20 
A VOYAGE TO SPITZBERGEN 
The breaking-up of this condition of things was due, 
in part, to domestic discontents, occasioned by the sub¬ 
jection of traffic to the domination of foreigners ; out 
of which grew the civil disturbances of May Day, 1517. 
A company for the transaction of the wool-trade with 
the Netherlands, incorporated by Henry VII. in 1505, 
became strong enough, ultimately, to oppose success¬ 
fully the interference of the Steelyard monopolists; and 
through their exertions, combined with those of the 
Merchants of the Staple, the privileges of the Steelyard 
Company were declared forfeited in 1552. Although 
renewed in 1554 by Mary, these are supposed to have 
been again withdrawn, as the company never recovered 
their power; and the houses they occupied were finally 
closed, by order of Elizabeth, in 1597. 
The second cause of the subversion of the courses of 
trade was the capture and sack of Antwerp, by the 
Duke of Parma, in 1585 ; which gave a shock to the 
whole system of European commerce, and established 
the independence of that of England. 1 
Events that seem to belong together from their na¬ 
ture, origin, and design, are sometimes separated by 
considerable intervals in history. The successful voyage 
of Columbus caused great attention to be given to the 
study of the form of the earth ; and, when the posi¬ 
tions of different countries in point of latitude came to 
1 The sacking of this city gave the finishing blow to the commerce of the Neth¬ 
erlands. The whole fishing trade removed into Holland; and as for the noble manu¬ 
factures of Flanders and Brabant, they removed to different parts. Much of the 
woollen manufacture settled at Leyden; the linen removed to Haerlem and Amsterdam. 
One-third part of the merchants and workmen who worked and dealt in silks, damasks, 
and taffeties, and in bayes, says, serges, stockings, &c., settled in England. — Ander¬ 
son's Commerce , vol. ii. p. 211-12. 
