258 DICKSON ON FLAX-CULTURE 



She passed an act relieving the counties of Somerset, 

 Gloucester, and Wilts from old oppressive statutes, which 

 confined the making of cloth to corporate towns ; and trade, 

 thus permitted to choose its own localities, began to flourish 

 rapidly. In 1582, England exported 200,000 pieces of cloth. 

 In this reign also the English merchants, instead of selling 

 their goods to the Hanseatic and Flemish traders, began 

 themselves to export, to the great annoyance of their foreign 

 neighbours. 



In the reign of James I., it was calculated that nine- 

 tenths of the commerce of the kingdom consisted in woollen 

 goods. Most of the cloth was exported raw, and was dyed 

 and dressed by the Dutch, who gained, it was pretended, 

 700,000 annually by this manufacture. English commerce 

 increased under the Commonwealth, but with the Restoration 

 came prohibitions which caused some thousands of manufac- 

 turers to emigrate to the Palatinate, and a slow progress of 

 the woollen manufacture was the result. The demand from 

 America and the West India colonies caused a reaction, and 

 the example of the cotton manufacturers induced the woollen 

 traders to direct their attention to machinery. Since that 

 period, the manufacturer has gradually improved, and instead 

 of being ruined, as seemed all but certain in 1782, our 

 exports of woollen cloth averaged between 6,000,000 and 

 7,000,000 in value. 



At this time the linen-trade was of little value in England, 

 and parliament made a present of it to the people of Ireland ; 

 and during the reign of William III., there was a feeling on 

 the part of the Parliament, which prevented the encourage- 

 ment of the Irish in the manufacture of woollens in opposi- 

 tion to England, but to leave them in possession of the linen- 

 trade, which appeared more suited to that country. 



Many circumstances contributed to render the linen-trade 

 limited and precarious in Ireland. The people, except in 



