Drake and Frobisher, and one of the heroic conquerors of the Armada. Hawkins carried out English goods, called at the Guinea Coast,

A Courtier of Queen Bess's Time.

and took in slaves, sailed to Hispaniola, and brought thence sugar, ginger, hides, and pearls.

the Straits of Magellan. These monopolies, so strange in their contrast to our modern conceptions and practice, left the English the sole alternative of a north-west or north-east passage. About 1500, a Portuguese named During the reign of Elizabeth the many voyages which Corte Real attempted to discover a north-west pas- were made in order to discover a north-west passage to India, sage, which was followed by a similar effort on the led to a more intimate knowledge of the North American part of the English in 1553. The idea received coasts. In these Frobisher, Cavendish, and Davis distinthe greatest encouragement from Queen Elizabeth, and guished themselves. From 1576 to the end of Elizabeth's a company was formed in 1585 called the "Fellow-reign, Raleigh and his step-brother, Sir Humphrey Gilship for the discovery of the North-West Passage." Sir Hugh Willoughby's last voyage, which was entered on with a view to discover a north-east passage to China, was fatal to him and his brave comrades, who perished in the ice. The instructions given to Sir Hugh by Sebastian Cabot, Grand Pilot of England by appointment of Henry VII., are extant, and furnish a curious and interesting specimen of naval regulation. No dicing, carding, tabling, nor other such practices were to be allowed on ship-board; morning and evening prayers were to be diligently observed. On the other hand, the natives of strange coun- As regarded the domestic manufactures of this period, tries were to be "enticed on board and made drunk with the woollen manufactures were the most important, and your beer and wine, for then you shall know the secrets extended themselves greatly on account of the foreign of their hearts;" and they were to be cautious with re- demand. This manufacture had to contend with many

bert, made repeated attempts to colonise North America, and particularly Virginia-so called in honour of Elizabeth-but in vain. Equally strenuous and unsuccessful efforts were made to open a direct sea communication with India by the English; and it was not till the close of Elizabeth's reign that the incorporation of an East India Company, destined to establish that trade, was effected. The charter was granted by Elizabeth in 1600. Elizabeth also chartered a company in 1579 for the exclusive right of trading to all the countries of the Baltic.

to make cloths and other woollen goods. Originally intermixture of inferior yarns, and by not taking the London, Norwich, Bristol, Gloucester, and Coventry were the privileged places. Essex became a clothing county; but by degrees the trade spread into those quarters where

proper means to prevent them running up on bea. exposed to wet. Norwich had manufactures of wool different to ordinary cloth, in which it excelled all othe

it still prevails. Berks, Oxford, Surrey, and Yorkshire | places; and in Elizabeth's reign the Norwich manua made coarse kerseys for exportation; Wales manufactured turers introduced new kinds under the name of Norw fringes and coarse cloths; but Tiverton, Bridgewater, satins and fustians. Chard, and other towns of Wilts, Gloucester, and Somerset

The art of dyeing received a new impulse and