340 



THE POPULAR EDUCATOR. 



The infinitive appears in apposition, chiefly after demonstra- 

 tive and relative pronouns, in order to give a more exact view 

 of the idea before generally indicated ; as, Papas n KO.I ro5' 

 fffTu; aivfiffQai Atcw, this also is something unpleasant, (namely) 

 to bs praised excessively. 



A substantive appears in apposition to an entire sentence, in 

 order to mark the point of view from which the fact in the 

 sentence is to be regarded ; as, "E.\ei>t)v KTavaiftev, MeceAey AUTTTJV 

 TTMpav, let us slay Helen, a bitter grief to Menelaus. 



INDUSTRIAL AND POLITICAL HISTORY 

 OF COMMERCE. 



CHAPTER XXIII. BRITISH INDUSTRY AND COMMERCE. 



ENGLAND. There was nothing in the intercourse between the 

 ancient nations and our own country that ever foreshadowed 

 the supremacy we wore destined to attain in the arts of industry 

 and the pursuits of commerce. The geographical isolation of 

 Britain had its counterpart in our social and commercial life. 

 Our richest natural endowments, coal and iron, were, in the 

 first period of British history, almost utterly unknown. 



England was covered with dense forests ; herds of wild cattle 

 and other beasts roamed through the country ; agriculture was 

 practised only in the rudest way, and the natives lived chiefly 

 upon fruits and the products of hunting. Tin, lying near the 

 surface of the soil, and lead in considerable quantities, were 

 exchanged with the Phoenicians for trinkets ; and a few simple 

 cemmodities were transmitted overland to Marseilles, for use in 

 the Levantine States and Greece. Roman occupation increased 

 the mineral produce, but cattle-rearing and swine-herding long 

 employed most of the inhabitants. Hides, wool, and furs are 

 named among the exports, and British pearls appear to have 

 been esteemed. In the Saxon period a commercial treaty was 

 made between the king of the Mercians and Charlemagne, and 

 about the same time notice is taken of an Anglo-Saxon mer- 

 chant trading in Marseilles. Other Anglo-Saxon merchants 

 visited the market of St. Denis, in the reign of Dagobert, while 

 Frisians visited England in the eighth century. Fairs existed 

 amongst the natives, but trade was restricted by the law which 

 forbade transactions above the value of twenty pence, except in 

 the sight of two witnesses or of the magistrate. Little of the 

 land was a cable, and the forests were valued not for their timber, 

 but for tha'r pannage in the form of the mast of oak and beech, 

 which furnished sustenance to herds of swine. 



Thile the Mediterranean was crowded with an active com- 

 merce, England was merely productive and passive, waiting at 

 homo for traders from abroad, who visited it for tin, lead, wool, 

 and hides. English wool was so esteemed that Charlemagne 

 exempted merchants dealing in it from the peril of capture in 

 war : wool, also, was the staple of exchange for the cloths of the 

 Netherlands from the days of Alfred the Great to those of Edward 

 the Confessor. 



William the Conqueror sheltered u band of weavers driven 

 from Zealand by an irruption of the sea, and the country profited 

 by the intercourse they established with Hollend. English wool 

 improved so much very soon, that next to money it was the 

 commodity most eagerly sought in foreign exchange. Part of 

 the ransom of Richard I. was paid in wool. Eventually corn 

 and cheese began to be regular articles of export. The herring 

 shoals found off Yarmouth gave the first impulse to our principal 

 fishery. The herring trade was confirmed to that toWn by a 

 charter of King John. An early trade in slaves brought profit 

 to Bristol, as did the negro traffic also in later days, and enriched 

 the exchequer to the extent of ,4,000 annually from the duties 

 levied upon this human commodity. London was the earliest in 

 time and first in importance of the English trading cities. 

 Ta,citus mentions London as a celebrated resort of merchants. 

 Bede relates that it was frequented by foreigners in 6l4 for 

 the purposes of trade. William of Malmesbury speaks of it as a 

 wealthy and populous city in 1041 ; and half a century later 

 considerable business was transacted there. 



In the Norman period agriculture and manufactures were less 

 rude than is. the time of the Saxons, but spinning and weaving 

 were for a long time household avocations, and the coarsest 

 cloths alone were produced at a time when the industrial arts in 

 .France had reached a high degree of excellence. During the 

 Roman occupation of Britain the native roada were improved, 



and others, still remaining j3 great higiiways, were first con- 

 structed. Nevertheless, the general means of communication 

 were wretched ; the carriages were clumsy, and pack-horses along 

 bridle paths were the chief mode of transport. On the rivers 

 the Britons skilfully managed their light coracles made of wicker 

 and hides. Probably they ventured in larger canoes as far as 

 Ireland and Gaul. Alfred the Great created a navy of war- 

 galleys, each rowed by sixty or eighty men, to cope with the 

 Danish naval power. Under the Norman kings, further improve- 

 ments were stimulated by association with France. England 

 was occasionally unable to hold her own, but at other times wag 

 aggressive. Trading states in the Middle Ages regarded the seas 

 as the domain of the strongest, and acts which would now be 

 called piracy were often committed. Towns fought against each 

 other without reference to law or king. Wincheisea, Yarmouth, 

 and the Cinque Ports were thus often in open hostility with the 

 maritime towns of Flanders and France. Individuals as well 

 as towns were left to enforce on their own account the repara- 

 tion for maritime wrongs, and in their desire to recover their 

 losses they were not scrupulous, where the real offender was 

 difficult to reach, about choosing another in his stead. English 

 merchants for many generations had to fight for every advantage 

 they gained. The European trading leagues having got the 

 start, did their best to stifle in its birth every native effort at 

 foreign trade. They even looked upon English vessels as 

 lawful prizes, and sealed their own ports against new comers by 

 heavy " discriminative" duties. A celebrated company of " mer- 

 chant adventurers " received a charter in 1406 from Henry IV., 

 and notwithstanding the opposition of Continental monopolists, 

 pursued a profitable trade, smuggling the cheap coarse English 

 woollens into the marts of Flanders, Italy, and the Levant, in 

 exchange for rich cloths, wines, and arms. 



The causes and the consequence of the backward condition of 

 England are not far to seek. Saxons, Danes, Normans, not only 

 plundered the prior inhabitants, but disturbed their institutions. 

 At each conquest the nation was thrown back, and had to begin 

 anew. The Britons under the Romans partook of the refinement 

 of their masters. Progress, arrested when William the Norman 

 ground the land under his iron heel and blighted Saxon freedom 

 with the curse of villenage, was long in making a fresh start. 

 The feudal system in England virtually rendered industry penal, 

 for it enforced idleness on the vassals, who learned to think that 

 war and the chase were the fitting employments for free men, 

 and that useful work was degrading. Forest laws kept the land 

 from cultivation, and consequently husbandry remained in a feeble 

 condition. The caprice of the seasons led to failures of produce, 

 both vegetable and animal, and famines were far from unfrequeiit. 

 For generations England continued a country of forests and 

 marshes the hunting-ground of untutored Normans. Red deer 

 and wild swine were of higher value in the eyes of such men 

 than the lives of two millions of Saxon serfs. Trade was limited 

 by rapine and lawlessness, and few foreign merchants would 

 risk life and property for the profits of commercial intercourse. 

 The monasteries of that time seem to have been the sanc- 

 tuaries of industry as well as of learning. Located in fertile 

 vales, the clergy made labour a sacred duty, and by cultivating 

 the rich lands around them they improved the practice of 

 agriculture. They were lenient masters. By shielding the 

 farm labourers from the injustice of the barons, the monks pre- 

 pared the way for the overthrow of villenage. If the loss 01 

 liberty be the loss of half our virtue, we owe an indefinite 

 debt to monachism for the restitution of this priceless boon. 

 As freemen the lower orders acquired a right to property, which 

 elevated their moral tone and added to the prosperity of the 

 whole population. Manufactures no less than husbandry were 

 fostered by the monks. The principle of every monastery waa, 

 that each community should supply as far as possible its own 

 wants by home labour. Cloth was woven from home-grown wool ; 

 abbeys and churches were planned and built by ecclesiastical 

 artificers, and beautiful ruins and splendid cathedrals remain as 

 evidences of their genius. Each religious retreat was a centre 

 of blessings greater than military glory. Conquerors and con- 

 quered were silently brought together by the teaching and exam- 

 ple of the Church, until at length, by the operation of a chain 

 of influences, the fusion of the two rival races of Saxon and 

 Norman was completed. From this period England possesses 

 a national history, and dates its growth as an industrial and 

 commercial power. Characteristic of ignorance, however, laws 



