Its criticism of Italian trade. the aim of our policy should be to make ourselves "masters of the narrow sea . . . that is the wall of England". "For if this sea be kept in time of war Who can here pass without danger and woe?" But England, we are told, was neglecting her opportunities by allowing her navy to fall into decay. Edgar had built a fleet of ships" not few but many a score", and in the days of Edward III. there was That might withstand of his majesty ". Henry V. again had built three great ships, the Trinity, the Grace-Dieu and the Holy Ghost. But now conditions were changed, and for the ship represented on English coins our enemies in derision were bidding us "set a sheep". The writer devotes special attention to England's commercial relations with the great Italian cities. He praises the Genoese because they brought us useful commodities-wood, oil, cotton, gold, cloths of gold, silk and black pepper-while they took from us our wool and woollen cloth. But the trade of Venice and Florence is bitterly condemned; it was regarded as an intolerable evil that we should exchange our valuable commodities for extravagant trifles. "The great galleys of Venice and Florence Be well ladened with things of complacence, All spicery and of grocer's ware, With sweet wines, all manner of chaffare [merchandise], tailed, Nifles [nicknacks], trifles that little have availed. And things with which they fetely [cleverly] blear our eye. With things not enduring that we buy. For much of this chaffare that is wastable Might be forborne for [as] dear and deceivable. Thus these galleys for this liking ware And eating ware, bear hence our best chaffare, For each other land of necessity Have great need to buy some of the three; And we receive of them into this coast Ware and chaffare that lightly [easily] will be lost". Even in the sixteenth century it was the ground of com plaint that merchants brought in strange merchandise "But would God that, without longer delays To go to host as we there with them do". England's Another work, On England's Commercial Policy 2, was com- On posed somewhat later than the Libelle of English Polycye, from Comwhich it freely borrowed many of its sentiments. It is mercial Policy. valuable for its allusions to the condition of the working classes, to which attention has already been drawn. In common with the Libelle the writer is at pains to show how England was in a position to exercise supremacy over all other countries, though his contention is based not on the ground of our strategic position, but on our industrial resources. No country was able to dispense with English commodities, wool and cloth, and this gave us a hold by which "we might rule and govern all Christian kings". He counselled further that we should sell our wares dear. The writers of both poems in fact were essentially mercantilist in their standpoint. They appear to have taken the view that foreign countries by obtaining our commodities enriched themselves at our expense; it was reserved for a later age to recognize that in a fair exchange both parties to the contract may equally benefit. They were anxious, therefore, that England should not part too easily with her commodities either by exchanging them for mere trifles, "things of complacence", or by selling them too cheaply. 1 Pauli, Drei volksw. Denkschr. 37. 2 Political Poems and Songs, vol. ii. s Supra, p. 423. Commercial Henry At the end of the fifteenth century a new epoch in the treaties of history of English commerce opened up with the reign of Henry VII. Henry was the first of the line of modern statesmen, and his significance lies especially in the fact that he seems to have recognized clearly the futility of the old schemes of aggrandizement on the continent. His face was turned westward, and his encouragement of voyages of discovery revealed to England her true destiny and helped to place her upon the path along which she has since moved. The pioneer of geographical discoveries was John Cabot, who was the first to set foot on the mainland of North America1. Henry's care for foreign commerce is seen especially in the numerous mercantile treaties which he concluded with the different states of Europe. His commercial activities fairly embraced the whole continent. He made a compact with Ferdinand and Isabella, by which the subjects of either country were at liberty to trade in the other country and to receive the same treatment as the nativeborn. He carried out agreements with the Empire3, France, and Friesland 5, which conferred trading privileges upon English merchants; but most important of all were the treaties between England and the Netherlands. The latter was the chief market for English produce, and it was of the utmost consequence to establish the relations between the two countries on a satisfactory basis. The Magnus Intercursus (1496) restored commercial intercourse after it had been suspended for a considerable time. Henry, irritated at Burgundy's support of Perkin Warbeck, and in order to force the archduke's hand, had banished Flemings from his dominions, ordering the Merchant Adventurers to leave Antwerp and removing the mart of English cloth to Calais 6. The Merchant Adventurers rallied loyally to the king's side, and "being a strong company (at that (i.) Relations with the Netherlands. 1 There appear to have been three Cabot voyages, the first two under John Cabot, and the third under Sebastian his son. For a discussion as to this, see J. A. Williamson, Maritime Enterprise (1913), 103 et passim. 2 Rymer (O. ed.), xii. 421 (1490); ibid. xii. 744 (1499). 3 Ibid. xiii. 6(1502). Ibid. xiii. 121 (1505). 6 Bacon, Works, vi. 147. A proclamation in 1493 forbade all trade between England and the Low Countries: Crawford, Tudor and Stuart Proclamations, i. 3, No. 23. Ibid. xii. 500 (1492). time) and well under-set with rich men and good order, did hold out bravely; taking off the commodities of the kingdom, though they laid dead upon their hands for want of vent". The Magnus Intercursus ensured a free market for the sale of English cloth, which was no longer to be excluded from the Netherlands (except Flanders); it also stipulated that only the customary duties should be imposed, and obtained the removal of the new imposition placed on English cloth 2. The English merchants, says Bacon, "came again to their mansion at Antwerp where they were received with procession and great joy". In 1499 another treaty removed all existing duties on cloth and allowed it to be sold anywhere within the dominions of Burgundy (except Flanders), and not merely at Bruges and Antwerp1. Finally, in 1506, the Malus Intercursus crowned Henry's efforts to establish complete freedom of trade by enabling English merchants to sell cloth in the Low Countries retail and not only wholesale, and even to sell cloth in Flanders, although here traffic was to be wholesale 5. But the next year Philip of Burgundy died, and the Regent's refusal to ratify the treaty compelled a fresh agreement in which the concession of retail trading was withdrawn, though the other privileges remained intact. Relations Henry's relations with the Netherlands showed his (ii.) anxiety to advance the commercial interests of his country with the and find an outlet for the cloth manufacture. The same Hansards. principles of conduct influenced his dealings with the Hansards and the Venetians. At the outset, indeed, Henry did not enjoy a free hand; the great disturbing factor of his reign was the insecurity of his throne which compelled him to pursue a makeshift policy. His leading idea was to prevent foreign courts from lending encouragement to pretenders, and he shrank from an open breach with the powerful Hanseatic League, which had already assisted one claimant to obtain the English throne and might easily be 1 Bacon, Works, vi. 172. 2 Rymer, xii. 655. Proclamation of peace: Tudor and Stuart Proclamations, i. 3, No. 24. 3 Works, vi. 173. Rymer, xii. 716; Tudor and Stuart Proclamations, i. 5, No. 37. 5 Rymer, xiii. 134. English trade in the Medi induced to assist another. But though compelled to confirm their privileges, he showed none the less clearly the trend of his inclinations and harassed them in divers ways. In order to break down their exclusive monopoly, he entered into compacts with Denmark (1489) and Riga (1498). The former welcomed an alliance against the common rival and admitted English merchants on advantageous terms, conferring upon them full trading rights in Denmark and Iceland1. A generation earlier (1450) Canynges, the merchant prince of Bristol, and other traders had been allowed to share in the trade with Iceland 2. The treaty with Riga (1498) was a virtual attempt to detach it from the League, but the latter reasserted its control and foiled Henry's efforts to make a breach in its monopoly 3. There were difficulties raised on both sides: Henry's commissioners reiterated their grievance that Englishmen were denied reciprocal rights in the Hanseatic dominions in spite of the Treaty of Utrecht; the Hansards complained of their injuries in England," which they would fain have written with a pen of iron on a hard flint-stone that they might never more forget it "5. But later a new menace confronted Henry in the pretensions of the earl of Suffolk, and once again the claims of dynasty proved paramount. abandoned his hostility to the League and restored it to complete favour. A statute of 1504 provided that no acts relating to merchants or merchandise should extend "to the prejudice, hurt or charge of the said merchants of the Hanse contrary to their ancient liberties, privileges, and free usages and customs of old time granted to " them ; and the League maintained its position throughout the reign of Henry VIII. He Henry not only sought to gain a firmer footing for Englishmen in the Baltic, his enterprise also made itself terranean. felt in other directions. English merchants had already begun to participate in the trade of southern Europe, and to frequent the ports of the Mediterranean with their 1 Rymer, xii. 381. 2 Ibid. xi. 273, 277. Ibid. xii. 701. 4 Schanz, Englische Handelspolitik, ii. 423, No. 94 (1499). 5 W. Busch, England under the Tudors (1895), i. 154. • Statutes, ii. 665. |
