t 



FROM THE SPANISH MONARCHY. I9? 



fcikigated by canals, foon taught this nation to obferve 

 the operations of nature, to fet a boifterous element at 

 defiance by induftry and perfeyerance ; and, like the 

 ^Egyptians, inftrucled by their Nile, to exert its in- 

 vention and ingenuity in the difcovery and ufe of the 

 means of renffeinc.e. The natural fertility of its foil, 

 which was favourable to agriculture and pafturage, at 

 the fame time increafed its population. Its happy iitua- 

 tion on the fea, and the great navigable rivers of Ger- 

 many and France, which partly here fall into the fea, 

 fucli a number of artificial canals interfering the coun- 

 try in all directions, incited and animated navigation ; 

 and the interior circulation of the provinces, fo much 

 facilitated thereby, very early awakened a fpirit of 

 commerce, 



The neighbouring coaft of Britain was the firft that 

 was yiftted by their fhips. The englifh wool which 

 they carried back, gave employment to thoufands of 

 indubious hands in Bruges, Ghent, and Antwerp; 

 and fcarcely had half the twelfth century elapfed be- 

 fore flemifh cloths were worn in Germany and France, 

 go early as the eleventh century we find frieHand fhips 

 in the Belt, and even up the Levant. This enter- 

 priling people were already able, without the compafs, 

 to invade the regions of the pole, and to fteer to the 

 porthernmoft capes of Ruffia. From the towns of Van- 

 dalia the Netherlands took a part of the trade to the 

 Levant, which at that time paiTed from the Black Sea 

 to the Baltic over the ruffian empire. On the decline 

 of this in the thirteenth century, when the crufades 

 jiad opened a new way, acrofs the Mediterranean, for 



9 3 the 



