THE MODERN HISTORY OF SILK. 181 



manufacture. At the period of the influx of the 

 refiigees, foreign silks were freely admitted into 

 England; and it is stated, in the custom-house 

 returns, that from £.600,000 to £.700,000 worth 

 were annually imported in the interval from 1 685 

 to 1693. But the manufacture was not long per- 

 mitted to continue on this footing. In I692, the 

 refugees, who seem to have been quite as conver- 

 sant with the arts of monopoly as with those either 

 of spinning or weaving, obtained a patent, giving 

 them an exclusive right to manufacture lutestrings 

 and a-la-modes, the silks then in greatest demand. 

 This, however, was not enough to satisfy them ; 

 for, in 1697, Parliament passed an act, in compli- 

 ance with their urgent solicitations, prohibiting the 

 importation of all French and other European silk 

 goods ; and, in I7OI, the same prohibition was ex- 

 tended to silk goods imported from India and China. 

 The year 1 719 is an important epoch in the his- 

 tory of the British silk manufacture, a patent having 

 been then granted, for fourteen years, to Sir Thomas 

 Lambe and his brother, for an exclusive property of 

 the famous silk mill erected by them at Derby, from 

 models they had clandestinely obtained in Italy, for 

 preparing thrown, or, as it is more commonly called, 

 organzine silk. At the expiration of the patent. 

 Parliament refused the prayer of a petition of Sir 

 Thomas Lambe for its renewal, but granted him a 

 sum of £.14,000 sterling, in consideration of the 



