A. D. 1560. 135 



ty-eighth, year of her reign, in the former of which they firft had the 

 defia;nation of merchants-adventurers given them. 



The fame yenr, the queen granted by charter to the merchants of 

 Exeter, by the title of the governor, confuls, and fociety of merchants- 

 adventurers of Kxeter, an exclufive trade to France *. 



Sigifm'.md, kinii; of Poland, being at war with Ruflia, wrote to Queen 

 Elizabeth, requefting her not to permit her fubjeds to trade to Ruflia 

 by the wav of Nurva, as furnifhing his enemies with arts, arms, and 

 other nec'ir.iries ; and he threatened fuch fhips as fhould fo trade with 

 his utmoft refentment. But his threatenings on this and another famous 

 occafion, h(-reafter to be noticed, were very little regarded. 



Eric XIV, king of S".eden, taking advantage of the depreflion of 

 the German knights of the crofs by the Ruflians, accepted of the re- 

 qnefl of the town of Rca'cI and of the country adjacent, to take them 

 under his protection, whereby Sweden got a footing in Livonia ; and by 

 the acquifition of that fine country, which Sweden held till the former 

 part of the eighteenth century, its commerce, weahh, and power were 

 confiderably increafed. 



156 1. — In the next year, the Poles, Danes, Swedes, and Mufcovites, 

 having in their turns gradually deprefled the power, and greatly leflen- 

 ed the dominions of the Teutonic order in Livonia, the great mafter of 

 that order, Gottard Ketler, refigned that part of Livonia which now re- 

 mained to them into the hands of the Poles, after that order had held 

 it 357 years, according to T'huanus [L. xxviii.] Ketler thereupon re- 

 ceived from Sigifmund king of Poland the fovereignty of Courland and 

 Semigailia, under the title of duke, to be held by him and his heirs of 

 the crown of Poland. 



The Hamburghers frill maintaining their claim to an exclufive fove- 

 reignty on the river Elbe, for the fupport of^ which they had feized a 

 Danifh fhip, Frederick II of Denmark, therefor now feized all the 

 Hamburgh fhips in the Daniih ports, and after much diipute obliged 

 that city to pay him 40,000 guilders for fatisfadfion. 



Howell relates, [Hi/lory of the World, V. ii, p. 222] that Queen Ellza-- 

 beth, in this third year of her reign, was prefented with a pair of b'.ack 

 knit lilk ftockings by her iilkwoman Mrs. Montague, and thenceforth 

 flte never wore cloth ones any more. He adds, that Henry VIII, that 

 magnificent and expenflve prince, wore ordinarily cloth hofe, except 

 when there came from Spain, by great chance, a pair of filk ftockings ; 

 for Spain very early abounded in filk. His fon, Edward VI, was pre- 

 fented with a pair of long Spanifli filk ftockings by his merchant Sir 

 Thomas Grelham, and the prelentwas then much taken notice of. Thus 

 it appears that the invention of knit filk ftockings came from Spain, 



* Their privilege was confirmed and reflridted to their o\vn city by an aft of parb'ameiit 4 Jac. I, 

 r. 9. 



