fXi:a&^ f-lf.:'-ifliS».:yliiii.f^.:f . '«A.> .'.t.Jji t.f.i^J fi'.iy ,f,iff,i ^ ^it^f 'tf'J14litfi^iit^ QJortteU Httiueraitg Sibraty 3)tt;aca, Neia ^ark BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF HENRY W. SAGE 1891 HF353 .S46™" "'"™'*"'' '""'"^ ^''^lIlIillllliSiViBifiiiil?' ''"""nerce, olin 3 1924 030 139 004 Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924030139004 THE ROMANCE OF COMMERCE THOMAS GRESHAiC 6 SaRTiflOMA3 Gmesham. THE ROMANCE OF COMMERCE BY H. GORDON SELFRIDGE WITH ILLUSTRATIONS fig fig LONDON : JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD NEW YORK : JOHN LANE COMPANY MCMXVIII PKIMTED BY WILLIAM UKENUUN AND SON, LTU., PLYMOUTH, ENGLAND " Five great intellectual professions have hitherto existed in every civilized nation : The Soldiers to defend it. The Merchants to provide for it. The Pastors to teach it. The Physicians to keep it in health. The Lawyers to enforce justice in it. And the duty of all of these is, on due occasion, to die for it." John Ruskin. DEDICATION To the Merchants and Men of Commerce throughout the entire world, or to those among them who love their calling and count themselves fortunate in being able to follow its intricate but fascinating paths — to those who look upon work as glorious and to be sought — who look upon idleness as unpro- ductive and to be avoided — to those whose efforts are unitedly making the world busier, happier, richer, and more able to provide the good things of life, this volume is dedicated by The Author. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. Concerning Commerce ..... i II. The Commerce of the Ancient Civilizations- China .... Phoenicia .... Assyria and Babylonia Greece ' III. Venice ..... » IV. Giovanni, Cosimo and Lorenzo dei Medici « V. The Fuggers of Augsburg . - VI, The Hanseatic League VII. Fairs and their Position in Commerce VIII. Guilds IX. Early British Commerce X. The de la Poles of Hull . XI. Richard Whittington, John Philpot, and William Walworth 19 34 42 44 48 63 79 98 121 139 164 180 190 201 20^ XII. William Canynge of Bristol XIII. Trade and the Tudors XIV. William and Sir John Hawkins of Plymouth 219 XV. George Heriot 224 xii CONTENTS CHAPTER PACt XVI. The Myddletons and the East India Company 230 XVII. Merchants of the North of England XVIII. Growth of Trade from the Seventeenth to the Twentieth Century XIX. The Fantastic in Trade XX. The Later English Merchants — Sir Josiah Child .... William Patterson .... Sir Robert Peel .... XXI. Trade and the English Aristocracy . XXII. The Hudson's Bay Company . XXIII. Japan ....... XXIV. A Representative Business of the Twen tieth Century 240 245 250 271 274 280 287 318 350 361 Note. — These chapters were written before the war, and have been waiting all these months for a time when publication seemed reasonably wise. They have now been read over, but very few changes or additions have been made. The Author. ILLUSTRATIONS Sir Thomas GrESHAM at the age of 25 . . . Frontispiece Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from the picture in Mercers' Hall. Tc face page The Royal Exchange 6 From an engraving in the possession of the Author by 7". Highams, after a drawing by G. B. Moore. The Rt. Honble. Joseph Addison, Esq. ..... 14 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from a mezzotint after Sir Godfrey Kneller, in the collection of John Lane. Daniel De Foe 16 From a scarce engraving in line by Van der Gucht, in the collection of John Lane. Early Chinese Cart (at least iooo b.c.) .... 20 Plan of Chinese Market (iooo b.c.) 28 From a reproduction in the British Museum. A Map of Syria and Phcenicia 34 From an engraving in the possession of the Author. Horse Carrying Blocks of Tin 36 From an engraving in the Museum at Truro. Block of Tin (weight 159J lbs.) 36 Now in the Museum at Truro. Phcenician Ships (about 700 b.c.) 4° From a relief reproduced in Layard's Monuments of Nineveh, 1849. Pack Camel 4^ Primitive Greek Cart 4^ Merchants Bitying Cloth 4^ Types of Merchant Ships . 4^ Europe in the Twelfth or Thirteenth Century ... 52 From a reproduction in the British Museum. Panoramic View of Venice (about 1480) .... 56 Reproduced from an engraving in the British Museum. xiv ILLUSTRATIONS To face page Florence and Genoa (about 1580) . . . . • 64 From an engraving in the British Museum. CosiMo DE Medici, Pater Patriae ....•• 68 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from an engraving by A. Perfetti, after Carrucci da Pontormo, in the possession of the Author. The Medici Arms ........ 7^ Reproduced from the Teatro Araldico by Tettoni and Saladini. Palazzo Vecchio, Florence . 74 From a drawing in the British Museum by Miss Maria Hardinge. Lorenzo de' Medici 76 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from a line engraving, by Rajfaele Morghen, after Giorgio Vasari, in the possession of the Author. German Merchant in the Fourteenth Century ... 80 Reproduced from a miniature in an illuminated MS. Old German Warehouse ....... 82 From a woodcut in the British Museum. Arrival of Cargo Boats ....... 84 From a woodcut published in Augsburg in 1539. Merchants on the Rhine ....... 88 From a miniature in the Municipal Library, Lucerne, dated 1484. Jacobus Fugger 92 From a line engraving in the possession of the Author. Map of Augsburg (about 1580) 96 From a print in the British Museum. LuBECK (about 1560) ........ 100 From a woodcut possibly by Altdorffer. LuBECK and Hamburg ........ 104 From an engraving in the British Museum. Old Bergen .......... 106 From an engraving in the British Museum. Bruges in 1580 . . .110 From an engraving in the British Museum. Old London, showing the Steelyard . . . . -.114 From a line engraving. George Gisze, Merchant of the Steelyard . . . .118 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from the portrait by Holbein. Old Steelyard, Interior and Exterior ..... 120 From drawings by T. H. Shepherd in the British Museum. ILLUSTRATIONS xv To face page Plan of Sturbridge Fair 128 NlJNI-NoVGOROD IN THE FIFTEENTH CeNTURY . . . -134 From a reproduction in the British Museum. NijNi-NovGOROD 136 From a print in the British Museum. A Citizen of London in his Livery Gown .... 140 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from a mezzotint by J. Faber, after Thomas Hudson, in the collection of John Lane. The Arms of the City Companies 144 From an engraving in the possession of the Author. Thomas Fielder, Fruit Broker ...... 148 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from a very rare mezzo- tint by Vol Green, after Chamberlain, in the possession of the Author. Goldsmiths' Hall . . . . . . . .152 From an engraving by W . Wallis, after a drawing by 1. H. Shepherd, in the possession of the Author. Merchant Taylors' Hall . . . . . . .156 From a drawing by 1 . H. Shepherd in the British Museum. Salters' Hall ......... 153 From an engraving in the possession of the Author by W . Wallis, after a drawing by 1 . H. Shepherd. Ironmongers' Hall ........ 160 From an engraving in the possession of the Author. Roman Boats 164 From a section of Trajan's Column. West Cheap in 1585 168 From a print in the possession of the Author. Map of Old London 172 From an engraved map in the British Museum. South View of the Custom House, London (burnt 1666) . 176 From an engraving in the possession of the Author, after a scarce print dated 1663. Old MS. Map of the Site of Ravensrod . . . .180 From a reproduction in the British Museum. The Site of Ravensrod 182 From a map in the British Museum. Sir William De la Pole 184 From a painting in the Wilberforce Museum, Hull. Early German Map of Hull 186 From a scarce print in the possession of the Author. Old Plan of Hull showing the Charter House outside the walls 188 From an engraving in the British Museum. xvi ILLUSTRATIONS To face page Charter House, Hull • 188 Reproduced from an illustration in Old and New Hull, by T. T. Urldridge, 1884. Sir Richard Whittington ....... 192 From a print in the possession oj the Author. Sir William Walworth . 194 From a line engraving in the possession of the Author. Whittington's House, Crutched Friars .... 198 From an engraving by Birrel in the possession of the Author. Bristol in 1576 ......... 202 From a line engraving in the possession of the Author. William Canynge ........ 204 From a mezzotint by Jehner in the British Museum. The Royal Exchange ........ 208 From a print in the possession of the Author. Sir Thomas Gresham ....... 210 By Antonis Mora. Antwerp in 1580 ......... 212 From an engraving in the British Museum. The Royal Exchange, Exterior and Interior . . . 216 From line engravings by Francis Hogenburg in the possession of the Author. Sir John Hawkins 220 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from a stipple en- graving in the collection of John Lane. George Heriot ......... 224 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from an engraving in the possession of the Author by G. B. Shaw, after Jamieson. Edinburgh in 1580 ........ 228 From an engraving in the British Museum. India House, the Sale Room 232 From an aquatint in the possession of the Author engraved by Stadler, after a drawing by Rowlandson and Pugin. Sir Hugh Myddelton ........ 238 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from an engraving in the collection of John Lane by George Vertue, after Cornelius Johnson. A Plan of Manchester and Salford ..... 240 From an engraving by 1. Tinker in the possession of the Author. Humphrey Chetham ........ 242 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from an engraving in stipple in the possession of the Author by W. Holl. ILLUSTRATIONS xvii To face page Henry Voguell, Merchant ....... 244 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from a rare engraving in line in possession of the Author by G. F. Schmidt,after Pesne. Robert Orchard ......... 246 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from a scarce mezzo- tint in the possession of the Author. The Custom House ........ 248 From a line engraving in the possession of the Author. The Ruins of the Custom House, London, after the Fire of February 14TH, 1814 ....... 248 From an engraving in the possession of the Author by Wise, after Fellows. Tulips at the Time of the Tulip Craze .... 256 From an engraving in the collection of John Lane. Philippe, Due d'Orleans ....... 262 From a line engraving in the collection of John Lane by Marie Horthemels, after J. B. Santerre. John Law .......... 264 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from a line en- graving in the possession of the Author by Peter Schenk, after Leon Schenk. The South Sea House ........ 268 From a line engraving in the possession of the Author. Sir Josiah Child ......... 272 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from an engraving by Van der Gucht, after a portrait by John Riley. William Patterson ........ 274 From a woodcut in the British Museum. A View of the Bank of England ..... 276 From an engraving in the British Museum published in lJ')J. The Bank of England (1816) ...... 278 From an aquatint by Havell, after a water-colour drawing by T. H. Shepherd. Sir Robert Peel, Bart, (i 750-1 830) ..... 284 From an engraving in the collection of John Lane by H. Robinson, after Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A. Sir Crisp Gascoyne ........ 296 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from a rare engraving in line in the possession of the Author by J. McArdell, after W. Keable. Sir Matthew Wood, M.P. . . .... 302 From an engraving in the collection of John Lane by Cooper, after A. Devis. xviii ILLUSTRATIONS To face page Peter, Lord King 304 Trom an engraving in the possession of the Author. Sir Thomas Smith ........ 306 From an engraving in the possession of the Author. Lionel Cranfield, Earl of Middlesex ..... 308 Reproduced in Rembrandt photogravure from an engraving by Bocquet in the Collection of John Lane, after a miniature by Ozias Humphry, R.A. Thomas Coutts ......... 308 From an engraving by R. W . Sievier of an oil painting by Sir W. Beechey, R.A. Speaker Brand, Viscount Hampden ..... 316 From an oil painting by Wynn H. Watkins in the possession of W . Greaves-Lord, Esq. Chart made for the Hudson's Bay Company .... 320 From an engraving in the British Museum. Prince Rupert ......... 324 From a line engraving by Chambers in the collection of John Lane, after a painting by Dobson. Old Hudson's Bay Fort ....... 326 From an engraving in the British Museum. Samuel Hearne ......... 3(28 From an engraving in the possession of the Author. Sir Alexander Mackenzie . . .... 330 From an engraving by P. Conde, after a painting by Sir Thomas Lawrence, P. R.A. Montreal from the East ....... 336 From an engraving in the British Museum. Hudson's Bay Company Building ...... 338 From a drawing by G. Shepherd in the British Museum. Lord Strathcona ......... 344 From a photograph by Elliot and Fry. Notes Issued by the House of Mitsui ..... 352 The Office Building for Mitsui Bank, Mitsui and Co., and Mitsui Mining Company, Tokio, Japan .... 356 From a photograph in the possession of the Author. Chart of Organization ....... 366 THE ROMANCE OF COMMERCE ROMANCE OF : COMMERCE : CONCERNING COMMERCE O write on Commerce or Trade and do the subject justice would require more volumes than any library could hold, and involve more detail than any mind could grasp. It would be a history in extenso of the world's people from the beginning of time. For we are all merchants, and all races of men have been merchants in some form or another. The desire to trade seems to be inherent in man, as natural to him as the instinct of self-preservation, and from earliest recorded history we see trade and barter entering into and becoming part of the lives of men of all nations, and further, we see it as one of the most desirable objectives of the nations themselves. Ever since that moment when two individuals first lived upon this earth, one has had what the other wanted, and has been willing for a consideration to part with his possession. This is the principle underlying all trade however primitive, and all men, except the idlers, are merchants. We give this title exclusively to the man who buys and sells merchandise, but the artist sells the work of his 2 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE brush and in this he is a merchant. The writer sells to any who will buy, let his ideas be what they will. The teacher sells his knowledge of books — often in too low a market — to those who would have this knowledge passed on to the young. The doctor must make an income to support himself and his family. He too is a merchant. His stock-in- trade is his intimate knowledge of the physical man and his skm to prevent or remove disabilities. He sells a part of his experience for a given sum to whomsoever seeks his advice. The lawyer sometimes knows the laws of the land and sometimes does not, but he sells his legal language, often accompanied by common sense, to the multitude who have not yet learned that a conten- tious nature may squander quite as successfully as the spendthrift. The statesman sells his knowledge of men and affairs, and the spoken or written exposition of his principles of Government ; and he receives in return the satisfaction of doing what he can for his nation, and occasionally wins as well a niche in its temple of fame. The man possessing many lands, he especially would be a merchant in fact, and sell, but his is a merchandise which too often nowadays waits in vain for the buyer. The preacher, the lecturer, the actor, the estate agent, the farmer, the employe, all, all are merchants, all have something to dispose of at a profit to themselves, and the dignity of the business is decided by the manner in which they conduct the sale. To work is elevating. To accomplish is superb. To fill one's time with profitable enterprise is to leap for- ward in the world's race and to place beside one's name the credit mark of effort. It has always been so since civihzation began, and all effort has always had for its object a gain of some kind, while the amount of effort is usually determined by the value of the hoped-for gain, plus the temperament, ambitions and inclinations of the doer. The first efforts were made in the direction of bodily CONCERNING COMMERCE 3 protection. Food, clothing and shelter, these, in some degree, must be possessed by every individual. And the steps from these crudest beginnings o£ trade up to the science of Commerce of the twentieth century are as interesting to study as the pages of the wildest romance. Wealth with its accompanying power has been since earliest time the goal that no honest effort can be too great to reach ; and the goal it must always remain for peoples who have the red blood of progress in their veins. And without Commerce there is no wealth. Adam Smith wrote one hundred and fifty years ago : " All original wealth comes from the soil " ; but while the soil so amply repays labour expended upon it, the owner of the crops looks to the alchemist. Commerce, to turn his golden harvests into golden coin. Commerce creates wealth, and is the foundation of the great state. Armies are raised and paid for to win, or to protect the countries' trade, or commerce. Ships are constructed, colonies established, inventions en- couraged, governments built up, or pulled down, for Commerce. Commerce cuts the way, and all profes- sions, all arts follow. If Commerce is necessary to wealth, no Commerce means no wealth, and our statesman soon finds himself out of employment. Where wealth again is greatest, everything else being fairly equal, arts thrive the most. A thousand departments of mental and physical activity foster and in turn are fostered by its achieve- ment. People must be governed, and there must be those who govern. Laws must be made, and there must be those who study, and those who execute these laws. People must be taught, and there must be teachers. All these and the Church, the newspaper, the theatre, the fine arts are essential to the completeness of the State, to the happiness and safety of its people ; but Commerce is the main stem, or trunk, where they are all branches, supplied with the sap of its far-reaching wealth. It is as necessary to the existence of any nation as blood to Missing Page Missing Page 6 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE in that direction before perfection is reached, but our mental development is limited indeed. We cannot go beyond a certain point in our ambitions, our achievements. We seem to reach the end of our ability, and, what is much worse, we seem to have made no progress since earliest history. A Brahmin prince, a thousand years before Christ, wrote a great epic poem, a poem of many volumes, and the striking thing in this wonderfully beautiful work is his description of the perfect character. We read his words three thousand years later and realize they de- scribe our ideal. We have imagined nothing finer, nothing more nearly perfection. It is as if our idea of the best were a perfect circle which, as a circle, cannot be bettered. When the Greeks reached their highest per- fection in architecture, they had designed that which could not be surpassed. The proportions conceived by them remain in this twentieth century as the acknow- ledged standard of perfection : we cannot better their graceful hnes. Man's character, however, is not governed by arithmetic but by imagination ; and if our minds were not so extremely finite we should pierce through this wall of hmitations and picture greater perfection, a higher type of man, a nobler ambition. The world is ready for a great superhuman mind which can break down the limits of mental vision and give a new philosophy that shall eUminate from the mind those little, petty, mean elements which cause it to be so earthy. Why should man allow jealousy to make him miserable ? Why should he hold his eyes so close to the surface that he cannot take a broad survey of life ? Why should he not throw from him for ever that contemptible yellow streak in his nature which breeds the snob ? Why should activity be an effort, and laziness a natural trait which must be overcome and thrown out before one is free from it ? Why does one follow another without thought, simply because that one has followed someone else ? Why do 'lll^ ■^*-» CONCERNING COMMERCE 7 so few think for themselves ? Why must one learn to think, and why cannot a philosophy be conceived which makes thinking as natural as seeing ? The human animal is a most superb piece of machinery, and the mind is the most wonderful part of that machine ; but man has allowed it to become clogged with old worn-out threads of prejudice, of hypocrisy, of cant, of inefficiency, of dullness, of snobbery, with the dust of a hundred undesirable things that mar the pattern of the fabric which this machine is trying to weave. The world wants another flood, — a great mental torrent to wash away the accumulations of false ideas, the obstacles, the traps, which trip and hold fast against progress. Oh ! for a mental giant who can brush away this wall of limitations and give us new ideas of life ! And in all phases of life we find this want. Just as the foolish superstitious person surrounds himself with childish notions and distresses himself because he sees the moon over the wrong shoulder, or spills salt, or travels on a Friday — so in all phases and undertakings of life we are raising unnecessary obstacles which prevent our running the race well and swiftly. Even in Commerce, which, as we have ventured to suggest, enters into the very life and soul of the nation, these littlenesses are too apparent. Why cannot business be conducted with the same sportsmanlike manliness as a game of football ? Business does not always mean getting the better of someone else. Business does not stand for trickiness, for chicanery. Though business too often thrives when such practices are adopted, its thriving is in spite of these rather than by their aid. One may feed a strong ox with a certain amount of undesirable food, and it will continue to be strong ; but when that proportion is raised to a point beyond its ability to ignore, the animal suffers and finally dies. So a business may often seem to accept the false policy of its heads and stiU survive, but a poor policy cannot help in the upbuilding of a lasting fabric. 8 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Honesty always pays. Honesty alone will never build a business, any more than good well-burnt bricks alone will build a house. But the policy of honesty, of scrupu- lous integrity, will, other things being reasonably equal, always win in the race for success. Let us take as an example the question of advertise- ment. We need a new philosophy here. Why should a statement be subject to question ? Is it not infinitely wiser to make every statement dependable beyond the chance of question ? Why pay for space and then fill it with matter which must quickly be discovered to be false ? Why thus reduce the value of every future statement ? And yet this is exactly what is continually being done in many parts of the world. This inconsistent action is due to the fact that men who have adopted Commerce as their medium of activity are working on the played-out philosophy of trade which sprang up after the sturdy old merchant-adventurers ceased to exist ; that false philosophy which thought it was clever to be too shrewd ; that it was good business always to try to get the better of the other ; that it was impossible to be honest in business ; that exaggeration, spoken or written, was not only necessary but clever ; that nearly everyone was a fool, and fools could best be handled by knaves ; that a trick which meant a cheat was something to applaud ; that nothing must be given which could be charged for ; that no one must be paid more than could be helped ; that the stronger was quite right in oppressing the weak ; that might was always right when dealing with employes ; that loyalty, if desirable, was to be obtained through fear rather than through justice or affection ; that competition involved personal antagonism ; that a large outlay or production was usually foolish, and that hoarding was the only way to wealth ; and so on until one is nauseated with the littlenesses which crowded out the broader philosophy. These were some of the things which discredited trade ; these were the thistles which were allowed to CONCERNING COMMERCE 9 grow up and choke the beautiful wide road of Commerce, No wonder that the word " trade" became the synonym for disrespect, almost for contempt. No wonder this great field of endeavour was avoided by the young man who was ambitious to hew out for himself a place in the world ; and that he rather sought opportunity in the overcrowded field of the law, which, more often than not, fails to provide its disciples even with a decent living, or in some other profession whose results are always problematical. These old fallacies provoked the sneer, and the extra- ordinary thing is they maintained themselves in their falsity as long as they did. But trade, with its broader, safer road to financial success, is coming into its own. The old must give way to the new, and the philosophy of the leaders in the world's Commerce is diametrically opposed to all those old unprincipled principles. It is not clever to be too " shrewd." It is not good to get the better of another by hook or crook, by decep- tion or falsehood. It is not only possible to be honest in business, but it is the height of unwisdom to be other than honest. Exaggerated statements of any kind are dangerous, and no people are easier to compete against than those who use exaggeration. The world is not made up of fools, but of extremely worldly-wise people who recognize a knave with little difficulty. The trick is no longer the object of applause but of condemnation, and a trickster soon finds himself very much alone in business. It is wise to be very liberal with the public, and to give something which could be charged for is no longer a business error but quite the reverse. It is desperately silly to hold wages down to the breaking point ; for there is so much more to the employe than two arms and two legs. There is the spirit of enthusiasm and earnestness and " I will," which means more to the employer than ten pairs of arms and legs. And loyalty is a quality to be earned by the employer from the lo ROMANCE OF COMMERCE employe, and only earned by fair, friendly, generous treatment. The spirit and even the letter o£ the " Golden Rule " has been proved not only possible but pre-eminently practical in business life ; and it is easy to see the reason for such a result if imagination is allowed to reverse the relation betvs^een employer and employed. Pettiness is being dethroned from the place in trade to which it never had a right, and big, broad, sports- manlike ideas have taken its place. That one must con- sider a competitor as necessarily other than a friend has gone with all the other discarded beliefs. It is no more true of business than of cricket or baseball. These notions have been discarded and thrown into the waste heap with other peculiar and absurd customs or methods of past years, but they have not yet been abandoned by every one. The newer philosophy of trade has been evolved and accepted by the leading men of business the world over. It has become their commercial Bible. They know that it brings the greatest success, but they know much more ; they know it is putting, and in many communi- ties has put. Commerce as a life work again into that splendid dignified position which it rightly held under the merchant-adventurers in the days of Queen Eliza- beth. Ill Ambition is wonderfully varied, and it is most fortunate that it is so. Not all the people of a country seek after the same thing — not to all do the charms of winning appeal. To some men Commerce, the science of making, of buying and selling, seems uninviting, and some are still foolish enough to think it undignified and mean. Commerce, broad not narrow, bold not timid; Uberal not mean, energetic not lazy, can be as dignified as any other calling or profession. CONCERNING COMMERCE ii It is not Commerce which often makes the individual merchant narrow, mean and dishonest. It is the man himself who undignifies Commerce to the extent of his influence. It is not the law which makes the little tricky, unscrupulous lawyer, it is the man himself, and it is generally he who makes men so hate that profession. It is the smallness of the man which makes us have disrespect for his calling ; but with breadth of ideas, with nerve, with confidence in self, the man of Commerce can, and does, feel as proud of his sphere of action as can any man. It is almost incredible that people should still exist who consider trade undignified. Of all the stupid ideas which the last century with its stilted and, more often than not, totally unintelligent dignity has handed down to us none approaches more nearly than this to the point of utter imbecility. Young men whose position makes them independent are greatly influenced by the attitude of those with whom they are thrown, as to the business or profession into which they are to place themselves. If society frowns upon aU work, or effort, except that connected with the Army or Navy or perhaps some governmental post, then unfortunately for the country the young men — members of the so-called governing class — will flock into these occupations and let the others suffer. There is in every country a limit to the number who can be satis- factorily employed permanently as officers in the Army or Navy, as diplomats, or as members of the working staff of the Government. These positions, it is needless to say, must be fiUed with intelligent men, but equal encouragement should be given to those in other spheres of influence. t^Trade is the foundation of wealth. It is the great bedrock of strength upon which a nation is built. It should be nourished, cultivated, encouraged, appre- ciated and praised. It should never be scorned. It is a magnificent servant which cannot be spoilt by Missing Page Missing Page 14 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE virility and strength of purpose no one can estimate t^e influence which it would possess in the world's affairs to-day. '^ Personally, I should like to see a revival of the fine old spirit of the merchant-adventurers. Broad Commerce still offers an opportunity to the flower of England's young men, but too many are bUnd to her outstretched arms. Long ago, in 171 1, that master of the pen — Addison — ^wrote of England's Commerce : " If we consider our own country in its natural prospect, without any of the benefits and advantages of Commerce, what an uncomfortable spot of the earth falls to our share ! Natural historians tell us that no fruit grows originally among us, besides hips and haws, acorns and pig nuts, with other dielicacie's; of a like nature ; that our climate of itself, and without the assistances of art, can make no further advances toward a plum than a sloe, and carries an apple to no greater perfection than a crab ; -that our melons, our peaches, our figs, our apricots, and cherries are strangers among us, imported in different ages and naturalized in our English gardens ; and that they wpuld>all degenerate and fall away into the taste of bur own country, if they were wholly neglected by the planter and left to the mercy of our sun and soil. Nor has traffic more enriched our vegetable world than it has improved the whole face of nature among us. . '/ :\ " Our ships are laden with the harvest of every climate ; our tables are stored with spices and oils and wines ; our rooms ^re filled with pyramids of china and adorned with workmanship of Japan ; our morning's draught comes to us. from the remotest corners of the earth ; we repair our bodies by the drugs of America, and repose ourselves under Indian canopies. " The vineyards of France are our gardens, the Spice Islands our hot-beds ; the Persians are our weavers, and the Chinese our potters. Nature indeed furnishes us with the bare necessaries of life ; but traffic gives us a great variety of what is useful, and at the same time supplies us with everything that is convenient and ornamental. For these reasons there are not more useful members in a commonwealth than merchants. They knit man- kind together in a mutual intercourse of good offices, distribute the gifts of nature, find work for the poor, add wealth to the rich, and magnificence to the great, /t'l''/ (JO ojieo/ ///.I . '^/M/i:r/f^,,/rr/;//^/ri/.'io/. //f//r. 'y^- CONCERNING COMMERCE 15 " Our English merchant converts the tin of his own country into gold, and exchanges his wool for rubies. "The Mahometans are clothed in our British manufacture, and the inhabitants of the frozen zone are warmed with the fleeces of our sheep. When I have been upon 'Change I have often fancied one of our old kings standing in person where he is represented in effigy, and looking down upon the wealthy con- course of people with which that place is every day filled. " In this case how would he be surprised to hear all the lan- guages of Europe spoken in this little spot of his former dominions, and to see so many private men who, in his time, would have been the vassals of some powerful baron, negotiating like princes for greater sums of money than were formerly to be met with in the royal treasury ! " Trade, without enlarging the British territories, has given us a kind of additional empire ; it has multiplied the number of the rich, made our landed estates infinitely more valuable than they were formerly, and added to them an accession of other estates as valuable as the lands themselves." This wonderful tribute to Commerce seems to breathe the spirit of the times when the merchant-adventurers held their heads high, knowing perfectly that' of all the so-called " learned professions " their own great profession required keener, quicker judgment, a broader horizon of thought, a nerve and strength of purpose greater than any. They were doing more than all the others to make their country great. Money, profit, followed their undertakings then, as they do now, but the simple seeking for wealth was in no way the chief part of their effort. They all, to a man, let imagination become a vital part of every undertaking, and we find them still " playing the game for the game's sake " long after there was any necessity for the stakes. Not only to make a fortune, but to surround its accu- mulation with adventure was then as truly the fashion in life as in story books ; and the men whose motto was " nothing venture nothing have " were surely more likely to accomplish really great things than the mere plodders by penurious saving. The good but not very 1 6 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE exciting precepts of Samuel Smiles had not then stamped themselves upon the rising generations. " Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise " was a later doctrine — good in its way, but cautious rather than imaginative. It is possible that such advice and all the kindred maxims which accompany it may be beneficial to the great rank and file, but when they per- meate the leaders to the detriment of nerve those leaders become commonplace and uninteresting, afraid to venture or to try the new. Just as life is often so much of a gamble, so the making of a fortune possesses almost always in its formula a large quantity of risk. This is not the risk of the lottery kind, which brings suc- cess or failure on the turn of the card, nor does it depend on the element of pure chance which so many call luck. But it stakes its future on the judgment of its leader ; it bets on its own conclusions. The absolutely sure things in this world are not so interesting, to say the least of it, as those which may not win, but which in winning win big stakes. Anything which places a barrier against progress, against walking in any but the old frequently trodden paths, tends to dry up the springs of imagination. And this faculty of imagination is one of the most useful that the real man of Commerce can possess. It cuts the path through the forest of inexperience upon which judgment can more carefully walk. Imagination urges on. It is the yeast of progress. It pictures the desirable. It is like the architect's plan, while judgment and eilort follow and build. No great thing was ever accomplished by the world's greatest men or greatest merchants without imagination. Samuel Smiles and his rules of saving, of thrift, of following in the footsteps of our fathers, may be well enough, but a long way behind the principles of those great merchant-adventurers who fearlessly planted the flag and established the outposts of the nation's Com- merce in the most distant points of the civilized and uncivilized earth. DANIKT, DEFOK CONCERNING COMMERCE 17 We may be permitted to quote another great writer — Defoe — ^who, in 1728, showed his full appreciation of the upbuilding powers of Commerce. He wrote : " Are we a rich, a populous, a powerful nation, and in some respects the greatest in all those particulars in the world, and do we not boast o£ being so ? 'Tis evident it was all derived from trade. Our merchants aire princes, greater and richer and more powerful than some sovereign princes ; and in a word, as is said^ of Tyre, we have ' made the kings of the earth rich with our merchandise,' that is with our trade. " If usefulness gives an addition to the character, either of men or of things, as without doubt it does, trading men will have the preference in almost all the disputes you can bring. There is not a nation in the known world but have tasted the benefit and owe their prosperity to the useful improvement of Commerce. Even the self-vain gentry, that would decry trade as a universal mechanism, are they not everywhere depending upon it for their most necessary supplies ? If they do not all sell, they are all forced to buy, and so are a kind of trader themselves ; at least they recognize the usefulness of Commerce, as what they are not able to live comfortably without. Trade encourages manufac- ture, prompts invention, employs people, increases labour and pays wages. 5 " As the people are employed they are paid, and by that pay are fed, clothed, kept in heart and kept together. "As the consumption of provisions inci eases, more lands are cultivated, waste grounds are enclosed, woods are grubbed, forests and common lands are tilled and improved. By this, more farmers are brought together, more farm-houses and cottages are built, and more trades are called upon to supply the necessary demands of husbandry. " In a word, as land is employed the people increase of course, and thus trade sets all the wheels of improvement in motion ; for, from the original of business to this day, it appears that the prosperity of a nation rises and falls just as trade is supported or decayed." S How truly this great essayist wrote on this vital subject and how excellently he reflected the public mind nearly two hundred years ago. That same branch of human activity to which nations owe their progress and strength 1 8 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE is to-day as necessary as then. It carries with it in this twentieth century the same charm, excitement, and interest, but it is a greater science now than then, made so by increased world-competition. It may also be made broader, because the opportunities are greater. A generation after Defoe, began the wonderful de- velopments in the iron industry. Necessity for a better product was the mother of inventions in steel. Many books have been written on the romance of this tremen- dous step, and that, and the application of steam as a motive power, have done more for Commerce than all other forces of the world put together, except the dis- covery of printing. We of this age have been given tools with which to work and accomplish of which our mer- chant forefathers never dreamed. Machinery — steam — electricity, have made one day's work equal to ten or a hundred, and the experience of all of our predecessors is ours if we choose to take it. Man's mind is finite, but it should be no more limited now than five hundred or two thousand years ago. If, then, we enter the lists with the same virility, determination, nerve, and imagin- ation, it would seem that the twentieth century man of Commerce should far surpass the merchants of Phoe- nicia, Venice, or Augsburg. II THE COMMERCE OF THE ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS CHINA HE romance of Far-Eastern commerce is of the same colour in the twentieth cen- tury as in the first, or, for that matter, in the twenty centuries before our era began. The scraps of their commercial history which have sifted down through the many centuries are not unlike the experiences of to-day. Our knowledge of the trading ability and achieve- ments of the ancient nations of the East are meagre, yet we are unwilling to omit them entirely, brief and dis- connected as our notes must be. Let China claim our attention first, though it must be remembered that it is quite impossible for the Occi- dental to think upon the same lines as the man of the yellow kingdom. It is almost as if we lived upon a planet different from his, and a newer one, for his people have been a nation for a far greater length of time than any of which the West can boast. The Chinese do almost everything in the opposite way to the Occidental. They saw wood upwards instead of downwards as we do ; they scratch the heel instead of the head when perplexed ; their night-watchmen in- dicate their presence to possible thieves by ringing a bell as they go their rounds, and in a hundred ways they perform their duties in a manner most strange to us. 19 20 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE But the Chinese people have been for thousands of years clever traders and money-makers through trade, and the history of early Chinese commerce, incomplete though it is, presents many interesting points. Even to-day the Chinese merchant's word is as good as his bond — an unusual thing in the Oriental — and with a few exceptional periods Commerce has been considered with extreme respect and has attracted the well-educated Chinamen to its inviting embrace. If China were not the most conservative nation in the world her position might have been commercially a most dominating one. But China seems to prefer not to change. She has thought of more inventions than most nations have ever known, but she has forgotten them too, though how she could allow such things as movable type or the mariner's compass to be forgotten once they had been discovered is beyond our ability to understand. It would almost seem as if the poUcy or proverb, " What was good enough for our grandfathers is good enough for us," must have originated in that part of the world : it is certainly unfortunate that such a maxim should ever have been adopted by the nations of the West. China still trades to-day over her vast territory — roughly once and a half times as large as the United States — much as she has always done. Her merchants, since man can remember, have had their caravans, their trade routes, and their far-away customers. Japan has fully equipped Department Stores, similar in arrange- ment and system to those in London. China has and will have none until some man of the West or of Japan organizes one for her. Nevertheless it must be admitted that though ap- parently lacking in ambition, China has in the course of time achieved notable results, and a short summary of her development demands a record here. The beginning of Chinese history is vague and legen- dary. It is said by some students that the race started EARLV CHINESE CART (at i.iiA^r loou B.C.) COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 21 from near the Caspian Sea and travelled eastwards to the Yellow River. No sooner arrived there than they began to cultivate the soil. They planted grain and flax, and showed their commercial spirit even from the first by a system of barter, and before long they estab- lished fairs, which in all countries have been associated with trade. Their early rulers were mythical beings, and Hwang-ti, the Yellow Emperor, b.c. 2697-2597, was claimed, like his predecessors, to be the offspring of a miraculous conception. He appears to have been the first to take a very active interest in the commercial life of his people. He or someone for him devised new methods of reckoning and regulating weights and measures to give a fixed standard to sales. During his reign fabrics were first dyed in imitation of the colours of nature. Utensils of wood, pottery and metal were made and boats and carts were constructed. His wife Lui-tsu was the goddess of the silkworms, for it was she who first began to rear them, and her husband, the Emperor Hwang-ti, the first to master the art of wind- ing the cocoons. Thus originated an industry which spread throughout the land to enormous proportions. The eastern pro- vinces were the most prolific, especially Tchihli, Shan- tung, Honan and Shansi, which Marco Polo described in the thirteenth century as having " many cities or walled towns and many merchants too therein, for much traffic takes place upon the river, there being a great deal of ginger and a great deal of silk produced in the country." In Tchihli the " mulberry ground having been supplied with silkworms, the people descended from the hills and dwelt in the plains." In the beginning the Chinese had a proverb, " Do not over-value strange commodities and then foreigners will be only too glad to bring them." Whilst waiting for this desirable advance from without, of which, when it came, they were a long time in taking advantage, the people turned their attention to the rich silk trade within. 22 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE An interesting reference to silk cloth occurs in The Book oj History, compiled by Confucius, when the Chinese ruler made a tour to the sacred mountain of Tai in Shantung and framed regulations concerning three kinds of silk ; the eldest sons of chiefs were to have deep red silk, sons of high officers reddish black silk, and chieftains yellow silk. Shantung has been famous as a centre of the silk trade ever since. The Chinese raised altars to the originator of silk manufactures and to Lui-tsu, or " First Wife," the pre- siding genius of the silkworm. Round the altar walls was a grove of mulberry trees, and near them a tank for washing the insects. Every year the Empress came to offer sacrifices at the shrine. Provided with a golden implement, whUe her ladies used silver ones, she helped to collect the mulberry leaves and to feed the imperial silkworms. The industry was celebrated in Chinese literature and the Duke of Tchou wrote an ode, pur- porting to be the song of an Oriole, which described the silk manufacture in the twelfth century b.c. as follows : " In the silkworm month they strip the mulberry branches of their leaves." " In the eighth month they begin their spinning : They make dark fabrics and yellow. Our red manufacture is very brilliant. It is for the lower robes of our young princes." P Many other articles of attire were soon to be made of the precious fabric : gowns, girdles, ribbons, braidings, hose and even fish-lines and bow strings. So jealous were the Chinese of their beautiful product that for many centuries it was strictly forbidden to take silk of any kind out of the country. " I should like to exchange what I have for what I have not," said a poetical and enterprising foreign monarch somewhere about 200 b.c. when negotiating for the Empress of China's hand and COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 23 heart. He foreshadowed foreign commerce"and did in fact obtain silk wares and other goods in response to his offer of camels and horses. About a.d. 120 also a daring princess broke the law. She married a king of Khotan, and because he sent a messenger to tell her his country had no silk she concealed mulberry seeds and silkworms' eggs in her headdress and thus passed the frontier with- out her treasure being discovered. In her adopted country she began to cultivate the silkworms. But Chinese delegates seeing what she had done told the King that she was harbouring venomous snakes, and the King ordered the " snake-rearing house " to be de- stroyed by fire. According to Pliny the Roman Empire obtained silk from China, and toward the close of the fifth century the Turks ventured as far as the Chinese frontiers, to exchange articles of produce for Chinese silk and wadding. Yet as late as a.d. 1173 the export of silk " to the North " was forbidden, and it was more than four hundred years later that the first European entered the city of Canton, and later still before any Englishman followed his lead. Yet in China itself the wonderful silk products were distributed through the land almost from house to house. Even the less well-to-do had their silk garments, for cotton spinning was then unknown. But the trader was not always looked upon with extreme favour in early times. At the period of the Han Dynasty (209 b.c.) merchants were not allowed to wear silk clothes nor to drive in carriages, and they were not eligible for official appointments. The people of that far-away time were divided into four great classes : gentleman, farmer, artisan and — at the bottom of the scale — the trader. But gradually the despised class, by virtue of innate gifts, raised itself to a high pinnacle of honour and attained as perfect a mastery in the science of buying and selling as anywhere else in the world. After Hwang-ti the greatest Emperors of that period Missing Page Missing Page z6 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE on carrying out his plan. The Emperor thought again when he reaHzed that he must do without jade from the Kiven mountains ; pearls, swords, horses, banners orna- mented with kingfisher feathers, drums of the skin of iguana, as well as gold and silver from south of Kiang, vermilion and green paint from west Shuh, pearl hair- pins from Wam, earrings, undyed silk cloth, etc. Altogether of the eighteen articles in Li-sze's list, eight were dependent on trade with foreign lands and the others were obtainable in parts of China, but not in Ts'in's dominion. If " drums of the skin of iguana " and " banners ornamented with kingfisher feathers " seem of Httle importance in our eyes, the absence of gold and silver would prove troublesome, so one must feel that old Ts'in was wiser in giving in and swallowing his prejudice. Incidentally it may be added that it was through the instrumentality of this same Emperor Ts'in and his Minister that the great burning of Chinese literature took place in 213 b.c. owing to their desire to blot out aU the claims of antiquity and to begin history anew with the ruling monarch, a procedure which would not be at all bad if applied to more than one business we know of, to a good many present-day nations, and to almost all political parties. The philosopher Confucius, who lived about 500 B.C., did much for the commerce of his state, and improved the working conditions of the people. Originally as a local magistrate he decreed that employment should be arranged according to the capacity and strength of the individual employed. He was very severe if work was done badly, and would not allow it to be exposed in the markets. When he was made Prime Minister in 496 b.c. he insisted that all men should practise honesty, and the tricks which had crept into Commerce were done away with. Yet he opposed the making of large fortunes, and said, " If the search for riches is sure to be successful, though I should become a groom with a whip in hand to get them, I will do so. As the search may not be COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 27 successful I will follow that which I love." But while this great man wrote in this manner he never ceased to regard Commerce with that respect to which it is so surely entitled. In his broad range of study and teach- ing, trade, the real wealth and strength of his empire, was applauded and encouraged in every way possible. While the first place in the kingdom was given to scholars, traders were placed above farmers and soldiers, and thus a high grade of intellect and ability was drawn upon for the merchant class. It was dignified by continuous recog- nition, and he did his utmost to discountenance and to eliminate the pettiness, trickery, and dishonesty which in Commerce, as in every other department of activity, too often attach themselves like barnacles or blood- suckers, and help to destroy the fabric itself. It is probably largely due to the wisdom and far-sighted teaching of Confucius that the Chinaman remains to-day so honest in his business dealings, and whatever we may say or feel about China, this fact remains splen- didly to the credit of that remarkable race. Another wonderful man was Fan-li, who lived about 500 B.C. and whom Terrien de Lacouperie calls the " greatest Chinese merchant of his age." This man occupied the post of Minister to the King of Yu for twenty years, but growing weary of public life withdrew from politics and started a commercial house, with the result that he became exceedingly rich. Fan-li, as we read in another work, introduced the cinnamon tree into China. The trade in fruit was an important one, and the West owes to China the apricot and peach. The peach is first spoken of by Theophrastus in 332 e.g., who suggests that it was originally a Persian fruit : at all events it did not reach Italy until the Christian era. Tea too from earliest times has been mentioned by travellers in the East. It did not, however, become an article of European trade until the seventeenth century, when it was brought overland across Russia by the Dutch 28 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE East India Company. In 1660 a law was passed in England levying a duty of eightpence on every gallon of tea, chocolate, or sherbet made for sale. Pepys, in his diary of 25th September, 1660, after a chat with Sir Richard Ford, " did send for a cup of tea (a China drink) of which I have never drank before." The English East India Company purchased 2 lbs. of tea in 1664 ^s ^ present for Charles II., and the first order for its importation by the Company was in 1668, and the first consignment of it, amounting to 143J lbs. was received from Bantam in 1669. The Chinese have never been a maritime people, and frequent efforts of many Emperors to make them so have been of no avail, so that the great trade routes of the Chinese merchants extended only west, north-west and south-west on the continental side, and as trade routes remain permanently, unless interfered with by some superior mode of traffic, these routes stiU exist in much the same condition. There are indications, writes Giles, of six early routes in China : (i) From Szetchuen to the Jade country in the Khotan region from 1500 B.C. or earlier in the nineteenth or eighteenth century b.c. (2) From Szetchuen to Patna in India later and intermit- tently. (3) Through Szetchuen from Shenshi to Pegu at the end of the third century e.g. (4) Through Yumen from Szetchuen to India in the third century b.c. and later. (5) Through Yumen from Szetchuen to Burma in the third century b.c. and later. (6) Through Yumen from Szetchuen to Tang King in the second century b.c. and later. And the writer adds : " It must not be understood that caravans made regular journeys from end to end along these courses. Trade was done by goods being passed '^)7'-^ r\ 'x p// "i r •/y :-rn"i v^-^ i-m-i^, rr-n^ li: I i "I -11 :l I.I I I'D rn- r- Ji*- *= m'-'r & C" / J_.c c. ^ i ^ vJ_l- -J-» ■-' I ; '-1 I ^ ^1$. ^ '^' -r — '^ -^ ->^%m W. m ]^\ ^r -IL ^ -^ 3l^ .^. 1 :i m % ^' I'LAN Ol' CHINKSK MAKKL'r (irKiO l'..C.) /■'ivni a ,r/T,;/i, lion in tli.- /h-i/is/i Miii,\ COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 29 from hand to hand along the way with alterations in price and sometimes deteriorations in value. Occasion- ally something was heard of at one end of the route which had been told at the other, but mangled and altered as it had passed through the hands of various interpreters. The channels were secondary and imperfect." But the first Chinaman who is credited with making the entire trip of exploration — ^who penetrated to the extreme west — was Chang Ch'ien, minister under Em- peror Wu Ti of Han Dynasty about 138 b.c. He is described as the " one who made the road." In this year he was sent on a mission to Boetria, but was taken prisoner and held for ten years. After his escape he went to Fergana or Khokand, whence he brought the walnut and cultivated grapes to China and taught the Chinese the art of making wine as he had seen done by the Persians. He is also credited with having introduced hemp into China, and for his many acts of public advan- tage he was made a marquis. A legend attributes to him the discovery of the source of the Yellow River, which until then was commonly supposed to be a con- tinuation of the Milky Way. It may be interesting in conclusion to glance over the following resume, which shows briefly the development of methods from the very early times to about the Christian era, and the introduction of various classes of merchandise during those 2000 years. From Hwang-ti to the Hia Dynasty 2282-1954 b.c. 2260 B.C. Pitcher of agate brought from Tan-kiu (Tur- fan) to Shao-Hao. 1996 B.C. The West Wang Mu send jade rings and archer's thimbles to Shun. From the Hia to the Tchou c. 1954-1110 1950 B.C. Yoked or car-horses employed. 1903 B.C. The Kun-wus, clever craftsmen acquainted with metallurgy, pottery and roof-tiling. 30 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE 1 74 1 B.C. Kun-wus settle in Wei, introduction of bronze and probably alum. 1743 B.C. Acquainted with iron (barbarian metal) un- successful with iron swords. 1 800-1 700 B.C. Carpets said to be imported from Kui-Su. Jade staple article on north-west. 1712 B.C. Introduction of hemp in S.W. Kansuh. The Shang Yu Dynasty 1686-1111 b.c. 1686 B.C. Foundation of the Shang, i.e. Merchant's Dynasty, of Shang-kiu Merchants Hill (Kwei- teh fu, Honan). 1 190 B.C. Horses of Khorasan brought to Tchou ruler. Said to have had red manes, white bodies, eyes like gold. 1 1 30 B.C. Importation of jade from Turkestan. mo B.C. Conquest of country by the Tchou who intro- duced ring money. West Tchou (Chou or Chow) Dynasty i 110-770 b.c 1 105 B.C. Routes opened to foreigners. Importations of mastiffs from West Tibet. 1099 B.C. Arrivals of peacocks from Ku-tze (Kutcha). Asbestos cloth from Badakshan. 1097 B.C. Arrivals of Missions from S.W. with Indian monkeys and elephants and pheasants. 986 B.C. Muh Wang (Chou) travels west perhaps as far as Kashgar. He brings back arts of laying metals, paste-gems, also jade from Khotan and amber through Wakhan. 984 B.C. Arrival of Prince of Li Wang-mus with white jade for Muh Wang. 860 B.C. Usual route for jade traffic stopped by unruly tribes, traffic reaches China by a more southern route, entering by north-east corner of Tibet, present Sung-pan route. Eastern Tchou Dynasty 770-481 b.c 680-42 B.C. Within twenty years of introduction by Sen- nakherib of the Phoenician navy in Persian COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 31 Gulf, traders from Erythraean Sea (Indian Ocean) arrive in Gulf of Kiaotchow (South Shantung), they established colonies at Lang-ya and Tsih-moh and presently issue first inscribed coinage of China; Influence of these foreign merchants extensive as is shown by joint issues of coin used in trade with cities in N.W. Shantung, S.C. Shansi, East and South-east Shansi and C. Honan. Their ships with a bird's or animal's figure and two big eyes on bow, the sculls at stern, were introduced into Chinese navy. They in- troduced coinage standards of weight and measure (mina of Karkhemish and Baby- lonian empan), quince fruits from Media, etc. 641-600 B.C. Foreign sea-traders coming to Shantung differed in character, coming now from India and Persia. Tempering iron with human sacri- fice, exchange of painted eggs. Seasamum, mercury. 600-575 ^•^- Opening of trade relations between India and non-Chinese west Szetchuen. Introduction into T'su of stamped ingots of useful shapes for currency. 565-525 B.C. Preponderance of Persian influence paramount among Erythraean Sea traders at Shantung. Period of Contending States 481-221 b.c. 500-450 B.C. Influence of Erythraean traders once again Babylonian and Indian. Itewis introduced into Shantung cementation of metal, con cave metallic mirrors (c. 450). 473 B.C. Emporium at Kwei-ki. 450 B.C. Foundation of a colony by two Hindu mer- chants from Orissa in Ukkalamandala near Rangoon. 423-375 B.C. Trade from Erythraean Sea passed into hands of Indian mariners who came south of Sumatra and Java, bringing mother-of-pearl, 32 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE large pearls from Persian Gulf, yakut stones of Badakshan. The fable of the Fortunate Islands. 334 B.C. Importation of jade from Yuman Nurma into Hupeh by south-western route. 327 B.C. Mow (Exchange) near Ningho Emporium of foreign trade. 325-310 B.C. Tung-yeh presents Fuhtchou emporium for foreign sea trade. Imports to these places : rhinoceros horns, ivory, carved vases, as- bestos wicks, yakut rubies, etc. Tran- shipments for northern ports made at Tung-yeh. 280 B.C. Commercial intercourse with Hindu mer- chants of Pegu facilitated by expedition of King of Teen. In South-West Hunan bearded merchants arrive with spices, mint palm, etc. 237 B.C. Jade imported in north-west. Chinese Empire 221 b.c. 201 B.C. Kwei-ki falls into hands of Chinese. Erythraean Sea-traders make Tung-Yeh their chief station. Import big pearls from Persian Gulf and sugar-cane from India. 195 B.C. Traders known as yellow-fingered. Their home was Hormuzia near Persian Gulf. They take jasmine from Persia and Sambac from South India to Hoppu connected with in- land market to Hengshan. 179-150 B.C. These traders establish pearl fisheries at Tchuh- yai Isle of Hainan. 164 B.C. Jade cup (from Turkestan) presented to Em- peror Han Wen. 140 B.C. First arrival in South China of Tarshish mer- chants with red corals from Mediterranean via Recken Ailana and Red Sea. COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 33 The following list of articles shows in a condensed form the chief articles dealt in by Chinese merchants, locally and for export. INDUSTRIAL AND AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS IN THE CHINESE EMPIRE Silk Salt Coal Tea Copper Silver Sheep Goats Yaks Wool Camels Cotton Paper Leather Fire crackers Deer skins Hemp Walnuts Nut gall Hides Wax Steel Eggs Bristles Rhubarb Tobacco Musk-deer Rice Opium Goat skins Wheat Brick tea Sugar Quicksilver Antimony Pith Timber Pigs Aniseed Oil Bean cake Peas Fruits Cloth Ivories Indigo Varnish Porcelain Joss paper Melons Cuttle fish Oil seeds Fans Egret feathers Ground nuts Grass cloth Feathers Preserves Camphor Oranges Umbrellas Human hair Rush mats Medicines Bamboos Green tea Hats Pottery Fire-works Lamb skins Jade Barley Millet Vermicelli Straw braid Lace Maize Ginseng (drug) Melon seeds Ships Cassia Paper fans Area of China 1,532,000 sq. miles. Area of the Chinese Empire 4,277,000 sq. miles, 34 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE PHCENICIA The world has not always been as keenly alive to the value of history as it is to-day. To us, accustomed to the lavish wealth of detail to be found in the records of the last few centuries, those of earlier ages seem woe- fully inadequate as we search in vain for information as to the lives and acts of those people who built and main- tained the empires of the Far East which flourished thousands of years before Christ. Of China, for instance, we know much, but our know- ledge is far from complete. We have all looked upon China until very recently as a nation soundly asleep and hardly capable of awakening ; yet China must have made much history in Commerce, and the Chinese merchant still stands at the head of the list of Oriental traders. He is scrupulously honest ; his word is as good as his bond ; he is bold and full of big ideas. He is often very rich, though the impossible system of taxation, or rather of semi-confiscation, which has prevailed in China, has made it necessary for him to hide his wealth lest it be taken from him. It is not difficult to look ahead and see the Chinese merchant becoming again a great power in Commerce. But of his very early commercial history we know practically nothing. We see in the British Museum an example of Chinese printing from movable types executed hundreds of years before Guten- berg and his contemporaries gave this, perhaps the greatest of all discoveries, to the world. We read that the Chinese also discovered gunpowder, the making of paper and the mariner's compass. But they seem to have failed to make the most of their discoveries, and the world was allowed to forget these and probably many other equally important things of which we have no record, until some more enterprising or tenacious people came along to rediscover them for us. Nor are we able to find many friendly pages in Indian J'7-om till C7igi'iii>ing in tJie possession of t lie Aiit/ior COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 35 history upon our subject. We have read that India became immensely rich : that the riches which she accumulated did much to establish the wealth o£ the cities of the west. But of the methods and lives of Indian merchants we know very little. So too the lives of the rich traders of Babylon, of Persia, and of Meso- potamia are surrounded by the mists of time through which no historian has enabled us to look. Yet there is one great race among these ancient peoples which stands out clearly as a race of traders and builders of Commerce, and fortunately Herodotus and other contemporary writers have recorded for us many of their deeds of progress and daring. These were the Phoenicians, no doubt the first great systematic traders in the world. They were also the first metallurgists ; they were won- derfully successful inventors or adaptors of the inventions of others ; the boldest merchants and the finest colonizers who eventually claimed as their field of activity the whole of the already ancient East, and the barbaric West as well. Rawlinson tells us of their moral characteristics that they had, first, pliability combined with iron fixed- ness of purpose ; secondly, depth and force ; thirdly, a yearning for dreamy ease together with the capacity for the hardest work ; fourthly, a love for abstract thought ; and, fifthly, religiousness together with an intensely spiritual conception of the Deity — character- istics which are also said to have especially distinguished the Arabs and the Jews. This wonderful race claimed an antiquity of 30,000 years. Their original settlements were " founded by the gods themselves," as their history says, in the Persian Gulf, then they migrated to the Eastern coast region of the Mediterranean Sea and named the narrow strip of shore — in all only about 200 miles long and from 10 to 35 miles wide — Phoenicia, or " The Land of Palms." There, some three thousand years before Christ, they built Sidon, "The City of Fish," and Tyre, "The Mistress of the Sea " ; and there they early won their 36 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE far-famed supremacy in the art of dyeing fabrics. The blue Mediterranean off the Phoenician coast, especially between Mount Carmel and Tyre, abounded with two kinds of shell-fish capable of furnishing an exquisite dye. These molluscs had a receptacle or sac behind the head in which a very minute portion of a colourless creamy fluid was contained, having an odour as of garlic. If it was carefully extracted by a hook or pointed pencil and appHed to wool, linen or cotton, and the material then exposed to a strong light, it became successively green, blue, red, deep purple-red, and, by washing in soap and water, a bright crimson, this last tint being permanent. The process was known to many people, but the Phoeni- cians excelled them all, and found in their dyed cloths, their glass ware and pottery, their vessels of bronze and precious metals, the sure foundations of a great trade. From their small base on the Mediterranean they travelled the seas into the most remote regions, carrying their trade and commerce where no one had heretofore dreamed of its being possible to penetrate. They navigated, not with the undiscovered compass, but by their knowledge of the stars. No voyage was too hazar- dous to be undertaken merely on the strength of some rumour of rich treasure in a distant land. Because some story had been repeated in their market-places, they sailed west through the Pillars of Hercules (now Gib- raltar) and across the Bay of Biscay to discover the Scilly Isles, or, as they called them, the Tin Islands and the neighbouring coast of Cornwall. And so watchful were they lest their discovery should become common pro- perty that a Phoenician captain, finding he was followed closely by a Roman ship anxious to seek a safe landing on these tin-producing shores, foundered his vessel on the rocks rather than disclose his secret. Truly the Phoeni- cians looked only for opportunity and considered ob- stacles^and dangers as but the greater incentive. To them to learn of treasure was to win it. V> --^^^ HORSE CARRYING BLOCKS OF TIN From 1171 engraving in the Muscinn at friiro BLOCK OF TIN (wEiGEiT i59i i.iifi.) AiSL.MED TO FiE ONE OF THOSE USTilJ IN TRADE BETWEEN THE MEN OF CORNWALL AM> THE I'MilMNICiANS OF t-KEHlSTOMC IJATE. Found hy dred^in^ at the I'nti'um f to Fahnoiith 1 1 (irl'our ahiuit /S-'J and /lozo i?i the Miiseinii at fi-iiya COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 37 They found their way, through the Dardanelles, along the Euxinus (the Black Sea) to the frozen borders of Scythia (now Southern Russia). Through the Arabian and Persian Gulfs they sailed to find rich trading ports in India ; and entering the Southern Ocean they doubled the Cape of Storms (now the Cape of Good Hope) and circumnavigated Africa two thousand years before Vasco da Gama. An American writer even thinks it possible that they reached California and gave Phoenician names to Islands in the Pacific. Carthage, their colony in North Africa, was primarily a trading centre, surpassing even the parent cities of Tyre and Sidon in its manufactures, and it became a great naval power only in self-defence. Their colony, Tharos, sent them gold. From the rich mines of Tarshish they brought silver ; and when the Pyrenees were accidentally set on fire by shepherds so that the earth oozed silver that ran down in streams of molten ore, the Phoenicians bought the metal from the inhabitants, who were ignorant of its use, by giving trifles in exchange. And they are said to have loaded their ships so heavily that they even cut off the lead from their anchors and made use of silver instead. Cyprus yielded them copper, Cilicia timber, and, according to Heeren, the Phoenician sailors scoured the coasts of the Baltic in search of amber — a commodity dearly loved by their women, who loaded themselves with necklaces, bracelets and nose jewels, passing on their love of ornament to the Hebrews. Thus the people of Phoenicia amassed treasure from all over the world, conquering by peaceful, tactful trading, rather than by the sword. The httle shiploads of mariners went out alone, bound for some wild country, heard of but never before visited ; peopled by barbaric and perhaps treacherous tribes who often regarded their visitors as succulent food sent from heaven. Each of the sailors was taught to look to his captain, but also to depend upon himself. How infinitely more courageous 38 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE to win thus, as win they did, than through the combined power of an army whose only thought was to kill and destroy, and how much greater the final profit and how much less the cost. For these Phoenician navigators seem to have been gifted with a special power to establish friendly relations with whomsoever they approached. They were derived from the Semitic races, and were friendly with the Jews — as proved by the fact that Solomon chose wives from amongst them ; with the Arabs and with the Armenians who supplied them with horses ; with the Gauls, the Sards and the rude Scyths. No tribe seemed too primi- tive or too vicious to understand their attempts at nego- tiation, and none who were approached seem to have declined to trade. They carried on a lucrative " dumb commerce " with the shy tribes of tropical Africa, where we are told that the method of traffic was as follows : The Phoenicians unloaded their wares, laid them on the seashore, then, lighting a fire, retired to a distance. The timid natives would see the smoke and follow its lead until they reached the goods. They would examine them, place small heaps of gold dust beside them and then withdraw. The merchants returned and examined the ore, and, if satisfied, would take it and leave the goods in exchange. If not, they left everything as it was, built more fire and again retired. The natives would return and either place more gold dust with the other or take their ore away. But this wonderful people whose own country covered only some 3000 square mUes — an area equalling a couple of English counties, or about one-third of Massachusetts — ^were not only navigators, they traded inland as well, and sold their products to all countries to the east and north and south. Armed caravans of merchants started from Tyre at regular seasons of the year carrying provisions sufficient sometimes for a year, and, provided with money as well as goods, but without maps and with no regular highways to follow, plunged into the heart of COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 39 Asia to trade. Imagine these keen, clever merchants camping outside the gates of some Oriental city and inviting its people to visit this moving fair o£ merchan- dise ; people whose language they understood not, whose common interpreter was gold. What adventures every day brought forth ! What real romance they must have had to relate when they returned home ! And the Phoenicians were always on the alert for " orders." We read that when it was learned that Solomon was about to build himself a palace in Jerusalem, Hiram, the King of Tyre, assumed at once the post of chief of the department of Commerce and sent a friendly embassy to the Israelite king with a present of cedar trees from Lebanon. He said that his country could supply carpenters and masons, and offered to superintend the construction. The offer was accepted, and so well was the work done that later, when Solomon inherited the empire from his father and decided to carry out on a magnificent scale his father's design to build a temple to Jehovah, he turned to his friend and former contrac- tor, Hiram, begging him for workers in fine bronze, in silver and in gold, for artisans and even for the architect himself ; and it was to another Hiram, " the master- workman," a man of Tyre, that Solomon owed the success of his great undertaking. The two piUars, Jachin and Boaz, which reared themselves in front of the triumphal porch to the height of fifty-two and fifty-three feet, were modelled apparently on the lines of the sacred Phoenician metal pillars, one of which, coated with gold, had recently been set up by King Hiram in his capital. Thus, the details were all conceived and carried out by the Phoenicians, and the temple was essentially a Phoeni- cian building. They built a fleet for Semiramis, and Egypt was dependent upon them for her carrying trade. And throughout all their wonderful history during the five-and-thirty centuries that the commercial pre- eminence of Tyre was acknowledged, this great people, 40 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE these princes of commerce, held the respect and good- will of their customers. They won their great reputa- tion by giving always full weight and full measure, and by producing qualities which the entire trading world accepted as the standard, striving in competition to approach them, since none felt it was possible to excel. A market once opened to them became theirs for ever. It was theirs by right of commercial conquest held by tact and fair dealing, and not by war and threats of war. It was held without distrust or question, and such was the condition of things between 3000 b.c. and a.d. 500. Surely we modern merchants and our twentieth-century nations, cultivating our trade relations so assiduously, can with profit take many pages from the book of Phoenician history. No other nation has lasted so long as this. Of no other people do we read that their virility continued for 3500 years ; and virUity, the driving force that urged these first great merchants on, is as valuable an asset to-day for a man, a family or a nation as it was then. Too often wealth quickly brings a cessation of interest. Too often the game loses its zest. To think is an effort ; to plan, to build, to accomplish is an effort and a risk. Why work ? Why scheme ? Why bother f We find such a Une of argument everywhere, but although the Phoenicians became enormously wealthy we see for a long time no diminution of their efforts. Their great men grew old and died, but others stepped into their places. They traded because they loved it. They played the great game of Commerce in a big way, and no matter how many counters they won they were never willing to stop. They were making their lives count. They were building up the glory of their state, the strength and influence of their nation, their own fortunes and that of their co-workers ; and everyone who called hiniself a Phoenician inherited the advantages of this world power. Tyre itself was rich, strong and influential, as may be seen from Isaiah's description of her about 700 b.c. COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 41 The following free translation is by an early student of the Bible : " Be silent ye inhabitants of the island, Which the merchants of Sidon that pass over the sea have replenished, The corn of the Nile on the broad waters. The harvest of the river was her revenue. She was the mart of nations. . . . She was a joyful city. Her antiquity was of ancient days. . . . She was a city that dispensed crowns, Her merchants were princes, And her traffickers the honourable of the earth." Isaiah xxiii. 2-8. And in the twenty-seventh chapter of Ezekiel is a graphic description of the import and export trade of Tyre, the city of beauty " that dwells at the entry of the sea." Both by land and water the trade flourished in " wheat of Minnith," " wine of Helbon " and " white wool from sheep fed upon the hills of the Antilibanes," and " the ships of Tarshish were the caravans of merchandise." We can safely assume that those who ruled this pros- perous country encouraged trade, and that Government was considered not as a master nor a tyrant but as a co-worker with Commerce. If we could see through the centuries of time we should no doubt behold the great merchants as the chief men of the empire, recognized as the builders and sustainers of the State. It would be of infinite interest to read of the home life of these great men. It is difficult to associate it with anything but refinement, culture, breadth of ideas, good judgment and high ideals ; but by such records the historians were, unhappily, not attracted. But Time, which is the final conqueror of all things, vanquished even the Phoenicians at last. Their commerce, and, as a result, the power of the empire, reached its zenith about the time of the rise of the Chaldean power in Babylon. The Egyptian rule ended iioo b.c, the 42 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Assyrian five hundred years later. In 333 b.c. Alexander the Great put an end to Persian rule and entered Phoe- nicia after the battle of Issus. Had he undertaken his campaign before the canker of laissez-faire had entered the Phoenician mind and character history would have been vs^ritten differently. Even after this blow they rose and gained fresh laurels by the exercise of that sound method of trading which was inborn and intuitive with them. But the nation as a great leader was slowly dying, and, weakened by thousands of years of great wealth, lost its supremacy to one whose virility was greater than its own ; so that about six hundred years after Christ, after a wonderful and unparalleled record of thirty-six centuries, the trade of the world found new channels, leaving barren and desolate the ancient ways upon the shore of Tyre. ASSYRIA AND BABYLONIA The great territory lying east of the Mediterranean from which civilization seems to have sprung was once the richest part of the world. Its history goes back further than that of any other country, for even the Chinese are supposed originally to have gone East from a district near the Persian Gulf. This territory we may call Assyria, but under various people it, or parts of it, was called by many different names. Rawlinson suggests that the original Garden of Eden was here in the neighbourhood of what was afterward Babylon, and from this part of the world sprang those wonderful races of traders — the Jews, the Phoenicians and the various Semitic tribes. Perhaps in this brief outline of the commercial life of the various periods and people of the world this vast territory may be narrowed down to Babylon as typifying the whole. Babylon was one of the newer and younger cities of that land, for although it had previously existed under PACK CAMKL COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 43 other names it only became the capital and chief city after the conquest of Khaunmuragas, and as such it remained until on the defeat of Suzub it was " pulled down, dug up and burned with fire, the town and the palaces, root and branch, and its ruins only remained." Under Nebuchadnezzar and his successors it became great in size and in commerce, and while authorities differ somewhat as to its area it is usually reported as covering about 200 square miles filled with houses three or four storeys high, beautiful palaces and wonderful gardens, among which were the famous hanging gardens. These were one of the seven wonders of the world, and Herodotus gives their height as 335 feet with a width of 85 feet. Building stone was not at hand, and bricks made of sun-dried clay were used, but the entire city was on a scale of grandeur which makes the modern reader feel a little less awe for the cities of the present day. The colossal wealth required to produce such a city as this was gained chiefly by agriculture and commerce. The soil was so fertile that historians assure us that farmers raised several crops a year, each of fabulous richness. But the people themselves were commercial by nature. They loved to trade ; to risk much and possibly to gain much. By 1 100 B.C. the trading spirit had become the domi- nant factor, and dominant it remained as long as the city lasted. Articles of necessity were the first to be sent for sale to other countries, and other necessaries were in turn brought back by the caravans ; but as commerce strengthened, articles of luxury found their way into the packs which the camels carried. By about 600 or 700 B.C. the highest point of trade was reached. The maund of Carchemish became the standard of weight and Aramaic the common language of trade. The rate of interest for money was 4 per cent, and bars of iron and other metal, or merchandise itself, was the medium of exchange, though one reads occasionally of coined money. Houses were let as they are to-day. Deeds Missing Page Missing Page 46 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE before about looo b.c. Such trade as existed was chiefly in the hands of the Phoenicians who brought their beau- tiful cloths and other productions and traded them for timber and metals. But as Greece grew stronger she developed her own merchants, or rather the development of her merchants caused Greece to grow stronger. She followed the fashion of the time, and estabhshed colonies in many places on the shores of the Mediterranean, even as far as what is now Spain, and on the site of the present Marseilles she created a commercial centre great for those days. The Greek colonists preferred to deal with their own people, and manufacturers at home of various kinds of necessary goods began to establish small factories and workshops. They made articles of bronze, clay and wool, and as their production increased, sought markets among other peoples of the world besides their own colonists. Thus we see the commencement in the most natural way of Greek commerce, and by about 500 B.C. it had reached considerable dimensions. MiHtos was the chief commercial city. Syracuse and Corinth had also won their way to recognition as commercial centres, but when Greece proved herself able to resist the Persians in war, her position in aU ways, commercial and political, was enormously improved, and for the following two centuries she became a great power in the world's trading. The rocky and sterile little island of JEgina. became for a time Greece's most important distributing point, and we read almost as a fairy tale of her amassing " fabulous riches " through her men of commerce. But Athens, which had during these many years been growing stronger and richer, was jealous of ^Egina, and history tells us that she actually sent an armed force against the island and confiscated her trade — a romantic episode which is more interesting than fair. At all events, Pirseus, the seaport of Athens, from that time became the leading commercial port of the Greek world, and held that honourable position until PRIMITIVE GREEK CART GREEK MERCHANTS BUYING CLOTH COMMERCE OF ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 47 conquered by the Macedonians about 300 B.C., and even after their country had been conquered the Greek mer- chants and navigators were energetic and resourceful, and continued to push their various businesses in a suc- cessful manner. They shipped to purchasers wherever they could find them precious metals, marble, manufac- tured wares, such as pottery, and the products of the soil, such as oil and figs. Athens bought wheat from the people north of the Black Sea, and from Egypt and Syria. She also imported salt fish and any article of luxury, because as a wealth comes to a nation, the love of luxury comes with it. " What delicacies there are in Sicily," wrote one, " or lower Italy and Cyprus, or Egypt or Lydia or on the Pontus, or in the Peloponnesus or anywhere else, they are all brought to Athens by her control of the sea." At the time of Alexander's conquest of Greece but three cities on the Mediterranean contained as many as 100,000 people — Athens, Syracuse and Carthage ; but another city, Rhodes, deserves mention, not because of her size but because of the wonderful energy and ability of her people in all commercial matters. Her navigators were daring and skilful, her mercantile laws were models of excellence, her business principles were high, and her methods so excellent that rich merchants from other countries sent their sons there to learn the science of trade, and she herself became rich and powerful. It is not without interest to read that the father of Demosthenes was a sword-maker, the father of Socrates owned a flute factory, Lysias and his brother owned a shield factory, employing one hundred and twenty slaves ; the mother of Euripides was a grocer, and we are told by one writer that Solon, the law-giver, was himself a commercial traveller. After he had framed his famous code he left Athens on a ten years' journey, one object of which was to sell his oil and thus make an income, the other to give the people time to try his laws thoroughly and to test their worth. Ill VENICE I S with Tyre, so with Venice, trade was the paramount interest and vehicle of all achievement ; and with both the fame of the individual was so entirely merged in that of the community that any at- tempt to chronicle the doings of her mer- chant-adventurers trespasses inevitably upon the history of the state. Each merchant worked consciously for the city and saw his success enhance its glory. Trade and trade alone raised Venice to her high position as the capital of a proud republic. Through trade she became the mistress of the commerce of the world, and held her supremacy triumphantly against all comers for centuries, until the geographical discoveries of her rivals, the Portu- guese, diverted the trade of the Indies into other channels. No record, however brief, of the romance of trade could be complete that did not grant some little space to the commercial history of this wonderful city. The beginnings of Venice date from the fifth cen- tury A.D. when the raids of the " Scourge of God," Attila and his Huns, drove many of the inhabitants of Verona, Treviso, Padua, Piacenza and other towns of the Romanized province of Venetia to seek safety in less accessible places. They had not far to seek. The Po and several other rivers which flow from the Alps into the Adriatic bring down a mass of silt which spreads in bars that in their turn enclose vast shallow lagoons. Amidst these marshes of shme and sand are numerous 48 TYPES OF MERCHANT SHIPS VENICE 49 islands, some of them of considerable size. Here came the refugees. The people of Altinum built Torcello, which may be regarded as the mother city of Venice, and supported themselves by fishing, by collecting salt and by crude manufactures and a local commerce. Even in 523 a.d. we find Cassiodorus, the secretary of Theodoric the Great, urging them not to fail to trans- port the tribute of honey, oil and wine to Ravenna from Istria. Their boats, he told them, were like horses on the mainland ; and they, instead of scythe and plough, handled cylinders, and " in their salt produced a mer- chandise more desired than gold, so that all the fruits of the earth were at their command." Narses the Eunuch, in return for help in transporting his troops, sent them Byzantine master-builders who built them the church of St. Theodore on the spot now covered by the cathedral of St. Mark. Longinus claimed their allegiance to the Emperor in Constantinople, but this they con- ceded only in return for trading rights, on condition that no formal oath was ever exacted. They were beyond the reach of the barbarians who had no boats ; they were forgotten by the Romans and their conquerors the Ostrogoths, and they maintained their independence under tribunes chosen to represent each separate island or community. The natural jealousies between these tiny states developed into anarchy, but the crisis was met boldly by the wisdom of the Church. The Patriarch of Grado called a general meeting at Heraclea in 697 a.d. and proposed the election of a chief who should hold oifice for life. His suggestion was approved, and the first doge or duke invested with the sovereign powers that endured for eleven centuries, till Napoleon thun- dered at their gates in 1797. The first doge, Anafesto, seems to have had a difficult task in preserving the political equilibrium of the young republic between the powers of the East and West ; but one of his first acts, after securing internal peace, was to conclude a treaty with Liutprand, King of the 50 ROMANCEfOF COMMERCE Lombards, defining the boundaries of Venetia and ob- taining, in return for an annual payment, rights of wood-cutting, horse-breeding and trading on the main- land. And in the years that followed, with war and rumours of war on every side, the Venetians proved themselves swift to seize any opportunity that offered for extending the trading privileges that they knew to be vital to their existence. When Charlemagne descended like a thunderbolt upon Pavia they accepted his invita- tion to guard the captive king, Desiderio, and possibly found their safety in compliance, for Charlemagne in- variably became master wherever he chose to attack. But if compliant in this respect they were anything but subservient to his claims to rule all Italy. They were at that time inveterate slave traders, selling Christians to the pagans in Africa, and they carried on their traffic in defiance of his express edict against it, until forcibly expelled from their trading centres in Ravenna and the Pentapolis. Pepin, the son of Charles Martel, decided in 809 to press his dominion, and closed in upon them from land and sea. The Venetians concentrated their force at Rivoalto, or Rialto, their main island, and after a desperate struggle that lasted for six months, emerged victorious. Pepin withdrew, restored captured territory and reaffirmed aD. ancient trading rights and privileges within his dominions. Concentration had paid well. United by victory, the Venetians set about confirming the security of their position upon Rialto. They built forts and churches and a ducal palace, and became possessed, in 827, of the precious relics of St. Mark the Evangelist by a pious trick carried out by certain of their traders at Alexan- dria. A rich crop of legends attends his adoption as their patron saint. His image, or that of his lion, was blazoned on their standards and impressed on their coinage, andjthe shout of their populace at home and of their armies in the field was henceforward " Viva San Marco ! " VENICE 51 By slow degrees and sure, the expansion of trade raised the small band of exiles and fishermen into a rich, powerful and independent nation. There was a demand in Northern Europe for finer stuffs, more perfect arms and armour, for jewels, and, above all, for gold. The Venetians rose to meet the de- mand. They sailed to Constantinople, a city rich with accumulated wealth from India, and bought in small quantities almost at their own price, for these were the dark ages and trade was at a low ebb. Yet even when they had the goods their markets were still to seek. The intrepid merchants studied the passes of the Alps, and learned of the points where agencies might best be estabhshed. They organized caravans and threaded their perilous way across mountains and rivers, through countries often hostile and always frequented by bar- barian robbers who knew no right but might ; pirates whose boats were fast running horses, whose sea was the impenetrable forests of the slowly developing north, the mountains of Switzerland, the Black Forest and the Rhineland. But to the true merchant obstacles exist only to be overcome, and the Venetians became regular visitors at all the fairs of Europe and established them- selves in Augsburg, Nuremburg and Bruges. Imagina- tion led the way, and their wonderful nerve and energy enabled them to accomplish their ends. The victories of the modern playing field fade into insignificance before the indomitable pluck and the staying power necessary for ventures where the risk was a man's entire capital, and often his life as well, and the reward, not a silver cup or shield, but a fortune perhaps doubled, and the reputation of an explorer. From Bruges as an intermediate port they traded with England, and are said to have bought wool, cloth and tin on credit, and, selling them in Bruges for ready money, five per cent under cost price, to have derived their profits from the interest of the money during the interval. An extraordinary way to make money, but if 52 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE they were satisfied we have no reason to find fault. Nor was their European trade without influence upon their art at home. From Bruges Van Eyck's medium, whether of oil or, as is now thought, of emulsion of egg, came as a revelation to the Venetian artists who had hitherto worked in tempera alone ; and Giovanni Alemanni (the German) crossed the Alps to become the master of Vivarini. Thus Venice became the emporium, not only of Italy but of Greece and aU countries bordering on the Mediter- ranean, and she stood between Europe and the riches of the Levant. The Emperor Rudolph confirmed her right to coin her own money. Her commercial boycott brought Istria to its knees. Harassed by pirates from Narenta, Doge Orseolo H. set forth in 997 with a great fleet to patrol the Adriatic, and returned as the lord of a protectorate that included Dalmatia. " Slavs and Croats were cowed and hostages given for future good behaviour, and the woods of Curzola made Venice inde- pendent of Italy for timber. It was the first stage in her development as a European power." ^ The young Emperor Otho III., hearing of these exploits, paid a mysterious visit to the doge, arriving at night and wandering through the city in disguise. His concessions, however, were valuable. He relieved Venice of the annual token of vassalage, a robe of cloth of gold, that had begun to chafe the growing pride of the citizens. He granted many exemptions and permission to occupy certain neighbouring ports. Honours too came from the East, and an invitation to proceed against the Saracens gave the Doge an opportunity of wiping out the scandal of an earlier trade in munitions of war with that infidel nation. His success in saving a Greek army from de- struction was rewarded by an alliance between his son Giovanni and the niece of the Byzantine Emperor. In the connection'withJConstantinople — a*connection based first and foremost upon trade — ^we find the explanation '^ Fiom The Story of Fenue,hyT. Okey. Dent. 1905. VENICE 53 of much of the art and architecture of Venice. The Byzantine-Romanesque palaces of the merchant princes are still the glory of the Grand Canal ; St. Mark's, ready for consecration in 1094, was Byzantine in form until the later outbreak of Gothic pinnacles obscured its original design ; the rich mosaic decoration of the in- terior was also purely Byzantine, until the misguided restorations of the sixteenth century altered its character. And it is a significant sign of the high position of henour accorded to trade in the city that the main portal of its cathedral should have carved upon the first archivolt scenes representing hunting and trading (possibly the social development of the human race), on the second the labours of the twelve months, and on the third or main archivolt the handicrafts of Venice itself. Constantinople was wealthy and held the key to the East ; her people, however, were sluggish and unenter- prising. But the race is to the swift and the battle to the strong, and in their slackness the Venetians found their golden opportunity. In return for further services at the end of the eleventh century the Greek Emperor Comnenus granted the ships of Venice a free entrance into all his ports and allotted warehouses for their goods ; he founded a Venetian quarter in Constantinople and naturalized the residents ; and he compelled the mer- chants of Amalfi to pay an annual tribute to the cathedral of St. Mark. About this same time a fair was established in honour of that saint, which mingled devotion with commerce, and attracted so many visitors to Venice that the national coffers were well filled. So lucrative did the institution prove that other canonized remains received similar honours, and it is regrettable to have to admit that in the ardour with which relics were collected as allurements for pilgrim-merchants the body of at least one defunct patriarch was transported to the Adriatic by somewhat questionable means. But Venice, thanks to her merchants, was now ripe for expansion, and it was not long before the opportunity 54 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE arose. There is no need to trace here the history of the Crusades, that summoned every armed man in Europe to a holy warfare in the East. It is sufficient to point out the part that Venice played and the briUiant results she obtained. Historians are apt to reflect upon her policy as self-seeking. It should be remembered, how- ever, that Venice was far ahead in every way of the rougher, ruder nations with whom she found herself aUied. They were comparative barbarians ; she had long been accustomed, through her trade, to the refine- ments of Cairo and Constantinople. Theirs was the generous, but headlong, ardour of undisciplined youth ; hers the foresight and prudence of maturity. They, anticipating conquest, thought of it in terms of plunder : the Venetians who knew that nothing can be had in this world without paying for it, preferred to pay with their own good coin rather than with the Hfe-blood of their sons. As Gibbon truly says : " The lives and labours of millions, which were buried in the East, would have been more profitably employed in the improvement of their native country ; the accumulated stock of industry and wealth would have overflowed in navigation and trade ; and the Latins would have been enriched and enlightened by a pure and friendly correspondence with the climates of the East." Yet the Crusaders had their value after all in breaking up the " martial aristocracy " of feudalism, and the Venetians, who saw war to be in- evitable, not unnaturally decided to turn it to such advantage as they might. To whatever extent the people partook of the pre- vailing religious enthusiasm the merchants were keen- sighted enough to see that their interests would be best served by preventing the intrusion of such rivals as Pisa and Genoa and other nations who were likely to become their competitors if allowed a foothold in the Levant. Their relations with Constantinople at first deterred them from active measures, but the tweKth century found them resolute in their purpose of establishing VENICE 55 trade relationships in Syria. A fourth of the city of Acre was granted to the Venetians, and after a victory at Jaffa they were allotted " an entire street in every city in the kingdom of Jerusalem, with a bath, a bakehouse, a market and a church." Their imports were admitted free, and they were released from the payment of taxes. The siege and conquest of Tyre, however, awoke a new enemy, and the relations between Venice and Con- stantinople became strained to breaking point. A kind of guerilla warfare upon the merchant ships ensued, in which the Venetians suffered heavily. To meet the cost of a war with the Eastern Empire a forced loan was levied on the most opulent citizens, and a Chamber of Loans established. " State bonds were issued for the amount of the loan bearing interest at four per cent. These securities were quoted daily on the Rialto according to the fluctuations of the market, and formed the first funded debt in Europe."^ Their recovery from these embarrassments appears to have been rapid. In 1177 we find Frederick Barbarossa submitting himself to the Pope in St. Mark's Cathedral, and this historic reconciliation not only saw the incep- tion of the picturesque ceremony of wedding the Adriatic with a golden ring, but it brought renown and solid gain to Venice, while the Peace of Constance in the following year ratified her position among the Powers. But Venice had by no means finished either with the Crusades or Constantinople, yet the extraordinary story of how she first fitted out the Crusaders with a fieet, and then persuaded them to turn their arms upon Con- stantinople and helped them to sack the city belongs rather to a military than a commercial chronicle — and there were complications in the Greek Empire which we have no space to narrate. This was in 1204. The fabulously wealthy city was captured and re-captured, and it was even proposed by a later doge that the seat ' ^ T. Okey's Story of Venice, S6 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE of his Government should be transferred thither from Venice. Though this was never done, he wils permitted to " tinge his buskin with the imperial purple," and to add to the title of doge the further designation of Despot of Romania and Lord of One-Fourth and One- Eighth of the Roman Empire ; and Crete, the key to the trade of the Mediterranean, was transferred to Venetian rule. But the Venetians were not alone in the field. They had powerful rivals who were to tax their strength to the utmost. In Italy, in Syria, and in Constantinople alike, the Genoese provided a stimulus of competition so fierce that it broke at length into an open warfare that lasted till the close of the fourteenth century. During this long period of alternate aggression and defence Venice was careful at first to remember that her navy was primarily a commercial one. Enterprise — always the direct outcome of competition — may be traced on all hands, even amid the vicissitudes of war. In 1240 Venice obtained the monopoly of trade with the Far East ; commercial treaties were concluded with Ravenna, Padua and Ragusa ; the cities of the Lombard League deposited their money with Venetian bankers. The reputed Crown of Thorns was pledged with them for something like £yooo, and they even held in pawn the son of the last Latin Emperor of Constantinople. The year 1284 saw the issue of the first gold ducat, famous for six centuries throughout the commercial world for its fineness, purity and weight, and it is perhaps worthy of comment that calculation by percentage in- stead of in fractions also originated in Venice some sixty years earlier. But there were reverses as well as gains. They lost the island of Chios ; and though a treaty with the Sara- cens, which, it must be confessed, scandalized Christen- dom, drove the Genoese from Syria, the latter were prompt to retort on the Venetians by defeating their fleet off Curzola in 1298. They then prohibited any ^^p.J"/') iJK ^'iKuarj LORENZO DEI MEDICI 77 the Arts were now cultivated and were of a higher order. It became accepted as the centre, the great Mecca for those who would and could produce the finest paintings, sculpture, poetry and music, and it was very largely to Lorenzo that this reputation was due. Everyone knows the story of how the young Michael Angelo was sent by his master, Ghirlandajo, to study with Granacci from the antique in the Medici Gardens, and won the approval and interest of Lorenzo with his sculpture of the head of a satyr. Until Lorenzo's death in four years' time he found himself an inmate of the Medici Palace and a member of a brilliant circle, on terms of equality with all the illustrious philosophers, wits and poets in Florence, among whom were Marsilio Ficino, Poliziano and Pico deUa Mirandola, the shining lights of the Platonic Academy founded by Cosimo. Lorenzo brought to Florence valuable antiques from all over the world. He recovered for Florence through his emissary Giovanni Lascaris two hundred Greek manuscripts, eighty of which had until then been un- known. He assisted the sports and games of the capital. He encouraged agriculture, and loved to spend his spare time upon his own model farm not far from the city. He had always possessed a fondness for horses, and as a young man had been a famous horseman. Whatever this wonderful man attempted he excelled in. His poems rank only below those of his close friend Poliziano. John Addington Symonds, in his brilliant book on the Renaissance in Italy, describes him as " Tuscan to the backbone, imbued with the spirit of his city, a passionate lover of her customs and pastimes, a complete master of her vernacular. His education, thoughlt fitted him for platonic discussions with Ficino and rendered him an amateur of humanistic culture, had failed to make a pedant of him. Much as he appreciated the classics, he preferred his Tuscan poets ; and what he learned at school he brought to bear upon the study of the native literature." 78 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE He was a patron of men o£ letters, but was careful never to patronize, and thus they gave him of their best. He was a bibliophile, and loved books for themselves. If a book could not be procured it could be copied, and Lorenzo employed many copyists. And while he thus enriched his own library he willingly allowed his books to be copied by others. When death came to him in 1492 he was but forty-four years old and at the zenith of his career. All Florence mourned him and called him " Father." One of his former enemies. King Ferrante, on hearing of his death exclaimed, " His life has been long enough for his own deathless fame, but too short for Italy. May God grant now that he is dead that men will not attempt that which while he was alive they did not dare do." Truly in the Medici the Romance of Trade blossomed as the'rose. V THE FUGGERS OF AUGSBURG HOT in Venice and Florence alone were there clever men who became powerful and rich through commerce. Other peoples in the north were treading the same in- tricate paths to fame and fortune, and it is largely owing to the wonderful energy and sagacity of several families of merchants living in Augsburg that this city became one of the great trading centres north of Venice — perhaps indeed the greatest. Of these families one stands out most conspicuously, and we know of no record in the history of Commerce more fascinating and more inspiring than that of the great Fugger family, to whom we shall give this chapter. The house of Fugger ranks even to-day with the proudest families of Germany, yet the Fuggers are not, like so many scions of the German aristocracy, members of an old line ennobled almost before history began. It was rather the nobility of civil activity, aided by fortune and seconded by imperial favour, that won them the princely coronet in 1803. Their oldest known ancestor was by no means of the inner circle of the patrician families of Augsburg, for we read that at Grabent, a village about a mile and a half to the north-west of Lager Lechfeld, a certain Hans Fugger and his wife Anna of the Meisners of Kirchheim pursued, in addition to his husbandry, the calling of weaver and dyer. The village, however, became too small for| the ambitions of his son and successor, and one fine September day in 1367 Hans the 79 8o ROMANCE OF COMMERCE younger left his little roadside home for a larger field of activity. In Augsburg he continued the trade of weaver, and through his business ability and manly open char- acter won for himself a position among the better families and a place of honour in his guild. He married the daughter of the burgomaster, and thus gained the freedom of the city. His brother Ulrich joined him in 1377. His business increased ; the number of looms and apprentices multiplied ; and, determining to found a business for the direct sale of his wares, he shocked and astonished the neighbours by opening a shop in his own house. The excellence of his goods speedily became recognized throughout the surrounding districts, and his enterprise both in the wholesale and retail trade was crowned with success. Large orders from Ulm, Nuremberg, and other towns came in so rapidly that Fugger's chief difficulty was to weave enough to supply his customers. In this way the foundations of the family were laid in the fourteenth century, with quality for building material and industry as a sure cement. When Hans Fugger died in 1409 he left, what was no small fortune for those times, a sum of 3000 florins. Hans Fugger's sons were Andrew and Jacob. Andrew, the elder, was richer and more respected than Jacob, but possessed of a somewhat imperious disposition. He carried on with all the fiery energy of his nature the business schemes of his father, and entrusting the looms to the care of his brother Jacob, devoted himself exclu- sively to the commerce in cloth. The name of Fugger bore so excellent a reputation among the merchants in the more important towns of Germany that the doors of every counting-house were opened wide to his ambitious projects. The shrewdness with which he availed himself of every opportunity for progress, the energy with which he steered straight for the goal, indifferent to obstacles and knowing no such word as failure, contributed greatly to the increase of his CERMAN ftlEKCHAN'l- I.\ I ME M\"TH CENTLK\' Rfpro.htccii from a niiiiiatiirc in an illiiunnnted mnii'iscri/ 1 THE FUGGERS OF AUGSBURG 8i business, the enhancement of his reputation, and to the wealth o£ this, the third generation o£ the house of Fugger. He won a position in society, and was made happy by seeing his son Jacob receive from the Emperor Frederick HI. in 1452, " for himself, his brothers, and his descendants forever," the first family coat of arms of a roe gules on a field azure. But, unfortunately, his haughtiness and overbearing manner marred what might otherwise have been a great character. He succeeded in his schemes and undertakings, but he estranged his friends and, finally, his brother Jacob. When Andrew Fugger died he left a great business which was undertaken by his sons, Luke, Jacob, Matthew and Hans. But it is difficult to instU the love of work into those who know they will inherit great wealth. Luxury and absence of necessity robbed Andrew's sons of aU incentive, and business is a mistress who overlooks no neglect and must be constantly courted. Though Andrew had been haughty and purseproud he had never ceased to love the great game of business. Every day saw him in his office or among his bales of merchandise. His love of enjoyment and magnificence did not deprive him of the result of his early lessons in thrift. His sons failed to maintain the standards and the traditions of their father and grandfather. They lost the family virility, and just as the nation which grows rich and gives itself up to pleasures and enjoyment becomes less virile, less capable, less respected or feared, and finally drops into insignificance, so the family almost always falls which counts work or effort other than in the chase for sport, or pleasure, as something to be shunned. It falls too in a very much shorter space of time than does the nation. For several years after their father's death the Fuggers' business increased by its own impetus, but at length began inevitably to show the lack of a master hand. At the death of the last brother in 1494 his debts exceeded his assets by an enormous amount. This branch of the family grew less and less, until many of 82 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE its members were reduced to seeking situations from their more fortunate cousins, and in 1583 the line of " the Fuggers of the Roe " finally disappeared. If there had been no other branch, the history of the Fuggers would never have been written. We remember, however, that the haughty Andrew had a brother Jacob, and to this more plodding and less ostentatious member of the family we may look as the real architect of the fortunes of the house. Jacob attained the rank of Master of the Worshipful Company of Fustian Weavers, but soon ceased to give all his attention to the business of weaving, since he saw further profit both in the spice trade and in the manu- facture of garments of silk and wool, which he sent out to all quarters of the world. The excellence of these latter productions is proved by the fact that, even in rich Venice then at the height of its prosperity and the home of the greatest merchant-princes, Jacob Fugger's northern-made garments were sold in great quantities. Jacob married a daughter of Basenger, master of the Augsburg Mint, who had enormous business relations with traders of all kinds all over the world, and it was through his father-in-law that he later developed an interest in the mines, which became a great source of wealth to the family. Jacob died in 1469, and three of his sons, Ulrich, George and Peter, carried on the business. His other sons, Mark and Jacob, were destined for the priestly callings, but after the death of Peter in 1473, Jacob, then three-and-twenty, renounced his vocation at the request of Ulrich and George and entered the farnily business as a merchant. In the sequel he proved him- self a business genius, to whom the world-famous posi- tion of the Fuggers is largely due. It was, however Ulrich who, as chief director, first entered into busi ness relations with the Imperial House of Hapsburg. In the year 1473 the Emperor Frederick III. wa making preparation for his journey to Treves to arrang OLD GERMAN WAREHOUSE l-'rovi a ivoodciit hi the British Musc-iai THE FUGGERS OF AUGSBURG 83 with Charles the Bold of Burgundy the details of the marriage of his son Maximilian with Charles's daughter Mary ; and, wishing to clothe and deck his train in cloth of a single colour, turned to the firm of Fugger. Ulrich provided what was asked, " whereupon the Emperor conferred upon him the coat of arms with the lilies in its fitting colours, and these," says Hans Jacob Fugger, " were the first mercantile transactions which the House of Austria had with them that bear the name of Fugger." This association gave them great publicity, it is true, but little gain, and small thanks ; and their relations with kings and emperors in the long run cost them enormous sums, for which little can be discovered to counterbalance. The brothers developed the business in all directions. They did an import and export trade in spices, silk and wool, and sent out great quantities of the garments which had won a reputation even in Venice. They came in course of time to an understanding together that their male heirs and descendants should invest the whole of their fortunes, undivided, in the business, while the daughters of the house should be provided with dowries, " to the end that the trade of the house of Fugger should remain undivided and undissipated." This prin- ciple was faithfully maintained even down to the time of the Schmal-kaldian War. A brief description of the counting-house of those princes of Commerce about the year 1490 is not without interest. At this period the Western Hemisphere had not been discovered ; printing had just been invented ; England was a growing but still an unimportant power under Henry VH. Methods of communication were crude and tedious. Conveniences which to-day seem indispensable were then non-existent. Almost all Europe north of Italy, with a few excepted cities, was a wild, undeveloped, half-civilized country where might was right ; where law was only worth the paper it was written upon unless backed up by an armed force. It 84 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE was in the face o£ conditions such as these that the giant commercial intellects of Augsburg built up their great reputation as traders. Ulrich and George bought two houses in the same street and utilized the space between for a counting- house, whose fame spread throughout Europe. It was known as the " Golden Counting-House," of which the following is a description taken from an old record : " Ceilings and walls were inlaid with rich panelling, whose carving of dark wood was overlaid again with glistening gold. The windows, broad rather than high, displayed in their small round panes magnificent paintings of varied tints ; heavy carved arm-chairs upholstered in red-flowered velvet lined the walls, and in one corner stood a large artistic safe with folding doors, which hid from view a part of the wealth of the Fuggers in the shape of specie, bonds, and bills of exchange. " The first object which struck the eye was Ulrich's desk standing by the middle window, and supported on four seated lions in black, carved wood, inlaid with gold and mother-of-pearl. Above, and in the back of the table itself, the top of which was formed of marble, with veins of light green, white and black, were a number of small compartments with drawers, which, half open for the most part, revealed the seals of the documents they contained, hanging by ribbons of silk. The whole was crowned by the Fugger Arms ; the blue field of lapis lazuli, and the lilies of beaten gold. A lion's skin lay under the table, spread out upon the floor ; a large arm-chair, upon the leather back of which the Fugger Crest was embossed in gold, stood in front of the table.^ " Here Ulrich Fugger worked, and reigned supreme, here he received callers, here were elaborated far-reaching plans with the busy'merchant princes of Augsburg. It was in this lovely chamber that many a noble, many a count bargained for a loan, and on Ulrich's desk subscribed the document wherein he mort- gaged to the Augsburg weaver territory and dominion. " Opening out of the ' Golden Counting-House ' was a large well-lit chamber, which, despite its simplicity, was a further in- dication of the wealth of the house. Here worked George Fugger, and the legion of clerks — persons of no little importance in those days, and valued for their knowledge." THE FUGGERS OF AUGSBURG 85 The house o£ Fugger continued to grow in wealth and power under Ulrich's able control. No matter was too large and none too small to receive his attention, and when the expedition to search for a passage around the Cape of Good Hope was proposed the rich merchants of Augsburg were among the first approached for financial assistance. It was the age of imagination as well as the age of risk. " Nothing venture nothing win " had a high place in their commercial creed, and the Augsburg merchant princes contributed heavily to the undertaking which was to be the undoing of Venice. Fugger, Welser,! Vohlin, Hochstetter, Gossenbrot and Imboff (all merchants of Augsburg), and the Nurem- berg house of Hirschvogel, together with certain Italian firms, fitted out, at a cost of 66,000 ducats, three large vessels, the St. Hieronymus, St. Raphael and the St. Leonard, which sought the new sea route to the Indies, convoyed by the Portuguese fleet of the Viceroy, Fran- cisco d' Almeida. It is satisfactory to read, in an account of this overseas expedition published in 1509, that the profits of the successful adventure helped to swell the coffers of all those who risked their money in it. Ulrich Fugger died from the effects of an operation for stone in 15 10. He is described as " a fine, friendly, pious gentleman," but that he had " a head of thick white hair that beseemed him honestly " is hardly of as much importance to the readers of his history as it was to him. He left several sons and daughters, but his sons died childless, and with them the family of Ulrich ceased. Four years before his death his brother George also died, and his two sons, Raymond and Anthony, became the founders of the Raymondian and Antonian lines of the Fuggers, and thus the common ancestors of the succeeding race. ' The Welsers attained the then considered unprecedented glory of marrying one of their daughters to the Emperor of Germany, a match commemorated in Augsburg to this day by the Philipine-Welser Strasse. 86 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Meanwhile, though Ulrich, as the eldest brother, was the head of the house, Jacob, working in the background, exerted a very strong influence almost from his entry into the business, and the family history gives to him the post of honour as the real founder of their world- wide power. The Mirror oj Honour oj the House oj Austria speaks of him as " the chief instrument in the exaltation of his line," and in the Chronicle oj the En- trance oj the Herren Fugger into the City oj Augsburg it is recorded that he had " permanently enhanced the name and line of the Fuggers in honour, trade and possessions." Jacob was born in 1459. As has been stated, he was intended for the priestly calling, but on the death of his brother in 1473 left his canonry to devote himself to the business, which he and his family considered as their inheritance. He was sent first to Venice, "where the Fondaco dei Tedeschi, allotted by the Venetian Republic to German merchants, had existed from the thirteenth century. This former caravanserai and em- porium of the German nation still stands on the Grand Canal immediately to the east of the Ponte Rialto. The building is three storeys high, square in shape, contain- ing a square courtyard, and with a stately gate upon the water front. On the ground floor were the store vaults, the first two of which were the property of the Fuggers of Augsburg. Here then, in Venice, the high-school of the merchants of that day, Jacob Fugger acquired an excellent commercial training, made valuable acquaint- ances, and gave some proof of his great versatility. He also travelled to the chief seats of European trade and gained much experience, which he turned later to so good an account for his house as to win for himself the title of the " richest merchant in Europe " ; and he married a wife Sibyl, the fair daughter of the merchant prince Artzt and granddaughter of that Ulrich Artzt who in 1429 had founded the first trading company in Augsbiug. b THE FUGGERS OF AUGSBURG 87 From the death of his brother Ulrich in 1510, the entire responsibiUty of the business rested upon Jacob. Having no children, he adopted as partners his nephews, Hieronymus, Ulrich, Raymond and Anthony, and gave the firm the name of Jacob Fugger and Brother's Sons. He continued with great firmness the policies of the house as maintained by Ulrich, and kept up the connec- tion with the Indies, via Portugal, then the uttermost ends of the earth, but the old trade in spices, wool and silk had gradually made way for mining enterprises and for speculations in banking, which were very profitable at this time in the commercial history of Europe when conducted with the necessary wisdom and experience. From banking developed the allied industry of coining. His house advanced large sums to the Archduke Sigis- mund of Tyrol, who was always in want of money, and received in return the entire output of the rich silver mines of Schwarz. From this source they received a revenue of 200,000 florins each year. They then bought up all the copper that Schwarz could produce. Their mining transactions became greater and greater, and their house continually more powerful. But it is not necessary to detail here the many mining and smelting operations of Jacob Fugger. It must have been an intensely interesting and delightful occupation, and carried with it a romance of trade difficult to surpass. The world of commerce was still restricted. They had first to deal with the princes and emperors as the original owners of the mines. The mines were scattered, and often in a hostile district ; and their market was in Venice. Their risks were high. If successful they gained much, if unsuccessful they lost their entire stake. Surely this was a zestful game and one well worth the playing. The superior judgment and ability, added to the great available capital of the house of Fugger, turned most of their ventures into highly profitable transactions, but the political conditions of Europe were in such an unsettled condition that it seemed wise after about 15 10 88 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE to withdraw from a field o£ labour which was growing less profitable and less satisfactory. They sold most of their mines and concessions, though ruins of castles and strong guard buildings built by Jacob Fugger in what were then rich mining districts are to be seen even to this day scattered throughout the central portion of Europe. So by degrees Jacob made his business conform more and more to that of banking, but of banking probably not as we usually understand the term, but rather as conducted by the great private financial houses of Europe and America. He was a financier who controlled and directed enterprises great for those days, and through the "power of money received no doubt the lion's share of their profits. In the year 15 ii the Emperor Maximihan conceived the project — sane or mad — of making himself Pope, and turned to the richest merchant in Europe for the neces- sary funds. He received help, and placed various manors in pledge with the house of Fugger, a number of which were never redeemed ; and to show his gratitude elevated certain members of the house to the nobility, and nomi- nated them to the Imperial Council. To call upon the Fuggers for financial aid had become almost a habit with the emperors and princes of Europe, but old Jacob was not so dazzled by this clientele as to forget that the use of money is worth money ; and he does not seem to have been held down by any laws against usury. When, for example, in 15 14 Albert of Brandenberg was consecrated Archbishop of Mainz, the Fuggers lent him 2000 ducats for the discharge of the Pallium fees to Rome, a loan which Albert promised to pay back on a day fixed " in good Rhenish florins at the rate of 140 gold florins for 100 ducats, together with 500 Rhenish florins for trouble, risks and costs." We are not surprised later to learn that when Leo X. began to promulgate his Indulgence for the building of St. Peters, and the Indulgence money had to be collected in various parts of Germany by the newly elected Archbishop of MERCHANTS ON THK RHINE LOADING IHEIK BALLS /■■/ CM a mini itim ill the Miinici/ml LilTary, Liiccriic. dated 14S4 THE FUGGERS OF AUGSBURG 89 Mainz, that the Fuggers kept in close touch with their debtor. A representative of the firm accompanied Tetzel, preacher and seller of the Papal Indulgence, on his travels, and this representative carried the key oj the Indulgence box. When the box was full it was opened in the presence of both. Its contents were counted, a receipt given to the Archbishop " on account," and the money duly handed over to Andreas Mattstedt, the Fuggers' factor at Leipsic. One half of the amount was forwarded to the Curia by the Roman factor of the house, while the other half went toward payment of the firm's claims against Archbishop Albert. Faster, and more surely, did the Fuggers draw near to the attainment of what was the highest pinnacle of their fortune. The time was at hand when, in the struggle for supremacy between the houses of Hapsburg and Valois, they were to throw their millions and the immense weight of their influence into the balance and, in throwing, win for the Hapsburgs the Imperial crown of the Holy Roman Empire. This occurred in 1519 with the election of the Emperor Charles V. Th& Fuggers had first entered into business relations with him at the time when Charles was master of the Nether- lands alone, and he also admitted having received the most substantial services from their house on the occasion of his accession to the Spanish throne. Charles's rivals at the election were Henry VIII. of England and the French King, Francis I., who expressed himself ready to spend on the election half his yearly income, reckoned at 3,000,000 thalers, a statement which allowed the German electors to bring increasing pressure to bear on Charles and demand either ready money or the sureties of German merchants of the highest standing. While Francis (whose promises, without doubt, would never have been kept) was always short of ready money, the Hapsburger found seemingly endless resources continu- ally at his disposal. But when his negotiations with other German and Italian firms grew less satisfactory Missing Page Missing Page 92 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE titles in no way afiected his naturalness. Nor did he hoard his gold as did too many of the rich men of his time. To lock it in strong boxes was not his notion of success: he was the master of his wealth and not its keeper only. If he made money, he spent it readily in the inanner befitting a gentleman. His entertainments were in the grand style of his time and rank, but he was ever ready to put large amounts to the most beneficent uses, and by his wise philanthropy gained great honour throughout the kingdom and in foreign courts, Fugger was not only a merchant, his character was well rounded. He was a great citizen, and stood for the enlightenment and development of his house, his city and his country. He was a patron of the Arts, particularly of literature, of horticulture and of architecture. He loved books, and was the first of his family to found a great library. His own beautiful grounds and garden were esteemed by all who knew them as the equal of the royal gardens at Blois and Tours. To architecture he added the celebrated Fugger House^or Fugger Palace, which still may be seen in Augsburg. While this remark- able edifice has been somewhat altered from the original design, it still shows the interesting and artistic exterior decoration. But perhaps the most lasting work of Jacob Fugger was the foundation of the Fuggerei, and all who visit Augsburg are shown, among the first of its interesting objects, this unique creation of its leading citizen in the year 1520. Jacob determined to solve for the Fugger workmen the difiicult problem of housing, then, as now, a burn- ing question in a commercial and industrial town with a constant influx of immigrants. For Jacob also believed in the policy of bringing to his city such racial ability as was not naturally inherent in his own people. We know to-day that the trend of thought and endeavour of the Latin race Hes in an entirely different direction from that of the Anglo-Saxon. Why^is it not wiser to import such ability as is, and always will be, foreign to our lyVCOBV^S FVgGER: SEMExJ THE FUGGERS OF AUGSBURG 93 temperaments, when such labour is necessary to the accomplishment of our desires ? After all there are certain things that the Anglo-Saxon finds it infinitely easier to perform in Latin countries than the Latin himself, and England, as we hope to show in another chapter, owes one of her greatest industries — the wooUen — to exactly this policy. Fugger knew that his German workmen could weave and dye cloth superbly, but there were some things which, if they did at all, they did clumsily. For such work he imported the finer-fingered Italians, injuring no one at home by a competition in which they were so unequal, but in- stead, increasing the entire commerce of his own country by including a greater variety of workmanship. And Fugger felt that the workmen who had grown old in the service of his house must be provided for. With this thought in mind he bought a large piece of ground, then in the immediate outskirts of Augsburg, and laid out six streets in which he built fifty-three excellent houses, each of which contained two dwellings. The rent for each dwelling was then, as it is to-day, only one florin a year — this is now the equivalent of about three shillings. One of the residents was appointed foreman, and it was his duty to collect the rent, all of which was to be spent in keeping the houses in repair. After four hundred years these substantial, very clean and inviting dwelling-houses still remain. The Fugger works have disappeared ; Augsburg is no longer a com- mercial town ; and the chief officials of the city now keep the Fuggerei filled with the families of the worthy poor of the community, a splendid monument to the intelligent but not extravagant munificence of this great man. Jacob Fugger died soon after completing this last of his undertakings. It was insignificant in size, cost and pretentiousness as compared with hundreds of the pro- jects which his busy mind had conceived and carried out ; but its charming simplicity and kindly benevolence have done as much as anything to perpetuate his memory. 94 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Jacob was childless, and with him his line ended. In his will he left his business to his two nephews Raymond and Anthony, and the latter, as the stronger of the two, was to be the head of the house. It is perhaps hardly necessary to follow in detail the further fortunes of this remarkable family, but a general view may be taken of their continued accomplishments. The period of Anthony's administration may be called the zenith of the Fuggers' prestige. Like a great tree, the roots of their house had grown deep in the fertile soil of the world's respect and confidence, and the later members of the family gathered the fruit of the great Jacob's ability, energy and foresight. More and more the hereditary princes and emperors of the several States of Europe courted the Fuggers ; more and more they came to be looked upon as the bankers and financiers of the nations. The map of Europe was maintained or changed by their aid, and the battles were decided in the counting-house of Augsburg, rather than by the armies of soldiers on the field. They had become a world power, not through diplomacy, not through an accepted inherited right to rule, but through their almost unlimited ability to provide the " sinews of war." They made many alliances with the German and Bohe- mian nobles, yet we can discover no undue effort on the part of Jacob, Anthony or any other member of the family to obtain a title or princely recognition for the great part they were playing in the world's commerce and finance, though honours of this kind were much more highly considered then than now. It was Anthony who proved that kings held no patent on kingly deeds by burning in the Emperor's presence the paper which Charles V. had given to the Fuggers in acknowledgment of an enormous loan. But Charles V., while not always a prompt payer, as this incident shows, was not altogether unmindful of his deep obligation to his bankers. In a document dated Grenada, June 30th, 1526, he granted the rank of Count to the brothers THE FUGGERS OF AUGSBURG 95 Raymond and Anthony and their cousin Hieronymus " with all the heirs of their body and heirs' heirs o£ the male line." And in the course of the Diet of Augsburg on November 14th, 1530, he raised " Raymond, An- thony and Hieronymus Fugger and the lawful heirs of their body and heirs' heirs of both sexes, even them that had the name of Fugger, to the rank, title, dignity and company, grade and honour, with their noble and knightly privileges, of counts, bannerets and barons." To these privileges many other licences and immunities were added. The most important of these were the following : " I. The Fuggers are confirmed in all the privileges granted to them by the Emperor Maximilian. " 2. The Fuggers are elevated not only to noble and knightly- rank but also to that of Counts, Bannerets, and Barons ; they are assigned a seat on the Frankish Imperial Bench of Counts, with all the Rights and Privileges of the position, namely, that of sealing documents with red wax, receiving countly, knightly, and baronial enfeoffments ; of calling themselves by the names of their holdings, and in addition, of exercising the high rights of the judicature. " 3. They and their descendants are taken under special Im- perial protection as regards their possessions, lands, and goods. " 4. They are exempt from all civic duties. " 5. They are granted the right of leasing their estates, but with the stipulation that they shall pay all dues on their landed property with the exception of supplemental taxes. " 6. The privileges of the places where they lived, should they be prejudicial to their own, shall become null and void where theirs are concerned. " 7. They shall in no case be proceeded against elsewhere than before the Town Court of Augsburg, but shall be free from the jurisdiction of the Council and its officers. " 8. And if the City of Augsburg wish to prefer a civil or criminal claim or charge against them, they shall only be pro- ceeded against before the Emperor himself. " 9. Then they, their servants, connections, and relations shall not be cited before any foreign court, especially the courts of Rothwell and Westphalia." 96 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE These and other rights were given them. They were granted permission to make use of their privileges then, or in the future, nor could they be compelled to produce the original document, but needed only to exhibit an attested copy ; and that they might be more readily protected in their privileges, the most eminent bishops, dukes, abbots, counts, priors and free towns, and even the Roman King Ferdinand, were constituted their guardians, commissaries, referees and protectors. As such the Emperor Charles V. appointed : " King Ferdinand, his brother, the Archbishop of Salzburg, the Bishops of Bamberg, Wurzburg, Eichstadt, Speyer, Con- stance, Freising, Strassburg, Regensburg, Passau, Augsburg, Trient, Brixen ; all the Palatinate counts and princes of Bavaria, especially the Palatinate Count Frederick, Dukes WiUiam and Ludwig, and their successors ; Palatine Counts Otto, Heinrich, and Philip ; Duke George of Saxony, Margrave Philip of Baden, the Governments of Upper and Lower Austria, especially those of County Tyrol and the Duchy of Wurtemburg ; the Abbots of Kayserheim, Roggenburg, Adelburg, Maulbraun, Weingarten, Salzmansweiler, Elehingen, and Weiblingen ; all the counts of Helfienstein and Montfort ; the Cathedral Provosts of Mainz, Bamberg, and Augsburg, and the free cities of Nurnberg, Ulm, Regensburg, Esslingen, Ravensburg, Ueberlingen and Donau- worth. As many of these as they, the Fuggers, should choose and call upon to stand by them, whoever should assail the privi- leges they had been given, should be held responsible for defending the same, and whoever should enfringe upon this warrant should be liable to a fine of loo gold marks." When signing the warrant the Emperor Charles V. is said to have declared that he had never granted such favours to any man, and was not minded ever to repeat them in the future. The supreme position of the house of Fugger in finance was surrendered when, after a series of difficult years which tested old Anthony's nerve and ability to the utmost, he was succeeded by his eldest nephew Hans Jacob Fugger, who was in no way equal to the task. THE FUGGERS OF AUGSBURG 97 The house at the moment required a strong hand and the ability of another great Jacob. The enormous calls upon its treasury had impaired even its wonderful resources, and the unfriendliness of Philip II. of Spain had proved that even lending to princes has its draw- backs, especially when no army stands at the back of the creditors to enforce the collection of their loans. The times were bad : during the years 1557 to 1562 the financial and commercial credit of all Europe was shaken to its foundations. Charles V., who owed his throne to these princes of commerce, grew more indifferent to his obligations, while the bonds which he had lodged with them became less and less of a security. Anthony lived to know that his house was threatened but not long enough to bring it safely through the panic. From that time the business began to decline as a world power in finance. Competition was strong and ever- lasting vigilance is the price of success in commerce as truly as in battles or diplomacy, and for this vigilance the business must look to its chief. Hans Jacob Fugger was the first head of the family who possessed no marked ability for business. He was endowed by nature with splendid intellectual gifts and a noble mind, but business capabilities and a devotion to the needs of the firm were not his. Further details are unnecessary. The house of Fugger, though no longer a dominating power in Europe, still enjoys a position of importance in Augsburg, where the splendid palace built by Jacob is a continual reminder of its wonderful achievements in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Missing Page Missing Page 100 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE translation of the Bible as signifying a society and union of men, particularly in the sense of combatants. It is applied to the band of men who came to capture Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane." But the actual and accepted formation of the con- federation was a matter of slow growth. Its very existence was illegal, unions and associations being for- bidden within the Empire. Kings and princes were greatly opposed to it, of course (who can blame them ?), for its aim was to win and hold a certain power which royal families had always regarded as their own pecuHar right, and it was only in 1370, after the combined cities had waged a great war against Waldemar of Denmark and concluded it with the Peace of Stralsund, that the cities came out into the open, as it were, and officially todik the title of " The Hanseatic League." The honour that is due to pioneers must be given in this instance to the city of Lubeck, which induced and indeed forced the several other cities of Hamburg, Bremen, Cologne, and Weimar to join in insisting on their rights. Each act of injustice, each arbitrary deed based on no principle but might, served but to strengthen their determination. And the climax was brought about, as we have said, over the matter of herrings. Europe was then Catholic from end to end, and, in obedience to the teachings of that faith, fish formed the chief food of the people on every seventh day, and fish took the place of meat throughout the six weeks of Lent. Herrings were a cheap and favourite article of food, and the great Baltic Sea was the best fishing ground in the then known world for these small but much desired members of the finny tribe. But the Baltic was controlled by Denmark, then a powerful nation whose king was mighty and autocratic and entirely disinclined to listen to suggestion or inter- ference from anyone. This was the redoubtable Waldemar III., the Waldemar who came to the throne in 1326 as a boy of only twelve, but what a boy ! He LUBECK (about 1560) showing the highway with merchants' carts and the harbour Front a ^voodcut possibly by Altdorffef THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE loi soon showed his elders that he had a mind, a will and an ambition o£ his own. At the beginning of his reign his country was small and distracted with many vexatious problems, both little and big, but in twenty years Waldemar had changed all this. He united Denmark and made it highly respected abroad, and strong in its own local power. His popular title was " Waldemar Atterdag," a nickname meaning, " there is yet another day." It typified the King's character. He felt that an object aimed for, a goal striven for, if not attained at once, could stiU be won on the morrow, if not to-day. His was not the nature to despair, but to wait if neces- sary, and win when win he could. At all events Waldemar made his little kingdom something which had to be reckoned with, and with his own and his country's advancement he became less amenable to petitions, if they did not suit his purposes. So when Lubeck and her sister cities approached him regarding the rights of the herring fishery and some other associated matters, he told them, not too politely, that their wishes were of no interest to him, and that they must find some other occupation than fishing for herrings in the Baltic Sea. Thereupon the cities did the only thing which could be expected of men of red blood ; they decided to force from Denmark what peaceable and beautifully illu- minated petitions had failed to win, and after a period of quiet preparation, that Waldemar was too wideawake to ignore, they declared war, though not before he had taken the first step. The story of the war with its victories and defeats, its treacheries, its love-makings and its legends is a fascinating one, and goes far to show what the people and the kings were made of in those days, but it must be sufiicient for us to know here that the League won in the end, and glad enough they were to stop fighting. Their game in life was Commerce, not war. The first recognition of their increased importance and enlarged portion in the world powers came when 102 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE the renowned Emperor Charles IV. expressed his desire to visit the " great city of Lubeck." The hint was accepted, and a formal invitation given, but when he appeared before their gates his retinue was so numerous that the experienced men of Lubeck hesitated before admitting them all, for they knew kings and their methods too well to be other than careful in trusting them too far. However, finally, they let them in, and for eleven days entertained them with such splendour that Charles's respect for this northern city developed into fear. The thrifty, successful merchants had gathered much wealth, and wealth has always meant strength. Charles left Lubeck a wiser but not a happier man. His visit, even in those days, when the art of publicity or advertising was young, became the talk of Europe, and Lubeck was accepted as the most important city of the northern states. Her leadership was from that moment acknowledged and the Hanseatic League sprang into a very high position indeed. With a succession of victories and honours the League now began to exercise its newly acquired power in a manner not always just and fair. All men are made of the same clay, and all, more or less, in time seem to be influenced by the same passions and desires. In those old days kings and people in high authority, with in- creased power, grew more and more autocratic, and to these wonderful old merchants came, with a greater ability to have their unimpeded way, an inclination to override any who opposed their wishes. The small cabal of cities composing the federation found themselves continually approached by the mer- chants of other cities who wished to join the League. Its trade advantages were enormous, and those outside its list found themselves opposing a combination which made competition almost prohibitive. The heads of the League, accepting the maxim that " in Union there is strength," admitted town after town into their charmed circle, but always under arbitrary and absolute THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE 103 conditions, and woe to that town which transgressed them. Thus, for example, Bremen was expelled in 1356. It came about in this way. Trading with Flanders was prohibited during a certain period. One of Bremen's merchants, however, overstepped this rule and the city was caUed upon by the League to discipline her refractory member. Bremen, over-estimating her strength, de- clined to do so, and took his part instead, with the result that she was expelled and totally cut off from the advantages of the Union, so that " for the thirty miser- able years which followed she was impoverished ; grass grew in the streets and poverty and desolation were everywhere in her borders " ; nor was her reinstatement made easy. At another time Brunswick was the culprit, and when after six years of fearful poverty she craved for pardon and reinstatement, two of her burgomasters and eight of her chief citizens walked bare-headed and bare-footed, carrying candles, from the Church of Our Lady in Lubeck to the town hall, where the Council of the League was assembled. There before a great audience they confessed upon their knees their enormous error, and implored the Council to pardon them for the love of God and the honour of the Virgin Mary. Lubeck was the absolute and unquestioned leader. Her popula- tion numbered 80,000. Her merchants were the most powerful. Her commerce was the greatest. Let us briefly survey the range of commerce which this fascinating old federation attempted to control. Let us view for a moment its romance, its charm, and its methods of overcoming its difficulties, and let us at the same time call upon our imagination to place us back in those dark ages, when neither printing, steam, electricity, nor a hundred other of to-day's necessities had been dis- covered, and when gunpowder had not deprived walls and castles of their ability to protect. The northern part of Europe was still sparsely peopled, and the entire population was very small. The large cities north of the Alps were few, and none were THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE 105 the delicate merchandise which the merchant-sailors of Venice brought from Constantinople and the Far East, — these and other products of the earth, the sea, the workshop and the loom were traded in at a fair rate of net profit by the hard-headed men of commerce who composed the Hanseatic League. And, as was the custom of the time, they acted as bankers as well, many members of the so-called Royal Families of Europe being seriously in their debt. In these early years there was no speculation as we understand the term. All commercial transactions were " legitimate," if we may use the word. Goods were bought outright and delivered. Futures and Puts, Calls and Corners, and buying on margin, were the invention of those who came after. Payments were made in coined money or by exchange of merchandise. Bills of exchange were unknown, and credit, when given, was always accompanied with surety, though in certain towns and in certain branches of business even this was prohibited ; a condition which would make the doing of business to-day a very much restricted affair.^ Lubeck coined the best money, adopting the Flemish and other names for the coins. Originally the British pound represented a pound in weight of silver. This was divided into twenty parts, or shillings, each of which was itself divided into twelve groats — a name taken from the old word " grote " or great and so-called because this coin was of a larger size than those previously in use. These divisions the Lubeck merchants adopted, and it is because the Baltic Hanseatic merchants were known by their Western customers as " Easterlings," and because the English traders insisted on the best coin in return for their wool, that the pound accepted by the Easter- lings, or Ea-sterlings, became the pound sterling of Great Britain. As the years went by the Hansa extended its field of labour to many towns in foreign countries, establishing THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE 107 watchmen and dogs were employed to see that this rule was carried out. No employes were permitted to remain longer than ten years, and every one who came was required to go through a regular series of graded duties, beginning at the lowest point and winning promotion slowly and laboriously. But even with these and many other restrictions posts were sought there by many more than could be employed, and it became necessary in time to make admission to the staff still more difficult. A series of so-called games was therefore instituted, of the coarsest and most brutal kind. Throughout Europe cruelty was not then regarded as it is now. Physical pain caused mirth, and the greater the pain the more amusing the entertainment. In the Bergen initiatory games, whipping with birch rods until the victim dropped, ducking in the cold sea until he could no longer stand, or choking him with smoke, were but a few of the methods used to keep the list of applicants down, and incidentally to amuse the spectators. As in Bergen so throughout Northern Europe these aggressive German merchants established their agents. In Sweden, in Denmark, in the then prosperous islands of the Baltic, in Flanders, in England, they planted their tents and their flag. Each was a successful trading point, each added wealth to the members of the League, but none reflected dignity upon its chief council ; and whatever romance there was, was of the coarse sordid kind which as much resembles the real romance as do paper-made roses take the place of the real flower. As the reader will see in a future chapter, the great fair of Novgorod was established in the thirteenth cen- tury, and had been for some hundreds of years the most important trading event of Eastern Europe, and there the Hansa, early in their history, established them- selves. German merchants resided there not only during the weeks of the fair, but permanently, and through the far-reaching influence of their League gained for themselves special privileges of trade. io8 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Following their usual custom, they soon created a little district of their own from which they excluded strangers. They built their own shops, stores, German houses, and their own church, and even protected them- selves by walls against any possible interference or invasion. They instituted their own laws and elected their own officers and aldermen. Their thoroughness was admirable, but their power made them indifferent to the rights of any, even including the Russians, among whom they had come to live. In case of a native bank- rupt, the Hansa insisted and backed up their demands by force that they should be paid in full before any other debtors were considered, and they further re- quired that such bankrupt should be banished from the city with his entire family. This is but one example of their tyranny, and it is no wonder that they were feared and bitterly disliked by those outside their League. The Chinese merchants who frequented the fair drew upon their Oriental cunning to get even with the men from Lubeck. They cheated them whenever they could ; they adulterated the wax they sold them, and cleverly dyed the furs,^ and in many ways kept the buyers fully occupied in protecting themselves, while as customers of the Hansa they showed a skill in making claims which would have made the critical twentieth century buyer green with envy. But even the League met its match in that great Russian Czar, Ivan the Terrible, who, having been successful in other parts of his kingdom, decided that Novgorod — the richest of all Russian towns — must con- tribute more handsomely to his money chest. The hard-headed German merchants objected. Who doesn't object to increased taxes, and especially when he thinks he has the strength successfully to resist ? But Ivan was a fighter with an army, and he swooped down on wealthy Novgorod and looted the storehouses not only of the German merchants but of all who did business in the THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE 109 district. They all fought and struggled to protect their own, but Ivan was one of those strong men of the dark ages whose cruelty and indifference to everything except his immediate wishes, coupled with great power, allowed him to snap his fingers at any foe. He imprisoned the Germans, and only after years of effort were they finally released. Thus ended the power of the Hanseatic League in Russia. It is true that Ivan's successors tried to make it again possible and profitable for agents of the League to trade in Russia, their absence being felt commercially. But Dutchmen and Danes had taken their places. The world moves quickly, and sometimes almost unimportant discoveries change conditions overnight. Their confidence in themselves had been shattered, and the final and insurmountable obstacle was reached when the English discovered a passage to Russia by means of the White Sea and Archangel, thus practically cutting out and going around the territory of the League. Nijni Novgorod and Bergen were outposts, but Bruges in the fourteenth century was the hub of civilization, and here too the merchants of the Hanseatic League came to establish themselves. The city was one of the greatest commercial centres of Northern Europe. Her people were rich, proud and independent. Her wealth was, as wealth always is, the result of Commerce. Her men of business were called " merchant-aristocrats." Her luxury was superb, her civilization wonderful, her position queenly. Many nations were already represented within her walls, and trading was coupled with restraint, so that certain modifications in the methods of the League were inevitable. They kept to one section of the city as before. They required all of their members to be at home by a certain hour, and limited them to a certain number of years' residence ; but the cruel sports, the autocratic ways and the indifference to others were at first absent. The Bruges " factory " (as their posts were always no ROMANCE OF COMMERCE called) was most profitable and advantageous to the League. It gave them opportunity to trade w^ith those merchants from the South who were not inclined to seek business in the less refined regions of the Baltic ; and it became the chief training point or finishing school for the sons of their merchant princes, who, proud of their calling, desired to perfect themselves in the science of Commerce. But again the growth of power led their council into paths of danger. They at first suggested, then asked, then urged, and finally demanded, certain so-called rights, until the rich men of Bruges rose in their anger and insisted that an end should be put to this continual encroachment on their trading privileges. These demands were stoutly resisted, but Flanders was being pulled and torn with political distractions, and no doubt the flame was fanned by the dictatorial methods of the Hansa merchants. At all events, just about this time its sovereignty passed into the hands of the Dukes of Burgundy who, seeming to fear the wealth and credit of the League, allowed them for the time to have their own way. Charles the Bold, who, while he was no lover of freedom and liberty for anyone but himself, made use of them to show his unfriendliness to England, aiding them in every way he could in their own bloodless but keenly fought commercial battles with their competitors in London, to their decided pecuniary advantage and doubtless to his own as well ; for what fourteenth-century ruler ever did anything which was not based on utter selfishness ? Death, always the final victor, put an end to the plans of the famous duke, and his son-in-law Maximilian of Austria succeeded him in the sovereignty of Flanders. This prince did what most spoiled young men would do. He was a German, and not in sympathy with the Flemish, and after he had shown his dislike of them in Httle and big ways for a sufficiently long time to tire out the patience of the strong men of Bruges, they THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE in inaugurated a quiet little revolt, and locked up the petted son of luxury and pigheadedness to reflect a while upon his folly. A pleasing story — perhaps entirely legendary — is told of this imprisonment. The Court jester, to show his love and loyalty to his unfortunate prince, planned his escape, and after preparing rope ladders, fleet-footed horses, disguises, and all the paraphernalia which usually accompany such fairy-tale adventures, he jumped into the canal one dark night to swim to his master's prison. But these things are rarely managed without a hitch, and the Court jester proved himself not only a jester but a fool as well. He entirely overlooked the noise which accompanies a bold plunge into the water, with the result that the royal swans were frightened out of their wits and set up such a racket as only frightened swans can ; furthermore, they attacked the poor would- be rescuer and forced him to swim and then run for shelter. We can see in imagination or in almost any musical comedy plot what happened. The scheme was discovered, the people became more irritated and Maximilian was kept more closely confined. But on his release, this older and probably wiser prince managed at last to wreak his vengeance on the people of Bruges. With the help of some of his numerous cousins and others who wanted kingships to continue, he gathered an army together, attacked the city and destroyed as many businesses as he could. Nor was this the only reason for its fall. The water-ways on which its trade depended were rapidly silting up, and by the year 1500 Bruges was a flourishing and opulent city no longer. The Council of Lubeck prudently transferred its factory to the rival city of Antwerp, which speedily acquired the mantle which Maximilian tore from Bruges. Antwerp was the commercial Venice of the north until the action of Philip H. and the wise and aggressive competition of England's merchants under 112 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE the leadership of Sir Thomas Gresham caused it to recede to a minor place, just as many a city, many a business has had to do since. The Hansa traded with France but possessed no " factory " within her borders. France was largely an agricultural country and was too poor to bother with. She had but a small navy, and her requirements in the direction of shipbuilding materials were almost nil. She produced wine and salt and bought herrings and smoked fish, but all such transactions could be carried out easily from these Flemish posts. They dealt with Spain both under the Moors and the Spaniards. The Moors affected to despise commerce and went the way of all who adopt this peculiar attitude. Spain and her people have never gained wealth from commerce, and as a result after those centuries when capture and confiscation passed — when Spain's strength of arms ceased to inspire awe, her star began to set. The Hansa's transactions with Spain were never noteworthy ; but in Portugal they did more. The factory was estab- lished in Lisbon, and thus kept in touch with the trade of South- Western Europe. In Venice the League also possessed a post, but under certain restrictions that prohibited much development of their trade. The still beautiful Fondaco de' Tedeschi on the Grand Canal was their bureau, but it was never more than the dwelling-place of the German merchants during the short trading period of the year. They came with their merchandise and received the keys of the Fondaco from the authorities of the city. They occupied the fifty-six rooms of the building for the moment, but on their departure again handed over the keys, and beyond this the rulers of Venice would never allow their authority to extend. Even during their presence in Venice three citizens of that city, under the title of Visdomini de' Tedeschi, with their Italian secretaries, THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE 113 always lived in the building to keep careful watch of their actions and account of the goods bought and sold. London, the growing trading outpost of the West, soon forced itself upon the attention of the League. It was evident in Lubeck that they must have representa- tion in the chief city of England. Individual merchants of Germany had long traded with the men of England, and various kings had in return for personal favours granted special privileges to these rich men of commerce. Richard Cceur de Lion had borrowed from the merchant princes to pay the heavy ransom demanded by Austria for his release from imprisonment, and we find him soon after, no doubt as part payment of the debt, grant- ing to his " beloved burghers of Cologne " a letter of freedom from the annual rent or duty, and a rehef from all taxes due upon their persons or their imports. King John felt the pressure of the same rich men of Cologne before he was willing to renew these favourable terms, and all succeeding kings were forced into a similar com- plaisance until Sir Thomas Gresham won for England a position of financial leadership and independence. The Hanseatic League made their headquarters in London on the left side of the river in Thames Street, close to Dowgate and just above London Bridge. Dowgate was in those days the only gate that com- manded the water. Their factory was first known as the " Guildhall of the Germans," then as the " Easterlings' Hall," and from this as they grew in importance and size to " The Steelyard," which seems to have obtained its name from the fact that here was located the great scale of the city of London upon which all exports and imports were weighed. Yet while the money-hungry kings favoured this foreign trading centre on account of their financial obligations, the citizens of London disliked its presence in the extreme. No mob, formed for whatever purpose, failed to make it an object of attack, and whenever a 114 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE crowd, with more muscle than discipline, could do so they drove the foreigners to seek protection behind their high defended walls. The Steelyard became a guarded city within a city. Its huge buildings and gardens, its residences, playgrounds and markets, all differed from the EngHsh-built buildings without the walls, and in no outpost of this great and powerful League was finally greater independence enjoyed by its members than here in London, where the rulers of these islands came cap in hand begging for loans. Its members enjoyed the benefits of England's laws in as far as they suited their purposes ; beyond that they made their own laws and carried them out with their own officers. The League was organized for one and only one purpose, namely, the development of trade, and its consequent profits to its individual members. Its aim was one target, not many. It lived, breathed, studied and achieved for one thing. Its stake was gold, the cup it fought or played for was the coined gold piece. The shrewd commercial men of Italy had become bankers and sought profit as financiers, but the bolder, more romantic and more hazardous channel of buying and selling of merchandise appealed to the rougher, harder- natured men of the North. We cannot help admiring the superb strength of purpose of this wonderful organization. In those ultra- religious centuries, when the flower of the youth of most countries adopted the Church as their life's work, when artful diplomacy, treachery, war and strife dissi- pated the physical and financial strength of nations, when the earth was only half discovered and great possible stakes offered themselves to be played for, this body of merchant princes never forgot its own principles. The League cared little for the religious controversies which frustrated men's efforts in those bigoted times, for while its individual members were Catholics, the Church was only allowed a subordinate place in its scheme when furthering its real ends. Politics and THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE 115 diplomacy were only admitted on the same footing. It attempted no political conquests, but its loans to those who played at that dangerous and often unprofitable game invariably brought in a good round interest. It let others be discoverers. It could not be drawn i nto any unprofitable undertaking, and at a time in the world's history when men's feelings were apt to run high it always held aloof from the wild and sentimental and " stuck to its bush." And this union controlled a greater portion of the commerce of Northern Europe than any man, company, or nation has ever done before or since. Its ramifications indeed were almost endless. For example, when piracy became prevalent, and the various rulers of Europe seemed indisposed to suppress it, or more probably were incapable of doing so, the Council at Lubeck decided to open a well-organized piratical department. If money was being made out of that branch of business they would adopt it too, taking care to do it better from the pirate's standpoint than anyone else. Conscience never entered into the plans of the Hansa's leaders, and after all piracy seemed hardly a crime in the days when might meant right. It was looked upon rather as a not entirely happy kind of competition, and accepted with much the same resignation as the smaller competitor of our own day exhibits towards the severe competition of the trust. At all events, the strong men of Lubeck proceeded with their usual skill and experience to produce a perfect organization that helped them to become even more independent and autocratic than before. They ad- dressed a letter to Henry IV. of England which to that proud monarch seemed " full of pride and audacity," and to it he replied in the same spirit. Not obtaining what they had demanded by written words, they pro- ceeded in company with England's various enemies to worry the English, making it difficult, almost impossible for the English merchant marine to carry'^on business. ii6 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Henry naturally retaliated. He caused the Steelyard to be attacked, and took possession of this important depot, and imprisoned and killed all whom he found there. But the Hansa soon found ways of revenge. Strong as they were in ships, and with the advantage of a personal arbitrary management, they closed their ports of trade and all harbours on the Baltic to such English ships as were left, and seized as many as they found on the high seas. Commercial war became war in earnest, and they carried it into England itself, attacking the sea towns, looting them, and hanging all whom they captured. Henry found himself beaten, not by some powerful state but by a collection of merchants, and he sought aid of the Duke of Burgundy to bring this costly and ruinous warfare to an end. A meeting was accord- ingly arranged at Utrecht, the result of which was a decided victory for the Hansa, as all the privileges they had formerly held were restored to them, and the entire world henceforward regarded them as a power to be reckoned with, equal in strength with nations. So the great League grew and added to its wealth and prestige. As its glory increased, and as the times became less turbulent, refining influences made themselves more apparent in the Steelyard. Their architecture became more beautiful, their buildings were more superbly decorated. The great masters of brush and chisel were employed to add to the grandeur of their banquet rooms. A love of pomp and ceremony began to invade the old home in England of the hard-fisted money-making Hansa merchant-princes, and whenever pageants were organized or public ceremonials arranged the first to be called upon to aid and give eclat to the affair were the rich merchants of the Steelyard. But the time of the decline and final disappearance of the Hanseatic League was at hand. During the centuries in which the several nations of the North were in the process of development, the Hansa, because of its almost one-man authority, had perfected its great and THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE 117 far-reaching strength and influence more quickly. It found it comparatively easy to force its demands in the countries that were still weak. But in the late fifteenth and the early sixteenth century this wonderful Council at Lubeck, either because its membership lacked men of the astuteness and breadth of view of its early days, or because they failed to keep pace with the changes which the passing years inevitably bring, began slowly but surely to show signs of diminishing influence and prestige. For these were wonderful years, when steps toward a higher and wider civilization were being taken with great rapidity. An enormous change had been made in the world's day book by the invention of printing. The discovery of the western hemisphere was followed not many years later by the further discovery of the water route to India and the Spice Islands of the East, around Cape Horn. Soon came Martin Luther, and with him the Reforma- tion, which changed not only the religion of the greater part of Northern Europe but the manners of life as well. The Catholic Church with its many fast-days had been the best friend to the herring industry, upon which the League was originally founded. When the principles of Luther displaced Catholicism the demand for herrings became less and less, and the fish dealers decreased accordingly. Men began to think for themselves and to recognize their own strength and individuality. The slavish obedience to rules and precepts, whether right or wrong, as held up by would-be controllers of the public destinies, was a thing of the past. Certain things were right, others wrong, and the great public began to feel that the things which were right were what they wanted, and the things which were wrong they would oppose, even to the point of forcing, if they could, the heretofore great masters from the position of power which^they had held so long. The Council in Lubeck failed to realize or at least to THE HANSEATIC LEAGUE 119 Soon after this, on the death of King Frederick of Denmark in 1533, the northern kings, tired of the power of the Hansa, combined to overthrow their authority. Wullenweber grasped the situation at once and, assuming control, seemed to inspire the old company with new fire. It was, however, but the last brilliant flicker of the flame, though in the four short years that elapsed before his death in 1537 he won for the Hansa once again the power to make and unmake kings, to trade as its Council dictated, to force all the world to hold up its hands in deep respect and fear whenever the Hansa chose. But the great old League had not been wise. It had failed to adapt itself to the changes which had come to the peoples among whom it lived. Had Jugen Wullen- weber lived fifty years earlier as the dictator of the League's policies its history would have been pro- longed. As it was he strove with wonderful ability and temporary success, but with stronger and more aggressive competition without, with jealousies accumulated and piled mountain high within, his road was a rough one. He tried to pacify the rebellious towns within the League, and flew from one to another as fast as horses could carry him. He maintained the strong front against the unfriendly kings and princes, and dealt hard blows to prove his fearlessness and the power of the Hansa, but foes within and foes without finally overcame him. In 1535 he started north and, against the urgent advice of friends, entered the territory controlled by his great opponent, the Archbishop of Bremen. No sooner did he pass the boundaries than he was arrested and imprisoned, and all his previous power and influence failed to secure his release. He was charged with numerous crimes, put to the rack to compel him to confess them, and made to feel in every possible way the degradation of his position. Even his enemies finally tired of heaping upon this great man those numerous cruelties of which the sixteenth century was capable, and in September, 1537, assembled an enormous crowd 120 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE of country folk of the neighbourhood from whom i jury of twelve farmers were chosen to decide his fate. The verdict was not long in doubt. Wullenweber was convicted and sentenced to death, his body " to be quartered and torn on four wheels." With his death came practically the end of the glory of this famous Hanseatic League. Several of its outposts were soon lost and its nearer " factories " diminished in prestige and power. The Steelyard in London was one of the last to disappear ; but as the " merchant-adventurers " of England grew stronger, and were themselves able to supply the English kings with gold, the money of the German Hansa became less necessary and less able to buy monopolistic privileges. Among its strongest opponents was Sir Thomas Gresham. One by one its cities deserted it. In 1603 only fifty were enrolled under its banners, and of these but four- teen paid fees and had a vote in its councils ; but it was left for the Thirty Years' War, which tore Germany into bits and reduced her rich men to paupers, and her principalities into petty collections of poorly fed, poorly clad people, finally to snuff out this once proud and powerful League of Commerce. When the Treaty of Westphalia was signed in 1648, all that remained was a certain privilege to the three " free cities " of Germany, Lubeck, Hamburg and Bremen. This freedom was taken from Hamburg and Bremen by Bismarck in 1888, while Lubeck had been obliged to surrender hers some twenty years before. These cities nevertheless are still self-governing and independent, though not in their former sense. And thus closes a chapter of the Romance of Commerce. Commerce brings wealth, wealth brings strength, strength brings mastery, and since the control of her merchant-adventurers ceased, the proud Lubeck of the thirteenth century has never even approached the importance of the period of their sway. 01,11 STEKI.VARIi IN'TF.RKMi OLD STEEIA'ARD ICXi KRIi iR ]iti}DGi)///-«.' Lryi-.iiYiJ^^w//. GUILDS 141 membership. Henry IV. and Henry VI. were members of the Guild of the Trinity of Coventry ; Henry VIII. and his Queen were members of the Guild of St. Barbara of St. Katherine's Church next the Tower in London. The members of yet another guild are said to have prided themselves upon their democracy, claiming that they were " of the rank of common and middleing folks," and would not even admit to their list a mayor bailiff. But towards the end of the fourteenth century, the Merchant Guilds become the most important of all these varied organizations, taking on other duties and aims as the foster-parents of British manufacture. Their pre-eminence was achieved in this way. The leading men of the various towns were almost invariably traders, and in the unsettled and undeveloped state of trade and manufacture united for the protection of their undertakings. A Gilda Mercatoria made for itself internal laws just as did the other guilds for the government of their own particular forms of activity. As their businesses grew the trade guilds increased in importance, so much so that when the different towns obtained municipal charters no one was admitted to the freedom of the borough unless he was a guild merchant. Trade guilds thus ranked in large measure as public institutions. Their members included the richest citizens, and they, as organizations, became so wealthy and often so tyrannical that the guilds formed for .other than purposes of protecting trade were pushed out of place and allowed to decay. A list of guilds or livery companies, existing at the time of Queen Elizabeth, is taken from Wm. Herbert's History of the Twelve Great Livery Companies of London, to which we are indebted for much of the information contained in this chapter. It should also be remembered that the guilds of Edinburgh, Dublin, Exeter and some other cities were nearly as important as 142 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE those of London, and some of them are still in existence. Here is the list: — Mercers Leathersellers Grocers Talough-chaundelers Drapers Cutlers Fyshemongrs Peauterers Goldsmythes Sadlers Skynnrs Barbours Merchauntayllors Gyrdelers Haberdashers Coryours Salters Cordenrs Ironmongers Inholders Vyntenrs Armourers Clothworkers Colkyers Dyers Fletchers Brewers Cowpers The battle for supremacj^ continued among themselves. The older and stronger companies insisted on greater and greater power to the detriment of the poorer, and thus the first twelve on this list rose to extreme importance, at about the same time as the Arti Majori in Florence, and became known as the Twelve Great Livery Companies of London. They were all modelled after the ancient guilds. They appointed a master or alderman, and other officers. They provided, with other benefits to their members, for the maintenance of the customs of their craft, and took precautions against fraudulent workmanship. They saw to it that their rules were fuUy carried out, even to the extent of helping to maintain municipal control, and they punished the guild brothers who infringed them. One after the other found it desirable to obtain a Royal Charter from the Crown, either by a direct pay- ment or by the acceptance of the obligation to pay some newly invented tax. But the advantages that accrued were considerable, for they were then free to exercise their authority in many ways, and chiefly : (i) By controlling the import and export of wares. (2) By limiting|the number of their own members. (3) By creating a secret agreement regarding prices, GUILDS 143 They could examine, pass or condemn all goods offered for sale, and with this privilege was guaranteed control over the transactions of foreign merchants. If the inspectors were not friendly to a dealer, it was easy to discover defects in his wares, and all goods claimed to be defective might be seized by the guild authorities and burned at stated places on the public highway. Furthermore, if a foreigner endeavoured to sell his goods at retail he was subject to their immediate con- fiscation. The guilds exercised to the full their arbitrary privilege of limiting their membership, and consequently the number of those who could make or deal in their class of merchandise. Among the privileged was fostered a spirit of fraternity which bound them together with bonds of sentiment, and greatly cemented the organiza- tions. Another power of very great importance was estab- lished, by the authority of the Lord Mayor, in a " Court," which was a court in fact as well as in name. The Court of any Livery Company had actual jurisdiction over its members and others who, while not members, were engaged in the same trade. It could settle trade disputes, discipline its apprentices, with the whip if necessary, could imprison its journeymen who struck work, and could fine its master members who acted against its rules. And, finally, the members of the Company were forbidden to appeal to any other Court unless their own Court failed to obtain justice for them. These great guilds appear, therefore to have been trade unions formed by the masters instead of by the men, though all were handicraftsmen entering by apprenticeship. They included in their membership most of the wealthy men of the nation, and the great halls now standing in the City of London testify in the proud names with which they are so generously decorated that the men who made England what she was, the men who built her commerce, won her wealth and risked their 144 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE lives and fortunes in extending England's commercial supremacy were mighty in their guilds. The guilds became undoubtedly in many cases arbitrary and unreasonable. They used their wealth and position both as guilds and as individual members to obtain official recognition and sanction, but though they were often unfair, and seemed to be thinking of self-interest only, they never winked at deception in manufacture. Their customers never bought one quality and received a poorer. These sturdy autocratic dictators of commerce tolerated no standard that was capable of improvement, and as a result goods of English manufacture obtained a high prestige throughout the entire trading world, and " Made in England " became a password that ensured a welcome in any market. But as England grew, her commerce became more catholic, more diversified. A large commerce implied a more careful supervision, but the guilds were rich, and became less inclined to watch details, and were perhaps not so necessary as they once had been. Gradually their hold on the various and more highly specialized branches of trade and manufacture became less strong. Commerce outgrew the control of its foster-parents and stood alone, greater by far than when in its early years it had been so well guarded by them. In other countries than England guilds have risen and become powerful, but have finally been snuffed out. Those in France, which at one time were so important a factor in the development of her commerce, were annihilated during the revolution of 1791. The guilds of Belgium and Holland were swept away when those countries were taken by France. Those of Spain and Portugal ceased to exist during the revolutionary years of 1833-40 ; those of Austria and Germany in 1859-60 ; those of Italy in 1 864. But England's guilds still remain as institutions possessing great age and dignity and wealth, though with but few of the powers which were theirs during the fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. •|HK ARMS nr 'IHI-, riT\' COMI'AXIKS /■/-,'/// all i:iii,Ta7'!'}itr i'l l/if />,'sstssi 'n J o ^ 'J ; GUILDS ii3 respectability, and its guild the earlier took a leading place among its fellows, since it was obliged to work earnestly to maintain the standards which the well-established traditions o£ the craft required. Like other livery companies it possessed great power, but a power which it found itself often required to protect against the always hungry and usually unjust demands of the various sovereigns. The pages of its history record with great frequency the appearance of its chief members before the reigning king, for the purpose of buying him off when some suddenly invented charge was brought against them. But while they paid, they generally obtained some concession in exchange, and as the people became stronger and the sovereign less omnipotent, these rights, bought with hard cash, became recognized and accepted ; for in the Goldsmiths' Guild, as in all others, they were exercised with the object of bringing their trade to a higher standard of perfection. The Guild controlled its members and apprentices often by using authority which now belongs only to the State. It arrested, fined and frequently deported foreign traders who failed to fulfil its strict require- ments as to quality and weight. It decided who should and who should not barter in its goods. It punished any fraud in its own sphere of merchandise. It carried on its charities. It exercised great influence in London, and took an important share in elections and all political matters. It required all silver and gold work made within three mUes of the city to be brought to its halP to be assayed and stamped, a custom which gave rise to the term " hall-marked," and it had the power of condemning and melting down work which did not meet the requirements of its assayers. And so the honourable Company of Goldsmiths lived out its years of creative life. Its roll includes many names of men great in municipal affairs. |^Its wealth was, and even now is, enormous, and its charities were • This Company still does the hall-marking in London. 154 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE equal to its high standing. While all the great livery companies of London left their impress upon the com- mercial history of this country, to none more than to the Goldsmiths is credit due for making England's " hall-mark " worth par all around the globe. The Skinners^ Company received its charter from King Edvi^ard III. in 1327, who addressed its members as his " Beloved the men of the city of London, called Skinners," and formed for the mutual benefit of those who traded in fur, is one of the oldest of the guilds. Who can say when fur first became an article of domestic use and consequently one of commerce ? In the ages before history was born men and women used furs for clothing just as they do now in the few spots of this earth where civilization has not yet won a fast hold ; and merchants in furs have existed from the time when such skins were the only known protection against the cold, to this moment when they have won a high place as the most luxurious and extravagant of articles of dress. Trade in furs is probably one of the very oldest of all trades. Food, clothing and shelter were the first necessities of man, and clothing, before the days of weaving, consisted chiefly or entirely of the pelts of animals, killed for food and for their hides. England, like other cold countries of the world, no doubt possessed its wearers of furs in the remote ages, perhaps hundreds of thousands of years ago. These men then were the commercial ancestors of the Skinners' Company, and the trappers of prehistoric England became the fur traders — the Skinners, of the twelfth, thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Furs were still necessary to the poor for warmth, but were used by rich people then as now for decorative clothing. Then as now, unscrupulous traders bartered in furs to the disadvantage of the ignorant buyer, and the Skinners, with that same splendid spirit of integrity which was the keystone of all of the guilds, formed their company to protect their trade from fraudulent dealers. GUILDS 155 Old furs were often sold for new. Furs possessing defects which a little wear would make evident, furs improperly dyed, misnamed, or stolen, were disposed of to the public, who then as now knew very little as to the real merit of the article offered. These and other objectionable features the Skinners proposed to remove, and soon acquired authority to the same full extent as was given the other guUds. They could send their stewards to the various fairs held throughout England to examine the furs, and to condemn and destroy those where fraud was evident. The Guild could decide who should trade in furs, and what apprentices should be received ; and its word was law in every detail connected with the trade of the furrier. The Skinners' Hall was an important edifice ; their pageants equalled those of the other guilds ; their endow- ments and consequent wealth were very great ; and their list of members possessed its share of Lord Mayors and other conspicuous men. The pages devoted to this company in the history of the Great Livery Companies of London, show that it, like the others, had its quarrels and its triumphs. It was compelled by the various sovereigns to give and give again from its exchequer. It had its periods of depression and of elevation. But like the others, too, it maintained its dignity throughout all, and lived but for the advancement of its own re- spected trade. The Merchant Tailors^ Company originally bore the title of Tailors and Linen Armourers, and as such was incorporated by Letters Patent in 1466 during the reign of Henry IV., while its membership by the time of Henry VII. included His Majesty himself as well as many great merchants of London. The word tailor is derived from the old French " tailler " to cut ; while the product, garments, comes from the French " gamier " or Old English " garn- ment " meaning to garnish. 156 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE The craft in the days of Don Quixote not only cut and made clothes but also made the padding and lining of armour and further traded in cloth. The tailors early in the reign of Edward III. were importers of wooUen cloths, and, as merchants, had become in many instances rich and powerful. In the twenty-seventh year of this sovereign's reign, their handsome gift of money helped not a little in carrying on his wars against France, and their riches frequently tempted his successors to induce them to contribute heavily to the royal exchequer. Their skill as merchants made their craftsmanship more profitable and increased their wealth and strength. The Livery Company joined in frequent disputes with the older companies as to the rights of precedence, and membership became a coveted honour. By 1708 its roll had included: 10 kings, 3 princes, 27 bishops, 26 dukes, 47 earls, and 16 Lord Mayors. Truly in those days Commerce won for itself the respect of all, a respect to which it is so well entitled as the gatherer of wealth for the nation. The great hall of the Merchant Tailors' Company has for hundreds of years been a conspicuous architectural feature of the City of London. It has not always been the same building nor on the same site, but the dignity of the Company has, since the year 1331, been main- tained by an edifice of quality, while even long before that date an " olde haU " stored the ever increasing treasures of works of art and utility of this distinguished institution. Of the " new hall " most interesting descriptions are still available. This fine old building was burnt to the ground in the Great Fire of London, as indeed were most of the other halls]^of^the liveried companies, but while this conflagration destroyed struc- tures, it seemed only to stimulate the ambition and deter- mination of these sturdy members of the guilds. No sooner were the ruins sufficiently cool to permit their approach than we find the wardens digging among them "0 GUILDS 157 for anything which could be salved. The plate of the Tailors' Company had been entirely melted, but its gross weight of over 2C0 lbs. was retrieved and sold immediately and its value used in building a new hall. This building was completed in 1671, and became the centre of the same pomp and entertainment. So truly were the great guilds important factors in the life of the City that even the history of entertainment in London could not be written without frequent reference to their beautiful halls, for in these commercial-social palaces kings and queens dined, important receptions and public meetings were held, and foreign potentates were entertained. It was as usual to look to the great guilds in social and political events as it is now to look to London's Lord Mayor and Aldermen to supply an interesting dinner at the Guildhall, to rulers from abroad. The magnificent entertainment given by the Merchant Tailors' Company to the Duke of Wellington in 1815 is one of the last of those old-time banquets and functions which for centuries had almost been within the exclusive province of the Great Liveried Companies. The account of its splendour is not untinged with melan- choly, for the grandeur and power of these societies which have done so much to build and perfect England's world-wide commerce had passed. Their virility and even their necessity had gone, and there remained only the outward shell of nominal position. The Haberdashers' were incorporated in 1448 and were originally spoken of as Hurrers and Milliners, the latter name being given them because the merchandise in which they dealt came chiefly from the city of Milan. They were an offshoot of the Mercers, and traded in the small wares or merceries that, as we have seen, were displaced in that Company by the larger trade in silk, cotton and wooUen goods. Hence their position was for a long time small indeed and inconspicuous, but time and accumulated profits, coupled with a desire and 158 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE determination to make for themselves a better position in their city, transformed the unregarded Haberdashers into a collection of powerful and highly respected men, and their Guild into an institution which could hold its own with any other of any kind or class in all England. For it is not the actual undertaking or business of men which establishes their status in their community, but the character and quaHty of the men themselves, their breadth of mind and ability, their manners and educa- tion, their bigness of brain and courage of conviction. So similar is the history of the Haberdashers' Com- pany to those we have already traced that we need not follow in further detail here the granting of its charter, its growth and development, its great entertainments, its arbitrary, but usually wise, control of those who entered its trade, its severe losses during the difficult years of Charles I. and the Commonwealth, the destruc- tion of its fine hall and its contents, at the time of the Great Fire of London. These and many other items were once of vital interest to the Guild, although they may to-day seem dim and faded through the atmosphere of two hundred years. And the charming old hall of the Haberdashers' Company filled with the sweet aroma of old legends and traditions, is now but a shell of its former self — like the empty but interesting chrysalis from which the living thing has flown. Let us now turn our attention briefly to The Baiters' Company. As no man knows when salt first became a necessity to the human race, so no one has recorded its first use as a preservative of food. To all races of men throughout the world its twofold use is known, and from the earliest time it has figured as an article of commerce. The salt-pits of England were developed by the Romans, and are described in the Domesday Book as existing all over the kingdom. Salters there- fore must have worked in England for centuries before their formation into a guild, which dates from 1394. GUILDS 159 Their history is again very similar to that of their con- temporaries. Commerce of whatever kind, coupled with wisdom, means wealth, and men then as now strove for the respect and approval of their fellow-men. Individual wealth produced individual desire to benefit the community, and this was most usually accomplished by giving handsomely to one's guild. Thus the Salters' Guild, like all other great liveried companies, became rich through gifts and legacies, and with these monies built its stately halls, established its schools, responded in some measure to the insatiable demands of the Crown, and performed its public duties in a manner befitting its great traditions. The Ironmongers. Whatever the share of England in transforming the Stone Age into one of Iron, Anderson at least considers it possible that our Latin conquerors found the Britons already working in iron when they arrived on these shores. If they were not then the pioneers, to the Romans belongs the credit of develop- ing this industry, and forges, tools, cinders, and iron- stone have been discovered in the Forest of Dean, together with quantities of Roman coin. In Sussex, Surrey and Kent may still be traced the diggings of later manufacturers who maintained this industry in the southern counties until their supply of wood was ex- hausted. The discovery of coal in the north, and its efficiency as a substitute for wood, came at an opportune moment, and the supremacy of England as an iron- producing country was established from that date. The making of iron and dealing in iron and its pro- ducts created a strong commercial body who called themselves Ironmongers, and, following the fashion of the time, formed themselves into a guild. They re- ceived their charter from Edward IV. in 1462, and as one of their first component acts offered the King a sum of £6 1 8s. 4d. to assist in carrying on his French wars. The amount, which sounds ludicrously small to us now i6o ROMANCE OF COMMERCE when gauged by the money value of those days, was no inconsiderable sum. The Ironmongers were responsible for a fair share of the topography of the old City of London, and Iron- monger Lane received its name as the residence of many in that trade. The activities of this great Company were numerous and varied. In 1545 they subscribed ^40 toward assisting the City to buy and lay up stocks of corn in times of plenty, to retail to the needy at reduced prices in times of scarcity. In another year they sent men " in armour and splendidly dressed " to attend the May-game that preceded Queen EHzabeth to Green- wich. In 1562 they provided nineteen soldiers as their proportion of a levy of men for the Queen's service, and seven years later sent another twenty-eight to fight against the rebels in the north. They paid their assessment of ^75 toward building the Royal Exchange, and a sub- scription of {jio towards cleansing the City Ditch between the Postern and Aldgate. Such were the occur- rences that made up the life of this great livery company, until with changed conditions came the slow dimming of the sunset and its after-glow, and the Ironmongers' Company settled into the place in the community which it holds to-day. The Vintners' Company, known in the time of Edward III. as " the Merchant-Tonners of Gascoyne," included two classes of dealers — the " vinetarij," who were the merchant importers, and the " tabernarij," who were the retailers and tavern and cellar-keepers. Their Guild, however, as such, does not seem to have been incor- porated under the name of Vintners until 1437. The King appears to have farmed out the control of the entire retail trade in wine and spirits to the Vintners' Guild. Their charter ordained that the Company " shall choose each year four persons of the most sufficient, most true, and most cunning of this same craft (that GUILDS i6i hold no tavern) and them present to the Mayor of London, or other presiding officer, and swear them in such presence to oversee that all manner of wines what- soever they be, be sold at retail, in taverns of reasonable prices, etc. That the Taverners shall be ruled by the said four persons, who are empowered to correct and amend defaults which may be found in the exercise of the same craft, and punish, therefore, according to their good advice and consideration, with the help of such mayor or president." And it further allowed " the Merchant- Vintners of England to buy cloth, and the merchants of Gascoyn^ bringing wines to England, may buy dried fish of the shores of Cornwall and Devon ; as also herrings and cloth in what other parts of the kingdom they please, subject to certain regulations which are prescribed." Another note informs us " . . . that all manner of wines coming to London shall be discharged and put to land above London Bridge, against the Vintry ; so that the king's bottlers and gaugers may there take custom." Of all these old-time privileges one delightful custom still remains, while even now Vintners have no need of an excise licence. The Vintners' Company controls and is responsible for a third part of all the swan in the Thames, and each year makes a formal excursion from Oxford down the river to view the work done by the professional " Nickers." To distinguish the Vintners' swan from the others, two nicks are made in each swan's bill, and the spring broods are nicked like their parents. From this old custom has come the name of many public-houses throughout these islands, but in a mis- understood sense, for " the two nicks " have been changed in course of time to " the two necks." The imaginative publican, thinking to dignify his house by legend or fancy associated with the Vintners' Guild, names it " The Swan with the Two Necks," and accom- panies the title with a gorgeous picture of a swan whose M i62 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE two long necks are extending in different directions. The story of the gifts, the entertainments, the levies, and the whole life of the Vintners is similar to that of the other old companies. Its detail then is unnecessary. Let us only add that the Vintners' Hall, with its beautiful architecture, fascinating and meUow with history, is stUl in an unassuming and charming manner the home of delightful banquets, where good fellows meet together and entertain with a spirit of camaraderie those who are so fortunate as to be their guests. Of the last on the list, and the youngest of the twelve great companies. The Clothworkers, but little remains to be written here which is not repetition. This Guild was made up of a number of trades, united by their association with cloth. The weavers, or tellarij, separated themselves from the drapers and tailors and took the name of " sheermen," and to these in the course of time were added fullers, burrellers, testers and dyers. The burrellers were inspectors and measurers of cloth, taking their name from its stipulated width, two ells wide from list to list, this width being called burrell. Their charter was given in 1482, and while they were first known as the shearmen, their title was changed by Queen Elizabeth to the " Masters, Wardens, and Commonality of Freemen of the Art and Mystery of Clothworkers of the City of London." And so the great Company of Clothworkers came into its strength. It grew very rich and powerful, was responsible for many great and good deeds, and controlled and fostered one of the most magnificent industries of which this nation boasts. The words of Elkanah Settle, spoken at the inaugura- tion ceremonies of Sir Thomas Lane as Lord Mayor in 1694, may be rewritten here, for they are true now as they were then. He said : " The grandeur of England is to be attributed to its Golden Fleece,^ the wealth of the » The Golden Fleece is the crest of the Clothworkers' Guild. GUILDS 163 loom making England a second Peru, and the back of the sheep and not the entrails of the earth being its chief mine of riches. The silkworm is no spinster of ours, and our wheel and web are wholely the clothworkers. Thus, as trade is the soul of the kingdom, so the greatest branch of it lies in the clothworkers' hands ; and though our naval commerce bring us in both the or and the argent, and indeed the whole wealth of the world, yet, when thoroughly examined, it will be found 'tis your cloth sends out to fetch them. And thus whilst the imperial Britannia is so formidable to her foes, and so potent to her friends, her strength and her power, when duly considered to the clothworkers' honour it may justly be said, 'tis your shuttle nerves her arm and your woof that enrobes her glory ! " IX EARLY BRITISH COMMERCE i HE early steps of trade and barter in any- country must always be regarded with considerable interest, and we find much romance surrounding the rudimentary en- terprise of the first British merchants. Commerce may be said to have begun in these islands when the hardy and bold Phcsnicians sailed their tiny boats two thousand five hundred or more years ago, and initiated the inhabitants of what is now Cornwall and the Scilly Islands into the elements of trading, bartering with them the manufactured pro- ducts of the East for their precious tin. Wherever the true merchant finds a footing he studies to improve his knowledge, his experience and his fortune ; and while tin was the first magnet which drew these early traders so far from home, they soon found them- selves able to trade profitably in lead, timber, hides, corn, etc., and it is said Julius Caesar was first tempted to cross the Gallic Strait on the report that British pearls were obtainable in these waters ; while from the same not too dependable authority we learn that his soldiers opened a thriving trade with the towns along the coast for oysters, and for ferocious bears whose readiness to fight excited the populace of Rome when the gates of the Coliseum were thrown open. The Romans occupied these islands for about four hundred and fifty years, and it is to-day a source of wonder that their presence here for so long a time has 164 EARLY BRITISH COMMERCE 165 left such a slight impression upon the country. They built some roads, which even now are indicated on the maps as Roman. Every country road in Great Britain now called street, as for example WatUng Street, or way, as Icknield Way, was originally a Roman-built road, constructed for military purposes. But these roads are no better for being Roman than those later roads which intersect them. Their chief towns were settlements before they came. They left no Roman industries, no great monuments of accomplishments of any kind. They were a military people, who looked upon this far-off colony as a temporary camping ground. The personnel of the legions was, no doubt, constantly changing ; no one looked upon Britain as his home ; no one established himself here as a permanent resident. Had a more commercial people followed Caesar's lead a far different condition would have resulted. If the Phoenicians had been inclined to settle on these shores instead of trading their stuffs for raw products only, the probability is that the position of Britain as the leading commercial country of the world would have been attained many centuries earlier. Yet the Romans, by their very presence, did after all do a good deal to stimulate commerce, and their straight military roads must have greatly facilitated intercommunication. The soldiers with the luxurious tastes and habits of Rome inspired the people whom they found here to think more definitely of supplying them with what they wished, in return for good Roman coin. The British developed, at first in a very crude way, the simple manufacturing resources of their land. From this time date the first efforts in iron working in Wales and the West of England, and we are even told that the Staffordshire potteries trace their history to the coming of the Romans, though it must be confessed that crockery was still a rarity, if not a luxury, in Elizabethan days, and bricks used architecturally had not long been in fashion. A demand generally produces a supply, and the inborn i66 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE talent for trade in the early dwellers in these islands developed soon after a public appeared to whom their products could be sold. We are told that even in those early days London, Canterbury, Rochester, Richborough, Dover, Exeter, Chester, York, Aberdeen and Dumbarton became notable resorts for merchants. Upon the introduction of Christianity, the pious men who betook themselves to monasteries became the special patrons of commerce and agriculture. " We command," so ran one of Edgar's laws, " that every priest, to increase knowledge, diligently learn some handicraft." Smiths and carpenters, fishermen and millers, weavers and archi- tects, are frequently mentioned by old chroniclers as belonging to various religious houses. The smith was the oldest and the most honoured of aU workmen. In a curious collection of Anglo-Saxon dialogues the smith is made to ask, " Whence hath the ploughman his plough- share and goad save by my art ? Whence hath the fisherman his rod, or the shoemaker his awl, or the seam- stress her needle, but from me ? " Then the merchant asserts his dignity and the honour- able nature of his calling. He wishes his position recog- nized. " I am useful," he says, " to the King and his nobles, to rich men and to common folk. I enter my ship with my merchandise and sail across the seas, and sell my wares, and buy dear things that are not produced in this land, and bring them with great danger, for your good ; and sometimes I am shipwrecked and lose all my wares and hardly myself escape." This piece of Early English advertising is interrupted by someone who asks the merchant a question. " What is it you bring us ? " " I bring you," he replies, " skins, silks, costly gems and gold ; various garments, pigments, wines, oil, ivory and brass, copper and tin, sUver, glass, and such like." Another asks, " Will you sell your things here as you bought them there f " " Nay, in truth," replies the merchant honestly to this fooUsh question, " else where EARLY BRITISH COMMERCE 167 would be the good of all my labour ? I will sell them here dearer than I bought them there, that so I may get some profit to feed me and my wife and children." And, had he been a more expert advertiser, he might, as long as he had the attention of his public, have added a few more pointed remarks on value giving, lowest prices for equal qualities, etc. Britain, some five or six hundred years after Christ, was still on the extreme outskirts of the civilized world, but its people even in this early day were controlled by the inborn love of commerce. And since the great Venetian merchants did not enter the arena of real activity until seven hundred or eight hundred years later, and the Augsburg merchants did not become famous until centuries later still, it would almost seem that the progress of Britain should have been greater than it actually was. Her isolation, however, handicapped her too heavily. Though her merchants went frequently to the Mediter- ranean, to Iceland, to Norway, and wherever they could hear of a chance to trade, the population, or that portion of it which possessed the wherewithal to buy, was very small and scattered, and there were no immediate neigh- bours with whom to barter. So Venice won, then Augsburg, then Cadiz ; but when trading conditions improved, when peoples in foreign lands by the aid of larger, faster, and safer boats became nearer neighbours, when the natural obstacles were reasonably overcome, then the Anglo-Saxons be- came the greatest merchants, the greatest traders of them all. They loved their work ; they feared no man and hesitated to approach no people with their merchandise. All the virility of which the Anglo-Saxon was capable was poured into the great cauldron of trade for trade's sake. Trade laid the foundation upon which the nation was builded. Trade demanded and received the best of her ability. Trade brought wealth, power, and the respect of every competitor, to every nation on the globe. 1 68 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE During the infancy of British trade the merchants were also the captains of their little ships. They risked their all in their ventures ; and while the storms were as great then as now, the waves as high, the shores more threatening, these fearless men made their voyages in tiny boats, rudely constructed of wood, propelled by eight or ten oars, and perhaps assisted by one small square sail suspended from a single mast. These boats were seldom large enough to hold more than half a dozen men, with two or three tons of cargo. No compass could guide them, for compasses were not known. China had invented them centuries before, but had forgotten all about them, and they awaited re- invention. Yet these courageous merchant-sailors went where they would, in vessels hardly more than skiffs, and we are not surprised that a law of Ina decreed that every merchant who had been thrice across the sea with his own ship and goods, even though he were by birth a serf, was to have the rank of Thane, with particular jurisdiction within the manor of which he became lord. To illustrate the conditions of trade in the seventh century we may quote from one of the laws of Lothair of Kent, which allowed no one to buy anything worth more than twenty pennies — equivalent to perhaps five pounds of present money — except in the presence of the chief magistrate, or before two or more witnesses, and within the walls of a town. Another of Lothair's laws decreed that " if any one of the people of Kent buy anything in London he must have two or three honest men, or the King's portreeve, present at the bargain," and in a third it was written, " Let none exchange one thing for another, except in the presence of the Sheriff, the Mass priest, the lord of the manor, or some other person of undoubted veracity. If they do otherwise they shall pay a fine of thirty shillings, besides forfeiting the goods so exchanged to the lord of the manor." Rogues were evidently plentiful, and these laws aimed at protecting honest, simple-minded people, but they / Wf ^ ; ? r -^ -^ '-z h X f S r-. o' f: - -c; '^h "^ - > EARLY BRITISH COMMERCE 169 also assisted the municipalities in obtaining their revenues from the transactions. Early in the eleventh century a regular tariff was put into force for the City of London by Ethelred the Second : " If a small vessel came to Billingsgate, the toll was one-half- penny ; if a larger vessel, and if it had sails, a penny ; if a full- sized hulk came and remained, fourpence. From a vessel laden with planks, one plank was demanded. The weekly toll of cloth was taken on three days — Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Whenever a boat with fish in it came to the bridge, the dealer gave a halfpenny toll, and for a larger vessel, a penny. From panniers with hens, if they were brought to market, one hen was" taken as toll ; and from panniers with eggs, five eggs. Cheese- mongers, who traded in butter and cheese, gave one penny fourteen days before Christmas, and seven days after they gave another, by way of toll."^ Fairs, religious in origin, as we have read in another chapter, gradually became important centres of local trade, and were so attractive to villagers that they sought more frequent opportunity of bartering their sheep- skins and agricultural products for the tradesmen's goods, and fairs in this way became markets. The Norman Conquest had a somewhat complex in- fluence upon trade, for while the haughty barons affected to despise industry, the free communication with Nor- mandy acted as a stimulus upon the Anglo-Saxons. They resented the invitation given to foreigners to settle in England, but profited by them none the less. It was about this period that the Jews were encouraged to make their home in this country. Penalties were removed and privileges granted them. The more rich men England could boast of the better for the rulers, since there were then greater sources from which money could be obtained when wanted, and the Jews then, as now, counted well on the side of wealth. ' Thorpe's Ancient Laws, I/O ROMANCE OF COMMERCE To another handful of half-drowned immigrants England owes her pre-eminence in the woollen trade. Serious floods having occurred in Flanders in and around Ypres, Henry II. granted permission for a Flemish Colony to settle in Cumberland. England had long grown her wool, and sold the sheepskins to the weavers on the Continent, but with the coming to her shores of the Flemish settlers, came too the knowledge of weaving, and henceforward the wool was spun and woven in this country with great advantage to its commerce. Scotland too was progressing in commercial skill and its hardy race developing its wonderful ability for trade. The Scottish King, David the First, who reigned from 1 1 24 to 1 153, encouraged trade to the utmost of his power. He it was, who first placed Scottish trading on what was then a high level. He invited foreign mer- chants to visit his cities, and encouraged his own subjects to embark in trading adventures. He granted special privileges to makers of woollen cloths, and when he died left his country far richer in money, in prestige, and in strength than when he became king. The attitude of the rulers of the various countries greatly affected the various industries. There was not then the independence of feeling that exists to-day, and Royal patronage or evident approval was necessary to surround any occupation with the kudos and enthu- siasm that were required to make it thoroughly successful. Even now, and quite naturally so, the attitude which society as a whole assumes towards any calling, or pro- fession, largely establishes its popularity or the reverse. Henry II. was a monarch who saw in the fostering of commerce the strengthening of the State. He wrote to the Emperor Frederick of Germany in 1 157 : " Let there be between ourselves and our subjects an indivisible unity of friendship and peace and safe trade of mer- chandise," and the Germans were quick to accept the proffered hand. His entire reign was one of commercial EARLY BRITISH COMMERCE 171 prosperity. England, and London especially, reached the highest point it had so far touched in prestige and wealth. One writer, William Fitzstephen, claims that " no city in the world sent so far and to so many quarters its wealth and merchandise, and none was so largely the resort of foreign dealers. Gold, spice and frankincense were brought to it from Arabia ; precious stones from Egypt ; purple cloths from India ; palm oil from Bag- dad ; furs and ermines from Norway and Russia ; weapons from Scythia ; and wines from France." British trade was indeed looking up. London was the chief centre then, as now, but other cities boasted of much commerce and of many merchants of wealth. Bristol received a special royal charter ; Chester was the great entrepot for commodities from Ireland. Glouces- ter and Winchester were noted for their trade in excel- lent native wines, for England was then a vine-growing country. Winchester furthermore held a great Cloth Fair, and each year drew to her gates the cloth merchants of other cities. Exeter was filled with wealthy merchants, and rich foreign traders who came for the minerals which the neighbourhood produced. The town of Dunwich was a port of importance, and Yarmouth, even in those days, was attracting attention as a headquarters for the fishing industry. Norwich, which had been destroyed by the Danes in 1003, had well recovered its position, and Lynn, the home of many wealthy Jews, did a thriving commerce with the Con- tinent. Lincoln possessed a fine canal, constructed under the direction of Henry I., which made it accessible to foreign ships. This canal connected the Trent and the Witham, and through its aid Lincoln was fast becoming one of the most important centres of commerce in England. York, which had suffered much from wars, and, later, from great fires, still attracted ships from Germany and Iceland. Grimsby was favoured by mer- chants from Norway, Scotland, the Orkneys and Western Isles. Whitby and Hartlepool were trading centres, 172 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE while Newcastle-on-Tyne, a new and well-built town reared on the site of the ancient village of Monk Chester, was already a market for coals, and sent them to many parts of Europe. Edinburgh was still a place of slight importance, and Glasgow hardly more than a village. Berwick was the chief part of Scotland, and one of its citizens, a Dane named Cnut, was so wealthy that when a vessel belonging to him, and carrying as a passenger his wife, was seized by the pirate earl of Orkney, he was able to spend a hundred marks in hiring fourteen good ships, properly equipped, with which to punish the offender. In Ireland, Dublin had been practically snuffed out during the EngHsh conquest of the country, but Henry II., always keen to develop his dominion, assigned it to the citizens of Bristol on condition of their colonizing it anew. So well did they perform their duty that we are told it soon almost threatened to rival London as a centre of trade and wealth. Thus fostered by the protecting hand of wise kings, the commerce of Britain grew, like a small tree from a tiny seed, and thrust its roots into the none too rich soil of a thinly populated land. But the kings were not always wise in protecting the sources of their wealth, and the rise and fall of trade caused by the law-makers and rulers may be traced like mercury in the glass. Laws passed to protect the gay courtiers and wealthy citizens proved a hardship to the working classes. Too many politics then, as now, injured and retarded the very thing which produced the wealth of the country. And as long as the body of the people were too weak to oppose the politicians, they sat by and saw their means of livelihood dissipated or curtailed. In the thirteenth century the rulers of the country arbitrarily and unwisely decided that certain almost im- possible restrictions should be placed upon visiting foreign merchants, and those merchants therefore ceased to trade. Petty jealousies were thus fortified at a very EARLY BRITISH COMMERCE 173 great cost to the State. They also concluded that no wool should be exported, and that no apparel made out- side this country, or made of imported materials, should be used by the people, and the result was immediately disastrous to the country's prosperity. Even the head- strong rulers soon saw the seriousness of their act, and the law was repealed in favour of dealers from France and Normandy, and although through personal and national jealousies it was nominally enforced against the Flemings, smuggling became so popular " that in 1270 at one seizure the Countess of Flanders, by way of re- prisal, forfeited 40,000 marks' worth of English goods waiting to be sold in her dominions."^ Difficulties without number were put in the way of the development of commerce. We need not assume that they were always the result of personal inclinations, of jealousies, or of spite, for they were more often than not due to lack of intelligence or breadth of view. Even in this twentieth century of ours, many irritating and quite unnecessary laws are still put upon the statute books simply because the law-makers rush through some totally impracticable and unworkable theory. They seem to be incapable of a careful study of the possible results of their action, and as they usually fail to consult the men who are, the country suffers from their lack of special knowledge. Yet men occupied in any given line of industry can be, and very often are, entirely un- selfish. They can and, if called upon, often do decide on the best for the country at large, rather than for their own immediate pockets. Why, therefore, should they not be consulted upon matters vitally touching their own interests ? On matters of finance the broad-minded financier should be able to supply the wisest counsel ; on matters of commerce, the public-spirited, successful merchant should know better than the professional politician; on matters of shipping the keen-witted, broad-minded > Bourne's English Merchants. Chatto and Windus, 1886. 174 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE shipowner ; and on matters of law the fair-minded lawyer. But if the lawyer undertakes to settle matters of finance, or of commerce, unaided by the advice of those who are better acquainted with its intricacies than he, it is as reasonable as to expect the merchant to pronounce a wise final judgment on matters of theology, astronomy, or any other highly specialized science. If politicians could only be a little more practical and put their country before themselves, choose and stick to principles of utility in preference to those that afford electoral cries, progress would be greater the world over ; for we must, regretfully, accept it as a fact that any progress made is rather in spite of the politicians than by their aid. Dishonesty and trickery will, unfortunately, too often associate themselves with trade. To be dishonest, how- ever, is siUy, to say the least of it, for honesty always vwns in the long run. But the early years of British trading were burdened with an overweight of unsatis- factory dealing. The traders sold short measure, weighed on untrue scales, used illegal weights, clipped coins, and did many other things which they ought not to have done. Tricks of all kinds, from mean little half- penny acts down to gross dishonesty, were constantly practised. The absence of permanency, or of the desire to build a business for the future, made it easier to get as much as possible from each customer. The poor producer from the country who brought his wares or grains to the market found himself too often helpless in the hands of the unscrupulous dealer, and the dealer being the stronger, the producer, or farmer, always came out second best. We read, as one of many examples, how certain buyers and brokers of corn would buy corn from peasants who had brought it from their farms and offered it for sale. The bargain struck, the buyer paid the seller a penny by way of binding the deal and then told him to take the corn to his house, where he should receive the money. On arriving there the buyer made some excuse, such as EARLY BRITISH COMMERCE 175 that his wife had gone out and taken the key so that he could not get at his cash-box, and the seller was told to come back again later. On returning, other petty excuses were made, while in the meantime the buyer had wetted the corn with a view to malting it. When excuses could no longer be made the buyer frankly said he would not pay until such and such a day, or if he, the seller, wanted cash at once he would only be paid at a discount. Further objection resulted in the seller being told to take his corn and sell it elsewhere, a thing which he could not do because it had been made unmarketable by being wetted. It is difficult for us to understand how such a petty trick could be worked more than once, but inasmuch as it was often done, we must conclude the farmer was made of weak stuff and did not possess the same ability to use his fists which he might exhibit to-day. Fists, at any rate, would have been more permissible then, in the absence of any official authority to help him to receive his rights. Old clothes were rubbed and varnished up to be sold as new ; shoes were made of dressed sheepskin and charged for at the price of tanned ox leather ; sacks of coal sold underweight ; rings of common metal gilded and sold as gold. These petty tricks were the common practice of the thirteenth century and are not entirely unknown in the twentieth, though it is now the buyer's own fault if he or she is imposed upon. All tricks, of whatsoever kind, which depart if only by a hairbreadth from strictest integrity are sUly, and prove the stupidity both of the one who employs the trick and the one im- posed upon. No great and lasting commercial success has ever been built on dishonesty. That business which builds on any foundation other than sturdy integrity is sure to fail, or at least to accomplish small results. At last someone in authority was roused to activity and locked up in the Tower twenty merchants who had been deceiving their customers by false weights and other means, and held them there until a fine of ^1000 had 176 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE been paid. This happened in 1269, and it was followed by a good deal of legislation to govern trade, which erred on the side of severity. It was with determination to withstand the aggres- sions of the Crown, and to maintain their interests in dealing with foreigners, as well as to protect themselves against impositions, that honest merchants clubbed together and formed guilds and societies. To them probably more than to any other source does Britain owe its world-wide reputation for excellence of produc- tion. The pendulum reached its farthest point when foreign merchants were required in dull seasons to leave port and sail back home even if their load of merchan- dise had not been sold. But this obviously unfair rule was withdrawn in the year 1303, a year which occupies a conspicuous place in Britain's commercial history, for it also saw the birth of Edward the First's famous docu- ment, known as the Charta Mercatoria, or the Statute de nove Custuma. This has been called the Magna Charta of Commerce, and it marks a great step forward. It granted that : " The merchants of Germany, France, Spain, Portugal, Navarre, Lombardy, Florence, Provence, Catalonia, Aquitaine, Toulouse, Flanders, Brabant, and all other foreign parts, who shall come to traffic in England, shall and may safely come with their merchandise into all cities, towns, and ports, and sell the same by wholesale only, as well to natives as to foreigners. And the merchandise called merceries — miscellaneous haberdasheries of all varieties, toys, trinkets, and the like — as also spices — gross spiceries or groceries, as well as minor spices — they may likewise sell by retail. " They may also, upon payment of the usual customs, carry beyond sea whatever goods they buy in England excepting wines, which, being once imported, may not be sent abroad again with- out the special licence of the King. Wherefore, all of&cers, in cities, towns, and fairs, are commanded to do sure and speedy justice to all foreign merchants, according to the law-merchant, or merchant's custom ; observing these three points especially — first, that on any trial between them and Englishmen, the jury r 5 - % 1 i. g o ^ EARLY BRITISH COMMERCE 177 shall be one-half foreigners, where such can be had ; secondly, that a proper person shall be appointed in London, to be judiciary for foreign merchants ; thirdly, that there shall be but one weight and measure throughout the land. " In consideration of those privileges, certain fixed duties were to be levied from the strangers ; two shillings on every tun of wine imported over and above the old custom of half a mark ; ten shillings on every piece of scarlet cloth dyed in grain ; and ' over and above the old customs on such kinds of merchandise,' an ad valorem duty of threepence a pound on miscellaneous articles, ' such as silk, sarcenet, lawns, corn, horses and other live cattle, and many other kinds of merchandise, both imported and exported.'^" We have quoted this important decree in some detail because of its far-reaching effect, for while it was often infringed upon in succeeding years, it remained as a bulwark against the opposition to the foreign trader, which often owed its existence to a narrowness of local feeling, a petty jealousy, a childishness, for which there should be no room in trade. The oppressive rules which this wise act of Edward I. did so much to correct had worked as hardly upon the English trader as upon the merchant from, abroad. For example : A fair was to be held at Westminster in the spring of 1245. All the tradesmen of London were commanded to shut their shops, and aU other fairs throughout England were forbidden during fifteen days, so that the entire commerce of the country should be confined to one place. This arbitrary Act seems to have been passed, not as a vote-catching measure, nor to make a party popular with a great class of employes, but because the Government thought it could thus more easily collect a large amount of money in tolls. But " the best laid schemes," of Governments as well as of men, " gang aft agley," and failure was the result. No sooner was the fair opened than it began to rain in torrents. The tents proved unable to protect the goods, and vast quantities of clothing and provisions were ruined, and the dealers, standing in the mud, 178 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE waited there day after day for customers who never came. We read, however, that " the King did not mind the imprecations of the people." But even under such wretched treatment trade con- tinued to grow. The act of Edward I. did much to help it. In the great Charter wrested from King John it was declared that : " All native merchants should have protection in going out from and coming back to England, as well as while residing in the Kingdom, or travelling about in it, without any impositions so grievous as to cause the destruction of his trade. Two important steps furthermore were gained by the assignment of different branches of commerce to different classes of tradesmen, each of whom made it a point of honour as much as possible to extend and improve his own calling ; and by the establishment of settled places of trade, in lieu to a great extent of the older practice by which every merchant was a sort of pedlar."^ These steps of progress, as we judge steps nowadays, were very slowly made. Imagination, the quality that inspires trade with the breath of romance, was hardly recognizable in them. A sparsely peopled country, with a trade that was chiefly local, encouraged few dreams of a commercial conquest of the world. The guilds were not yet sufficiently strong to give a sterling depend- ability to all goods of British manufacture. Traders, as regards England, were still pioneers. But London was growing in population and had gradually become the permanent residence of the men who were the founders of England's race of great mer- chants. The business was all done within the City walls, and in this small area grew and flourished many markets. We find at this period Chepe, or West Chepe (now Cheapside), as the head-quarters for bread, cheese, poultry, fruit, hides, onions, garlic and similar articles. The dealers traded in little wooden stalls two or three feet wide in tightly built rows along the roadside. In Cornhill, grains and all articles manufactured of wood '^ Bourne's English Merchants. EARLY BRITISH COMMERCE 179 and iron were offered for sale ; Soper's Lane (now Queen Street), running at right angles to Cheapside, was the district for pepperers or grocers ; Poultry, still so called, was occupied hy poulterers who were freemen of the City ; while Leadenhall claimed the dealers in fowls and game who had not the honour of being accepted citizens. The pavements at Grace Church and before the Con- vent of the Minorite Friars at New Gate were devoted to miscellaneous dealings, and here merchants of all sorts and conditions were allowed to occupy temporary stations. Saint Nicholas Flesh Shambles, the precursor of modern Newgate, occupied the site of the present Mansion House. It was the head-quarters of the butchers and the stocks- market, and was furnished with permanent stalls, occupied by butchers on flesh days, and fishmongers on fish days. Near to the stocks-market was the important mart of Wool-Church-How, close to Saint Mary Woolchurch. This was the great meeting-place of wool and cloth merchants, while in aU parts of the City, except Cornhill, carts might stand loaded with firewood, timber and charcoal. A rental was demanded for these stalls, and as many small dealers could not afford this expense, they were free to trade from their carts in the unoccupied suburbs of the City, in Moorfields, or on the banks of the Old Bourne, by Fleet Ditch, or around the Holy- Well mid- way in the poor district called The Strand. Westminster, the independent little settlement situated west of the City, had also its collection of markets, the chief one being at the gates of West-Minster-Hall. Finally, those merchants who found the markets too far from the homes of many, established depots where they thought they could do a business, and the ground floors of their houses were turned into shops, and the entire condition of commercial London was not unlike that of a far-west Canadian small city as it might have been toward the end of the nineteenth century. 1 X THE DE LA POLES OF HULL c. 1 272-1 366 HE gradual development of British trade brought into prominence several great names of merchants w^ho are entitled to a place among the leading men of Com- merce in history. Even so early as the beginning of the fourteenth century cer- tain men appear who by ability, nerve, and a certain commercial flair won high place in the opinions of their feUow-countrymen, and made themselves powers in the State. Among the first of the conspicuously successful men were the members of the de la Pole family of Hull, who are said to have come over from France with WilUam the Conqueror. Be that as it may, this family of strong men soon grew away from, or forgot, their Norman ways, and became thoroughly English, establishing branches in Middlesex, Oxford and Devon during the reigns of the first Pkntagenets, though according to some authori- ties the consanguinity of these branches is very doubtful. Their early reputation was obtained as soldiers and courtiers. In 1264 a William de la Pole of Middlesex " lately decorated with the belt of knighthood " was ordered by Henry HL to receive ^10 " to purchase a house for his use as our gift." Several members of the family fought for Edward L in^the Conquest of Wales and received as reward a large grant of land in Mont- gomeryshire. But in 1272 one Nicholas de la Pole was 180 (2- ,^:-.'s \t -'-: /'^t Cll.I) MS. MAI' OK THK SITK OF RAVKNSKOD /■-,./// a r,'/-r,:,liiction hi I hi Ihilhli M„snnii THE DE LA POLES OF HULL i8i appointed one of the authorized collectors and receivers o£ the goods of the Flemish merchants of England, and about the same time William de la Pole of Totnes, with other merchants, received the sum of £iz 9s. 5|d. for cloth sold to the King at Winchester Fair. This William was also well known in Rouen, and probably acted as his own commercial traveller between England and France, but he removed later to Ravensrod, then a newly founded town in the south-eastern corner of Yorkshire. The brief history of Ravensrod is a curious one. The site was originally a small island a mile from the main- land, formed by gradual heaping up of stones and sand from the action of the ocean currents on one side and the River Humber on the other. This island later found itself connected with the mainland by a tiny neck of land, very narrow, but just broad enough to act as a road. As a peninsula it evidently possessed special advantages as a site for a mercantile trading town, which were immediately recognized by the quick-witted in- habitants of the neighbouring town of Ravenser. Thus came into existence what was first called the town of Odd, then Odd-juxta-Ravenser, then Raven- serodd, and finally Ravensrod. It proved an excellent landing-place, and at first was free from what at this present day and throughout all history has been an obstacle to progress, namely undue civic interference. It soon grew into .an important mart, so much so that in 1276 the people of Grimsby, on the opposite side of the river, complained to the King of the great damage it was doing their trade in causing them a loss of £100 a year. The King seems to have felt that competition, as long as it was fair and above board, was not a bad thing, and that any community of people who could not meet it in the same frank spirit deserved to lose. At all events, he paid no attention to the childish complaint ; but according to their competitors these aggressive and 1 82 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE unscrupulous merchants then sailed in their smaU boats into the North Sea and intercepted the trading ships and fishing smacks, inviting them to put in at Ravensrod where the trade was so much brisker than that of Grimsby, that often forty shilhngs could be obtained for a last of herrings against not more than twenty shillings at Grimsby. Even if this was true it ought not to have been hard for Grimsby to pay them back in their own coin. The rivalry, however, was not destined to last for very long. In 1361 a great flood drove aU of the in- habitants of this lively little place to seek shelter on the mainland. The whole peninsula was wiped off the map, and the spot is now marked only by the solitary Spurn Head lighthouse, for of the mainland town of Ravenser as well as of Ravensrod not a vestige remains. William de la Pole, as we have seen, had become one of the prosperous merchants of this " great flourishing city," and had probably done his share to disturb Grimsby's peace of mind, but he had been gathered to his fathers fifty years before the great catastrophe came upon them. His widow married for her second husband John Rotenheryng, a famous merchant of Hull ; but we are more concerned with the sons, of whom the eldest, Richard, was born about 1280; the next, WiUiam, a few years later ; while of the third, John, we know but little. These sons early tasted the pleasures of commerce. They learnt to be adventurous — to risk money and safety in the hope of accomplishment. They took frequent voyages with their father in his good ships to Flanders and France. They met and bartered on those foreign shores with the richest merchants of the world. They sold them the wool and leather of England, and bought their wines and timber. This was a splendid training for the young " merchant-adventurers," for while full of danger, it sharpened their wits and cultivated their imagination to the full. During their journeys they were likely at any time to be attacked by French or Scottish pirates, when, as all THK blTE OF RA\'hNsROI) From It limp in t/ie Biiiish Museum THE DE LA POLES OF HULL 183 sea-traders knew, in those wild days, unless they were strong enough to beat them off or fleet enough to escape, their goods would be seized and they themselves butchered or held captives until a sufficient sum was paid in ransom for their release. These conditions were bad during the energetic reign of Edward L, but were much worse under the poor, weak rule of Edward H., and it was no doubt for greater safety that the brothers re- moved soon after their father's death to the fortified and rapidly growing city of Hull, twenty miles to the west. Hull, or Wyke-upon-HuU as it was then called, was owned by the monks of Meaux, who were themselves shrewd traders and encouraged trade in others. It was the home of many foreign merchants, especially of those from Florence and Flanders. The Italian merchants were also great money-lenders, and this so well suited the requirements of Edward I. that, as he had been struck with the possibilities of its situation, he went to the length of buying the city from the monks in 1298. After this it prospered more than ever. In 1297 it was made the sole port of exportation of Yorkshire wools, and when in 1298 York was made a " staple town," it was with the proviso that all its goods should pass through Hull. By the year 1300 it claimed one-fourteenth of the entire English export trade in wool, rough sheepskins and pre- pared leather. Indeed in some years its trade in these articles was half as great as that of London. Our first actual knowledge of the de la Poles as living in Hull dates from 13 16, the year of the great famine, when wheat rose in price from six shillings and eight pence to forty shillings a quarter. At this great pass Richard de la Pole determined to visit foreign ports and bring back grain, thus serving both himself and the suffering public. His act brought him into considerable notice, and he seems to have gained more and more influence at Court, being appointed to one office after another. We find him lending the King on various securities 1 84 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE ^4000, ^2000, j^i200 and so on, which were considerable sums in those days. He was highly esteemed by his debtor, for in 1328 Richard received from Edward III. a Christmas present of 1000 marks " in consideration of good services done by him," while in the following years he was appointed to further offices of honour — among them that of test- ing the quality of wine used at the royal table — and these duties demanded so much of his time that Richard decided to remove to London. Here he lived respected and honoured ; a rich man, but possessing wealth gained through honest means. He died in 134S, and at his death passed away the first conspicuous merchant-prince of England. In the meantime Richard's younger brother William, who had continued the business at Hull, was rising to the highest honours. In a thinly peopled country, situated on the extreme border of the known world, he had discovered the delights and fascination of world- commerce, and he and his brother made for the merchant the position to which all sterling success is entitled. William became richer and richer. His influence was far-reaching, and continually grew greater. When King Edward passed through Hull in the autumn of 1332 on the way to begin his Scottish wars, " he himself with several of his nobles and attendants following after . . . were splendidly and nobly entertained by William de la Pole." So says the history of Hull, and the King was so pleased with the town and its people, and so impressed with his host, that he transferred the local government from the hands of a bailiff to those of a mayor, and nominated William de la Pole as first to fill that office. _ William was called upon to perform^ many public services. He was sent on a special mission to reprove the Earl of Flanders for giving aid to the Scots. He was chosen mayor to succeed himself ; and he was appointed supervisor of all the collectors of customs on the east coast of England from Hull as far as Lynn. SIR WILLIAM riK LA I'OLE l-ion, a /•,-iinliiig in the iri/hifonf Slii.VHiir, Hull THE DE LA POLES OF HULL 185 England about this time (1337) was quietly preparing for the subjugation of France. Shipowners were busy building new ships and repairing old ones. Everyone was in favour of the coming campaign. William himself was hearty in his approval and in giving his aid, and in 1338 a great responsibility was placed upon his shoulders. He was given the duty of finding and clothing the army which was to be taken to France, and was authorized to seize whatever ships he considered necessary to convey both cloth and corn, and to buy what he could not seize. On August 4th of the same year William was appointed Mayor of the Staple of Antwerp, and in that city he lived in great state for a year and a half, a period which he considered the most memorable of his public life. To him the career of a merchant was a continual delight and oflFered as he thought the greatest scope for organiza- tion, for exercising his wonderful power of imagination, and for filling his life with innumerable interests. He conducted many delicate negotiations, and carried through many matters of extreme value to England ; and for his splendid work there King Edward showed his appreciation in five notable documents, all issued from Antwerp on the 15th day of May, 1339. In one, he and his brother Richard were released from all annual payments on certain properties. In another, he and his younger brother John (of whom we know little else) were relieved from all actions or demands of any kind which might be brought against them. In the third the King wrote : " In consideration of the great and reasonable supply which our beloved merchant William de la Pole has often made to us, and especially after our late passage over the sea, and also of the praise- worthy attendance bestowed by him upon us, we, at the earnest request of the same William, grant and give licence, for ourself and our heirs, to Katherine, wife of the same William, that she, after his death may marry whomsoever she wishes, so long as he be one of the King's subjects, without let or hindrance." This seems a strange 1 86 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE document, but the reason for it was that the marriage of a widow was a prerogative of the King. He could sell it like the marriage of an infant, and usually did so if the widow had money in her own right. It would be interesting to know whether Mistress de la Pole forced William to plead for it, or whether he obtained it for her as a wedding anniversary present. At this time WiUiam was about fifty-five years old, and as they had boys grown to manhood she could not have been his junior by a great number of years. In the fourth document Edward accepted the post of guardian to WiUiam's daughters in case of his death, and indicated the amounts of their allowances and the manner of men they might marry. The fifth further complimented William, and promised that he should not be required to attend assizes, juries and the like, nor to act as mayor, sheriff, or agent of the Crown against his will. William had lent his King large sums, which Edward duly acknowledged. One debt of ^76,180 and another of 2^46,389 19s. lojd. would in their equivalent nowadays amount to much more than a million pounds. But Edward, like all kings, always needed more money, and regarded his rich subject, the merchant-prince, as the source of an inexhaustible supply. De la Pole not only lent him nearly all his ready money but mortgaged his estates to meet the constant requests. How closely the history of his relations with the King resembles the history of Jacob Fugger, especially in what follows ! As long as his demands were met Edward could not say kind enough things about William, as note this re- markable charter, perhaps unique in the history of Commerce, issued on September 27th, 1339: " Know that our faithful and well-beloved subject, William de la Pole, presently after our coming to the parts on this side of the sea, hearing and understanding that our affairs, for which we took our journey, were for want of money very dangerously deferred, and being sensible of our wants, came in person unto z: 5 a; THE DE LA POLES OF HULL 187 us, and to us and our followers hath made and procured to be made such a supply of money that by his means our honour, and the honour of our followers — thanks be to God ! — hath been preserved, which otherwise had been exposed to great danger. And afterwards the said William, continuing our supply with exceeding bounty, hath undertaken the payment of great sums for us to divers persons, for which he hath engaged himself by bonds and obligations, and if he had not done so, and intrusted his bounty and goodwill thus, not only unto us, but also unto our confederates and subjects with us in Brabant, we could not by any means have been supplied, but must necessarily, with a great deal of reproach, have ruined our journey and designs. And by his means, being assisted and supplied, we got to Hainault, near the marches of France, but could go no further, our moneys there again failing us. And when it was held for certain that our journey was altogether in vain, and our affairs utterly ruined, the said William, having still a care to relieve our extreme necessity, engaged himself and his whole estate, procured for us a great sum of money, and delivered us again out of exceeding great danger." This extraordinary confession o£ a king's dependence on one man makes one wonder why no calculation of the probable expenses was made in advance. Edward seems to have handled the finances of his campaign as the schoolgirl does her first allowance, and that one great trader, a man who by means of world-wide com- merce had made every farthing of his fortune himself, should come to the financial rescue of his country and his king, and save the day, is a splendid and inspiring fact that adds its full share of romance and glory to the history of trade. Edward showed his gratitude by making William a knight-banneret, and then Chief Baron of the Exchequer, excusing him from payment of even the ordinary patent fees. Titles were not always a welcome honour in those days, and were often thrust upon the unwilling recipient to increase the revenue of the Crown. Our merchant- prince had, however, it seems to us, paid out about all that the titles were worth. i88 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE His office as Chief Baron of the Exchequer brought about a rupture between him and the King, whom he had so often helped out of trouble. With the usual in- telligence, or want of intelligence, which so often char- acterized the acts of the sovereigns of those days, Edward seems to have thought that he had only to appoint some- one to this office, for coin to be instantly forthcoming to carry on his wars. He made his demands accordingly, but here, for the first time, William became unruly. He could not raise any more on his own estate, and there was no reason why he should if he could. He could not make the people pay over the one-tenth demanded of their incomes because they could not spare it, and to force them spelt possible rebellion. When the money failed to reach Edward in France he became very angry, and himself came over to England to bring his newly appointed Baron of the Exchequer to order. He actually seized Sir William and his co-workers in this office and thrust them into confinement. How long he kept them there we do not know, but Edward treated his beloved merchant-prince with harshness for some years afterwards. Many of his favours were withdrawn, and payments on loans, made by de la Pole when Edward was in sorest need, were tardily and grudgingly made. We find the King in a somewhat changed condition of mind later, when in 1346, after six or seven years unfair and unjust treatment, he restored to his " faithful mer- chant " certain manors which the Crown had illegally taken from him. By this time de la Pole was about sixty-five years old, and had earned a peaceful old age. He lived at Hull, and stiU conducted his large business affairs. He was beloved by everyone, and " did mightily encourage and improve his town by many new charters, privileges, im- munities and freedoms that he got and obtained for it." He built the Carthusian Priory, part of which is still in existence as the Charter House. This work, ^amply provided for in his will, was continued by his son and V. 'r''S> U>1 i ^ w 'M' k i !»;n: h ^ J ^ o -~ THE DE LA POLES OF HULL 189 heir ; and in addition Sir William erected a building called the Maison Dieu for the housing and maintenance of thirteen poor old men and thirteen poor old women. He died at Hull in 1366. His widow lived until 1382 without maling use of her licence to marry again. William's son Michael began life as a courtier, and became the favourite of Richard H., who made him Chancellor of England in 1383 and the Earl of Suffolk in 1384. But he was a corrupt man, and was im- peached hy the Commons, and forced to fly from England. To his son Michael, however, the peerage was restored, together with his father's possessions. His son, another Michael, a great-grandson of Sir William de la Pole, was slain at Agincourt, to be succeeded by his younger brother William, who, from being the fourth Earl, became the first Duke of Suffolk. This man con- ducted the siege of Orleans against Joan of Arc, and became Lord Chancellor, Lord High Admiral, the favourite of Margaret of Anjou, and virtually King of England, until he was hunted down as a traitor and beheaded in 1450. His grandson Edmund was beheaded by Henry VHL in 15 1 3 for high treason, having coveted the Crown of England, and Anne, his only child, became a nun. Thus ended the direct line of succession from Sir William de la Pole, the merchant-prince of Hull. V XI RICHARD WHITTINGTON, JOHN PHILPOT, AND WILLIAM WALWORTH {c. 1350-1423) jONDON early boasted a number of mer- chants of importance. There was Henry Fitz-Alwyn, whose " profession " was that of a draper. He was the first Mayor of London, and held this exalted office for a quarter of a cen- tury, from its establishment under Richard I. in 11 89 to the time of his death in 1214. Another Mayor of London, Gregory de Rokesley, was the richest goldsmith of his time. He was also a great wool merchant, and is named at the head of fifty-seven dealers in wool, who in 1285 were charged with having caused dissensions between the Earl of Flanders and Henry III. and Edward I., Kings of England, by persis- tent prosecution of their trade. Another, Sir John de Pulteney, ancestor of the Earls of Bath, was a draper by trade. He was Mayor in 1 330-1 331-1333 and 1336. Simon Francis, a mercer of Old Jewry, was Mayor for two years. He died in 1360, the owner of twelve rich manors in London and Middlesex. History makes but slight mention of these men. Historians are too apt to chronicle the home and foreign policies. Governments and wars of a nation, as though Commerce were some bye-product almost unworthy of 190 PHILPOT, WALWORTH, WHITTINGTON 191 their notice. But Commerce is the backbone of the State and supports the body poUtic. Wars were waged usually to defend or develop Commerce. The statesman who ignores the trade of his country finds his public life short, and that Government is, or should be, quickly voted out of office, which enacts laws injurious to the commerce that upholds it. Yet we are supplied with but little information re- garding these real builders of England's wealth, and even of that great merchant-prince Richard Whittington we know none too much, and find his admirers, not satisfied with the scanty facts recorded by the historians of the time, resorting to the same quality of imagination which was so conspicuous in their hero. But imagination may be a pole star in commerce and an unfortunate defect in history. The story that he ran away from home at seven, and then begged his way for several years, rests upon no substantial foundation. The tradition which has been a favourite with the chil- dren of all peoples for nearly five hundred years goes on to say that Dick Whittington, hearing that the streets of London were paved with gold and silver, worked his way to the big City, where he was saved from starvation by the kindness of a merchant named Fitzwarren. He lived for some time in this merchant's home in Leaden- hall Street, where he was favoured by the merchant's daughter. Mistress Alice, but treated most unkindly by the " vile jade of a cook," under whose direct charge he was. Then one day his master sent a shipful of merchan- dise to Barbary, and with the spirit of a true sportsman let his servants also venture something on the voyage. Poor Dick had nothing but a cat which he had bought for a penny with which to drive away the rats, which were too frequent visitors to his garret, and so he sent this cat as his " venture." After the ship had been a long time away Dick seems to have concluded that life under the cook's tyranny was hardly worth living, and ran away from his master's house ; but he had only reached 192 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Bunhill Fields whan the bells o£ old Bow Church rang out a melody which seemed to say to him : " Turn again, Whittington, Thrice Lord Mayor of London," and according to the legend Dick thought better of his determination and turned back to the house in Leaden- hall Street. We can imagine — for the whole tradition is imaginary — his surprise and delight on returning to learn that his cat had been bought by the King of Bar- bary for ^100,000. Obviously this great fortune at once made Whittington one of the richest commoners in England, and permitted him to marry Mistress Alice, and in time to complete the prophecy of Bow bells, and become thrice Lord Mayor of London. This legend has been traced back to within a generation of Whittington's death, and a cat is in some way closely associated with his success. Some say that Whittington did marry AHce, and the " Cat " was the name of the ship. Lysons tells us of " a singular discovery of a sculptured stone in basso relievo, representing young Whittington with the cat in his arms." This*stone was dug up by those employed in building a sewer at Glouces- ter on the very spot where Richard Whittington, grand- nephew of the celebrated Lord Mayor, had built his town house in 1460. The stone may have formed part of a mantelpiece, or a tablet over the door of the house, and as the grand-nephew was probably born before his great uncle's death this would seem to indicate that he was familiar with the story of the cat, and proud of the association. However this may have been, we can safely picture Dick Whittington as serving the long term of apprentice- ship required of everyone aspiring to trade on a large scale before he could become a member of one of the great city companies. He had elected to become a mercer, and must have stood day after day in Cheapside or^^Cornhill offering a stock of haberdashery to the SIR RICHARI) \VHri'J'IN(/ION PHILPOT, WALWORTH, WHITTINGTON 193 passers-by. His associates were rough and coarse, and his pleasures must have been of the rude sort, which charac- terized the apprentice Hfe of the time. The kings of that period differed in no way from the kings of all other times in their chronic shortage of money, and the hard-headed merchants of London were only willing to supply the deficiency on terms not entirely adverse to themselves. Whenever a king needed money he came to the men who were making it and in return surrendered one after another of his rights. Thus the many unique and special privileges which are possessed by the City of London were all bought with hard cash. Edward HL's long reign ended in glooms, plague and pestilence, and the people grew restless and dis- contented. When news of his death reached the City, a deputation, headed by John Philpot, one of the wealthiest merchants, and including large numbers of the Grocers' Company, waited on the successor, young Richard II., at Kennington. After the usual courtly language, they added : " And, furthermore, we beseech you, most noble Prince, that you would vouchsafe to make some good and profitable end of the discord which lately hath arisen, through the malice of some and not the commodity of any, but to the hindrance and dis- commodity of many, between our citizens and the Duke of Lancaster." Parliament, taught perhaps by experience, assumed that the new king would make a bad use of any money given him, and had now become strong enough to exer- cise some control. Therefore, in granting him a subsidy, it wisely stipulated that the money should be placed for safe keeping in the charge of trustworthy officers, and named John Philpot and a William Walworth as such. This, historians tell us, was the origin of the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer. William Walworth was a prominent fishmonger and the chief promoter of the Fishmongers' Company, and he and Philpot were the foremost City men during Whittington's 194 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE younger merchant years. He, no doubt, learnt much from them, and especially from Philpot, who, we are told by Stow, was "a man o£ jolly wit and very rich in substance." He had also his full share of initiative and strength of purpose. It was during one of Philpot's terms as Lord Mayor that a merchant of Perth collected a little fleet of Scottish, French and Spanish ships and captured several English merchantmen off Scarborough. He slew their commanders, put their crews in chains, and appropriated the cargoes. No one whose real duty it was seemed to have had enough interest, or energy, or courage to punish this act, but Philpot, with his own money, gathered a few ships, manned them with a thousand armed men, and sailed north. He soon met and defeated the enemy, and in his turn seized fifteen Spanish ships laden with wine which he met on the high seas as he returned to London. On his arrival we read " there was great joy made among the people, all praising the worthy man's bountifulness and love towards his king." But as might be expected, the weak-kneed peers were jealous of this merchant and condemned his conduct as ofiicious and high handed. They called a meeting of the King's Council, and summoned Mr. Philpot before them. The Earl of Stafford, who deeply resented this inde- pendent action, reproached him the most loudly ; but the intrepid old merchant spared neither breath nor words in his reply : " Know, sir," he cried, " that I did not expose myself, my money, and my men to the dangers of the sea, that I might deprive you and your colleagues of your knightly fame, or that I might win any for myself ; but in pity for the misery of the people and the country which, from being a noble realm with dominion over other nations, has, through your sloth- fulness, become exposed to the ravages of the vilest race. Not one of you would lift a hand in her defence. Therefore it was that I gave up myself, and my property. sik WILLIA-M WALWORTH From a line f'rt;raz'hig in the posSL'<:sion o/t/ic Author PHILPOT, WALWORTH, WHITTINGTON 195 for the safety and deliverance of our country." The chronicler adds that " the Earl had naught to answer," and perhaps felt, if the truth were known, that he had already said too much. PhUpot, undaunted by the disapproval of the poor good-for-nothing King's Council, continued to follow the dictates of his conscience, and his good judgment on more than one subsequent occasion was of the greatest service to the nation. The King finally knighted Philpot and his associate Walworth, not so much because anyone at Court was anxious to allow this honour to these city merchants as that their public acts had made them too_ conspicuous to be ignored any longer. For, while Philpot had been chastising pirates in the north, Walworth had devoted his spare time to other matters which seemed to him to the advantage of his country. During the year of his elevation to knighthood occurred the Wat Tyler iii- surrection. Every honest man in the City felt that this must be quickly quelled, and it is said that Walworth was the man who rushed in among the insurgents and slew Tyler with his own hands. He is credited with this speech, when the men of Kent were preparing to re- taliate for this deed : " Good citizens, and pious all, give help without delay to your afflicted King ; give help to me, your mayor, encompassed by the selfsame dangers ; or if you do not choose to succour me by any reason of my supposed demerits, at any rate beware how you sacrifice your King." The citizens immediately acting with one thought, suppressed the insurrection. John Philpot, merchant-adventurer, died in 1384, and only a few years later we begin to hear authentic accounts of the man who had been studying the characters, methods and manners of his two predecessors. Richard Whittington was elected Sheriff in 1393. He was at this time about forty years old, a master mercer, and a member of the Mercers' Guild, with five appren- tices working under him. 196 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE A short time before his promotion to this civic dignity King Richard had wished to borrow, or at any rate to acquire, ;^iooo, and, as usual, approached the City mer- chants for the money. Instead of trying to trade for some special privilege they declined the loan. The King was much irritated by their presumption. He could not be happy until he had punished these men who were so bold as to try to keep what belonged to them, and, consequently, he summoned the mayor, John Hinde, and other municipal officers before him at Nottingham and threw them all into prison. He also annulled all City laws, characters and liberties, and placed the whole government in the hands of a custodian of his own choos- ing. It is extraordinary to think that the people could ever have allowed such tyranny ; but they did, and suffered accordingly. There was no one in the position of John Philpot or William Walworth who was strong enough to protest, and probably English history has been deprived of several interesting pages as a result, for though these sturdy men of might and courage could and did fight for their King, they were never disposed to accept manifestly unfair treatment from anyone without protest and retaliation. However, King Richard had matters entirely his own way, and after the mayor and officers had grown tired to death of being locked up, the citizens paid ten times as much as he had demanded in the first instance. He released his prisoners, and probably noted the value of a despotic method for future use. Then, on the 29th of August, 1393, King Richard proceeded from his palace at Shene into the City, and condescended to lend his presence to these servile hosts who entertained him with a wonderful pageant. Whether the historian of that day was acting as a press agent and wrote for an awe-inspiring effect on the reader, rather than to convey the real truth, we cannot say, but his description is impressive. The streets were festooned with rich tapestries, and fine silks were draped amidst PHILPOT, WALWORTH, WHITTINGTON 197 sweet-smelling flowers; great crowds thronged the streets ; a thousand and twenty young men on horseback walked back and forth keeping order. Then came the civic procession, headed by a custodian appointed by the King and followed by four-and-twenty aldermen, among whom was Whittington. They were decked out in red and white, and were followed by the representatives of several trades, each in his Hvery. One old chronicler, whose imagination was a trifle vivid, wrote : " None seeing this company could doubt that he saw a troop of angels." This procession met the gracious King, his Queen, and their escort of nobles in Southwark, and by the time the double procession had reached London Bridge the citizens were so impressed by the wonderful magnanimity of the King that they presented the Queen with a crown and palfrey and the King with two chargers richly caparisoned. Wine played freely in the fountains in Chepe, and choristers made " heavenly music " at St. Paul's. From the top of Ludgate " angels " strewed flowers and per- fumes on the royal party, and at Temple Bar there was a representation of a forest and a desert full of wild beasts, with John the Baptist in the midst of them leading the Lamb of God. Whether the forests and the wild beasts, and the Lamb of God were intended to symbolize the relations between the King and the City men we do not know, but they were there, because the historian tells us so. After King Richard and Queen Anne had seen these wonderful sights the whole procession hurried off to Westminster, where the King seated himself on his throne. Then followed a little drama, carefully pre- arranged of course, with the King and Queen in the leading roles. Queen Anne arose and threw herself before the King, beseeching him to pardon the City merchants for their evil deeds. After a sufficient hesitation to give dignity PHILPOT, WALWORTH, WHITTINGTON 199 money-lenders, to whom they had been given. All these he flung into the sweet-scented fire. The King, as soon as he realized what had been done, exclaimed, " Never had prince such a subject," to which Whittington hastened to reply, " And never had subject such a prince." Knighthood followed, almost as a matter of course. The story, which closely coincides with similar tales told of Anthony Fugger and George Heriot, is a charming one, so let us believe it if we can, for though there is no proof, it may nevertheless be true, for we have other definite knowledge of Whittington's extreme liberality. He built the library of Grey Friars Monastery, and furnished the books. He rebuilt churches, founded a college, and contributed to every good effort through- out the country. He helped the poor, and the sick, and the neediest among his fellow-men. He began to re- build Newgate Prison, " a most ugly and loathsome prison, so contagious of air that it caused the death of many men," and, dying before the work was done, left money for its completion. Another of the provisions of his wiU, extraordinary for his day, was for the paving and glazing of the Guild- hall, luxuries which were then almost entirely confined to palaces. He lived in Crutched Friars in considerable state, and died in the winter of 1423 respected by all and beloved by many. He is reported to have said not long before his death, " The fervent desire and busy intention of a prudent, wise and devout man shall be to cast before and make sure the state and the end of this short life with deeds of mercy and pity, and specially to provide for those miserable persons whom the penury of poverty insulteth, and to whom the power of seeking the neces- sities of life by art or bodily labour is interdicted." No one can study the information we possess regarding this remarkable man and not regret its brevity. He gained from commerce money, position, and a life which 200 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE he enjoyed. After the fire of young manhood had burned out he devoted himself to acts of kindness. He was a great and good man, and if he did not possess the posi- tiveness and strength of his predecessor Philpot, or the viriUty of William de la Pole, he had a sweetness and a tenderness of character which, with determination and courage, do much towards making a good man, a true friend and a splendid citizen. XII WILLIAM CANYNGE OF BRISTOL (i 399-1475) OTHER NOTABLE EARLY ENGLISH MERCHANTS jE have read of the de la Poles of Hull, of Philpot, Walworth and Whittington of London, but other cities also in the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth cen- turies bred men who achieved riches and fame in Commerce. In fact Commerce was the chief and almost the only medium through which the wealth of the nation was acquired. Bristol had become an important trading city, and even in the twelfth century, according to William of Malmes- bury, " it was a very celebrated town, in which was a port, the resort of ships coming from Ireland, Norway and other countries beyond the sea, lest a region so blest with native riches should be deprived of the benefits of foreign merchandise." About the year 1400 Henry IV. issued to Bristol a charter which ran, " Considering the many and notable services which very many merchants, burgesses of our town of Bristol, have done for us and our famous pro- genitors with their ships and voyages at their own great charges and expense, we have granted that the said town shall be forever free from the jurisdiction of our Ad- miralty." As far as we can discover no compliments of this kind were paid by any of the sovereigns of those days without a quid fro quo, so we can only wonder as to the amount of the " loan " exacted. 201 202 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE But even with this special privilege Bristol did not make any great progress for many years. Winchester and Totnes in the south were much more favoured by mer- chants ; Hull and Boston in the north showed more progress. But we can quite understand the reason for its backwardness if the action of the civic authorities in the case of Thomas Blanket is in the least typical. Blanket was a merchant of Bristol, but because he and his associates " caused various machines for weaving and making woollen cloths to be set up in their houses," and because they employed men to work these machines, they were in 1340 actually subj ected to a fine. Edward 11. , however, remitted the fine, and then the people of Bristol began to realize what this merchant's enterprise meant to their city. Blanket and his brothers became rich. In 1342 Thomas was appointed Bailiff of Bristol, and in 1356 was summoned to Westminster, to advise with the King on matters of importance in connection with the trade of the country. Blanket gave his name to the article which now has its place in every household in the world, and Bristol became a cloth-producing centre. His was the most notable name in the history of Bristol before Cabot's discovery of America ; but we may also find during his Ufetime some sHght reference to a William Canynge, or Canning, who was the fore- runner of a family of great merchants. Canynge's grandson Thomas became a man of some importance. He was at one time a sheriff of London, then a member of ParUament, later Mayor of London, and Master of the Grocers' Company ; but he was far surpassed in fame by his younger brother, who was known as William Canynge the Younger, to distinguish him from his grandfather. WiUiam was born in 1399 or 1400, and became something of a power when about twenty-five years of age, for then it was that he and others succeeded in transferring to Bristol the control of the fish trade of the west coast. But the Governments of the various z ^ WILLIAM CANYNGE OF BRISTOL 203 interested countries could not let things alone, and Denmark felt called upon to interfere. Henry VI. was an infant, and his ill-advised councillors hastened to submit to the Danish demands. A treaty was written and signed by which the merchants of Bristol, as well as those of London, Norfolk, Suffolk, Lincoln, York, Hull and Newcastle were forbidden to trade with Iceland, Fin- land or other of the King of Denmark's possessions. In this treaty seemed to lie a chance for William Canynge to secure a monopoly. He bought it by can- celling a debt due to him from the Danish subjects of Iceland, and consequently was permitted by the Danish King " to lade certain English ships with merchandise for those prohibited places, and there to take fish and other goods in return." This special royal permit, however, was not obtained till 1450, when Canynge had long been one of the largest shipowners of the district. By 1460, after ten years of exercising his monopoly, he is said to have employed about 800 mariners in the navigation of ten vessels. One of his ships was of 900 tons burden, another of 500, and another of 400, and the cost of his fleet was 4000 marks — in these times equivalent to anything between ^30,000 and ^50,000. Canynge had begun to trade with German ports in 1449, thus entering a field heretofore almost entirely held by Flemish merchants. We read that King Henry, probably for a handsome consideration, caused letters to be addressed to the Master-General of Prussia and the magistrates of Dantzig inviting their favour toward certain English factors who were located within their jurisdictions, and especially toward William Canynge " his beloved and eminent merchant of Bristol." As an indication of the position of Bristol among"the ports of England, it is interesting to note that in 1451, owing to the troublous conditions existing on the sea, Parliament decided to raise ;^iooo for the creation of a fleet " for the protection of trade," and this amount was 204 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE apportioned among the seaports as follows : from London ;^300, Bristol ^150, Southampton £100, York and Hull together ^^loo, Norwich and Yarmouth ^100, Ipswich, Colchester and Maldon j^ioo, and from Lynn, Salisbury, Poole and Weymouth ^50 each, Boston ^30, and New- castle-on-Tyne ^20. These are the figures given by the chronicler of the day ; but as their total is ^iioo, instead of ;£iooo, we can only surmise that the extra j^ioo was either used to defray the expenses of collecting or, as is more likely if the figures given are correct, found its way into the pocket of the King. In 1456 Canynge was elected Mayor of Bristol for the third time, and during this year entertained Mar- garet of Anjou, who came to Bristol to gain the greater interest of the West country for her husband. In 1461, while serving his fourth term as mayor, he had the expensive privilege (doubly expensive as it proved) of entertaining the new King, Edward IV. The people honoured the King with pageants and processions, and all the childish and fantastic pomp of the time, but Edward had made the journey for something more substantial and caused it to be known fairly early in the proceedings that while pageants and compliments were all very well in their way, what he really wanted was hard cash. King Edward's host was the wealthiest man of the West, and at the same time was known to have been a staunch and loyal friend of the Lancastrian cause. That he entertained the King instead of being put to death as a traitor was probably due to his money-making capacity, for it would have been folly to kill the goose that laid the golden eggs, and Edward, even at nineteen, was a singularly astute young man. He was, therefore, heavily assessed at 3000 marks, or what would now be ^25,000 to j^35,ooo ; " this," as the historian quaintly observes, " for the making of his peace." It speaks well for the recuperative power of his trade that within a few years of being thus heavily mulcted, he was again very wealthy and in a position to found several charities. I'j-o 11! a I" WILLIAM CAN^'NGE (ISHs-HT-l) r:-^e/:i,i hi tJic Ihitl'h iVvm.iiicrgi a: cd ly J. Jilimrhi JjSj WILLIAM CANYNGE OF BRISTOL 205 But he had grown tired of supplying the Yorkist King with money whenever he wanted it. Edward thought to circumvent him by finding him a second wife — he had been a widower since 1460 — and would no doubt have expected a round sum for his services as broker. But at this appalling prospect Canynge's nerve seems to have forsaken him, and he hastened to put himself out of Edward's way by taking holy orders. In the following year he was made priest, and in 1468 Dean of Westbury. He died in November, 1475. As Canynge was only one of a number of rich merchants Edward IV. must have looked upon Bristol as one of his principle sources of supply. A fine old example of West- Country pluck and perseverance existed in Robert Sturmey, who lived in princely style, and entertained all the visiting great merchants. He was chiefly interested in trading with the Levant, and occasionally added to the romance of his occupation as a merchant-adventurer by excursions to Jerusalem in the name of rehgion. On one occasion he took with him a boat-load of one hundred and sixty pilgrims, but hoped to meet the expenses of the affair by filling the hold of his good ship Anne with such articles as he thought likely to extract the ready money of the people of the sacred city. The end of the trip, how- ever, was disastrous, for this keen trader was shipwrecked near Navarino on the coast of Greece, and though he himself was saved, thirty-seven of his party were drowned. On another occasion, in 1458, we read, " as the fame ran that he had gotten some green jpepper and other spices to have set and sown in England, therefore the Genoese waited him upon the sea and spoiled his ship and another." Sturmey, who preferred a fairer com- petition, complained to his Government at home, and the result was that the Genoese merchants living in London were arrested and imprisoned until they saw their way to pay compensation estimated at 9000 marks, the full value indeed of the lost property. Such was life in the fifteenth century. XIII TRADE AND THE TUDORS ENRY VII. became King in 1485, and in another few years Columbus returned to Europe to announce his great discovery. Both events greatly affected the com- merce of England. For many years before Henry's acces- sion political wars had caused trade to languish, and almost with the retirement of Canynge began a period of depression, during which the name of no great merchant-adventurer stands out conspicuously. The Wars of the Roses had done much to bring the supremacy of the barons to an end, and in its place was to arise the supremacy of the great towns, or in other words the supremacy of the merchants and manufacturers who made the wealth of the towns. With Henry's reign, then, commerce began to revive. This ruler, whose faults overbalance his virtues, was at least wise enough to learn from history that a progressive country must have a progressive commerce, and that active trade meant a richer state. He therefore did his utmost to foster the greatest wealth-producing power which England contained — ^her unconquerable inclina- tion to trade with the other peoples of the earth. A contemporary and enthusiastic historian of Henry VII. says : " This good prince by his high policy marvellously enriched his realm and himself and left his subjects in high wealth and prosperity, as is apparent by the great abundance of gold and silver yearly brought in to the 206 TRADE AND THE TUDORS 207 realm by merchants passing and repassing, to whom the King, o£ his own goods, lent money largely, without any gain or profit, to the intent that merchandise, being of all crafts the chief art, and to all men both most profit- able and necessary, might be the more plentifully used, haunted and employed in his reahn and dominion." It is a little difficult to read this long sentence without taking" breath, and equally difficult to believe that so niggardly a king ever lent anyone anything, at aU events without obtaining full interest for it. But there is no doubt that he did leave the country much richer than he found it, and this because he fostered commerce so excellently. There were more matters to be adjusted and corrected, however, than could be made right in one reign, and Henry VHI. was fortunately minded to continue his father's good work. If he did not encourage so much as Henry VII. had done the very expensive and doubtful voyages of discovery, it was because he felt that his country could be best served by steady trade with such places as had already proved profitable sources of supply. This was a wise course from the standpoint of the country no doubt, but one from which certain adventurous spirits departed, more to their fame than profit. This very arbitrary ruler also granted charters, Hcences, immunities and the like, but his greatest contribution toward developing trade lay in his efforts to strengthen the English Navy. From time immemorial the English had been a seafaring people. Alfred the Great set an example to future kings by trying to improve the ship- ping of his time, and each succeeding ruler had done little or much to encourage this branch of industry ; but the credit of being the creator of England's maritime greatness belongs to Henry VIII. Yet for many years after this the Navy depended more upon merchant vessels in time of wars than upon the actual men-of-war in the possession of the Government, and when called upon for aid each city prided itself on 208 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE " doing its duty " to its country and its King. Queen Elizabeth put her trust in private enterprise, and con- sidered an annual naval estimate of ^4000 as excessive, and when the Spanish Armada threatened England her Navy consisted o£ only thirty-seven ships and fourteen more hired by her for this special work of defence ; but the actual fleet with which Drake met the Spanish admiral numbered one hundred and forty-three vessels. Of these London was asked for ten, and her merchants proudly sent thirty, all completely manned, provisioned and supplied with ammunition. Bristol sent three and a tender, Barnstaple " three merchant ships converted into frigates," Exeter two and " a stout pinnace," Plymouth " seven stout ships in every way equal to the Queen's men-of-war, and a fly boat." We see, therefore, that commerce not only filled the strong-boxes o£ the people and the Goverimtient with gold, but in time of war turned her peaceful merchant ships into fighting ships of line, and assumed the royal privilege of defenders of the country. Among the most notable and the most famous of the merchants of England during this sixteenth century were the Greshams, of whom Thomas was the greatest merchant prince of them aU. Norfolk was the home of the first Gresham of whom we hear. John Gresham, gentleman, of Gresham, lived in that county in the latter part of the fourteenth century and possessed apparently a fair fortune which he had inherited. His son James was a lawyer, and spent much of his time in London. He removed the family seat from Gresham to a place called Holt, about four miles from the sea on the Norfolk coast. This new estate was in the neighbourhood of busy towns frequented by traders from Flanders, and he no doubt acquired a certain taste for trade from this association. At all events during the latter years of his life he seems to have been a merchant in a small way. 1 1 TRADE AND THE TUDORS 209 His son married a rich wife, but we know nothing more of him than that his four sons were all brought up to trade in preference to any other career. Of the eldest, WiUiam, we have not much information. He was a mercer and merchant-adventurer and a freeman of the Mercers' Company. In 1533 he was appointed Governor of the English merchants living in Antwerp. He died in 1548 and was buried in Soper Lane, now Queen Street. The next brother, Thomas, became a merchant, and selected certain towns on the Mediterranean as his points for trade. He could not have been made of very brave stuff, for he was so frightened one night by a ghost which he saw, or thought he saw, on one of the islands that he threw over the adventurous life of a merchant and trader and became a priest. In 15 15 Henry VIII. pre- sented him with a living in Norwich, and he was after-' wards made a Prebendary of Winchester, and died shortly before Queen Mary. The two younger brothers of this Thomas were Richard and John, and both were important men. Richard became a freeman of the Mercers' Company in 1507 and John in 15 17, and both were knighted. Richard, a personal friend of Cardinal Wolsey, became early associated with the King and Court, and occupied several offices. Among others he acted as financial agent on several occasions for Henry, and^ travelled in this capacity in the Netherlands, France and Germany. He longed to see the Bourse, which had been recently established at Antwerp, duplicated in London, and worked for the creation of an exchange, but his efforts were fruitless in direct accomplishment, except in so far as they influenced his son, through whom the ex- change was later to become an accomplished fact. In 1 53 1 he was elected sheriff of the City of London, and in 1537 we find him as Lord Mayor petitioning the King that certain hospitals might be restored to their first design " for the aid and comfort of the poor, sick, blind, 210 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE aged and impotent persons, being not able to help them- selves, nor having no place certain where they may be refreshed or lodged at till they be holpen and cured of their diseases and sickness." In other ways Sir Richard proved his worth, and his interest in public affairs, and on his death in 1549 he was accounted one of the broadest-minded and best informed of men, and one of the richest of the London merchants of his generation. His youngest brother John became even richer, and seems to have been a man of much the same calibre as Richard. It was to him that London owed the transfer of Bethlehem Hospital from Roman to Protestant hands, which the people seemed to think much to its advantage. Perhaps the fact that he was then sheriff assisted him not a little in turning one sect out and another in. His wealth was sufficiently great in 1546 to allow him to lend the Crown ^40,000 (and, as we know, this would be the equivalent of perhaps ^1,000,000 now). He entertained King Henry and the wife he had recently married, Jane Seymour, by elaborate and very expensive pageants, when minstrels and morris dancers wandered through nearly every street in London. Sir John died in 1556, and by this time the name of Gresham had stamped itself indehbly on the records of the City of London, but the greatest of the family, and one of the four or five greatest merchants in English history, was still to become famous. Sir Richard had had two sons. The elder. Sir John Gresham, became a merchant and a soldier. He had his share of shipwrecks and other perilous experiences, and died in 1560 at the age of forty-two years. It was the second son, Thomas Gresham, born in Norfolkin 15 19, who won the greatest fame, wealth and position of all this notable line. His father. Sir Richard, had fortunately realized what so few men of means nowadays appreciate, and insisted that his son should have a good training— good, hard, even severe — and it is probably due to the fact that he .'X^ ''' k. ^^H^^fc^'' ' -^'^ -\^^^^^^^^^^^^l .-• ^^'IWa . ■ii,,;., . wwt; , ■- V-\; -1-ir '•■**.^^*'**i,^ \%\ '- .- "'-^vl;;:--.. " ■^•'— — ■ 'v^ H ll^ *'**'^^,.t * ^^^^mwmm \v. /^ , i y' •^• '' , i ■i SIR THOMAS GRESHAM jSV Jutonis Mon TRADE AND THE TUDORS 211 and other great men of business did not follow the Court's method of pampering their sons and letting them grow to manhood in idleness that we are able to read of one after another who came into the arena ready for the hard work which always did and always will accompany success. Thomas was first sent to Gonville, now Caius College, Cambridge, where his time was well filled under the personal instruction of Dr. Caius, one of the founders. But when college days were over — and with Thomas they ended when he was sixteen years old — ^he was apprenticed to his Uncle John. In 1543, at the age of twenty-four, he was admitted to the freedom of the Mercers' Company, and from this date may be said to have started on the career of merchant-adventurer. He was proud of his severe training, and later in life wrote to the Duke of Northumberland : " I myself was bound 'prentice eight years, to come by the experience and knowledge that I have. Nevertheless I need not have been 'prentice for that I was free by my father's copy." Thomas seems to have gone almost at once to Antwerp, coupling with his business or profession of merchant- adventurer the duties of acting for the Crown in many of its difficult transactions. He bought supplies for the army and became one of the financial agents of Henry VHI. It must be remembered that Antwerp at this time had displaced Bruges as the first commercial centre of Northern Europe. Here gathered the great merchants from Venice, Augsburg, and other wealthy cities, and here loans were m.ade, interest collected and merchandise exchanged. The debts of the English King had become a serious matter. We learn that about 1550 the annual interest due from Edward VI. was ^40,000, an enormous amount in those days. Usury was considered entirely legitimate, and when a king wanted money and could not get it from his own people he paid to the money- lenders of Europe whatever they chose to ask. For example, in 1551 an arrangement was made between 212 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Edward and the rich Fuggers of Augsburg, whereby a loan of j^6o,ooo due to the Fuggers was renewed on these somewhat severe terms : that ten per cent should be added to the loan ; that Edward should buy 12,000 marks' weight of silver at six shillings an ounce; and thirdly, that he should purchase for 100,000 crowns " a very fair jewel, four rubies marvellous big, one Orient and great diamond, and one great pearl." The bankers evidently made the most out of young Edward's inability to pay, and these jewels probably form to-day a part of that magnificent collection of Crown jewels which are shown in the Tower of London. What delightful interest, what fascinating charm would surround these jewels if we could know their intimate history ! Nearly everyone would be wrapped around with a romance surpassing the wildest imagination of the story writers. All of them probably bore their share in the adventures of the great merchants of those old times ; and as the rare and beautiful orchids which we at our ease examine to-day in collector's hands have been searched for and found by fearless hunters amidst all the dangers which exist in the inaccessible swamps of the tropics, often at the cost of health or life itself, so these jewels have often been the cause of plots and bloodshed, of great robberies, of pain and of disgrace. Edward VI., or his council, felt the need of better and keener representation in Antwerp. It was all very well to borrow and to put off the lenders, but when it came to having jewels forced on him at prices far above their value, even he turned. At any rate Thomas Gresham, then about thirty-two years of age, was appointed the King's factor. It is no agreeable duty to be forced continually to seek the money-lender as a borrower and never as a payer, and Gresham was too good a financier not to accept the bankers' maxim that " there is a time for paying as well as a time for borrowing," but his instructions were always to procure further supplies, and by a liberal use TRADE AND THE TUDORS 213 of soft words and ostentatious concessions to postpone the payment of loans already effected. The task was most unpleasant, and we find him addressing a bold note to the then Chief Adviser to the Crown, the infamous Duke of Northumberland, in which he said he was tired of putting their creditors off, and unless some way could be found at home which would permit him to carry out the Crown's promises, he would prefer to be relieved of the ofiice. He suggested that a certain sum should be put aside each week and sent to him to be used in paying off the debts as they became due, so that in two years the King would be out of debt. If the King's Council did not relish such advice from their factor they could but admit its wisdom, and con- cluded to follow it, and for eight weeks ;^I200 was sent every seventh day to Gresham. Then the remittances ceased, and instead came complaints that " the manner of exchange was not favourable to the King's subjects," but Gresham kept to his point. He urged public re- trenchment, and suggested other methods of providing the necessary funds. He adopted very rigorous ways of controlling the rate of exchange, so much so in fact that, as he teUs us, " My uncle, Sir John Gresham, hath not a little stormed with me for the setting of the price of the exchange, and saith that it lies in me now to do the merchants of this realm pleasure, to the increase of my poor name among the merchants for ever." But Thomas would not be turned from his purpose, and by his far- sighted and patriotic conduct did much to give his name the glory which has made it luminous throughout the succeeding years. While Gresham was accomplishing so much to estab- lish his country's credit one Uttle act seems to have won the gratitude of the King to a degree far exceeding its importance. He presented his sovereign with a pair of long Spanish silk stockings, and in the June of that year, 1553, Edward's appreciation of this gift was shown by his bestowal on Gresham of lands worth ;^ioo a year. 214 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE saying as he handed him the charter, " You shall know that you have served a King." But three weeks later Edward died, to be succeeded by Mary, and soon after her accession Gresham was called upon again to find money for the ever empty pocket. No increase of taxes could be made at home, and open borrowing in foreign centres was almost im- possible, not because of poor credit, for Gresham had built up England's credit by his business-like methods, but because of the jealousies and the unfriendly feelings existing between the nations. Gresham had no difficulty in secretly negotiating the ^50,000 loan in Antwerp, but his problem lay in getting the money out of the Low Countries and into England unknown to the authorities, who would have raised serious objections to such a loss of cash. The coin supplied was chiefly in Spanish reals of silver, " very massive to convey." To the mighty merchants of those days, however, to desire was practically to accomplish, and to Gresham such details existed only to be overcome. He contrived to make a consignment to England labelled as " one hundred demi-lances' harnass," packed in large vats with ^^3000 in each vat. On the day of shipment he seems to have felt that the end justified the means, and presented the Custom House officers and inspectors with handsome presents ; and what, under the circumstances, was much more to the point, treated them to large quantities of liquor. As a result the town gates were left unguarded and the money was safely smuggled over to Queen Mary. For this rather shady piece of work he received a State document announcing the worth of Her Majesty's " trusty and weU-beloved servant, Thomas Gresham, Esquire." When Mary was succeeded by Elizabeth, Gresham speedily won the new Queen's confidence, as well he might, and we find him writing her at length, detailing the unfortunate financial position of England in the TRADE AND THE TUDORS 215 rich capital of Antwerp, and further, informing her how these conditions could be changed. His shrewd advice in peace and in war was followed (save when he counselled the unpalatable course of mar- riage), and as a result the English merchants began at last to compete with their neighbours on equal terms and to excel them both at home and abroad. " When Queen Elizabeth ascended the throne the commercial centre of the world was Antwerp ; when she died the commercial centre of the world was London."^ But Gresham's life was by no means all spent in a city that was beginning to take second place. From 1560 or thereabouts he had left most of the detail of the Ant- werp office to Richard Clough, his manager, and had himself devoted more time to his business in Lombard Street ; and after the great Catholic victory of Jarnac he found it prudent to abandon his position in Antwerp altogether, hastening to England for safety, and followed speedily by the trusty Clough. Thus ended his twenty full years as Factor of the Crown in the Flemish city. In London Gresham found full scope for his commer- cial ability. He was a merchant and he was a banker. He dealt in every variety of goods. He was an importer, an exporter, a shipowner and a money-lender. He had agents all over England and the Continent. He became rich and respected, and as he grew in importance himself, rejoiced to see the capital of his country growing steadily in wealth and dignity. Not many years later, Duke Frederick of Wurtemberg on his first visit to London was to describe it as " a large, excellent and mighty city of business and the most important in the whole kingdom. Most of the inhabitants are employed in buying and selling merchandise and in trading in almost every corner of the world, since the river is most useful and convenient for the purpose, considering that ships from France, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, Hamburg and other ^ Sir Walter Besant. 2i6 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE kingdoms come almost up to the city, to which they convey goods, receiving and taking away others in ex- change." Gresham, however, comparing London with the Con- tinental capitals o£ his acquaintance, found one great fault with it. There was no proper meeting-place or merchants' exchange where merchants could meet and trade instead of " walking in the rain when it raineth, more like pedlars than merchants." It will be remembered that his father had advocated such an institution twenty years before, but had failed to enlist public opinion and support, and the matter had been allowed to drop. Thomas Gresham determined to devote his efforts to the building of such an edifice. He took the matter up earnestly in 1562, and in what seems to us a very long time, namely, three years, he had convinced his fellow-merchants of their need and gained their co-operation. By the autumn of 1566, seven hundred and fifty busi- ness men had subscribed about ^^4000, and this sum sufficed to buy the ground ; while its enthusiastic en- dorser and sponsor, Gresham, announced that he would meet the cost of the building from his own purse. The Ciironicler Stow tells us that Gresham " On the 7th of June, laying the first stone of the foundation, being brick, accompanied with some aldermen, every one of them laid a piece of gold, which the workmen took up, and forthwith followed upon the same with such diligence that by the month of November, in the year 1567, the same was covered with slate." The stone came from one of Gresham's estates in Norfolk, the wood from another in Suffolk, and the slates, ironwork, wainscoting and glass were sent from Antwerp by Richard Clough. The building, which was destroyed in the Great Fire of London, is described as being " noble, with ample walks and rooms for merchants in the base- ment, and a hundred shops or booths above stairs for retail dealers." It was completed in the summer of 1569 i ^ TRADE AND THE TUDORS 217 and formally opened in January, 1571, by the Queen's Majesty, attended by her suite. We read that she came from her house at the Strand called Somerset House and entered the City by Temple Bar, through Fleet Street, and after dinner at Gresham's house in Bishopsgate Street, entered the Bourse on the south side, and " after that she viewed every part thereof above the ground, especially the Pawn (the upper part with its hundred shops), which was richly furnished with all sorts of the finest wares in the City, she caused the same Bourse by an herald and trumpet to be proclaimed the Royal Exchange and so to be called from thenceforth, and not otherwise."^ Sir Thomas Gresham, who had now been knighted for some years, also built for himself a fine residence in Bishopsgate Street, and either built or adapted several mansions in the country. One of these was Osterley House, where he received a visit from Queen Elizabeth in 1570, upon which occasion we are informed that " Her Majesty found fault with the court of the house as too great, afiirming that it would appear more handsome if divided with a wall in the middle." Whether the rich adventurer-merchant agreed with his Queen upon this point or not is immaterial ; at all events he proved him- self as chivalrous as Sir Walter Raleigh, but at a much greater cost, for he arranged for workmen to be brought quickly from London, and they, as soon as all his guests had retired, speedily and silently constructed the suggested wall, so that the Queen and other guests on assembling the next morning were greatly surprised to see Her Majesty's thought already carried out. Many were the congratulations upon this charming exhibition of tact, but some, it is said, knowing that Sir Thomas and his wife were not entirely congenial, hinted that " any house is easier divided than united." We hear but little more of this great merchant, who died suddenly in 1579. He had accomplished his aim. * Stow's Survey. Missing Page Missing Page 220 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE his fellow-countrymen with the story of all the fine sights of London. Of William Hawkins we hear no more, except that he left two sons, who in their turn became sailors and traders, but after the custom of other nations of the time took to slave-trading as the most profitable form of investment which presented itself. The best known of these sons, afterwards Sir John Hawkins, had good company in this commerce which we now consider so reprehensible, for, after a little experi- ence of its profits, he succeeded in enlisting the co- operation of Lord Robert Dudley, afterwards the famous Earl of Leicester, the Earl of Pembroke, and others, who subscribed ^500 with which to charter the Jesus oj Lubeck, one of the stoutest and largest ships of Queen Elizabeth's service, as well as four smaller vessels, manned by about two hundred men in all. The crews were sub- ject to certain rules, among them, " Serve God daily; love one another ; preserve your victuals ; beware of fire ; and seek good company." It is not necessary to follow their expedition in detail. They did what all slave-traders did. They landed where they chose, burned the villages and carried away the blacks until their ships' holds were full ; then sailed for the West Indies, where the slaves were sold. This round was repeated as often as the slave-trader felt disposed. The great Drake himself, who, as one account has it, was related to Hawkins, accompanied his kinsman on at least one of his slave-trading expeditions, and shared in the results, which in this instance were losses. But Hawkins seems soon to have had enough of it, and changed his profession from that of slave-trader to that of the buccaneer, with Spain as his particular enemy. Yet while these adventurous spirits carried on a trade which had neither honesty nor decency to recommend it, they nevertheless cut out a path to distant countries which was afterward travelled by English merchants in ffardvt^Jc 221 WILLIAM AND JOHN HAWKINS Ip£n? r"""""'."- W^ '^^^' f°^ example, that while S^fil •'°"'- I filibustering expedition against Cadiz S. F^f C^"^ tT^",§^ Portuguese trading%essel from the East Indies Hakluyt writes: " It is to be noted that the taking of this carrack wrought two extraordinary effects m England— first, that it taught others that carracks were no such bugs that they might not be taken, presumablywith ease ; and secondly, in acquainting the English nation more generally with the particularities of the exceeding riches and wealth of the East Indies, whereby themselves and their neighbours of Holland have been encouraged, being men as skilful in navigation and of no less courage than the Portugals to share with them therein." And Stow says of this capture : " By the papers found on board, they so fully understood the rich value of the Indian merchandises and their manner of trading into the Eastern world that they afterwards set up a gainful trade and traffic, and established a company of East India merchants." John Hawkins was a man of progress. He spent little time at Plymouth, but, as a sailor grown famous for his exploits, an inveterate hater of Spain and a man of un- questioned nerve and daring, he was regularly employed by Queen Elizabeth in as open a warfare with Spain as she felt wise. In February, 1572, he was one of those few commanders who were instructed to clear the British seas of pirates and freebooters, which meant in other words to attack any Spanish vessels that were to be found near the English coast. In 1577 he became Treasurer of the Navy and did splendid service in the manifold duties of his office, especially in the building of new ships and equipping, victualling and manning old ones. His training as a merchant stood him well in this work, for the best training any man can have for any respon- sible duty, except the detail work connected with any particular profession, is that received in the broad 222 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE channel of commerce ; and i£ the Governments of the world were only conducted on the principles which this great science, the science of business, teaches, can any- one doubt that States would be more intelligently and satisfactorily managed than they are. Hawkins was Rear-Admiral of the wonderful little fleet which annihilated the Spanish Armada and filled so many pages of history with its gallant work, and his exultant joy at the regret and sorrow which he helped that day to bring to his inveterate enemy, Spain, was crowned with the gratitude of his Queen, who gave him a knighthood for his services. After the battle, the debts incurred by this grea\ undertaking had to be paid, and to Hawkins, the mer- chant-sailor-soldier, was handed over the difficult duty of paying off the many large sums incurred. To badger Lord Burghley for money was a thankless task, yet during those troublous days Hawkins declared that if only God would help him to end the matter to Her Majesty's liking, " then he would have all." In less than a year from that time, however, and before the debts were fully cleared, we find this inveterate fighter submitting to the Queen a further and new " device for annoying the Spaniards," in which, as he said, as he personally was out of debt and had no children, he could end his life as agreeably as in any other manner. He proposed to take the best of the fleet and boldly attack Cadiz, which had supplanted Venice as the greatest shipping centre of the world, and capture the rich galleys wintering in her harbour. His suggestion was not acted upon, and in his chagrin and disappointment he asked to be relieved of his post as Treasurer of the Navy. The Queen gave him a scolding, but had no idea of parting with so good a servant, and to pacify him gave him command of six ships with permission to worry the Spaniards, and, if possible, to replenish her exchequer by capturing everything which he could lay his hands upon. WILLIAM AND JOHN HAWKINS 223 If he enjoyed the excursion into the enemy's waters he was unsuccessful in capturing prizes, and on apologiz- ing to the red-haired Queen, dropped into language which she had no relish for. He said, " Paul might plant, and ApoUos might water, but it was only God who gave the increase." To which the Queen answered with the vigour for which she was famous, " God's death : this fool went out as a soldier and is come home a divine." Yet this is not the only instance in which a fair lady has lost patience at the absence of expected funds. Hawkins continued as a sailor to the end of his life, and the same expedition proved fatal both to him and to Sir Francis Drake. The world was fast becoming Eng- land's market, and this little island country had taken on the metropolitanism of Venice, of Augsburg, and of Antwerp, and sent her ships boldly to every known corner of the globe. Her commerce had spread its sails and established itself wherever men could be found with whom to trade. Yet the conditions of commerce were such that the merchant of this period was obliged to be a soldier too. He sailed with his sword in his hand, and was ready to defend himself and his country. And the English Navy, small as it then was, found her ablest hands amongst those who had been sailors in a merchant service, and from the list of what were then the captains of industry, drew the men who became her most famous admirals. XV GEORGE HERIOT 1563-1624 IjCOTLAND has furnished the world with its full share of merchants and men of business. Go where you will, into the great cities or far afield to the out-of-the- way corners of the earth, there the thrifty Scot wiU be found trading and accumu- lating this world's goods. He is a hard man to bluff or to worst in an argument, and a competitor who is never wisely ignored. He is almost always successful, and has a most enviable reputation for integrity, shrewdness and sound common sense. He risks nothing beyond the line of prudence ; he is solid in his finance, and it is safe, almost always, to trust a Scotsman. It is of a Scot that the story is told that he called to his office his son who was about to leave home to seek his fortune. " My son," said he, " of two things would I admonish you. Do right and fear no man. Don't write and fear no woman." His caution is traditional, and makes for a substantial balance to his credit ; yet he too possesses the faculty of imagination — and that is indeed indispensable to success — though he hides it so deep below the surface as to make it frequently undiscoverable except in its achievements. But imagination has helped the Scotsman in every part of the globe to win position and wealth, and to no race have the fascination and romance of trade appealed more strongly. 324 • ^S^kP^ioe^ c^if-t^'^/y From Ike Ori/t-a,^l Future m Hiriots H^spiUU,SJjnJ'(Jn/'u QEDfi£K=^gRlOT 225 But this commercial spirit was comparatively slow in developing. The instinct for trade was there, but opportunity was extremely limited. One cannot trade without people, and up to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the population o£ Scotland was very small. It would have been difficult in all probability for any other race, the Jews alone perhaps excepted, to make for that very small country, with its beautiful but barren hiUs, so delightful a history and so rich a result. For in this northern country, far from the active centres of the south, the Scotch trader was eclipsed by his rivals in London, Hull, Winchester, Bristol and other towns. Yet Scotland was fortunate in having rulers who realized that a people who are commercially successful are a happy people, and privileges and favours were frequently granted to those who endeavoured to push forward the commerce of the country. From the time of David I. we hear of progress, slow indeed, but very sure. Those who carried wool, hides and fish to foreign towns returned to the north of the Tweed with spices, food products, wines, haberdashery, ironmongery, and such articles of commerce, and against great odds a small trade was built up in Edinburgh, Berwick, Perth, Leith, Stirling, Glasgow and Dumbarton. Edinburgh received its first charter from Robert Bruce in 1329, fifteen years after the battle of Bannock- burn. In 1436 it was recognized as the capital of Scot- land, and in 1450 King James II. encouraged its citizens to enclose and fortify the town, and from that time Edinburgh became gradually divided into wards as London had been, with certain portions assigned to each of the various branches of trade. The energetic King James IV. showed special favours to merchants who traded in foreign countries. Ander- son, in his History of Edinburgh, tells us that " they were encouraged to extend their trading voyages, to purchase foreign ships of war, to import cannon, and to superin- tend the building of ships-of-war at home. In these 226 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE cases the monarch not only took an interest, but studied the subject with his usual enthusiasm, and personally superintended every detail. He conversed with his mariners, rewarded the most skilful and assiduous by presents, visited familiarly at the houses of his principal merchants and sea officers, and delighted in embarking on short voyages of experiment, in which he became acquainted with the practical parts of navigation. The consequences of such conduct were highly favourable to him : he became as popular with his sailors as he was beloved by his nobility ; his fame was carried by them to foreign countries ; shipwrights, cannon-founders, and foreign artisans of every description flocked to his Court from France, Italy and the Low Countries." His efforts made Edinburgh more and more attractive, and enterprising men from the outlying districts came to enjoy the advantages which their country's capital offered. Among them was a George Heriot, whose great-great-grandfather James is spoken of as " a con- federate " of James I. Our only concern with this George Heriot, however, is that he was the grandfather of the subject of our sketch, George the younger. This great merchant was born in 1563, married in 1587 a Mistress Christian Marjoribanks who possessed a little fortune of her own, and became a goldsmith with his own booth. He must soon have shown both skill and business abihty, for in 1588 he became a member of the Goldsmiths' Company of Edinburgh, and during the same year doubled the size of his booth. Heriot's business was evidently in a flourishing con- dition, but his greatest good fortune lay in winning the goodwill and patronage of Anne of Denmark, the Queen of James VI., a customer who proved on many occasions her inabiHty to resist his tempting wares. We can picture him in his Uttle booth — ^it was only seven feet square — ^handling the jewels that, wrought in Spain, in Venice, or even in India, and brought by hardy Scottish travellers for hundreds of thousands of miles in small GEORGE HERIOT 227 boats and through unfriendly territories, were to deck the precious persons of the King and Queen of little Scotland, to add to their dignity and gratify their appetite for display. But the booth was not Heriot's only workshop. He was made Goldsmith in Ordinary to Her Royal Highness, and a little later Goldsmith to the King as well, with an apartment in Holyrood Palace fitted up for his especial use. The direct fees attached to these offices were insignificant, but his business grew enor- mously under royal patronage, especially as both the Queen and King were his constant clients. From selling them jewels was a short step to becoming their money- lender. They were poor payers, and Heriot charged long prices. Why, he argued, should he trust these spendthrifts for an unconscionable time and not make them pay for it ? And why trust them at all unless he was fully protected ? Thus honest George became jeweller, money-lender, and pawnbroker to the Court. A very charming incident which gives colour to Heriot's all-too-brief biography is similar to that told of Anthony Fugger of Augsburg and Richard Whittington of Lon- don, and in each instance we may believe or not as we choose. One day, so the story goes, Heriot left his official room in Holyrood Palace to seek the King. He found him enjoying the cosy warmth of an open fire of sweet- scented woods from the East. " The fragrance is sweet," said Heriot, to which the King replied, " Aye, and is costly." " And if Your Majesty will but enter my shop I will show you one more costly still," said the merchant. " Indeed and I will," replied King James. They both proceeded to the booth against Saint Giles' Kirk, where James found nothing but a small fire in the goldsmith's forge. " Is this then your fine fire ? " he asked scorn- fully. " Wait a little," replied Heriot, " till I get the fuel." He then opened his strong box and took from it a bond for ^^2000 which he had lent to the King and 228 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE threw it upon the burning coals. "Now, is Your Majesty's fire or mine more costly ? " " Yours, most certainly, Master Heriot," acknowledged the monarch, but the usual kingly compliment to the generous subject is on this occasion lacking. When James became King of England in 1603 and' set forth upon his journey south, we find Heriot not only supplying him and his suite with much jewellery for personal adornment, but also with a cart-load of gifts to the English courtiers, whose goodwill had yet to be obtained. Nor was it long before he himself removed to London to be near his royal patron. Here Heriot, as the King's jeweller and banker or pawnbroker, became an important man. He it was from whom Sir Walter Scott was afterwards to draw the character of Jingling Geordie in The Fortunes of Nigel. He shows him as a man of strength of purpose, of good- ness of heart, and one who set for his fellows a noble example of manliness and true worth ; who " walked through life with a steady pace and an observant eye, neglecting no opportunity of assisting those who were not possessed of the experience necessary for their own guidance." And George Heriot was all this. He died in February, 1624, leaving a large fortune and an honoured name. Every really great and rich man should try to give to the world some enduring gift as part return for what the world has given him, or rather has made it possible for kim to acquire. George Heriot gave much to charity, but his best remembered gift was for the establishment in his own city of Edinburgh of " a Hospital and Seminary for Orphans, for the education, nursing and upbringing of youth, being poor orphans and fatherless children of poor burgesses and freemen of the said Borough, to such competent number as the means and maintenance allowed thereupon are able to afford, where they may have some reasonable allowance for their maintenance of food, lodging and raiment within the said Hospital GEORGE HERIOT 229 and Seminary, until they attain the age of fifteen, at which time they may be set forth in 'prenticeships to learn some honest trade or occupation, or otherways sent to colleges or universities according to their capacities." And as Fugger is remembered to-day by the Fuggerei in Augsburg, so this hospital is the finest monument of the great, honest and kind-hearted merchant George Heriot. XVI THE MYDDELTONS AND THE EAST INDIA COMPANY {c. 1575-1631) OTHER GREAT ENGLISH MERCHANTS HE early historians of London have not been too kind in their treatment of the men who did more than any other class to build up England's great commerce and consequent wealth. The pages they have given to the merchant-adventurers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries are far too few, as compared with their deserts. To the writer of those days the intrigues and petty happenings of the Court seemed to provide more ex- citing " copy," because neither the writers nor their readers were familiarly admitted to the inner circles where these incidents were occurring. On the other hand, the lives of the great merchant-princes were an almost open book to the public, of which they were a part, and " A prophet is not without honour . . ." We are obliged, therefore, to be content with condensed sketches of such giants of industry as Sir Lionel Duckett, who was the friend and chief executor of Sir Thomas Gresham. He was a Lord Mayor of London, a miner who set up many furnaces in England, and employed agents in Augsburg, there to melt copper and silver for his profit. He was, too, a manufacturer of cloth, and 230 THE MYDDELTONS 231 one of the master builders o£ England's commercial strength. From him we turn to Sir Edward Osborne, dealer in cloth, who, while an apprentice to Sir William Hewitt, jumped into the Thames and saved his rich master's daughter from drowning. He married the daughter, who inherited her father's great fortune, and became Lord Mayor of London. Osborne was an influential member of the Turkey or Levant Company, and if we could follow this great merchant's career in detail we should no doubt find on every page further adventures and romance, such as gave colour to the lives of his compeers. Between the years 1575 and 1600 there came into existence a company for trading in the further East ; but while it seemed from the start to offer great possi- bilities, it remained an undertaking of small size and of doubtful success for some years. Just as the little tree requires time to develop its tiny roots, and while doing so seems hardly sure of living, so this East India Company gave little evidence at its start of the great future which the originators hoped for it. But its inception was in the hands of men who were ready and were delighted to risk Hfe, fortune and reputation. Caution was hardly one of the first qualities in their make-up. Imagination came much nearer the top of the list, and led these men of iron nerve where later in the history of England caution would have shouted the stern order to halt. We have seen that a lucky capture of a Portuguese trading vessel by sturdy old John Hawkins discovered to him, and thence to his fellow-countrymen, the richness of the trading field in the East Indies, and the manner of trading with those far-away people. This was in 1587, and the fascination of such traffic appealed among others to members of the Myddelton family, who were mer- chant-adventurers of ability and note. The Myddeltons, or Middletons, originally came from Cheshire, and were of Welsh ancestry. 232 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Legend and family history tell of their adventures as far back as the twelfth century, but with these we are not concerned. A William Myddelton, a friend of Raleigh, was an author and translator, but in those days the call of commerce was strong, and it soon coaxed the young writer from his desk and made him a man of nerve and fortune. He sailed the ocean for two things : to find Spanish ships which he could destroy and thus punish the enemy he hated, and to carry rich goods to distaat ports for the purposes of trade. It is said that in his later days, when he had become too old for a life of this kind and had settled comfortably in London, he and some of his old friends were often pleased to gather open-tQouthed crowds around their chairs set under the trees, who watched them going through the strange new process of smoking tobacco. WiUiam had brothers who were as successful as him- self — ^Thomas, Robert and Hugh ; and Thomas and Robert especially were active in organizing the East India Company. It seems that in 1599 ^bout one hun- dred merchants subscribed a huge sum, £30,1'}^ 6s. 8d., for the purpose of trading under this name, but it took them an entire year to obtain the consent of Queen Elizabeth to their enterprise. With her Charter at last in hand matters went quickly ahead, and in the spring of 1 60 1 five ships under the command of Captain Lancaster were ready to embark, and of one of them Henry Middleton " of Cheshire " had charge. Tlus Henry Middleton was probably one of the family with whom we are concerned, though we are not defi- nitely so informed. He was a man in whom the managers of the Company placed confidence, and he was second in command, with authority to succeed to the first place in case of Captain Lancaster's death. This little fleet of five small ships sailed from Torbay on May 2nd, 1601, and first dropped anchor in the har- bour of Acheem, the chief port of Sumatra, and then and there formed an alliance with the king of the island, THE MYDDELTONS 233 who in his enthusiasm, or, as is more Ukely, under the gentle pressure of the fleet, wrote to Queen Elizabeth telling her how " the coming of the English had filled the horizon with J07." Perhaps the dusky king really felt pleased at the arrival of the fleet in his harbour, for his people brought their pepper and other spices which the island supphed and sold them in great quantities to the English. Further good fortune smiled on Captain Lancaster, for an unlucky Portuguese vessel of large size and rich cargo fell into their hands, and this booty, added to the spices, gave them all their tiny boats could carry. They stopped at Java, and at its capital town, Bantam, traded what they had for what they wanted more, and at the same time established friendly relations with the people. Whether they obtained as good a letter from this king as from the other we are not informed, but if they failed in this they missed an advertisement which nowadays would be considered as worth many times its weight in gold. The fleet returned to England with its rich cargo in September, 1603. In the following year a fleet of four ships, the largest of 600 tons burthen, was again sent out. Middleton himself was in command and anchored off Bantam on December 23rd. He bought largely of the spices, and then proceeded to explore the district of Malacca, and established commercial relations with the natives. In an account written on March 17th by one of the ship's company, we read : " We had sight of all the clove islands, that is to say Maquian, Motir, Tidore and Ternate, aU of them peaked hiUs in form of a sugar-loaf. The people of Maquian came aboard of us with fresh victuals. They said they had good store of cloves in the island, but they could not sell us any without leave of the King of Ternate." Ternate had already been visited in 1579 by Sir Francis Drake, and Middleton thought it desirable to proceed thither. He found its king " sorely troubled both by the quickened jealousy of his old enemy, the 234 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE King of Tidore, and by the new rivalries of the Dutch and Portuguese merchants already settled on his island."! Captain Middleton seems to have smoothed things over enough at least to get from the king of this Httle spice island a letter to King James of England. This is what he wrote, or signed : " Hearing of the good report of Your Majesty by the coming of the great Captain Francis Drake in the time of my father, which was about some thirty years past — by the which captain my predecessor did send a ring unto the Queen of England as a token of remembrance between us — since the time of the departure of the aforesaid captain we have daily expected his return. My father Uved many years after, and I, after the death of my father, have lived in the same hope till I was the father of eleven children : in which time I have been informed that the Enghsh were men of so bad disposition that they came not as peaceable merchants but to dis- possess them of this country, which by the coming of the bearer hereof we have found to the contrary, which greatly we rejoice at." This voyage was on the whole a very successful one, for, while one of the four vessels was lost, the cargoes of the others were of much value and well repaid the pro- moters of the enterprise. We can, perhaps, imagine Middleton's satisfaction in presenting to King James the interesting letter sent by the king of a little island twelve thousand miles away, insignificant enough except for its production of those highly prized spices. The third voyage, begun in 1607, was also successful and so profitable that to the shareholders of the enter- prise were given dividends amounting to 234 per cent. On this occasion Captain Middleton remained at home and devoted his attention to the management of the still small and insignificant East India Company, and his zeal in connection with this new development of British Commerce earned him a knighthood. ! Bourne's English Merchants. THEfMYDDELTONS 235 Another expedition was planned and carried out, but ended disastrously, for both of the fine ships sent out were lost — one being shipwrecked in the Indian Seas and the other, on its way home with ^70,000 worth of goods, was captured, looted and destroyed by " the wicked Bretons." Another single ship sailed in April, 1609, and after two years returned with a cargo of nut- megs and mace, yielding a profit of 211 per cent to the owners. Thus far the East India Company had really consisted of a few merchants willing to risk much with a chance of much profit, but the experiments had proved so suc- cessful that in May, 1609, in lieu of the privileges granted by Queen Elizabeth, a new and more comprehensive Charter in the shape of a monopoly was obtained from King James " granting to the Company ' the whole, entire and only trade and traffic to the East Indies ' for ever and a day, no one being allowed to have any share in that branch of Commerce without licence from the Company, and all members being bound by oath to be good and true to the king and faithful and assistant to the Company, ' having no singular regard to themselves in hurt or prejudice of the said fellowship.' "^ This supplied an opportunity which appealed strongly to the imaginative men of commerce who composed the Company. They immediately set to work, and built within twelve months the largest merchant ship ever launched. She was christened by the King The trade's Increase, and was of ten, eleven, or twelve hundred tons burthen, accounts differing as to the precise figure. With a cargo of goods worth ^82,000 to be used in trading she sailed in March, 1610, under the experienced captaincy of Sir Henry Middleton. He reached Mocha early in November, and thus far all was well. Here the governor expressed himself as delighted that his country should have been chosen by the voyagers, and entertainment and smooth speeches were exchanged. ^ Bourne's English Merchants. 236 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE So pleased the natives appeared to be that Captain Middleton was urged to take up residence on land and bring with him quantities of cargo. He did so, and soon regretted the step, for the wily people of Mocha im- mediately found cause for showing the cloven foot. A claim was made that the crew were displaying signs of fight, and Middleton and his company of fifty-one men were at once treated as prisoners. For six months they were held thus. One of the men escaped, found a canoe on the shore, rigged up a sort of sail and finally reached the ship, from which, by letters adroitly smuggled in, he urged Captain Middleton to procure native clothing, cut off his hair, stain his face and steal out of town with a burden on his back, assuring him that if he would do so they would get him back to the ship. This suggestion the captain declined to act upon — we cannot quite see why — nor would he listen to his chief deputy's request that they should be allowed to make forcible entry into Mocha and liberate him. But this most natural proposal also was declined, and it is more than likely that the worthy captain possessed a streak of obstinacy which even now is not entirely wanting in the Anglo-Saxon race. At last, however, he escaped, and then, by threatening to attack the town, and by promising that neither he nor the English should in the future make any trading expeditions to that coun- try, he secured the release of those men who had been held with him. Of his goods, ^26,000 worth had been taken from him : several of his men had died, and he had also suffered the loss of eleven months of valuable time. He left the Red Sea as quickly as the winds would take him and in October reached Surat, where he found his path disputed by a fleet of twenty armed Portuguese vessels. This was not a very agreeable reception but one which the men who entered into competition with the entire world were quite likely to encounter. The admiral of this opposing fleet sent word to Captain THE MYDDELTONS 237 Middleton that if he could show a permit from the Por- tuguese King they might enter harbour, otherwise the sooner they set sail again the better for them. Middleton replied that he bore credentials from the King of England to the Greal; Mogul, whose territory was free to all nations, and that, while he wished no harm to traders or ships of other nations, he nevertheless proposed to carry out his plans and trade as he chose. He tried to carry on a peaceful trade with the natives, but found it waste of time, and therefore, brave old fighter that he was, boldly attacked with his three vessels the twenty of the enemy, and so vigorous and well planned was his attack that he sunk one of their frigates and put all the rest of the fleet to flight. He then sailed for Bantam, but ill-luck still dogged the The Trade's Increase, for she struck a rock and was barely able to reach her destination, while the other two vessels were suffering from the wear and tear of two years at sea. He sent one of them back to England to obtain material with which to patch up the damaged ship, and took up his residence in a little town near Bantam. Here his men died one by one, and he too found it impossible to battle with the diseases the climate and the season bred in the constitution of the unacclimatized white man. This fine old merchant-adventurer grew weaker and weaker and died near the end of 161 3, and as he passed out of this life so the proud and splendid ship which he had commanded found herself unable to buffet the storms any longer, and became a total wreck — a dead thing on the shore of this tropical ocean. Hugh Myddelton, the third brother, who had no association with the East India Company, won a name and fortune in domestic affairs, but his place in history was chiefly gained by his successful efforts to bring a stream of running water from the River Lea to the northern parts of London. We read that " The matter (of a water supply for London) had been well mentioned though little minded, long debated, but never concluded, 238 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE till courage and resolution lovingly shook hands together, as it appears in the soul of this no-way-to-be-dauntQd well-minded gentleman."^ On the 28th of March, 1609, the Corporation of London formally accepted Myddelton's proposal to bring water from Chadwell and Amwell in Hertfordshire to Islington, stipulating that the work should .be. begun in two months' time and finished, if .possible, in four yea;rs. ■ ? , The opposition of the landowners thtough- whose property the new river was to be directed was .iminedi- ately aroused, and petitions to Parliament became fast and furious. They said that their lands would be turned into " bogs and quagmires " and their ploughed fields into " squalid ground " ;. their farms would be " mangled " and the canal would be " worse than an open ditch into, which men and beasts would fall by the score in fine weather, and at every rainfall would overflow to the certain ruin of all the poor on its banks." By May, 1610, Myddelton had speiit £3,000 of his own money on the work, but a restraining bill was brought into Parliament and referred to a committee. The House, however, fortunately soon adjourned and did not assemble again for four years, before which time the cutting had been completed-. During, the progress of this expensive work Myddelton became hard pressed financially, but luckily King James beUeved in the under- taking and agreed to assist to the extent of paymg half the expenses on condition that he was to receive a moiety of all interest and profits to be derived from it when complete. The New River Company thus formed registered seventy-two shares, thirty-six for the King and thirty-six for Myddelton ; but so great was the drain on the latter's resources that before the work was complete he had been obliged to sell all but two of these shares. 1 Stow's Survey oj London. S^HUGH MYDDELTON Kjughl .C:BaroiK-t 'fif'///f('nwii ^- tif'i/i/- PfMf . Jh/7yn JJiriih/j.f t/ti/rniii/ ... ^r/rmtr: /imitt//. '' yet another splendid example ot the merctiant-adven- turer who, by a fine commercial training, developed a brain quick in resource. He was full o£ nerve, broad in experience, and seemed capable of carrying out practi- cally anything to which he turned his attention. XVII MERCHANTS OF THE NORTH OF ENGLAND HE great manufacturing districts of York- shire and Lancashire, which have done so much to make England rich, laid their foundations as manufacturing centres early in the thirteenth and fourteenth _ centuries. Their grass lands were so excellently suited to sheep raising that very early in the history of this country wool ranked as an important, in fact as the chief, commercial product of the North of England, and soon won for itself the place of honour among weavers of fine cloths the world over ; but we must remember that the known world was at that time very small. Merchants from foreign countries competed among themselves for the best fleeces. The trader from Venice vied with the man from Spain ; the Augsburg merchant fought his commercial duel with the rich manufacturer from Flanders, and all visited the wool-raising counties of Yorkshire and Lancashire. But why, argued the wool- growers most reasonably, if they possessed the raw pro- duct should they not make the added profit by spinning and weaving it themselves. The most enterprising made the experiment and duly profited thereby, since enter- prise coupled with intelligence was as good a guarantee of success in the thirteenth century as it is to-day. Their efforts, however, taught them how much they had yet to learn. The most skilful weavers in the world were the Flemish, and by a good stroke of fortune for England 240 MERCHANTS OF NORTH OF ENGLAND 241 many of these were driven to our shores by the great floods in Flanders, and were hospitably received by Henry H. Receptive minds in the north were quick to learn of these refugees the mysteries of their art, realizing that it was far better, as well as far cheaper, to learn from others who were experienced and successful than laboriously to study out for themselves. The business of cloth-making received a strong im- petus. The process of warp and woof entered slowly but surely into the very Hves of the people, for just as certain trees and plants are indigenous to certain coun- tries and districts, so certain departments of commerce seem to belong to certain races of people. Their children and their children's children saw the work being done as soon as their eyes were open, until it became as natural for a child of the north to weave cloth as it is for a child of Italy to sing, or of Iceland to fish. Manchester and Leeds, Wakefield and Halifax, Kendal, Bolton, Bury and Rochdale all became cloth-making towns. Leland, who visited the north in 1538, describes Wakefield as " about as large as Halifax and Bradford as half the size of Wakefield." He speaks of Leeds as " a pretty market, as large as Bradford but not so quick as it " ; while " Manchester is the fairest, best-builded, quickest and most populous town of all Lancashire. There be divers stone bridges . . . the best, of three arches, is over the Irwell." " Manchester is, and hath of long time been, well inhabited," stated the preamble to an Act of Henry VIII. in 1542, " and the King's subjects, inhabitants of the said town, have obtained, gotten and come unto riches and wealthy livings . . . within the said town ; and by reason of the great occupying, good order, straight and true dealings of the inhabitants many strangers, as well of Ireland as of other places within this realm, have resorted to the said town with hnen yarn, wool and necessary wares for making of cloths to be sold there, and have used to credit and trust the poor inhabitants of the same town, which were not able and 242 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE had not ready money to pay in hand for the said yarns, wools and wares unto such time the said creditors, with their industry, labour and pains might make cloths of the said wools . . . and pay their creditors ; wherein hath consisted much of the common wealth of, the! said town, and many poor folks have living, and children and servants are there virtuously brought up in honest" and true labour out of aU idleness." Manchester developed her linen-making with her wool, but what curiously enough was formerly known in com- merce as Manchester cotton, or coating, was a rough kind of woollen cloth, excellent for keeping out the cold, and of great durability. The manufacture of cotton goods as we now know them was not undertaken until the seventeenth century. An account of .the trade of the north, written in 1641, describes it thus : " • " The town of Manchester must be worthily for their en- couragement commended, who bu^ the yarn of the Irish in great quantity, and, weaving it, return the same again into Ire- land to sell. Neither doth their industry rest here; for they buy cotton-wool in London that comes first from Cyprus and Smyrna, and at home work the same, and perfect it into fustians, vermilions, dimities, and other such stuffs, and then return it to London, where the same is vended and sold, and not seldcm sent into foreign parts." - , ; ' To win its position as the " quickest and most populous town of Lancashire," Manchester possessed men of nerve, of strength of purpose and of abiUty, and that progres- sive and enterprising merchant, Humphrey Chetham, perhaps represents the best and most successful'of any m the list. , , . , , Chetham was born in 1580, and early m the seventeenth century was maHng a name and fortune for himself as a merchant dealing in the products of his district. His wealth, and the ability which won it for him, attracted the attention of the King, and he was early called upon to help in the affairs of State. We do not find that he shirked the duties that devolved upon him, but its E/i^.Tff*i by "W KoTl , (i.^-//y/myl' ^/ fJr///yy-//i''>.,^U';/''y'Vy': (r//.//fy^/y//^l-' MERCHANTS OF NORTH OF ENGLAND 243 supposed honours he avoided as he would the plague. In August, 163 1, "Mr. Humphrey Chetham of Turton " was summoned to Whitehall, there " to compound for not appearing at His Majesty's crownation to take upon him the Order of Knighthood." This was merely one of the curious forms of taxation at the time, and was inflicted on many others besides Chetham, who, after paying heavily for the privilege of retaining his name as his parents had given it to him, became sheriff in 1634. This was a case of the office seeking the man, rather than the man the office ; and while fulfilling its duties he was obliged to collect money, much money for the Crown. Is it not surprising how, throughout history, the chief occupation of all rulers of all nations has been to get money ? If this money, all these uncountable sums of money collected or wrung from the people, had been used intelligently or even with reasonable good sense, what wonders could have been accomplished. There are enough mistakes made and poor judgment shown, as we all know, in that field of activity called Commerce ; but if one-tenth of the fooUshness had been employed there that has been exhibited by those who have under- taken to govern, all commerce, and everyone connected with it, would have been bankrupt many times over and have sunk long since in the seas of oblivion. At all events Humphrey Chetham, who declined to be Sir Humphrey Chetham, passed the most unhappy days of his long and successful life in trying to carry out the duties of the public offices which were thrust upon him. He advanced money out of his own purse, and King Charles's Government declined even to consider its return. He was appointed High Collector of Subsidies in 1641, and this unpleasant office gave place to one which was even worse — that of General Treasurer for the county. Chetham petitioned to be excused on account of old age and his many infirmities, feeling that he had done his share in the work of the Crown. But he was too good a prize to be relinquished lightly, and for five 244 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE years he performed the duties of this office, bring made again to pay, pay, pay, not because it was just, but because his rulers thought his purse was deep, as indeed it may have been, for Chetham was a bachelor. Finally, when he had reached the age of sixty-eight,, he was permitted to retire, and his remaining years were devoted to deeds of philanthropy. He died in 1653,; leaving an honourable name. His life had been one of honest effort, and he had helped to build into the great foundation of Manchester's future greatness caissons of integrity, of fair dealing, of enterprise and of courage. //t'/rA//// . _ r XVIII GROWTH OF TRADE FROM THE SEVEN- TEENTH TO THE TWENTIETH CENTURY I N the seventeenth century Britain worked as she had never worked before, and pushed her trade toward every point of the compass. ;-. i She increased the efl&ciency of her strong and growing East India Company, and ooked to her Eastland and Muscovy and her Turkey and Levant Companies trading in the Near East as enter- prises of great importance. Of the Turkey Company Lewis Roberts wrote in 1638 : " Not yearly but monthly, nay, almost weekly, their ships are observed to go to and fro, exporting hence the cloths of Suffolk, Gloucester, Worcester and Coventry, dyed and dressed, kerseys of Hampshire and Yorkshire, lead, tin, and a great quantity of Indian spices, indigo and calicoes ; and in return thereof they import from Turkey the raw silks of Persia, Damascus and Tripoli ; cottons and cotton yarn of Cyprus and Smyrna, and sometimes the gems of India, the drugs of Egypt and Arabia, the muscatels of Candia, and the currants and oils of Zante Cephalonia and Morea." Other merchant-adventurers, acting^ independently, traded nearer home in such centres as Hamburg, Rotter- dam, Antwerp and Bruges. They shipped their cloths and bought in return such merchandise as crockery and soap. We are fortunate in being able to reproduce a 245 246 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE remarkably fine portrait of Henry Voguell, an eminent merchant of Nicholas Lane, Lombard Street, noted for many acts of generosity and kindness, who traded chiefly with Hamburg, and died in Bremen in 1746 aged 65. The portrait of this most distinguished looking man, by a French artist, Pesne, was twice engraved, in mezzo- tint by Faber and in line by G. F. Schmidt. A note- worthy feature of it is the view of the Tower of London in the right-hand background. Perhaps here we may also be allowed to refer to a later portrait, this time of a notable grocer and tea-dealer, Robert Orchard, whose shop, No. 34 Greek Street, Soho, is stiU standing, and was until recent years still a grocery, while he had another establishment at Saw- bridgeworth in Hertfordshire. Orchard, who was also the pubUsher of the mezzotint (in 1803), declares himself in the inscription to be the manufacturer of Chocolate and Cocoa on a new and improved Principle, Wholesale, Retail and for Exportation. He is said to have been a scion of the Orchard family, after whom Orchard Street is named, and, as shown in the print, he bore the same canting arms, on a field azure, a chevron argent between three pears proper. But this is a digression. Other merchants again sent England's products into Italy and brought back velvets, damasks and other things which Italy had to offer, while already the new colonies across the Atlantic were stretching out their arms toward the Mother Country and tempting the plucky merchants to come to them and trade. Of these colonies Virginia was the oldest and tobacco her greatest product, while Maryland, situated just north of Virginia, was second only to her in importance in this respect._ The importa- tion of tobacco, however, met with considerable opposi- tion in England. James I. requested the colonies^ to breed silkworms and establish silk works, silk being " a rich and solid commodity preferable to tobacco " ; and in 1631 Charles I., becoming more peremptory, ordered (Hi( n \iii. .,, „, ./_"S, .„'' '^^'^tiSdtilmL U GROWTH OF TRADE 247 them to send Lome " some better fruit than tobacco and smoke " and thus avert " the speedy ruin Hkely to befall the colonies, and the danger to the bodies and manners of the English people through the excessive growth of tobacco." But in the battle royal between these kings and my lady Nicotine the victory was all with the latter, and we read that in 1740 at least two hundred English ships were constantly employed in transporting tobacco, and that their united cargoes amounted to no less than 18,000,000 lbs. annually. The little collection of states in the north-east corner of what is now the United States, known as New England, was peopled with the Puritans who from the very first as traders were fully able to take care of themselves. From these Puritans the real Yankees are descended, and as men of business it is generally conceded that they, as a rule, require no guardian. Do not let us lose sight of the difficulties of those days : the small boats, the ill-equipped harbours, the poor roads. There were no railways ; steam and electricity and the thousand uses to which they are now put were then utterly unknown. There were only a few news- papers and journals, though this, indeed, is a questionable disadvantage. The facilities for banking were meagre, and the amount of money in the world was comparatively small. The risks of crossing the broad ocean were there- fore a thousand times greater then than now, and yet these splendid merchant-adventurers went wherever the possibility of profit and excitement called. Is there any other occupation, any other game, than business into which men will so continually enter with so little thought of the risk — enter with such zest and enthusiasm, knowing they are sure to receive at least a certain amount of reward in fascinating romance ? We have read that James I. indicated to the Virginian colonists that as far as he was concerned they would be wiser to breed silkworms and manufacture silk than to 248 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE grow tobacco, but by a turn of the wheel England her- self soon became the centre of the silk industry. The policy of France, which caused the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, deprived that country almost at once of half a million good citizens — good workers and thrifty savers. These workmen fled with their families from the shores of France, and England, chosenby a large number as their future home, profited accordingly. They brought with them the skill and experience of the silk weaver, and made it possible to establish this great industry in England. Their coming was opposed ; they were not wanted ; they would " take the bread out of other people's mouths," and much more of this narrow-minded argument. But their advent gave a splendid impetus to many trades. We read in an old acknowledgment of the advantage gained by this immi- gration that " Instead of doing us hurt they have proved a great and manifest blessing by improving some of our ancient arts and manufactures, and likewise by introduc- ing various new ones. To them England owes the im- provement of several of its manufactures of slight woollen stuffs, of silk, linen, paper, glass and hats . . . also watches, cutlery-ware, clocks, jacks, locks, surgeons' in- struments, hardwares, toys, and the like." What has become of this silk industry? Why has England lost in the twentieth century so much of what good fortune gave her in the seventeenth f Are the present day men of business less ready to try, less pre- pared to risk, and not so eager to compete with other nations ? One sees no reason why, if the climatic conditions of England allowed silk manufacture to excel here in 1700, there should not be a great field for a similar industry now. There are plenty of such possible branches of commerce which could be grafted into the great_ parent tree and thereby cause the whole to be rnightier and wider spreading. Why does not someone do it I What is lacking ? Certainly everyone is not always so very busy, so GROWTH OF TRADE 249 deeply occupied as to make it impossible. Is it not per- haps that England has grown rich and more or less in- different to these things ? Is the game worth the candle ? Is business to the average man quite the sport it was a hundred years ago ? The young man at once says, " Yes, I'd do it, but how about capital ? " The rich man says, " Oh ! very well, but I prefer a lower rate of interest and reduced risk." Yet England can, if she will, again become by far the greatest manufacturing centre of the world. She can, if she will, snap her fingers at competition. She does it admirably in some branches of trade, why not in all ? XIX THE FANTASTIC IN TRADE RADE has often been developed on lines as widely hysterical as if directed and controlled by silly school children, for when trade touches a man's or a nation's fads, common sense departs and gives place to the wild and fantastic. Men and women become infatuated with an idea, and so bereft of usual financial judgment that their acts when viewed from a distance appear insane, as indeed they often really are. Romance may remain, but a romance which is nebulous and unreal. Perhaps some of the sweetest moments of life are experienced in the gratification of a long-felt wish. Let a man be a collector, with all the ideals that a true collector may possess. Let him collect books, or orchids, or Chinese pottery, or miniatures, or pictures, or coins, or old furniture, or manuscripts. Let him be a student of any one of these subjects or a hundred others. Let him dream of and long for some precious example rare and difficult to find. Let him feel in his very marrow the intense love for that one object, then let it become finally possible for him to possess it. Money which cannot well be spared goes quickly. Everything gives way to this unconquerable desire. To own it, to look at it, to handle it, to take one last long look at it each night before sleep, to gloat over it with a miser's love, and to display it proudly to admiring companions : such is 250 THE FANTSSnC IN TRADE 251 a portion of the joy which comes to a man who is a collector at heart. A true bibliophile may be pointed to as a collector far excellence. The lover of first editions is a delightful faddist. His common-looking, unpretentious volume has perhaps been read and caressed by the great man who wrote it, and who watched anxiously the reception by the public of this his first effort and first step to fame. Its later owner points with infinite pride to errors of typo- graphy which the careless printer had not been suffi- ciently interested in or well paid for to correct. Such little faults as a wrongly numbered page, an inverted letter, or an error of statement have through years of book collecting added charm and value to the shelf of first editions. Then the bindings running from the famous Groliers through the entire gamut — the Tourne- vains, the Deromes, the Mace-Ruettes, the Plantins, the Padeloup, the old pigskin Elzevirs and the ornate and bejewelled Bibles of that age of display, down to the beautiful works of delightful art of the finest binders of the present time — these all are to the collector dearer than gold, and seem the most entrancing objects on earth. Then the Missals which breathe an air of the monastery and reflect the patient skill of the monk-artist of that period of the world's history when all that was best and cleverest was devoted to the Church. Then the books from the library of the great or famous or notorious characters of olden times ; one sees now as perfectly as if each volume was upon this table a beautiful red morocco copy, the red as bright and brilliant as when it left the tooler's hands, a charming book which was once Marie Antoinette's and stamped with her royal coat of arms. The fair Queen has touched and perhaps loved that book and now — now it is here surrounded with all the memories of her life to take one back for an hour to the Court of Louis. Missing Page Missing Page 254 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE II THE TULIP CRAZE As long ago as the sixteenth century the tuhp— a name taken from the Turkish word signifying a Turban —was introduced into Western Europe. Plants bearing this flower were first seen in the garden of a learned man of Augsburg, Counsellor Herwart, who had already acquired a local reputation as a collector of rare exotics. The bulbs had been sent to him by a friend from Con- stantinople, and either Herwart's fame as a connoisseur of rare plants, or the erratic condition of the public mind at this period of the world's history, when it seemed to crave a new sensation, or both, within a few years caused this single little flower to turn everything topsy-turvy, to make and unmake fortunes, and to leave several nations much worse off than before its appearance. Herwart's plants were seen by his neighbours, who at once desired some of their own — their blooms became their pride, and others were infected with the desire to possess them. Money will nearly always procure material things which are wanted, and as the numbers of envious ones increased the value of the plants rose. " Ten times one is ten " with collectors as truly as with mathe- maticians, and more and more of Augsburg's citizens caught the fever. Pickmann in his History of Inventions says : " There are few plants which acquire through accident, weakness, or disease so many variegations as the tulip. When un- cultivated and in its natural state it is almost of one colour, has large leaves, and an extraordinarily long stem. When it has been weakened by cultivation it becomes more agreeable in the eyes of the florist. The petals are then paler and smaller and more diversified in hue, and the leaves acquire a softer green colour. Thus this masterpiece of culture the more beautiful it becomes grows so much the weaker, so that with the greatest of THE FANTASTIC IN TRADE 255 skill and most careful attention it can scarcely be trans- planted or even kept alive." At all events the cultivated tulip profoundly pleased Europe's entire public. It gradually found its way into many gardens, at first of the wealthy and then of those whose means were limited, and it is not surprising that in Holland, which in the seventeenth century was one of the richest countries of Europe, it became the horti- cultural pet of the merchant princes. About the year 1600 we find the owners of the fine gardens of Amsterdam sending to Constantinople for more plants, and each year until 1634 ^^^ tulip increased in reputation. It became almost a requisite of polite society that one should possess a collection of these flowers, and it was looked upon as extremely bad form for a man of means to be without his share of them. It was a short and easy step from the wealthy to those of moderate fortune, and from them to the less well off, and each class in turn became imbued with the desire to own at least a few of these flowers of fashion — these tulips. As the financial scale descended so the number became larger and competition grew fiercer. Not to be outdone by his neighbour, we read of the trader of Haarlem who gave half of his entire fortune for a single bulb, not with the thought of selling again at a profit but to keep in his conservatory — to admire — to have and to show with pride to his visitors. And as the mania developed, prices of course went up and up. We read that in 1634 100,000 florins were paid for forty bulbs. But selling by the plant became too commonplace. Collectors, traders and speculators began to quote them by their weight in ferits, a small weight of less than a grain. A tulip named Admiral Liefkin weighing 400 perits was quoted as worth 4400 florins, and the Admiral Van der Eyck weighing ^6 ferits 1260 florins ; a Childer of 106 perits 1615 florins, a Viceroy of 400 perits 3000 florins ; a Semper Augustus, which was esteemed as most precious 256 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE of all, weighing 200 ferits, was considered a bargain at 5500 florins. 0£ this last named there were very few, and an enthusiast offered a dealer in Haarlem for a specimen plant twelve acres of valuable building ground. A volume of 1000 pages upon the tulip mania by a Mr. Munting gives the following list of various articles which were paid over for a single bulb of the Viceroy : Two lasts of wheat Four lasts of rye . Four fat oxen Eight fat swine Twelve fat sheep . Two hogsheads of wine Four tons of beer . Two tons of butter One thousand pounds of cheese A complete bed A suit of clothes . A silver drinking cup Value 448 florins 558 480 240 120 70 32 192 120 100 80 60 2,500 which shows that the buyer had pretty well ransacked his house for trading merchandise, and also that beer and wine were cheap as compared with other commo- dities. The demand for rare species of tulips increased, so that by 1636 regular markets for their sale had been established, and they were daily quoted in the Stock Exchange. This, however, must seem hardly surprising to us, because on the Stock Exchanges in every capital in the world are quoted in this twentieth century shares of companies which have more doubtful value and less raison d'etre than had those beloved but over-valued tulips of Amsterdam and Haarlem. Stock jobbers made the most of the mania. Few kept their heads and fewer kept aloof from the mania. At first — and it was at this immediate period that the disease THE FANTASTIC IN TRADE 257 reached its virulent form — at first everyone had infinite confidence in the values and the speculators gained. The market broadened, and, as is so often prayed for nowadays by Capel Court and Wall Street, the public came in. Everyone seemed to be making profits from tulips, and no one dreamed that prices could fall. It appeared to be a permanent feature of Commerce — Commerce really in its most fantastic phase, but fas- cinating to a people all alike mad with the artificial respect and almost adoration for a simple little flower. We read that " nobles, citizens, farmers, mechanics, seamen, servants of both sexes, even the poorest, dabbled in tulips." People of all grades converted their property into cash and invested in the flowers. Houses and lands were offered for sale at ruinous rates or assigned in pay- ment of purchases made at the tulip market. Foreigners became smitten with the frenzy, and money from abroad poured into Holland. As a result, living became more expensive and altered, and in a short space of time almost aU conditions of life had to be readjusted because this mania for tulips had turned all the people's heads. In the smaller towns the duties of the public notary were usurped by the " tulip notary," and each town and village possessed its show place, usually the chief room of the principal inn, where tulips were displayed to the demanding and buying public. It reminds one of that interesting story of Jules Verne who, in Dr. Ox^s Experiment, describes the doctor as fiUing the air of a town with a peculiar gas, and thus transforming the slow-going and slow-thinking inhabi- tants into a lot of wild men. The story is ingenious and worth the reading, but that famous writer might almost have had in mind the years 1634-5-6. However, the mania finally reached its climax, as all manias must. Rich men were found to be buying to seU again rather than to keep in their gardens. The fascination of the flower had been conquered by the love of gold. Commerce had won against the delight of 258 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE a true fad. It was not a fair race. Commerce with its ally, the winning of gold, wiU with a great public always win in the end. It always has done so, and those who can resist its allurements against great odds are few. The few who still possessed any property began to raise their eyebrows. To them the gigantic folly of the whole thing began to become apparent. Somebody must lose in the end. Nothing can always keep advancing in price, and the conviction of the few began to take hold of more and more of the saner members of the nation. One would agree to purchase ten Semper Augustines six weeks after date at 4000 florins each, but when the plants were presented at the date agreed upon for payment the price was found perhaps to have dropped seriously. [Defalcation became common. Many of those who had counted themselves as rich found their fortunes really consisted of a few bulbs, for which sud- denly there was no market. Men accused their neigh- bours of bringing about a financial pandemonium. The fever of speculation was superseded by an equally intense fever of pessimism. The whole country was involved, and it became imperative , that something be done to prevent general bankruptcy. Public meetings were held everywhere. The Government was appealed to. But Governments too often fail in the impossible as well as in matters which require only fair judgment and un- selfishness. The Government did the usual thing. They discussed the matter for three months and then con- cluded they could not solve the problems, and thus the whole matter rested. Those who had tulips must lose, and lose they did, and this applied to nearly everyone. Holland suffered fearfully. Her people, many of them at least, had to begin the accumulation of savings or of fortunes all over again, and for years the commerce of the nation languished. London and Paris had followed Amsterdam in the craze but with a lesser frenzy. Their losses were great ■THE FANTASTIC IN TRADE 259 but were individual instead of universal. Neither public felt the shock more than happens often now when some bubble in rubber or equally speculative feature bursts. Always when great numbers of the public try to make money out of little or nothing, disaster results. In our own time the only approaching comparison is the price occasionally paid for some very rare orchid. A little plant, perhaps three inches high and looking to the uninformed like a tiny shoot, which might be a sweet pea or a blade of grass — a tiny shoot with a couple of leaves — fetches a thousand guineas, but only from the real collector. He does not buy to sell again. There would be no buyers. He buys only because he loves the plant and wants it much more than he wants the money, and when the plant reaches maturity the superb flower seems to repay the real collector many times over. But such an one when thinking of his beloved hobby banishes all thoughts of money and profits. He would feel that that which he loves is too precious to associate with any- thing so comparatively commonplace as even Commerce. Ill THE MISSISSIPPI SCHEME The Mississippi madness which enveloped France in the years 1719-20 is another of those freakish children of Commerce which sent people insane in their expec- tation of sudden wealth. The name of John Law must always stand out as the creator of this remarkable episode in the history of Commerce. Commerce usually calls for the soundest of common sense, for carefuUy proposed plans, for risks, yes, but risks which at least look like good fair risks. Dame Commerce requires the greatest intelligence which a man can bring to bear, and casts no friendly eye upon the wild and irresponsible speculation which is based on nothing but fantastic dreams. 262 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE which had befallen France. He asserted that a metallic currency without the aid of paper would surely fail to provide France with the necessary funds for carrying on the business of the country. He used many plausible arguments to prove his position, and gave much sound advice on matters pertaining to credit and finance in general. In his second he proposed, as a means of restoring France to a normal condition, that he should create a bank which should have the management of all the royal revenues and the power to issue notes based on this revenue and on landed security. He further proposed that this bank should be administered in the King's name, but subject to the control of commissioners to be named by the States-General. While these proposals were being considered, he trans- lated into French his essay on Money and Trade, and used adroitly the vehicle of publicity to gain recognition as a financier. His efforts were successful. He became conspicuous as apparently a man of great ability in financial matters, and one whose help was much wanted just now when things were in so chaotic a state. Therefore on May 5 th, 1 716, a royal edict was published authorizing Law, in company with his brother, to establish a bank under the name of Law and Company. The notes of this bank were to be received as legal tender in payment of taxes. The capital was fixed at 6,000,000 livres divided into 12,000 shares of 500 livres each, purchasable in one-fourth specie and the remainder in billets £etat. Law's thirty years of study now helped him greatly. He became the master of finance. He made all his notes payable at sight and in the coin current at the time they were issued, and by this shrewd stroke they immediately became as " good as gold," or even better than gold coin, because the initial currency might at any time by some act of the Government be depreciated, while Law's notes remained always at par, providing of course his bank PHILIPPE, I.»UC D'ORLEANS RECENT ['U ROVAUMK / a line cit;ra.vifii: hy Marie H i>7-tht'ii/els a/to- a fanttiii;^ i'y I . A", \iuit,- i ntL r AXN i AO i iv^ ii\ 1 KAJjr. 203 remained solvent, and the question o£ this does not seem to have entered the people's minds. Law at the same time publicly declared that a banker deserved death if he made issues without having suffi- cient security to answer at any time all demands. Before long the effect showed itself. Law's bank- notes were quoted above par — trade revived — the public mind became easy. Within twelve months the notes were at 15 per cent, premium, while the billets d'eiat dropped to 78J per cent, discount. Law became more and more important as a great financier. He opened branches at Lyons, Rochelle, Tours, Amiens and Orleans. The Regent was both surprised and delighted with the success of the scheme, so much so in fact that he began to think that paper currency alone was necessary and that gold and silver were quite unnecessary. At this period Law proposed the scheme with which his name is so closely linked in history, and the great " Mississippi Project," or " Bubble " as it finally became, was launched. There is no indication that he was other than perfectly honest in its creation, but in final, careful judgment he certainly was woefully wanting. He proposed to the Regent to establish a company which should have the exclusive privilege of trading on the great Mississippi river and the province of Louisiana on its western bank. His company was not only to mine the metal in which this country was supposed to be very rich, but it would, it was claimed, gain enormously from a monopoly of trade, of farming, of levying and collect- ing taxes, and of coining money. It was only necessary for Law to ask of the Regent. He seems to have had an influence which gave him what he wanted, and letters patent were issued in August, 1717. The capital was divided into 200,000 shares of 500 livres each, and payment for shares might be made in billets d'etat on their face value, notwithstanding they could be bought at 78^ per cent, discount. 264 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE If anything was necessary to create an era o£ speculation this did it. Law was at his highest point of popularity. His bank had certainly done much — artiiicially of course, but it had for the moment helped credit. The people believed in Law, in Law's Bank and any scheme which Law cared to propose. His bank was the recipient of great favours from the Regent. It was given the monopoly of the sale of tobacco. It was given the sole right of recoinage of gold and silver, and finally was constituted the Royal Bank of France. With this final mark of royal favour Law's Bank reached its highest prestige, but from then on, the Regent in- sisted and Law acquiesced in issuing unlimited amounts of paper money without any reference to security. The Parliament of France opposed this action, but the Regent vetoed its action. Again and again this vote of opposi- tion and veto was gone through until Parliament, which looked upon Law as the chief instigator of the paper money troubles, prohibited all foreigners under heavy penalties from interfering either in their own name or others in the management of the finances of the State. Some of the members of the Parliament went further and insisted that Law should be brought to trial and if found guilty be hung at the gates of the Palais de Justice. Law was thoroughly alarmed and hurried to the Regent, whose protection he demanded. The Regent used his utmost efforts, and after arresting various Parliamentary officials finally overawed that body into submission and silence. Law used his victory, which was, however, secured at much loss to his prestige, in pushing his famous Mississippi project, and these shares began to rise rapidly. It was too interesting a speculation for the gamblers of the nation to resist, and into the great gamble almost the entire public soon rushed. At the beginning of 1 719 an edict was issued granting the company the exclusive privilege of trading in the East Indies, China and the South Seas and in all the pos- sessions of the French East India Company established W:jEAifLAW^COif"DU ROYZN TOITS CZS CON'. CONTROLEUR GNAL DES FINANCES cjij-jxc. 3)u ■.''/-i.nc^ tji^iwii ia. rtv ''ur^e.t rtL' . U'/ inii J^AJN'lAiJ il(J IJN IKAUM. 2&S by Colbert. The company thereupon renamed itself " The Company of the Indies," and issued 50,000 more shares. Law made greater and greater promises, and public enthusiasm grew with every day. The shares were subscribed six times over. Law's house was sur- rounded by great throngs including dukes, marquises, counts and rich men and women all anxious to change their cash for shares. The Regent was so delighted with this outpouring of gold that he insisted that a further issue of 300,000 shares at 5,000 livres be made, with which funds he could pay off the national debt. So mad had the entire nation become that several times this 1,500,000,000 Hvres could have been obtained if it had been asked for. The street where Law lived was narrow and incon- venient. It was continually crowded — stock jobbers were busy — everyone bought and sold stock, and so great was the desire to get at Law and secure some of the coveted shares that he decided to take a greater house in the Place Vendome, where the crowd of course followed him, and the great square was soon as packed with people as had been its narrow predecessor. So great was the noise that the neighbouring courts of justice could not carry on their duties, and Law secured from the Prince de Carignan his Hotel de Soissons. Its spacious gardens, however, were retained by the Prince, and at once an edict was issued forbidding all trading in these shares except in the gardens of the hotel. The Prince made handsomely, therefore, by the transaction, for spaces were let in the garden, booths erected, and rents collected which all went into his pocket. Law during these busy months was again becoming more and more the great financial power of France. He was courted by the rich. His nod was worth a small fortune. Many anecdotes are recorded of schemes to win Law's attention, some humorous, some pathetic, some sanguinary — all crazy. 266 ROMANCE OF COMMhiKUJi All of this seeming plethora o£ money created « business greater than Paris had ever seen or saw for a long time afterwards. Jewels, costly articles of luxury, pictures, tapestries and what not were sent to the capital for sale. Frightful extravagance, this time of the people as well of the King, ruled. Paris was the Mecca for all who would sell dearly. The Regent was as carried away by the fever as anyone else. He purchased the famous diamond, thereafter known as the " Regent," for 2,000,000 livres, but with its purchase added yet one more to the long list of financial scandals due to the rulers of France. And thus the wild delirium kept on until the begin- ning of 1720. Parliament, which seems to hav6 reasonably kept itself aloof from the general craze, occasionally deprecated the currency issues of paper money. The Regent could not see why if an issue of 10,000,000 Hvres should make good times 500,000,000 would not make better times. But a few of the clearer headed gradually exchanged their paper for coin, which they sent into Belgium, Holland or Eng- land. One transaction especially helped to shake confi- dence. The Prince de Conti applied to Law for more shares and was refused. He therefore presented an enormous amount of paper money at the bank and demanded gold, and it is said that it required several carts to transport the metal to his vaults. Law saw the disastrousness of this act, and hastened to the Regent to beg that the Prince de Conti be forced to pay the precious gold back into the bank. His request was acceded, and the Prince paid back two-thirds of the sum under protest. If the Prince had been other than extremely unpopular this act would have then and there precipitated a panic, but as it was, the people called him mean and unpatriotic, and most of them continued as blind as before. Not all, however. The wiser of the gamblers quietly began to present their paper for payment — a little at a time, but as much as they thought the bank would stand. THE FANTASTIC IN TRADE 267 Law, who was no fool, could not have possibly felt that the shares would always remain at their high quota- tions. He had studied finance all his life, and he must have known that the whole foundation of the scheme of paper money, without security at the back of it, rested only on the tissuey foundation of public confidence — that this confidence must disappear sooner or later — that it could not continue permanently, — but whether he thought so or not, he frequently tried to bolster the scheme up by artificial means. When the withdrawals became too heavy to ignore, he procured the passage of an edict, making the paper worth five per cent more than the metal ; when this failed to check the outgoing coin another edict officially put the paper money at a premium of ten per cent. But Governments or banks can call a thing worth any- thing they choose, but calling does not make it so, unless they possess at the back of their edicts the gold security which in other parts of the world is considered worth what they claim it to be. Otherwise the reaUy valuable medium leaves the country and the artificially valuable only remains. By the end of January matters were rapidly approach- ing a crisis. In his desperation Law had more rigid edicts passed. He made it illegal to use specie at all, and finally in February it was decreed that no person should be per- mitted to have in his possession more than 500 livres (j^2o) in coin under penalty of heavy fine and confisca- tion of any such sums so found. It was further forbidden to buy up jewellery, plate, precious stones, or such easily transportable articles, and informers were to receive one-half of any such articles which they could discover. Of course this brought about an impossible condition of things — servants watched their masters — all privacy was done away with. Everyone was suspected by every- one. It was only necessary for some informer to report that he suspected anyone, to have that person's house searched. THE FANTASTIC IN TRADE 269 seats. The Regent, with the blindness of financial ina- bility, continued to believe in the truth and efficacy of Law's financial system. He felt that he — the Regent — had made many blunders, and expressed himself as greatly distressed at their unhappy results. During his last interview with Law he is reported to have said : " I confess that I have committed many faults. I committed them because I am a man, and all men are liable to error ; but I declare to you most solemnly that none of them proceeded from wicked or dishonest motives, and that nothing of the kind will be found in the whole course of my conduct." Very shortly after Law's departure from Paris he received a friendly letter from the Regent granting him permission to leave France whenever he pleased, and offering him such money as he required. Law respectfully declined the offer of money, but at once left for Brussels, and went from there to Venice, where the populace looked upon him with great curiosity. They as- sumed that he was very rich, but in this they were quite mistaken. Law at the climax of his success had invested his profits in land in France. He apparently believed absolutely and always in his schemes, strange as such belief seems to us now. When he left France he lost this landed property, and it is said that his sole possession was one solitary diamond, worth perhaps five or six thousand pounds sterling. During his days of success he had purchased an annuity of 200,000 livres (about ^8000) on the lives of his wife and children. This annuity had cost him 5,000,000 Uvres, but this with his land, library and household effects were all confiscated. The fickle public who had fawned at his feet a few months before would have been glad to see him hanged, and expressed great discomfort that he had been per- mitted to escape. Law felt himself an exile, and continued to hope that he would be recalled to his adopted home, his beloved France. The death of the Regent, however, put an end 270 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE to this dream. He was pursued by his creditors from one city to another and finally found himself back in his native land. Even here he was not welcome. He was severely criticized by his fellow-countrymen as one who had renounced both his country and his religion, and was regarded as an undesirable citizen. Law, now a broken man, an accepted failure, re- mained in England for four years, and then sought the hospitality of Venice, where in 1729 he died in poverty. And thus ended one of the remarkable romances of business or finance — ended as far as its chief actor was concerned, but the far-reaching effects of his wild acts born of imagination, but nurtured by unwisdom, were felt for many years by the country which he had hoped to make rich. XX THE LATER ENGLISH MERCHANTS SIR JOSIAH CHILD — 163O-1699 OSIAH CHILD, afterwards Sir Josiah, made for himself a great name in Com- merce, while his father was a successful merchant in London trading in the East and West Indies. Josiah, who was born in 1630, began as a naval store-dealer in Portsmouth, and afterwards traded chiefly with the West Indies, bringing among other merchandise a large supply of American timber to England for use in His Majesty's dockyards ; and so excellent were his importa- tions that the Admiralty paid him the highest prices then on record for ships' masts. In 1665 Sir Josiah wrote a little book which he called Brief Observations Concerning Trade and the Interest of Money. This book provoked journalistic controversy, which continued for many years, but it became a standard work, and may be looked upon as one of the forerunners of the modern science of political economy. The author treats first of the growth of neighbouring states, and says regarding the Netherlands : " The pro- digious increase in their domestic and foreign trade, riches and multitude of shipping is the envy of the present and may be the wonder of all future generations ; and yet the means whereby they had thus advanced them- selves are sufficiently obvious, and the great manner imitable by most other nations, but more easily by us of 271 272 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE this kingdom of England." He then proceeds to give fifteen reasons for their success : " First, they have in their greatest councils of state and war trading merchants . . . who had practical ex- perience of trade. "Secondly, their law of gavelkind whereby all their children possess an equal share of their father's estates after their decease, and so are not left to wrestle with the world in their youth with inconsiderable assistance of fortune as most of our youngest sons of gentlemen in England are, who are bound apprentices to merchants. " Thirdly, their exact making of all their native com- modities " whose standard is so well known abroad that " buyers wiU accept them by the mark without opening. "... Fourthly, their giving encouragement to the inventors of new manufactures and the discoverers of any new mysteries in trade. . . ." Fifthly, they encourage those who bring the com- modities of other nations first in use amongst them. Sixthly, their economy and thrift. Seventhly, the careful education of their children not only to know and understand Commerce, but to love and delight in it, an education which is given to girls and boys alike, so that when a girl marries she shall have the ability to continue her husband's business in the event of his death. Another reason is the immense assistance given by their banks to their merchants. Another, their " law-merchant," by which all contro- versies between merchants and traders are decided in four days. Another, their law of the transference of bills of debt from one man to another " by means whereof they can turn their stocks twice or thrice in trade for once we can in England." Another, the low rate of interest charged " which in peaceable times exceeds not three per cent per annum, whereas the rate of interest in England is six per cent at the least." THE LATER ENGLISH MERCHANTS 273 Several other subjects were dealt with by this clear- headed old merchant-adventurer, and except for the differences of phraseology, many of his proposals for the betterment of conditions in England might well have been made by some social reformer of the twentieth century rather than by one who lived two hundred and fifty years ago. Later, Child became a leading director of the East India Company, which he considered as one of the most important of all England's undertakings, and did much to bring it to the wonderful position it occupied for so many years. child, in his later days when his power and wealth were very great, is thus described by a not too friendly contemporary : " He was a man of great notions^as to merchandise, which was his education, and in which he succeeded beyond any man of his time. He applied himself chiefly to the East India trade, which by his management was raised so high that it drew much envy and jealousy both upon himself and upon the company. He had a compass of knowledge and apprehension un- usual to men of his profession. He was vain and covetous, and thought too cunning, though he seemed to be always sincere." Sir Josiah Child died at Wanstead in 1699. His close connection with the English nobility is traced in another chapter.* His son Richard became the first Earl Tylney, and his brother Francis has the honour of being the first Englishman who made banking his sole business, divorcing it from the goldsmiths' craft, which up to his time was always associated with and part of the business of banking. The present Earl of Jersey is his representative, and Child's Bank is carried on to this day. 1 See page 306. 274 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE WILLIAM PATTERSON 1658-I72O Another man, a Scotsman, who left his stamp on England's commercial and financial history, was William Patterson, whose ability and energy established the Bank of England. Born in 1658 at Skipmyre in Dum- friesshire, where his father was a well-to-do farmer, he left home early and spent his youth in Bristol. This great city of the West divided with London the trade of the West Indies and America, and it was but natural that a youth of brain and ambition, dependent upon his own efforts, looked to this fascinating branch of commerce as the one through which to win his fortune. This em- ployment carried him on a voyage to the West Indies, where he made his headquarters for trading with Boston and the Bahama Islands. After five or six years we find him again in England, urging a scheme for establishing an English colony on the Isthmus of Darien. Patterson seems to have been more of a thinker and dreamer than an actual doer. He tried trading at Hamburg, then Berlin, but was successful in neither place. He then returned to push his Darien project to completion, and proposed to James II. that a company of his subjects should take possession of this isthmus, from which he argued both the northern and the southern countries of the new world could be effectively controlled. But James would have none of it, and Patterson was obUged to abandon the idea, at any rate for the time. During the following years he lived in London, and occupied himself in commerce. He was only reasonably successful, and except for his proposal made before the House of Commons in 1691, and what followed this proposal, we should probably know Uttle, if anything, of this really great man. He was invited to give evidence to the House regarding the collection and management of public loans ; and he proposed that in place of the occasional and " unsettled loans formerly made to the h'roiii a i-:andciii in the British Musci/n/. Jht.' only f-ortrait kh THE LATER ENGLISH MERCHANTS 275 Government, a fixed sum of ^1,000,000 should be advanced by the trading merchants at six per cent interest as a perpetual fund to be managed by trustees chosen from the subscribers, and used not only in the supplying the pressing claims of the Government but also in forming a public bank."^ In this proposal originated the Bank of England. Up to this time the so-called bankers were really pawnbrokers. The country people found it expedient to leave their small savings for safe keeping with gold- smiths and other city merchants, whose shops included among their fittings strong boxes which defied thieves These clever people soon found that instead of keeping these savings locked up, they could make loans on ample security to anyone, from the King down at an interets which paid them well. This was the natural evolution, and the system had resulted in making many of these banker-pawnbrokers rich and powerful. When Patterson proposed a public bank some supported him, but many financially strong merchants opposed a scheme in which they saw a powerful competitor for their own businesses. The Committee of the House, to whom the matter was referred, announced themselves of the opinion that they could not " receive any proposal which required making the bills of property current so as to force them as payment on any without their con- sent," but they informed Mr. Patterson that " they would receive any proposal to advance one million on a perpetual fund of interest, to be in the nature of a pur- chase, where they might assign their interest as they pleased to anyone who consented thereto."^ Patterson, eager to see his plan carried out, accepted this one-sided offer ; but his proposed subscribers, thinking more carefully of their own advantage and less of the glory of the concern than did Patterson, declined to find the capital, and the whole matter was, for the time ^ Bourne's English Merchants. ^ Quoted in Bourne's English Merchants. 276 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE being, thrown aside. It continued to be discussed, and many absurd suggestions followed, all of which, thanks to the good common sense of the merchants of the City of London — the financial rulers of those days — ^were laughed out of existence. Patterson held resolutely to his point. He knew, and everyone knew, that one of the chief reasons Parliament had for declining his pro- posal was that by its adoption the Government would be deprived of the revenue it obtained from time to time by the pernicious system of debasing the coinage. This system Patterson earnestly and publicly condemned. He also denounced the method of raising money for Government use by lotteries and the annuities, by which heavy additions were made to the national debt without equivalent gain to the State. After several years of criticism and argument, however, the legislators began to show a few symptoms of intelli- gence, and after much ado they ventured to test his proposition in a half-hearted way. And so the bank became a possibility at last, though further opposition had yet to be overcome. It was savagely denounced in the House of Lords, but, finally, received the approval of the majority. William III. was in Flanders, and every effort was made to prejudice Queen Mary against the Bill; she was detained by the non-contents in the Council, " from four in the afternoon until ten at night," wrote Patterson, " and had it not been for the Queen, who insisted on the express orders from the King, the commission had not passed." The Bill was endorsed by the King on April 25th, 1694, and on the 27th July was issued the royal charter of incorporation. Within ten days the subscription books were full, and the bank became an established fact. It is not our purpose to pursue the history of this great institution. Those who are interested can find a number of complete works on the subject. We have briefly referred to its creation and to the great man who conceived the idea. It came, as did every other epoch- p o. H H ^ W U I Zi ^ ^ THE LATER ENGLISH MERCHANTS 277 making step of progress in those days, from one who had studied the details of the trade or profession of merchant- adventurer and who was proud of his calUng. The in- auguration of the Bank of England takes its place as one of the links of that chain of the Romance of Commerce, which began with the Phoenicians or before, and will grow longer and longer while men continue to possess the instinctive desire to trade. Patterson was not a successful man in accumulating a fortune for himself. He had been one of the original subscribers to the bank, but he later withdrew from it, and from the board of directors, of which he was one. He had become unpopular with many, and is referred to by Macaulay as " a foreign adventurer whose whole capital consisted of an inventive brain and a persuasive tongue." At all events he ceased to be associated with the undertaking which was the child of his brain, and interested himself in other matters. He was the father of the Scottish African and Indian Com- pany, afterwards known as the Darien Company, by which his earlier scheme was revived. It met with much opposition, with difficulties and losses, and was finally wrecked, and with it Patterson was greatly reduced both in finance and prestige. He seems indeed to have erred in judgment in many instances, but the under- taking appears to owe its failure to the jealousy, envy, and prejudice of his enemies rather than to his mistakes. Patterson lived in troublous times. The reign of William III. had not been one of unalloyed success and progress, and the financial and political disturbances of that period had disheartened him and many of his con- temporaries. In a letter written to the Lord Treasurer Godolphin on December 12th, 1709, he reflects on the conditions of the Government, and also demonstrates that notwithstanding his loss of fortune and of prestige he was still a man of influence and great ability. He wrote : " In the last months of the life of this great but then uneasy Prince (William III.), I had access to him, when, finding him in 278 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE much perplexity and concern about the state of his affairs, I took opportunity to represent to him that his misfortunes did not so much proceed from the variable tempers, or humours, of his people as some pretended, but rather from the men of his house, or those he had trusted with his business, who, either for want of capacity, or experience, or that they preferred themselves to him, had brought the affairs of the kingdom into such confusion as made his subjects uneasy ; and now at last, instead of removing the causes of complaint they had presumed to employ his treasure and authority to silence the complainers ; that, as matters stood, there were no reins of Government, no inspection, no enquiry into men's conduct; every man did as he pleased, for nobody was punished, nor indeed rewarded according to merit ; and thus his revenue was sunk, and his affairs in the utmost confusion. He owned this, but asked for remedies. Upon which I proposed that, in the first place, he should put the management of the revenues on the right footing, without which all other remedies would prove ineffectual. The first step toward reforming his revenue was that of restoring the public credit, by making pro- vision of interest for all the national debts, and hy taking care for the time to come such should be granted as to prevent further deficiency. The course of the Treasurer and Exchequer should be so regulated, both in receipts and payments, as to render them easy to be understood, and so certain and prudent as to leave no room for fraud, or ill-practices in time to come. In order to do this, I proposed that a method of enquiry and inspection from time to time into the behaviour of all men concerned in the revenue, be laid down, and nicely executed. Thus I showed him that he could quickly get out of debt, and at least a fourth part of the revenues would be saved hereafter. The next thing I pro- posed to him was the seizing upon the principal posts in the West Indies. The third thing I proposed was a union with Scotland, than which I convinced him nothing could tend more to his glory, and to render this island great and considerable. The fourth thing I proposed — and which I told him was to be done first, in order to the restoring his authority, and showing to the world that, for the time to come, he would no more suffer such a loose and unaccountable administration, as his being a stranger to men and things here had forced him to wink at hitherto — ^was a present commission of enquiry, by which he would see how, and by whom, his affairs had been mismanaged, and who they were who, under pretence of mending matters, perplexed and made THE LATERl!Ht?E!SH MERCHANTS 279 them still worse, and in particular would be able to point out how far the present debts did arise from mismanagement, or from the deficiencies of the funds, i spoke much to him of the nature of this commission, with which, and the other proposals, he seemed extremely satisfied as is evident by his last and memorable speech, in which he earnestly recommends the retrieving of the public credit, and offers his concurrence to all such enquiries as should be found necessary ; and it is plain by the seventh article of the Grand Alliance, and his messages to the two Houses of Parliament, how much he laid to heart both the affair of the West Indies, and that of the Union." Perhaps the most important part of this remarkable letter is that proposing the Union of England and Scot- land, and the later historians give to William Patterson, the merchant, more than to any other man, the credit for its accomplishment, for his efforts in this direction were unceasing. He argued against the prejudices of the English, he insisted to Scotsmen that their fears were groundless. He was the guiding spirit, and when on May ist, 1707, the separate States of England and Scotland were merged into the Kingdom of Great Britain, this merchant-thinker — perhaps dreamer — felt he had not lived in vain. The last act of the Scottish independent Parliament, which dissolved on March 25th, 1707,' was to declare that William Patterson, Esquire, deserved a great reward for his efforts in promoting the Union, and on that ac- count recommended him formally to Her Majesty's favour. His last years were hard ones. His money was gone. He wrote books and urged reforms, most of which the legislators were too stupid or too prejudiced to accept. When he died at the age of sixty-two he left no fortune or house, but his active brain had conceived ideas which had been crystallized into concrete form for the advancement and dignity of his country, and William Patterson, the merchant, is entitled to a niche in the temple of fame of England's men of achievement. 28o ROMANCE OF COMMERCE SIR ROBERT PEEL Although Sir Robert Peel is better known as a statesman than a man of commerce, his life as a matter of fact was chiefly devoted to developing his unit of the great cotton industry of Lancashire, and both he and his forbears are surrounded by the romance of trade. The first of the Peels of whom we hear wa« a WiUiam Peele who, about the year 1600, removed with his father, brothers and their families from Yorkshire to Blackburn in Lancashire, and there followed the then somewhat monotonous and hard calling of a farmer, as did his children after him. But to one of these sons was born a son who was named Robert, and in him the family prided themselves as their real founder. When Robert reached the age when work must claim his daylight hours, he abandoned the farm for the more enterprising occupation of making woollen clothes. He strove to improve the quality of such goods, and success in this effort made him a little richer than his neighbours, so that when he died he was able to give to each of his daughters " nine score pounds " and to his son Robert his business. Whether this Robert progressed or not we are unaware, but his son William became a farmer, and William's sons seemed likely to follow in the same path. But his son Robert^ who, by the way, shortened the name of Peele by dropping the final " e," found in the accumulated lumber of the farm the rough wooden blocks with which his grandfather had stamped out patterns on woollen cloth. In 1774 he married Elizabeth Haworth, whose brother came to young Robert full of ideas which he had gained as an apprentice to some calico printers in London ; and as a result of their combined enthusiasm and imagination they embarked in the business as calico printers themselves. Very soon, however, these young " merchant-adventurers " found wanting the vital sinews of business as well as of war, money, and were fortunate ITHE LATER ENGLISH MERCHANTS 281 in making up the deficiency by taking into partnership a WiUiam Yates, who as an inn-keeper had made a Uttle money. Haworth, Peel and Yates was the first firm in Lancashire to manufacture and print calico, and accord- ing to the policy of the times they used the utmost secrecy in their work. In 1779 Peel, who had practically assumed the control of the business, found it necessary to leave Blackburn because the hand-loom weavers were so provoked by Hargreave's invention of the spinning-jenny that they destroyed nearly all the machinery in the town. He migrated to Burton-on-Trent, where he built mills, and here he lived and died. He was a plain commonsense, hard-working man. He thoroughly understood every branch of the cotton trade as it then existed. He was unostentatious, reserved and almost shy, disliking parade or show of any kind, and shrinking from public service and public notice. He always looked down when he walked, and was therefore known as " the philosopher " by the Burton people. " He wore a curly Johnsonian wig, and like Johnson he was dressed in dark clothes of ample cut. He leaned as he walked upon a tall gold- headed cane, and as he was a very handsome man he looked a figure stately enough for a mediaeval burgo- master." It was his maxim through life that " a man, barring accidents, might be whatever he chose."^ When this interesting and prosperous man died he left six sons, all of whom he had instructed in the business of cotton-spinning and calico printing. The cleverest of the six sons was the Robert to whom our chapter is chiefly devoted. He became one of the great men of commerce of England, and of the world, and left a famous name in England's political as weU as commercial history. At eighteen years of age he told his father, who was still living in Blackburn, that " they were too thick upon the ground," and asked for the sum of ;£soo with which to strike out and build his own ^ Sir Lawrence Peel's Sketch of Sir R. Peel. Missing Page Missing Page 184 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE employment for most of the inhabitants of Bury and its neigh- bourhood, of both sexes and all ages, and, notwithstanding fheir great number, they have never wanted work even in the most unfavourable times. The peculiar healthiness of the peoples may be imputed partly to the judicious and humane regulations put in force by Mr. Peel." In 1803 his house is stated to have had 15,000 people in^its employ. The finer qualities of these prints were very expensive to make, as much of the work was done by hand, and whenever possible Peel endeavoured to use machinery and thus decrease the cost of production. He quickly took advantage of Samuel Crompton's wonderful inven- tion in 1779 of the spinning mule, and tried upon two occasions to associate him with his house. Once he offered him a lucrative position and one of dignity and responsibility in his works, and subsequently he offered him a full partnership, but Crompton declined both his advances. And so Peel grew richer and more powerful alone. Commerce, that broad highway which leads men, as well as nations, to wealth, was the road upon which he travelled every day and which he never forsook. Business was of first importance during the hours which were assigned to it. But he was a many-sided man, and loved other things as well: a brief description by one of his nephews of his uncle's character throws further light upon his in- clinations and activities : — " ' He was,' says Sir Lawrence Peel, ' an ambitious man. He loved money ; but he loved it principally as an instrument of power. He was the very reverse of a selfish man. He possessed a genial, generous nature ; he loved young people, and loved to see all around him happy. He was eager to diffuse happiness ; he was at all times bountiful and munificent in his gifts. As his possessions were great, it was his duty to give largely ; but still, even so viewed, his was a bountiful hand. He dealt with money as one who, if he knew its value, with how much toil and anxiety I- i-iUll tin I 'l^^' itT'Uli MR l '- -^ ^\v^' PK 1 l-.R I.I iR 1 (11 \\ VA 1 ( Ik KIXi Fiv,i „;; ,./, v„r7,,c TRADE AND ENGLISH ARISTOCRACY 305 1908. Schuster, Waechter, Wernher, Montefiore and Goldsmid also figure on the roll of baronets among the merchants and financiers of foreign and Jewish extrac- tion, at the head of which stands the great name of Rothschild. The founder of this world-famous house was Mayer Anselm Rothschild, a banker and moneylender of Frankfort-on-Maine ; of his sons, who all possessed financial genius, one settled inVienna, another in Paris, and a third, Nathan Meyer, in London, becoming naturalized in 1804. Nathan devoted his abilities to the accumula- tion of wealth and never cared to use the title of Baron of the Austrian Empire, which was conferred on him in 1822. His sons, however, while not relaxing their efforts in financial directions, assumed the title of baron, and of these sons Baron Anthony was created a baronet in 1847 ; Baron Lionel, the first Member of Parliament of the Jewish persuasion, was father of the second baronet, raised to the peerage as Lord Rothschild of Tring in 1885 ; and Baron Meyer, of Mentmore, was father of Hannah, who married the statesman the fifth Earl of Rosebery. Various members of the English house of Rothschild have intermarried with members of the continental branches, and the control exercised over European finance by this family is a matter on which much could be written by those in a position to know the facts. A family which at one time rivalled the Rothschilds in the world of finance and, like them, came out of Germany, is that of Baring. John Baring, son of a Lutheran minister of Bremen, settled at Larkbeer in Devon as a cloth manufacturer ; his descendants at the present time hold two earldoms, two baronies, and a baronetcy. John Baring's son, Francis, came up to London and became the greatest merchant of his day, obtaining a baronetcy in 1793, and at the time of his death in 18 10 leaving a fortune of over a million, a figure far more remarkable in those days than at the present time. Of the sons of Sir Francis Baring, the eldest, 3o6 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Thomas, was father o£ the first Baron Northbrook, whose son became Earl o£ Northbrook in 1876; the second, Alexander, under whose direction the firm of Baring Bros, became " one of the six powers of Europe," was raised to the peerage as Lord Ashburton in 1835 ; from the third son, Henry, are descended the Earl of Cromer, Lord Revelstoke and Sir Godfrey Baring (baronet 191 1). Sir Francis, it may be observed, received his commercial training under Clement Boehm, a naturalized Hamburg merchant who married Anne, daughter of Fisher DUke, skinner, by Anne Trafford, whose ancestors were mer- chants ; on the strength of this descent the Boehms, who acquired estates in Norfolk, adopted the name of Trafford, and Burke in his Landed Gentry proclaimed them " a branch of the old and knightly family of Trafford." Another striking instance of " trading families laying the foundation of nobiHty by their wealth and opulence " is recorded by Defoe in the case of " Mr. Child, for example, afterwards Sir Josiah Child, whose posterity by his two daughters are now (1726) Dukes of Beaufort and of Bedford, and his grandson Lord Viscount Castle- main, and yet he himself began a mean tradesman and in circumstances very mean." Josiah Child, as we see i n another chapter, was the son of a London merchant, a cadet of a good Worcestershire family. He obtained a baronetcy in 1678, was chairman and practically dic- tator of the East India Company, and was able to give a dower of ^50,000 with his daughter when she married the eldest son of the Duke of Beaufort. Sir Josiah him- self married as his third wife the widow of Sir Thomas WiUoughby of Wollaton ; their son Richard, who suc- ceeded to the baronetcy on his father's death in 1699, married the heiress of Francis Tilney and was created Baron Newton and Castlemaine in 1718 and Earl Tylney in 1732. Josiah's brother Francis, goldsmith, in 1690 founded the oldest EngUsh bank ; his eventual heiress eloped in 1804 with the Earl of Westmoreland, and their SIR THOMAS SMITH F}-0!n an engraving TRADE AND ENGLISH ARISTOCRACY 307 daughter married George Villiers, fifth Earl of Jersey, to the considerable enrichment of that earldom. Nearly a century earlier than Josiah Child, there was living in London a merchant tailor who was destined to be the root from which sprang a family tree of surprising fruit- fulness. Gerard Gore, at the time of his death at the age of ninety-one in 1607, left seven sons, of whom six appear to have been merchants. From his fourth son, John, are descended the Earls Temple of Stowe ; from the youngest, Sir Paul, come the Earls of Arran and the baronets Gore, Gore-Booth and Knox-Gore. Moreover, the earldom of Ross and the barony of Annaly, both extinct, were held for a tirne by members of this family, as is at present the barony of Harlech. " A respectable draper at Nottingham " whose de- scendants were bankers, founded a famUy of which most of the branches appear to have regarded the honest name of Smith as insufficiently genteel ; one branch changed it for Carrington, and in that guise attained to the marquis- ate of Lincolnshire, a second adopted Pauncefote for its name and title, whUe a third, with a baronetcy, became Bromley, a fourth being the Dorien-Smiths. Another Smith, a haberdasher in Elizabeth's reign, had thirteen children, of whom the eldest, John, was knighted and was father to the first Viscount Strangford ; while the third sen, Sir Thomas Smith, haberdasher and skinner, was "Go/ernor of the East Indian, Moscovia, French and Sommerland Companies ; treasurer for the Vir- ginian Plantation, Prime Undertaker (in the year 1612) for that noble designe, the discoverie of the north-west passage; Principal Commissioner for the London expe- dition against the pirates and for a voiage to the ryver Senega upon the coast of Africa ; one of the chief com- missioners for the Navie Roial and some tyme ambassar dour from the Matie. of Gr. Brit, to the Emperour and Great Duke of Russia and Muscovia, etc." The widow of this merchant of many enterprises married Robert Sydney, Earl of Leicester ; his eldest son. Sir John Smith, 3o8 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE in 1618 married a daughter of Robert Rich, Earl of War- wick (himself the descendant, as already mentioned, of a Lord Mayor), and had a son who married Dorothy Spencer, Countess of Sunderland (known to fame as the poet Waller's " Sacharissa "), and a daughter who married Lord Robartes, from whom came the Earls of Radnor (extinct 1764) and the present Viscount Clifden. A third notable Smith was W. H. Smith, who led the Conservative Party in the House of Commons under the premiership of Lord Salisbury ; his political services gained for his widow and so, on her death in 191 3, for his son, the viscounty of Hambleden, which " Old Morality " himself never cared to accept ; but it was from his business as stationer and his monopoly of rail- way bookstalls that the wealth to support that dignity was derived. Among Mr. Smith's political contempor- aries Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman drew his wealth from a great dry goods store in Glasgow ; Sir Michael Hicks-Beach, now Lord St. Aldwyn, descends from the elder son of Robert Hicks, merchant of Bristol and Lon- don, whose younger son, Sir Baptist Hicks, Viscount Campden (said to have been the first baronet to remain in trade), was ancestor to the Earls of Gainsborough ; and Lord Goschen, the grandson of a publisher in Leip- sic, was himself a banker. It is natural that banking and the allied mysterious operations known as " Finance " — a form of trading without goods, a sort of intensive culture of the golden geese — should yield not only wealth but honours. An early instance is the bestowal of the earldom of Middle- sex upon Lionel Cranfield, merchant, in 1622, as a reward for his financial services to the Government. Although Child's Bank has the longest continuous pedigree of any English bank, dating from 1690, the firm of Coutts might seem a close rival, from the date 1692, which appears on all their cheques ; at this date, however, the family of Coutts were merchants and traders in Edinburgh, and it was not until the middle of the next century that From aJlneJkfiuiafun- by dffii//i/i/iry Fs-y "" Ji.A . faki/i yhim t/tr ^'rir/jnal at Ahcw/r . TRADE AND ENGLISH ARISTOCRACY 309 Thomas Coutts founded the famous bank. Thomas married Harriott Mellon, the actress, to whom he left most of his fortune, a fact which perhaps assisted her subsequent marriage to the Duke of St. Albans. Sophia, the banker's youngest daughter, married Sir Francis Burdett, fifth baronet of an ancient house, and of their children one daughter became the mother of the present Lord Latymer and the youngest daughter Angela, to whom the jolly, vulgar, swearing old Duchess of St. Albans left her wealth, was the famous Baroness Burdett- Coutts. Another old bank, Martin's, has recently brought its chairman a baronetcy, and similar honours were be- stowed in 1759 upon Sir Richard Glyn, alderman and banker of London; in 1786 upon James Hunter-Blair, banker and Lord Provost of Edinburgh ; in 182 1 upon Claude Scott of Lytchett Minster, banker of Westmins- ter ; and in 1838 upon Benjamin Hey wood, son and suc- cessor of a banker in Manchester, whose forbears were merchants in Drogheda and Liverpool. In recent times the baronies of Aldenham, Avebury, Wolverton, Swayth- ling, Michelham, Wandsworth and Peckover have all been bestowed upon men who have made their money as bankers or financiers. The last-named, Lord Peckover, is a partner in the firm which bears the name of the respected but not ennobled family of Gurney of Norfolk, who may be a branch of the great Norman house of Gournay, but certainly spring from John Gurney, cord- wainer, born in 1655, apprenticed in Norwich and prominent as a Quaker, to which persuasion his descen- dants have remained faithful. Closely associated with the Gurneys was another Quaker banking family of Hoare, one branch of which obtained a baronetcy in 1786. The commercial ability displayed by many Quaker houses is notable and may be not entirely unconnected with the conscientiousness and sobriety enjoined by their tenets, to which may also be due the comparatively large number of wealthy traders of this community (such as 310 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE the Barclays, the Cadburys, Frys and Rowntrees) who have hitherto contrived to avoid titles. The first Quaker baronetcy appears to have been that bestowed in i882^|upon Joseph Pease, for Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, partner in Truman, Hanbury and Co.'s brewery, who was created a baronet in 1840 for his advocacy of the abolition of slavery, although his mother was a member of a Quaker community (from which she was expelled for frivoUty and for marrying one not a Friend), did not hold that form of faith himself. A century earUer, in 1732, John Barnard, a Quaker, son of a wine merchant and himself interested in that trade, Member for the City, and Lord Mayor, was knighted ; his daughter married Henry Temple and so became grandmother of the Victorian statesman Viscount Palmerston. The fortunes of the Winn family, now represented in the peerage by Lord Headley and Lord St. Oswald, were founded by a wine merchant ; the CoUiers were estab- lished as wine merchants in Plymouth long before law and politics brought them the barony of MonksweU ; and the baronetcy of Shaw of Eltham was conferred by Charles IL, in return for large sums lent him during his exile, upon the son of John Shaw, vintner. The allied source of wealth which arrogates to itself the proud title of " The Trade " has procured in recent years so many honours as to cause its enemies to suggest that the peerage should be rechristened the " Beerage.''^ Lords Ardi- laun, Iveagh, Burton and Hindlip are the chief instances of ennobled brewers. The baronetcy conferred on 1 It would be interesting to know who originated tliis term. It is said that during a riotous celebration of " Kitchen Lancers " at a county ball, Miss Bass (afterwards Baroness Burton) was tossed from the fray into the circle of spectators. One of these, having somewhat too audibly commented : " Not quite Vere de Vere ! " was crushed by the young lady's retort : " No, because it's Beer de Beer 1 " She is the only child of the late Lord Burton (head of Bass's Brewery Co.), and succeeded to her father's title under a special remainder. TRADE AND ENGLISH ARISTOCRACY 311 Henry Meux, founder of another well-known brewery and descendant of a London mercer, is extinct, but the name and wealth of Meux have passed to Admiral Sir Hedworth Meux (Lambton), brother of the Earl of Durham, by bequest from Lady Meux, widow of the last baronet. Mention has already been made of the Buxtons, descendants of Essex clothiers, as brewers, and their partners the Hanburys, it may be noted, claim to be of the same stock as the Barons Bateman and Sudeley, other members of the family pandering to the drinking propensities of infants as manufacturers of Allen and Hanbury's baby foods. Tobacco, the natural concomitant of beer, has recently brought a peerage and two baronetcies to the family of Wills, and in the eighteenth century played a considerable part in the enrichment of Joshua Vanneck, the wealthy London merchant whose descendant is the present Lord Hunting- field. The obscurity which usually surrounds the fate of younger sons in English social history makes it far less easy to trace the cases of cadets of good family who have adopted a trading career than to name those of families whose fortunes were acquired in commerce. A good instance, however, of the absence of any social barrier between merchants and great landowners is afforded by the ancient and famous territorial house of the Lowthers of Lowther Castle, now Earls of Lonsdale. Sir Christo- pher Lowther, the head of the house, who was succeeded by his son Sir John, in 1617 had a younger son Robert, who became a merchant at Leeds and afterwards a London draper and an alderman. His grandson was made a baronet in 1697, but the title became extinct in the middle of the eighteenth century. The eldest brother, Sir John Lowther's eldest son, Sir John, married a daughter of Sir Richard Fletcher, a wealthy Cocker- mouth merchant, of whom we shall speak below, and was grandfather by her of the first Viscount Lonsdale. But their third son, Richard, became a " Turkey Missing Page Missing Page Missing Page Missing Page 3i6 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE claiming as long a pedigree as the Welds. The Buncombes of Buckinghamshire were another landed family of which the elder branch remained gentry, being afterwards represented by the Pauncefort-Duncombe baronets, while a cadet went into trade. Charles Buncombe, goldsmith, to whom James II. applied in vain for a loan of £^5°° " to carry him over sea," accumulated wealth by consistent sharp practice, culminating in forgery, from the consequences of which he only escaped owing to technical legal reasons ; but he was able to spend ^90,000 on the Yorkshire estate of Helmsley, once held by the great Fairfax and the brilliant Buke of Bucking- ham, and on his death in 171 1 he was reputed the richest commoner in England, and left ^200,000 to his niece, the Buchess of Argyle. From his sister, who had married a London merchant, descends the present Earl of Fever- sham. Instances of members of noble families marrying heiresses of traders have already been given in abundance, but an early case which has not been mentioned is that of the daughter of Sir John Spencer, cloth-worker and Levant merchant. Lord Mayor in 1594, who married the second Lord Compton, afterwards first Earl of Northampton. Mention may also be made of the death of Viscountess Faulkland in 1722, for Musgrave's Obituary records that " she was daughter to Mr. Molineux, late woollen draper of St. Paul's Churchyard," where woollen drapers stiU do congregate. Examples of traders marrying noble heiresses are not quite so common, but a good instance is to be found in the case of the Brands, who were mercers and traders until about 1720, when Thomas Brand married the Lady Bacre, representative of a score of ancient families, and became Lord Bacre, a title now borne by his descendant Viscount Hampden. It is surely unnecessary to labour the point of the in- timate connection between trade and nobility at the present time when our roads are scoured by motor-cars built by the firm founded by the Hon. C. S. Rolls, son ■Ill pij /^anit !■ KAKI-.R r.UANIi, \"lb(;Ol'N'r IIAAirni- N l.y )l'riiiiir. Il'atk,,:.,. ''i, t/i,- /^'sstss/nii .'/'ll'. l,r<,iv, s-l .,>r,i . Jls,/. TRADE AND ENGLISH ARISTOCRACY 317 of the first Lord Llangattock, and our seas are swept by vessels fitted with turbines invented and manufactured by Sir Charles Parsons, son of the Earl of Rosse, when our women folk purchase their hats from millinery shops run by ladies of title, and our own pockets are filled or depleted by innumerable companies all provided with titled directors. There is significance in the fact that the peerages start alphabetically with Lord Aberconway, who is not only a K.C. but also a director of one railway and four coal and iron companies. Enough has been said to establish our contention that of the three chief sources from which our nobility and gentry are recruited — military, legal and commercial — commercial services are, and have long been, considered as honourable, as profitable to the country, and as worthy of reward as services rendered on the field or in the court. " All this confirms what I have said before, viz. that trade in England neither is nor ought to be levell'd with what it is in other countries, or the tradesmen depreciated as they are abroad, and as some of our gentry would pre- tend to do in England ; but that as many of our best families rose from trade, so many branches of the best families in England . . . have stoop'd so low as to be put apprentices to tradesmen in London, and to set up and follow those trades when they have come out of their times and have thought it no dishonour to their blood."! ! Defoe, The Complete English Tradesman (1726), p. 379. XXII THE HUDSON'S BAY COMPANY OR various reasons individual businesses do not usually survive many generations. We have seen the commercial monument built by de la Pole disappear on the death of his son, and the great businesses of Whit- tington, of Gresham, of Peel, of all the giants of commerce in Venice,- Florence and Augsburg either die with their creators, or continue for a time only. The enormous business seems to grow and then die much like the giant oak ; it does not appear to be possible so to construct it, to surround it with safe- guards and bulwarks, or so to organize it that ability, energy and perseverance shall always continue in control. The uncertain quantity is human nature. To the man who builds, delight lies in the building. To his son or successor and to his son's son the pleasure must lie in maintaining, in increasing, in strengthening. But in- herited wealth and virility do not long as a rule continue as partners, they sooner or later always part company. The controller of the business may be and often is foolish, weak, or lazy, easily satisfied, or unprogressive, dissipated, or unambitious, and the business is soon out- run or outgeneralled by its ubiquitous competitors and finally disappears. This is the rule, but one of the excep- tions, which are so few as to be wonderfully conspicuous, is the subject of this chapter. The oldest commercial company in existence is the 318 THE HUDSON'S BAY COMPANY 319 Hudson's Bay Company. Established almost two hun- dred and fifty years ago, it is still live, aggressive and powerful, while of the hundreds or thousands of con- cerns organized at the same time, or even fifty ^or more years later, hardly one survives. Such virility is superb, and shows how deeply and securely the foundations of this great company were laid. It proves the marvellous ability of its chiefs during the early years, and also of those who have directed its affairs down to the present day. While we do not propose undertaking anything more than a very brief survey of its centuries of accomplish- ment, we find it has done so much and has made history to such an extent that even a summary must occupy a large proportion of our pages. As Bryce says in his most fascinating and complete history of the Hudson's Bay Company : " The London merchants were mighty men, men who could select their agents, and send their ships, and risk their money on every sea and on every shore " ;^ and that newly discovered but still unknown and un- traveUed country comprising the northern half of North America offered to these intrepid and fearless merchant- adventurers a field doubly enticing because of its great risk and its possible very large profit. About the middle of the seventeenth century two French Protestants, Medard Chouart and Pierre Esprit Radisson, journeyed to Canada. They penetrated the frozen country as far as Hudson's Bay. They saw and became acquainted with the Indians, traded with them for furs, and were impressed with the possibilities of a large and lucrative trade. Their several early voyages and expeditions finally ended to their disadvantage, for on returning to Quebec they were arrested by the French Governor and heavily fined for illicit trading. They appealed against the fine, ^ The Remarkable History of the Hudson's Bay Company, hj George Bryce, m.a., ll.d,, Professor in Manitoba College, Winnipeg, etc. etc. 320 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE and urged, both in Quebec and Paris, the great advantage that would accrue to New France (as that part of the country was then called) if an expedition under Govern- ment control was sent to explore this vast region ; but Paris was deaf to their appeals. Receiving no satisfaction in this quarter they then turned to England and to its chief town in America, Boston, before whose merchants they placed their argu- ments. They were promised two ships, but the ships went elsewhere, and they again failed in the realization of their dream. They were nearly ready to abandon their project when they met two Royal Commissioners, sent to America by Charles II. to settle several disputed ques- tions between the Mother Country and New England, One of these. Sir George Carteret, induced them to return with him to England and tell their story to the King, who readily promised them a ship for their long- desired expedition. But Stuart promises were made more easily than they were fulfilled, and delay still followed delay, until by good fortune they obtained an audience with Prince Rupert, the King's cousin, and awakened his interest at once. An association was formed, a ship secured, the voyage made, and proofs obtained that the two persistent Frenchmen were right in their judgment. The country did indeed offer an opportunity for development, and what more was to be desired ? On May 2nd, 1670, the Charter of the Hudson's Bay Company was signed and sealed by the King. The privileges he bestowed were enormous, for it was easy to be generous with regard to a country of which he knew nothing more than that it was now to be called Prince Rupert's land in honour of his cousin, their chief and active head. The Charter ensured the Company " the whole trade of all those seas, straits, and bays, rivers, lakes, creeks and sounds in whatsoever latitude they shall be, that lie within the entrance of the straits commonly called Hudson's Straits, together with all the lands, countries and territories '- -^Jajiiist:<: i -^^^fS^^ ( HAk'l iMADIC FOR T H K HrT).SC'N>^ i;AV COMI'ANV sHi>>\"IN'i, \\lli^>\\ i;a., i.Alil^AOOi: ANIj 'IIIE M Hv t ll-WliS I l'\^sAGE From nn c/r^r.ij'i/ii^- i/i the ih-lllsh Mustiiiii THE HUDSON'S BAY COMPANY 321 upon the coasts and confines of the seas, straits, bays, lakes, rivers, creeks and sounds aforesaid which are now actually possessed by any of our subjects or by the subjects of any other Christian prince or state," and the rights further included " the fisheries, the minerals in- cluding gold, silver, gems and precious stones." All this, however, was almost by th.6 way, for what now seems most remarkable to us is that the Charter gave this great tract, extending from Hudson's Bay to the Pacific — a tract including about one-third of all North America, " in free and common socage," i.e. the Com- pany as proprietor was the absolute possessor. It was given entire military control. It could raise armies and ships of war within its boundaries when it chose, and it could appoint governors ; and this absolute control was held and exercised for two and a quarter centuries. II The Company had been incorporated in 1670, and the remaining years of the century saw its development on very gradual lines. The voyages, starting from Gravesend, were almost monotonous in their similarity. Each year, about the end of May, those in control in London consigned their cargoes of merchandise to the captain's care. We read, for instance, of one ship's inventory in 1672 as containing 200 brass kettles, 200 fowling pieces, 12 gross of knives, 900 or 1000 hatchets ; while a few years later, tobacco, glass beads, 6000 flints, boxes of red lead, looking-glasses, netting for fishing, pewter dishes and pewter plates constituted part of the stock which was to be traded for furs. Each ship took out men who were to act as agents for the Company in the trading stations in the frozen North. For a hundred years the Company satisfied itself by maintaining stations, which were forts and places of protection as well, only on the shores of Hudson's Bay. 322 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE There was no occasion for penetrating further inland, because the Indians brought their year's catch to these points to exchange them for the wonderful merchandise of the white men. The Company was a keen trader, as its coat of arms implied — " Pro PeUe Cutem " (skin for skin) ; but it never forgot the great principles of fair trading, and the Indians soon learnt to trust its agents implicitly. As soon as the ice disappeared from the rivers the Indians started for the posts ; by July or early in August the trading season was at its height. The furs were bought, the ship loaded and sent on her homeward journey. October usually saw her arrival in the Thames, and when one considers the small size of the boats and the difficulties of a voyage the losses seem very few. But with the arrival of the furs in London the Company's work was only partly done, for they had still to be sold. When the market was very unfavourable the sales were postponed, and we can easily imagine the obstacles which the keen fur buyers of Europe placed in the way of the sellers. The sales were conducted by auction, and that system became so well grounded in those early days that it persists in the world-renowned sales of sealskins and other furs stiU held in London twice each year. Those old auctions, however, were a little less prosaic than the present, as is proved by the entertainment which it was thought wise that the Company should give the prospective bidders. We read that during the November sale of 1681 " a committee was appointed to provide three dozen bottles of sack and three dozen bottles of claret to be given to buyers at ye sale. Dinner was also bespoken at ' Ye Stillyard ' of a good dish of fish, a loyne of veal, two pullets and four ducks." These figures of the articles sent out for trade, the returns and the entertainment aU seem very small to us now, but the Company was still young. Yet the first recorded dividend — fifty per cent — ^was declared in 1684 ; it was followed by a similar one in 1688 ; in 1689 THE HUDSON'S BAY COMPANY 323 by one of twenty-five per cent, while in 1690 the returns were so admirable that it was decided to treble the stock. The reasons given were these : " (i) The Company has in its warehouse about the value of its original stock (^(^10,500). " (2) The Factories at Fort Nelson and New Severn are in- creasing in trade, and this year the returns are expected to be j^20,ooo in beaver. " (3) The Factories are of much value. " (4) Damages are expected from the French for a claim of ^100,000." A dividend of twenty-five per cent was then declared, being equivalent to seventy-five per cent on their original stock. We can assume that these careful and thrifty old merchants thoroughly understood their business, and that they were within the bounds of safety in declaring a huge dividend on expectations of realizing a claim from the then unfriendly country of France. Nowadays, however, Capel Court would look upon a similar action as akin to prematurely counting one's chickens. The King, WilHam III., was one of the shareholders, and on the occasion of the declaration of this great dividend he had but recently returned from a victorious campaign in Ireland. A deputation in presenting his share of the profits accompanied it with the following address : " Your Majestie's most Loyal and Dutiful subjects beg leave to congratulate your Majestie's Happy Return here with Honour and Safety. And we do daily pray to Heaven (that hath God wonderfully preserved your Royal Person) that in all your under- takings Your Majestie may be as victorious as Caesar, as beloved as Titus, and (after all) have the long and glorious Reigne and Peaceful! end of Augustus. " On this happy occasion we desire also most humbly to present to your Majestie a dividend of Two Hundred and twenty-five Guineas upon three hundred pounds stock in the Hudson's Bay Company, now Rightfully delivered to your Majestie. And although we have been the greatest sufferers of any Company 324 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE from those common enemies of all mankind, the French, yet when your Majestie's just Arms shall have given Repose to all Christendom, we also shall enjoy our share of these great Benefits, and do not doubt but to appeare often with this golden fruit in our hands, under the happy influence of Your Majestie's most gracious protection over us and all our Concerns." There is no doubt but that Prince Rupert's Governor- ship of the Company, and the presence among its share- holders of important people at Court, helped it enor- mously in its early days, when Governmental protection meant so much to hazardous undertakings such as this. In those days the titled classes lost no fair opportunity of joining in commercial adventures and of adding any influence they possessed to their success. Great, there- fore, was the loss to the Company when Prince Rupert died in November, 1682, and long and serious were the deliberations as to his successor. While James, Duke of York, was most unpopular with the people at large, he possessed a keen head for business and a liking for it. He was therefore chosen Governor in January, 1683, a duty he assumed without hesitation, and performed punctually until he became king on the death of Charles three years later ; and it is pleasing to read that the Company benefited greatly by his intelligent adminis- tration. On James's retirement his favourite. Lord Churchill, afterward the Duke of Marlborough, was chosen for the post, and his efforts and abilities seem to have been as great as those of his princely predecessors. He was Governor throughout seven years of troublous times for England, during which he forsook his friend James and helped to induce William of Orange to make himsell king in James's place. He used his influence in favoui of the Company whenever and wherever he could, anc was rewarded for all these services by the elaborat* thanks of the Company, and by more substantial token of their gratitude in the shape of pieces of plate. Hi Governorship, however, came to an abrupt end when 01 Fr,i„ n Inu' r ■C'l I'klN'C'E Kl'FKK'I ii,C ''r '/'. C/miJihis a/Iff a paii,(ni^ I V IKtI'Snii THE HUDSON'S BAY COMPANY 325 one morning in May, 1692, William UL, becoming con- vinced that the Earl was proving false to him, sent him to the Tower under an accusation of high treason. As it happened his imprisonment was short, but it became imperative that the post should be filled by someone else. Sir Stephen Evance was therefore selected, and con- tinued as Governor for many years. The extraordinary position which the Hudson's Bay Company had acquired by the close of the century deserves a word of comment in passing. It was still the age of Romance in Commerce. Starting in a compara- tively small way, this body of merchant-adventurers had won for itself in less than twenty-five years a commanding position among the great commercial undertakings of the time. Its chief office was not only accepted but sought for by the greatest men of the kingdom. It was petted by the British public, favoured at Court, respected by those in foreign lands who cast jealous eyes at its high and successful position. Ownership of its shares was almost a royal favour. It was highly profitable ; it possessed a charter with privileges greater than any ever granted before or since. The execution of its business carried with it the greatest fascination for adventurous spirits, for there were not only the innumerable risks of shipwreck or capture upon the high seas but the even more probable dangers attendant on the development of a new and wonderful territory. And the very breath of romance rested upon the products of its trading. The furs possessed the charm of the distant and almost impenetrable forest, and carried to the hands of the great dames of Europe the touch of the savage redman of a continent thousands of miles away. Every pelt which came to these shores brought with it the aroma of the salty ocean spray. Here was free opportunity for imagin- ation to run as wild as the great wind from the boundless prairies of the West. 326 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE III But though the youthful Company made an en- couraging start by sailing its ship of progress through a smooth sea, clouds and storms arose a year or two before the beginning of the eighteenth century, which gave great alarm to the directors. Louis XIV. of France carried his imperative ways so far that in 1690 four of his neighbours — Germany, Spain, Holland and England — combined to force him to a more reasonable attitude. After several years of hard work and much fighting Louis accepted his defeat, at least to the extent of making them overtures for peace. They received these advances, and appointed a meeting at William IIL's chateau near The Hague. We are only concerned with one of the various articles discussed at this meeting, which became part of the treaty and proved of vital importance to the Hudson's Bay Company. " Article VH. compelled the restoration to the King of France and the King of Great Britain respectively of ' all countries, islands, forts and colonies ' which either had possessed before the declaration of war in 1690."^ Now the great territory given to the Hudson's Bay Company had been claimed by France long before that date, and the Company awoke to the seriousness of their position too late. They sent a strong and influential deputation to The Hague which did something, but not enough. The Treaty as finally signed was a decided blow to the Company, and for at least fifteen years after that date its affairs suffered greatly. So much territory around Hudson's Bay was by the Treaty claimed by and allowed to the French, that in 1700 the Company received even from their stronghold Fort Albany only one-fifth its usual quantity of furs, and their year's trading showed an actual loss. That they should have struggled for so long in this 1 Bryce's History of the Hudson's Bay Company. THE HUDSON'S BAY COMPANY 327 uphill fight against such odds speaks well for the per- tinacity of this sturdy band of merchant-adventurers. They had no reason to think that the conditions would be reversed, as happily they were when Marlborough's victories brought Louis XIV. to sue again for peace. When this Treaty was signed at Utrecht, Great Britain watched her interests in the new world much more carefully. She insisted upon and received as her own certain West India Islands, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and the entire west coast of Hudson's Bay, with the undisturbed control of the Iroquois. A special sectioil of the Treaty provided " that the French King should take care that satisfaction be given, according to the rule of justice and equity, to the English Company trading to the Bay of Hudson for all damages and spoil done to their colonies, ships, persons and goods by the hostile incursions and depredations of the French in time of peace." The lobby for the Company was therefore as success- ful upon this occasion as it was unsuccessful fifteen years before. The Treaty calmed the troubled waters so well that the great public concluded as the years went by that the waters were too smooth, and felt that the Company whose Charter gave it such extraordinary privileges should assume certain obligations as well. The discovery of the North-West Passage had long been a cherished dream, and many began to criticize the Hudson's Bay Company for not showing activity in that direction. It was all very well to buy and sell furs, to make a profit and declare a dividend, but how about opening up the country f They said the Company had become lethargic and needed competition to wake it up, — and it probably did. One of the Company's chief opponents was a Mr. Arthur Dobbs, and he excited the public interest by a most stirring book. He quoted from the accounts of the early voyagers their description of the interior of North America with its great rivers, fertile soil and wonderful 328 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE scenery. He argued that the Company had all this at its door, but was missing the opportunity of adding such wealth to England's resources because it had become rich and sluggish. It had lived out its days of virility. It was no longer fit for the great work which must be done. First, let the discovery of the North- West Passage be made, and what could not then be done ? Opinions of leading men were quoted, and those expressed by the Earl of Halifax — that great friend of colonization after whom the city of Halifax, Nova Scotia, was named — might be read into our leading columns to-day with equal force. It was said of him that " he knows the true state of the nation — that it depends on trade and manufactures ; that we have more rivals than ever ; that navigation is our bulwark, and colonies our chief support ; and that new channels should be industriously opened. Therefore we survey the whole globe in search of fresh inlets which our ships may enter and traffic." Dobbs had the gift of making written words count. He was convincing, and the Company, like many other strong men and great companies, offered nothing to combat his argument, so that the feeling against it grew steadily. A great Company — a combination of men and money — often through the valour of independence ignores attacks ; but the public character of such a Company must be defended — its leaders must strike back, strike hard, just as any man's private character must, when necessary, be defended. Public opinion is a force, perhaps the greatest we have to reckon with. To ignore criticism which cannot be sustained, to carry dignity to the point of indifference to public opinion, has so often proved a fatal error that it would seem that everyone should know it by now. But everyone does not. However, the Hudson's Bay Company let someone else discover the North-West Passage — someone who had MR. SAMUEL HEARNE LATi; CHlEl^ AT I'lMNXE OF WAi.Ks'S l-dRT, [JUDSON'S HAV From an eni^ra^'iiig in tJte EtUl nf^>\X KAI-.H\i AMI MII^I/l _MIMX(; (OMI'AW. lOKlO, |Al'A\ JAPAN 357 President : Baron Takayasu Mitsui (Executive partner M.G.K.). Directors : Mr. S. Hayakawa, Mr. S. Ikeda, Mr. U. Yoneyama, Mr. Morinosuke Mitsui (Councillor M.G.K.), Mr. T. Dan (Councillor M.G.K.). Toshin Warehousing Co., Ltd. Capital 2,000,000 yen paid up. President : Mr. Yonosuke Mitsui Directors : Mr. K. Hayashi, Mr. S. Hatano (Councillor M.G.K.), Mr. K. Eukui (Director M.B.K.). The Company are the principal Shareholders of the following enterprises : — Oji Paper Manufacturing Co., Ltd. Capital 8,400,000 yen paid up. President : Mr. Tokuyemon Mitsui. Directors : Mr. G. Fujiwara, Mr. S. Ohashi, Mr. T. Ono, Mr. N. Ariga, Mr. K. Takashima. Mr. N. Koda, Mr. K. Ogasawara. Sakai Celluloid Co., Ltd. Capital 2,000,000 yen paid up. President : Mr. Yonosuke Mitsui. Directors : Mr. M. Morita, Mr. T. Dan (Councillor M.G.K.), Mr. K. Fujino. 358 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Shibaura Iron Works, Ltd. Capital 5,000,000 yen. Paid up 2,750,000 yen. President : Mr. Morinosuke Mitsui. Directors : Mr. K. Kishi, Mr. S. Kobayashi, Mr. T. Dan (Councillor M.G.K.), Mr. J. Otaguro, Mr. J. R. Geary. Outside of Mitsui people — (Representative, General Electric Co. of America). Mitsukoshl Gofukuten, Ltd. (Successor of old " Echigoya.") (Originally Drapery Store, now a Department Store). Capital 2,000,000 yen. Paid up, 1,750,000 yen. President : Mr. H. Nozaki. Directors : Mr. T. Asabuki, Mr. K. Fujimura,. Mr. R. Nakamura, Mr. Y. Masuda, Mr. S. Yamaoka, Hokkaido Tanko Kisen Kaisha, Ltd. {Hokkaido Colliery and Steamship Company, Ltd). Capital 27,000,000 yen. Paid up 22,500,000 yen. President : Mr. T. Dan (Councillor M.G.K.), Directors : Mr. T. Isomura, Mr. T. Uno, Mr. C. Ikegami, Mr. N. Yamada, Mr. W. Amamiya, Mr. K. Takashiro. JAPAN 359 An Abstract of the Memorandum or Association of Mitsui Gomei Kaisha (Firm of Mitsui Partnership ; the holding Company.) Art. I. The name of the Firm is Mitsui Gomei Kaisha. Art. 2. The objects of the Firm are to acquire hold and ad- minister securities, to carry on afforestry and manu- facture of camphor, etc. Art. 3. The Capital of the Firm shall be 50,000,000 yen divided into 1,000 shares. Art. 8. The Partners of the Firm shall amongst themselves bear responsibility according to the proportion of their individual subscriptions. Art, 10. When a partner shall have lost his right of Headship of his Family, his rights and responsibilities shall as a matter of course devolve upon the heir of such partner. Art. II. A partner shall not be permitted to assign to any others any portion or the whole of his shares, neither shall he be permitted to place his shares as security with others. Art. 13. The partners shall amongst themselves in general meeting elect . . . Executive partners to conduct the business affairs of the Firm. Art. 26. The Partners shall have the right of one vote for each share held. Art. 31. The sum to be placed to the Reserve Fund of the Firm shall be over and above 50 per cent of the Net Profit of each fiscal term. Art. 32. The names of the Partners of this Company are as follows : Hachiroyemon (Baron) . . Mitsui Gennoske . Mitsui Genyemon . . Mitsu Takayasu (Baron) . . Mitsui Hachirojiro (Baron) . Mitsui Takanaga Mitsui Sugako (Miss) . Mitsui Morinosiike . Mitsui Takaaki . Mitsui Yonosiike . Mitsui Tokiiyemon . . Mitsui Missing Page Missing Page 362 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE affiliated. There was less money in the world and less need for money. Commerce was in its infancy. Com- petition was infinitely less, and the terrific effort to get business which now permeates the commercial world was a thing unknown. Where one Jacob Fugger, Cosimo de Medici, de la Pole or Gresham strove for success we have now literally thousands of keen, clever men as fear- less, as progressive and as determined as they. Money not only for the few but for the many is the prize which is sought, and for this prize is the race now perhaps swifter, the battle keener, the game bigger than has been any race, battle, or game since the world began ; and commerce in its broader sense is the medium through which this prize is won. And the day of physical adventure is over. The day of the bold Phoenician, the fearless trader who with his caravan threaded his way into unknown lands ; the day when the early English merchant-sailor trusted and risked his fortune in one small boat, and sought out markets and trading points in undiscovered corners of the earth — these days are gone for ever. The earth has all been " discovered," its lands and peoples are known, and its oceans charted. The merchant who desires to transact business abroad has at his call every detail of information regarding every country, island, or people. The world is smaller. Steam and electricity, great ships, railways and many recorded experiences have made it so ; but as the circumference of this earth has seemed to diminish its commercial undertakings have grown greater. Men of genius and wonderful nerve and deter- mination, who in the Dark Ages would have been conquer- ing princes, have in these later years thrown their ability into Commerce and have conquered, not territory and slaves, but trade and its child, money, from any and every part of the world where trade was to be found. The man of business of the twentieth century differs enormously from the merchant-adventurer of the four- teenth, fifteenth and sixteenth centuries in his methods A GREAT DISTRIBUTING HOUSE 363 and the tools with which he works. The last hundred years have shown him that one man cannot do it all, and that anyone who attempts to hold within his two hands all the threads o£ a great business of the present day fails to achieve the greatest success. No one has more than a given number of minutes in every day and year in which he can work, and no matter how great his ability he will soon find his limitations. If, however, he uses that ability in finding and teaching others as capable as himself, or in certain details even more so, the limits to his sphere of operations are hard to set. This ability, therefore, to organize, to breathe into others that fire of enthusiasm, that quality of judgment, that spirit of progress, has long been considered by think- ing men of commerce as the final and greatest of all qualities, the test of supreme commercial genius. In an abridged description of trade such as the present, the great Distributing House or Department Store, so called for the want of a better title, may be per- mitted to represent the modern spirit of organization. It is to the writer the most interesting of aU forms of business, and by its constant and necessary publicity it occupies perhaps the most conspicuous place in the public mind. It usually employs the greatest number of people, and must seek employes of the higher grade of intelligence. It frequently, therefore, pays out in salaries and wages a larger sum weekly than any other single business, and is more often approached by those seeking opportunity to work than any other. Its daily transactions are large in volume, its cash handled is very great. It is intimately associated with every family in the community in supplying them with the necessities of life, and thus by force of circumstances enters into the daily life of the city in which it is. We can perhaps best appreciate the magnitude of this modern develop- ment when we remember that a hundred years ago the selling of goods at retail had settled into a system of small shops, each confining itself to a particular class of Missing Page Missing Page 366 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE of space and beauty of design, and embodying every newest device to lighten manual labour and to give greater protection to the goods. The floors are of marble or mosaic or are covered with hundreds of thousands of yards of carpets. The lifts are almost without number, for there are already great stores equipped with between one and two hun- dred lifts of the highest grade and excellence, and all must have many staircases as well. But further details of the physical plant are quite unnecessary. Everyone who is familiar vnth the large cities knows at least some- thing of the enormous size to which each division of the great department store has attained. In this specially built receptacle are placed many hun- dreds of thousands of pounds worth of merchandise, gathered and selected with the utmost care and experi- ence from every corner of the world. Buyers are con- tinually sent skirmishing here, there and everywhere, to buy of well-known and time-tried makers, or to discover hidden away in some almost inaccessible village a little unknown maker who is producing some trifle of com- mercial value. The merchant sends the buyer far afield with instruc- tions to invest a greater or less sum of money in such goods, either staples or novelties, as he thinks will interest the home public. He risks his money and a certain amount of prestige upon the judgment of the buyer, to whom an intimate knowledge of the public's wishes and whims, and of the department's ability to sell profitably what he buys is absolutely necessary to remove as much as possible of the element of risk. Much merchandise begins to depreciate from the day it arrives ; practically none increases in value. The buyer then must learn to buy enough and not too much ; to buy what wiU give satisfaction when sold again ; to pay not too much for what he buys ; to know qualities and values ; to spend his employer's money wisely and well. AU this carries with it a certain speculative risk, but so certain does his NT :tof on of tletie .1 tion ■^'tch lispatch Fai ^^St Account I Hospitals edical Berv X -l — Dentist 1 Stable J Drivers 1 I ispatrh Btablemeilrc^*^ I rvicB Motor Garaf tilation itch I Motor Drive I Motor Kepai 1 Machinery -1 'ower -f \t r Water Supply House Carpenters r- ^ Alterations Bepairs Cleaning X. i I. i Plumbing House Painters I Sprinkler System ipectora ' i'ire Jnspectara Aero Fire Alarm System Fixture Folisfaera Fixture ^'Fitting Bepairs Upholsterers A CiKEAl' DISTKIUUTIJNG HUUSE 367 judgment become, that the house conducted on scientific lines can estimate to a fraction of one per cent, what reduction must be made on the remainders or on un- desirable purchases before the lot is cleared, since such reductions must always be made. But there are other risks to be taken by the merchant besides those of buying stock, and the man who fears to take risks must, to be successful, find some other avenue for his activity than the business of the department store. Perhaps the accompanying Chart of Organization should be scanned by the reader before learning of some of the other " chances " which the merchant must face. A great department store must always depend vitally upon its staff, and this chart shows how the staff of a house employing from 5000 upwards can best divide the responsibilities in the conduct of its business. There are seven great divisions of labour each independent of the other, but all necessarily close, co-operative and thoroughly in harmony with the policy of the business. By reference to the chart they will be seen to be classed as follows : — The control of the building itself, the fittings and furniture : in other words, the physical home in which the business is to be conducted — the gathering of the merchandise which is to fill the counters, shelves and reserve rooms — the selling of these goods — the selection of the great staff by whom all parts of the business are carried on — the clerical work of the business, including its finance — the supervision of the very many individual systems so necessary to a smooth running establishment — the supervision of expense. Perhaps a more careful outline of each of these pro- vinces may not be out of place. Let us therefore follow each in turn and show the qualities of mind and direc- tions of thought necessary in each. To refer then to the first one mentioned — the control and management of the buildings and equipments. 368 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE The Sufep&tsors of this -portion of the organization must bg-students of architecture and schools of design. Thejr^ust know of the best which man has thus far been able to draw and to build, and must include in that knowledge the relative value and cost of each of the component parts which enter into the construction. They must know the best markets in which to find their requirements, and be keen to originate new and workable ideas for improvement, and equally keen to acknowledge and accept ideas, if practical, which someone else has worked out ; for it must be recognized that when once an improvement has been demonstrated and put into use it becomes pubUc property, and can be adopted by anyone progressive enough to accept it. There is very little in a department store which is patentable, and secrecy in the case of its improvements either in architecture or equipment is quite out of the question. The supervisors of this division must be open-minded and free from prejudice, for otherwise they build a wall beyond which they cannot see. Indeed in this, as in every division of the control of a twentieth-century business, broadmindedness is an aU important factor. The Supervisors of Merchandise, or merchandise mana- gers, must be students of men, of markets, of the science of trading and of figures. Of men, because they are advising and controlling the buyers, but doing it so adroitly as not to deprive them of their responsibility, credit and enthusiasm. They must know more or less intimately the world's markets, so that they can inteUi- gently advise with the buyers as to where and when to buy. They must be pastmasters in the art of trading, for otherwise they are controlling those who know better than they. They must be experts in figures, for great businesses now are directed and controlled through figures. To the merchandise manager a detailed report in figures is as clear and as enlightening as the compass to the navigator. It tells him how his ship of trade is A GREAT DISTRIBUTING HOUSE 369 going. It keeps him away from rocks and shoals, and shows where the water is open and clear. To the student of figures a great and seemingly complicated statement of percentages is as beautiful a picture as can well be made, and with it always goes the satisfactory feeUng that figures cannot lie. When reports deceive, as they easily can do, it is not the fault of the figures but of the one who made them. Business results are based nearly always on comparison. This month or quarter or year with last — this department with its neighbour — this business with some corresponding business, if need be in some other part of the world, but comparison, always comparison, is the thing. Yet comparisons, no matter how illuminating they may be, are of little value to the self-satisfied manager or board of managers. If one cannot learn from others, one can only be interested in comparisons when they are in one's own favour, and such a policy is only comparable with that of the ostrich whose head is buried in the sand, again demonstrating how necessary is the open mind. Self-contentment finds no chair, no place for repose in the modern business which has for its motto " Excelsior." The merchandise managers must cultivate conserva- tive judgment and must be free from impulsive hysteria. Conservatism does not mean always saying " no," but may be defined as a careful forethought, ready to en- dorse risk when risk can be afforded, and when accom- panied with the chance of probable success. The mer- chant is not a speculator beyond the necessities of his business. Its exigencies require a certain gamble, but one in which the purely speculative is eliminated as far as human ability and thoughtful experience can contrive. The merchant's province is to buy or produce and sell. It is not within his sphere of activity to sell what he has not, nor to " corner " any product, nor to trade beyond his financial or commercial abilities. The buyer may through undue optimism see greater possibilities than 2 B 370 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE exist. It is the merchandise manager's duty to see through and past this too great optimism, and conserva- tively check the step toward hysteria. Conservatism, as understood by the man of commerce, is a vi^ord of two meanings : the one he admires, for the other he has no respect. To be conservative means to be wisely careful, more ready to say " yes " than " no," but only ready with a " yes " when a clear road ahead is evident ; optimistic and enthusiastic on principle, but keenly alive to possible pitfalls ; determined to do, to work, to think, to accom- pUsh, but with eyes wide open, and hand always on the steering wheel. Or to be conservative may mean to let well enough alone ; to adopt as one's motto, " What was good enough for my grandfather is good enough for me " ; to say " no " always, because it is easier and requires less effort, to let things rest as they are rather than give one's sanction to a change, a possible advance. To shrink from the re- sponsibihty of trying anything which has not already been tried. In short, such conservatism means standing still rather than advancing. It is the opposite of progress. It is the result of mental laziness and physical inactivity. It hates imagination, shuns progress, fears anything new, and guided by this kind of conservatism no nation. State, business or individual has done great things or left a creditable impress on the period in which it or he lived. The other conservatism — the progressive conservatism, if we may use this term — stands, however, for almost the opposite. It takes progress to its arms, it feels that nothing is " good enough " which can be better, that our grandfathers' methods and results should, wherever possible, be surpassed. It stands for effort, no matter at what physical or mental cost, if that effort will place the foot a step further toward what may be called the better. Such conservatism is optimistic, happy and never tiring, but it brackets all effort with the principle of A GREAT DISTRIBUTING HOUSE 371 intelligent forethought. It counts the cost with a " look before you leap," but nevertheless urges the leap if safe ground and a fair landing is evident. It applauds imagination as the forerunner and roadbuilder for judg- ment. It counts imagination as its wild, fantastic, but original comrade who is always exploring the undis- covered, and who often points out the way to new vic- tories. One conservatism makes for progress, the other stands still or worse. One looks up and out, the other down and back. One thrills with determination, the other shudders with hesitation. One is the disciple of intelligent opti- mism, the other is nearer pessimism than it knows. It is the intelligent conservatism of progress which is essentially a necessity for the managers of the several great divisions of a large department store. To the managers of merchandise it is especially so, yet it is but one of the many qualities required, for broad and far- reaching must be the experience which is hourly called upon by this important division of a great business. The Manager of Staff. Perhaps in a great store — a distributing house — the personnel of the staff is of more importance than in any other undertaking employing many people, and we must now describe the qualifica- tions necessary to those who would fill the posts as managers of staff. A house may spend effort and money to any extent in preparing its building, its stocks, its systems. It may persuasively invite the public to become its customers, but before the public complete their first transactions they must through each individual come in direct contact with some member of the staff, and upon the manner in which that transaction is conducted de- pends largely the future goodwill or disrespect with which the customer regards the business. It behoves the house, therefore, to place in its various departments and behind its many counters those whose manners, attentiveness, acquaintance with their duties. 372 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE will give evidence of intelligence and of a desire to per- form well what is required of them. To the manager of staff falls the selection of the mem- bers of the staff, so that probably their first requisite is a thorough acquaintance with that most complicated of aU studies — Human Nature. He must know men and women and be able to put himself into the condition of mind of the applicant for the position. He must judge quickly from the manner, the words used, the tone of voice, the appearance, the walk, the face and the answers given to his questions ; he must be fair-minded and free from all favouritism or prejudice, and as the listen- ing to complaints and possible reprimand or dismissal of the staff also comes under his control, he must have a keen sense of justice and strength of will to maintain his decision, for whoever allows an unfair and uncalled- for criticism to militate against an employe loses the loyalty of the employe and the respect of the critic. The time has passed when an irritable customer, no matter who he or she may be, can, whether right or wrong, ride rough-shod over the young man or woman behind the counter and demand his or her dismissal, and it is a good thing it is so. There are always two sides to every question, and even when mistakes are made they are usually of the head and not the heart, and the precept to be laid down by the staff manager to employes should be " Don't make the same mistake twice." He is often sitting as a judge, upon whose decision depends the success or failure of the young man or woman who may be just starting out in life. Fairness is, therefore, a prime quality. But many other duties fall to the staff managers. They must be the friends and co-workers of the staff, always ready to give help or sympathy when wanted. They must know more or less of the manner of life of the men and women, not with the thought or privilege of inter- fering but of recognizing whether each is able to give his best during the business hours of each day. Thej^ A GREAT DISTRIBUTING HOUSE 373 should help to make each employe happy in his work, for everyone works better who puts his heart into it and does it for the love of doing rather than from the fear of not doing. To the wise managers of men encouragement more often than fault finding brings the better service and loyalty, and anyone who has ever served in a minor capacity knows that a well-earned "pat on the back " will make the blood flow faster and do more to cement the loyalty and determination to do continually better than any number of scantily earned reprimands. The managers of staff must, therefore, find it as easy to say a pleasant thing as to reprove, and must know when to administer praise or blame. The golden rule of treating others as one would like to be treated is as wise and practical in the business of managing a staff as it was in the Sermon on the Mount, and has in this twentieth century been adopted as a guiding principle by the most eminently successful managers of men. The Managers of Selling. Every division of a great department store is fascinating to one whose mind grasps and enjoys details, and this faculty is an absolute essential to the managers of selling. Each is an executive officer carrying out in minute detail the policy which the head of the business has formulated or endorsed. For a great manufacturing and distributing business is like a prin- cipality made up of states. Each state acts co-operatively with aU the others, and the policy is the same for all and must include every division, section and department of the business. Of aU the divisions none offers greater opportunities for that superb quality which we call imagination than that allotted to the managers of selling. As necessity is the mother of invention, so it and imagination are the two parents of originality, which is a prime necessity in a business already surpassing in development and 374 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE excellence in its almost infinite details and ramifications any previous business in the world's history. Originality of one kind is appallingly rare ; such originality as produces an absolutely new idea, which reaches out into the blue sky and grasps a thought that has not been known before, and as the world of civiliza- tion grows older it becomes increasingly difiicult to do so. There are, of course, many, many things which should be discovered, but the human mind is exceedingly finite and it finds its limitations quickly. It would be enormously interesting could we get into communication with Mars or some inhabited planet other than our own and learn how its people are doing things. Suppose steam and its power had never been discovered, how different our lives would be. Suppose the weaving of fibres, or moulding of iron, or the use of electricity, or the discovery of printing, or the making of paper had never come about. Perhaps the people of Mars, if such there are, have not followed our general line of thought. Perhaps they have discovered other principles of which we know nothing. What a gigantic step forward each people could make by communicating with the other. But while ways and means for doing this are still undis- covered, why should not man as the most intelligent animal on this earth develop his originality stUl further by the exercise of that too often discredited faculty of imagination ? But the kind of seeming originality which is more often used consists of adapting an old idea to a new branch of activity. For example, the knitting-machine at first was but the adaptation to machinery of the move- ments of the fingers of the hand-knitter. It was mar- vellously ingenious, but it was nevertheless adaptation. The aeroplane is but the sustaining power of great stiff wings, as we constantly see used by the seagull when flying against the wind, coupled with the internal explosion engine which has been in use for years. A GREAT DISTRIBUTING HOUSE 375 The electric light is nothing more than the electric current of which we have known since the time of Frank- Hn, retarded by a non-conducting substance for a suffi- cient length of time to produce a white heat. And so in a lesser degree many of the seemingly original things resolve themselves into nothing more than adaptations of someone's great discovery. And practically all indus- tries are developments and owe their present conditions to evolution. Of the great discoveries, printing is the only one which we can recall which sprang at once into per- fection, for it is a fact that as beautiful printing was done in Venice, and as beautiful type was designed there within ten years after the first type was cut, as has ever been produced since. But all this is a digression from our subject. We are writing of the duties and oppor- tunities of those men who supervise the sales division of a great department store. The selling of merchandise is the primary reason for existence of a distributing business. Something new, something better must constantly be thought of, and the imagination of the sales manager must devise con- tinually fresh schemes for the stimulus of sales. He must put himself in the place of the public. He must think from the standpoint of the customer. He must dream out the ideal, allowing his thoughts to run wild, and then by bringing judgment and experience to his aid and discarding the impractical and useless, crystallize the thought into workableness. Neither must he expect nor attempt to do all the thinking or imagining himself, but must be quick to receive and act on the suggestions of others, always giving them full credit for what they have proposed. Coming also under this subdivision is the pubhcity branch of the business of which the old merchant- adventurers knew little, and so wide is this field that one could fill volumes with its details. The past few years have seen enormous strides in this art, and so important has it become that it is said that more money is spent 376 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE annually throughout this world for publicity or adver- tisement than for any other purpose. It is called an art, and so it is, but equally is it a science or a profession. It has been taken into the service of commerce just as commerce has employed every other art or profession. As the whole must be greater than a part, so then niust broad commerce be greater than any single profession, or art, or science which it uses, encourages and pays.^ The department store wishes and requires publicity — advertising, if you please, for they are one and the same — and so does almost everything else in the world which will stand the calcium light of public attention. Men in high places do not often wish their work and words to be hidden under a bushel unless they are ashamed of them. Members of Governments often strive for the top of the printed column, though their efforts may be skilfully disguised. Great ladies see to it that their goings and comings are chronicled, that their pictures are printed, that their entertainments are described, and it is only necessary to be half a newspaper man to know these things. Publicity, or perhaps more politely. Recognition, is what they want.' Publicity is the vehicle of the ruler who must retain the good wiU of his people ; of the statesman, politician or agitator ; of the society leader or slum worker ; of the house of commerce, the man of science, the artist, the inventor : and even the man who does nothing often wants to make it known to his feUow-men that he does that nothing uncommonly well. All this is but natural ; to wish the respect of one's fellow-men is a laudable ambition, and why should not this respect be received from a greater number by the aid of printers' ink ? At all events the fact remains that publicity is not often honestly avoided. Let this all be as it may. A department store is a public institution, and its carefully thought-out efforts must be recognized, appre- ciated and taken advantage of by as many as possible. A GREAT DISTRIBUTING HOUSE 377 It therefore looks to printers' ink to help do this work, and for it, pays large amounts freely, with good business judgment ; and the supervision of this branch comes under the general charge of the manager of sales. In a large house, secondary only to its published matter are the displays of merchandise. This too is a kind of advertising. The dressing out of the departments and the windows is done by highly specialized artists, men who study a window with the same care that the stage manager or scenic artist studies his stage effects. Window displays are designed, constructed and actually dressed in the studios before they are placed in the windows. They often require months of study and months for execution. It is an art, and a very costly art, but it is worth all that it costs. Displays are created not from the goods alone, no matter how attractive they may be, for such aids as electricity, flags of all nations, emblems of all under- takings and buntings are also used freely. Graceful palms are as much a part of a comprehensive store scheme as are other decorations, and in fact the whole world of colour and of art are considered by the artistic window- dresser as his field of supply. This feature of the great store is reaching nearer and nearer the point of perfec- tion, but fortunately always as one reaches the goal of what seemed perfection a point of still greater perfection appears further on. Furthermore, as all parts of a business are worked on a mathematical system the manager of sales must be an adept at figures, to whom a table of comparative per- centages is as clear as the primer. He must, therefore, be highly practical as well as imaginative. He must have a broad knowledge of what is going on all over the commercial world so that he may adopt any good new idea which appears. He must know how to encourage original thought in himself and others. He must be a reader, a student, and an observer. And yet there are st 11 some people who look upon 2 E 2 378 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE business as a discredited and unworthy occupation. The want of breadth, of knowledge of world affairs and inability to increase their horizon are singularly apparent in many whose opportunities for what is called education and for finer degrees of civilization have been the greatest, and especially is this true in these islands where " pre- cedent " in certain restricted circles stiU stands for so much. Precedent should have little place in a progressive business, a progressive Government or a progressive nation. To act always according to precedent is to acknow- ledge that one's ability to think and judge is inferior to that of one's grandfathers, and to assume with a blind stupidity that nothing is right which has not been ac- cepted long ago. Steps had to be taken once : they were taken, and as often as not proved to be errors of judgment. No matter, the steps were taken, and right or wrong they are the only ones to be taken again. How extraordinary it is that men can be found who, failing in nerve or brain power, follow Uke blinded sheep some false leader of a century ago simply because he did live a century ago. It is fortunate for the empire, however, that few of the younger men accept the theory that whatever was is right, and generally prefer to think for themselves, while those who stick to many of the old worn-out, moth-eaten policies of the Mid- Victorian era must by the laws of nature before very long retire from the direction of this world's affairs and^seek final rest some- where where things never change. The Managers of Systems. In a large organization someone must be a supervisor of systems. System is the servant which keeps the machinery straight. It is here, there, everywhere. It must never make itself felt except through its beneficial results. It must be known by its works. System which is obtrusive is irritating^; it A GREAT DTSTRIBUTING HOUSE 379 becomes red tapism. System is like gravity, it acts without being apparent. In a great organization it is an imperative necessity, but wisdom in management quickly cuts off any piece of so-called system which has failed to justify its existence. System is like oil, but it is much more than this. It not only keeps the machinery cool and free from friction but it is almost the machinery itself. System, according to the modern department stores' acceptation of the word, means " the best way to do things." How shall merchandise be received ? Certainly not in some haphazard fashion ! A system must be devised based on experiment, experience and conditions. How are the hundreds of thousands of parcels to be delivered each at the door of the right purchaser ? How shall each transaction be carried out to its satisfactory conclusion ? How shall employes set about their tasks ? How shall the building be kept clean, and watched at night ? How shall the cashiers receive and pay out money ? the monthly statements be posted up day by day ? the heating and lighting be done ? the lifts managed ? How shall the entire mechanical and clerical parts of the business be conducted ? Ask system, and if the system of the house is correct, things will at least run smoothly. But system is always the servant, never the master, and furthermore a servant which improves with each added season's practice, and it is the pleasurable task of the managers of the systems of the house to see that the systems are always modern and^the best that can be devised. These men must always have time to investigate any new time, labour or money-saving machinery or con- trivance. If a new typewriter or adding machine is offered it must be looked at, and accepted or declined according to the judgment of the manager of systems. A new method of entering records, of counting money, of making out bills, of collecting parcels, of wrapping Missing Page Missing Page 382 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE 7he Chief or Head of the Business. It now but re- mains to describe the position of the head o£ the house ; for whether the great business is controlled by a board of directors, as is the usual method in England, or by an individual owner, as is more often the case in America, the fact remains that there must be one controlling spirit, one who stands for the policy, the principles and the personality of the house. The head may be designated by any convenient title. He may be the managing director, the chairman, the president, the controller or the owner. It is all the same. His personality must be, or should be, the out- standing influence on the character of the house, and his ambitious breadth of view, knowledge of the world and good judgment will, when competition is strong and healthy, determine the results of his house. If any house is continually to grow and develop and not like the tree to stop after reaching a certain size, but to keep on growing greater, finer and more splendid, the head of such a house must make of business a great game which he loves for the game's sake and never tires of playing. The cold profits in pounds sterling, in dollars, francs or marks must represent simply the counters in the game — desirable in themselves but not the only prize. As the father finds pleasure in watching his son's progress with each week's or year's study and experience, so the merchant should find keen pleasure in the yearly progress of his business — not only in volume but in prestige and excellence. The father does not always look forward to his son's reaching the age of full maturity, for too often when that time is reached he finds his son less close to him and less his own. So the merchant can- not with wisdom consider or look forward to the final growth as the period of the greatest pleasure, because in a business there should be no final growth. He must, therefore, be ambitious as regards his busi- ness beyond the point of final gratification. Business success is by no means the only aim in life, but with the A GREAT DISTRIBUTING HOUSE 383 real merchant it is one of the aims, and one that employs a large number of hours in every day and week. Con- tentment and self-satisfaction have little place in his plan of life. Just as the scientist finds his greatest joy in discovering new formulae, and is not ready to stop and do nothing after finding the first ; so the merchant studies and experiments in new fields of development, new methods, new ideas, new formulse. As he grows in power and strength he must outgrow the littlenesses of the nature with which most men are born. Jealousy and narrowness of outlook must disappear. He should be broad as the great prairies — much more ready to applaud success whenever he sees it than he is to receive applause, for, aside from any more praiseworthy motive, such an act on his part dignifies the calling which he has adopted, and increases its repute among his fellow-men. The great merchant must be a world man and not a local man. He must be in touch with all the world of com- merce, but he must enjoy the continual gaining of fresh knowledge. If all this is irksome, is disagreeable work rather than a happy occupation, he is poorly fitted for his post. The head of the business must know at least in a general way the daily duties and the requirements of each of his lieutenants, though he need not necessarily be a master in each of the varied branches of effort. His opportunity to study human nature is almost infinite, and as has been truly said, the most fascinating study of which man is capable is man. Nor is this study without result, for what can be more delightful than to select some immature and untried young man of latent ability and to direct his development, inspiring, en- couraging, criticising, moulding him into a splendid, strong, successful, self-respecting man. And this is en- tirely within the province of the merchant if he has studied human nature as he should and if he uses his opportunities. Opportunity is what the quick-thinking, energetic man most looks for in this world. Opportunity 384 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE is the road — sometimes broad and smooth, often rough and difficult — but always the road along which one may tread toward that goal called Success. The word oppor- tunity as applied in this sense is wonderfully compre- hensive, encompassing a marvellous range of directions and possibihties, and only second in breadth and scope to the goal to which it leads, namely, Success. What is success ? Pedagogically " the favourable attainment of anything attempted," but what then is the thing to attempt ? The work of life ! What is it ? What is the successful life ? What is the best channel for activity ? Is activity of mind or body necessary ? Can the lazy man be a real success ? Is not one obliged to do something to win success ? The question has been asked a hundred thousand times and answered from innumerable standpoints, but real success must be determined by that great jury which finally decides all big questions — the jury of public opinion. We may say that we believe that Success in its broadest meaning is the favourable attainment of that object or series of objects which makes for a higher standard of civilization, which gives to the world higher ideals in those things which concern the everyday life of the mul- titude. The people count for more than ever before in the world's history. The so-called common people, the multitude, make themselves continually more felt. They control more, and their power grows with every added year ; and that man who by word or speech or example or works causes the great body of plain people to think on higher planes, to strive after a finer quality of living, who causes the brain of the people to throb faster and on more nearly perfect lines, that man Ufts humanity into a higher realm, enlarges its horizon, makes men happier, broader minded, more self-respect- ing and more dignified, and the degree with which he does this shall define the degree of his Success. A GREAT DISTRIBUTING HOUSE 385 In this pre-eminently commercial age the merchant, the man of business or affairs, is in the centre of the move- ment. It is his to do as he will, and the quality of his doing is determined by the height of his ideals and his strength of purpose. Inactivity — doing nothing — simply enjoying himself, while perhaps agreeable, does not and cannot in this twentieth century stand for the highest Success. What then are we here jor ? What is or should be the goal in life? and what occupation, what effort most surely leads us to that goal ? For as truly as the captain of the ship decides before weighing anchor for which port he is to sail, and as he proceeds in his voyage carefully plans out the following day's duties, so every man, every State, every nation should, if possessing sufficient moral courage and ability, decide, "What is the thing to be accomplished? " — what is the goal? What is the man, the State, the nation here for? WORK, good, hard, honest work, will achieve almost any material thing in this world, and work may be de- lightful, noble, exhilarating, fascinating. Work may he full of excitement, of satisfaction, of joy and happiness. Work may be directed in a thousand channels, but of all golden chances, of all departments of endeavour, none, none presents such infinite and kaleidoscopic, always changing opportunities as does that broadest, surest field of effort called COMMERCE— a field yielding its rich harvest in quick response to well-directed energy — a field to be looked upon, if we will, as surrounded with beauti- ful flowers, fragrant always with wonderful Romance. THE END INDEX INDEX Aberconway, Lord, 317 Aberdeen, Donald Smith in, 343 — trade of, 166 Abingdon, Lord, 295 Abyssinia, 57 Acciaiuoli, Donato, 70 Acheem, harbour of, 232 Acre, Venetians in, 55 Addison, Joseph, on Commerce, 14, 291 Adelburg, Abbot of, 96 Adrian IV, Pope, his golden candle- sticks, 152 Adriatic, wedding the, 55 Advertisement, its uses in com- merce, 375-377 — value of honesty in, 8 Aegina, the, 46 Aeroplanes, invention of, 374 Africa, circumnavigation of, 37, 61 — Phoenician trade with, 38 Agincourt, battle of, 189 Agriculture, encouraged by the Medici, 70, 77 Aitkin, Dr., on Peel's cotton mills, 283 Aix-la-Chapelle, fair at, 123 Albert of Brandenburg, Arch- bishop of Mainz, 88 Albizzi family, the, 64-66 Albizzi, Rinaldo degli, opposed by Cosimo de Medici, 67 Aldenham, barony of, 309 Alemanni, Giovanni, 52 Alexander family, the, 298 Alexander the Great, conquests of, 42.47 Alexandria, Venetians in, 50 Alfred the Great, King, encourages commerce, 126 — encourages goldsmiths, 152 — improves shipping, 207 Allen and Hanbury's Foods, 311 Almeida, Francisco d', Viceroy, 85 Altinum, 49 Alum, Chinese, 30 — Papal and Medici deal in, 73-75 Amalfi, merchants of, 53 Amber, Chinese, 30 — Phoenician love of, 37 America, department stores of, 365 — discovery of, 57, 61, 117 — fairs in, 132 American colonies, trade with, 246, 274 — Fur Company, the, 332 — timber, 271 Amiens, Law's bank at, 263 Amsterdam, its trade with England, 298 — tulips in, 255, 256 Amwell, Herts, 238 Anafesto, Doge, 49 Ancaster, Earl of, 298 Anderson, his History of Edinbvrgh, 225 — on Antwerp, 125 — on trade, 159 Anderson, Jonathan, of Forres, 342 Andes, orchids of the, 252 Anglo-Saxon, racial ability of the, 92,93 Anketil, monk and goldsmith, 152 389 390 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Annaly, Earldom of, 299, 307 Anne, Queen, consort of Richard II, 197 Anne of Denmark, Queen, employs Heriot, 226, 227 ^»«^, S.S.,205 Annuities, Government, 276 Antwerp, 223, 245 ; De la Pole in, i8s — Gresham in, 209, 211-215 — Hanseatic factory in, III — its commercial prosperity, 125 — linen of, 128 Aquitaine, merchants of, 176 Arabian drugs, 245 — gold and spices, 171 Arabs, characteristics of the, 35 — their horses, 38 Aragon, Venetians in, 57 Aramaic language, the, 43 Arbuthnot, baronetcy of, 298 Archangel, port of, 109 Architecture, servant of commerce, 368 Ardilaun, Lord, brewer, 310 Argyle, Duchess of, 316 Aristocracy, its relations with trade, 287-317 Arkwright, his inventions, 304 Arlington, Earls of, 315 Armenia, trade of, 38, 44 Armenians, at Nijni, 134 Armitstead, Lord, his arms, 294 Armourers' Guild, the, 142 Armstrong, Lord, his arms, 294 Army, careers in the, 1 1 Arran, Earls of, 307 Arts, Fine, encouraged by Fugger, 92 encouraged by the Hanseatic League, 116 encouraged by the Medici, 70, 76-78 Artzt, family of merchants, 86 Arundell of Lanherne, family of, 296 Asbestos, Chinese, 30, 32 Ashburnham family, the, 291 Ashburton, Alexander Baring, Lord, 306 Ashcombe, Lord, 295 Ashikaga Shogunate, the, 351 Ashmolean Museum, the, 152 Assiniboine, river, the, 336 Assyria, rule of, 42 Astor, John Jacob, his career, 331- 334 Astrakan, products of, 134, 135 Athens, English oysters in, 150 — trade of, 46, 47 Attila, raids of, 48 Aubrey- Fletcher, baronetcy of, 312 Augsburg, Bishop of, 96 — Duckett's trade with, 230 — Fugger Palace and Fuggerei, 92, 93, 229 — merchants of, 167, 211, 223, 240 — Philipine - Welser Strasse, 85 note — position of the Fuggers in, 79- 97. 128, 361 — tulips first cultivated in, 254 — Venetians in, 51 Augustus, Emperor, 147 Austrian guilds, 144 Avebury, barony of, 309 Babington, Sir John, 292 Babylon, Chaldeans in, 41 — rise and power of, 42-44 — traders of, 31, 35 Back, Sir George, pioneer, 341 Badakshan, 30 Baden, Margrave Philip of, 96 Baffin, William, financed by Cokayne,'297 Bagdad, pahn oil of, 171 Bagge family, the, 298 Bahama Islands, the, trade with, 274 Bailey, J. R., his barony, 290 INDEX 391 Baltic, the, controlled by Denmark, 100, loi, 104 — Phoenicians in the, 37 — trade of the, no Bamberg, Bishop of, 96 Bankers, Baring family as, 305 — Fuggers as, 87-92, 94-97 — Gresham as, 215 — Hanseatic League as, 105 — Italian, 114 — Medici family as, 64-66, 69 — merchants as, 65, 361 — Mitsui family as, 353-356 — Rothschild family as, 305 Bank of England, foundation of the, 274-277 Banking becomes a separate busi- ness, 273 — early system of, 275 — its connection with the aristoc- racy, 305, 308, 309, 314 — Scotch methods of, 260 Bannockburn, battle of, 225 Bantam, trade with, 28, 233, 237 Barbary, 59 — Whittington's cat sent to, 191, 192 Barbers' Guild, the, 142 Barclay family, the, 310 Baring family, the, 305, 306 Baring's Bank, 306 Barker, Sir William, 286 Barnard, Sir John, Quaker, 310 Barnstaple, its merchant ships, 208 Barron, Oswald, quoted, 289, 312 Bartholomew Fair, Smithfield, 127 Basenger, master of the Augsburg Mint, 82 Bashkir tribes, the, 135 Bass, Miss, of Bass's Brewery, 310 note Bateman, Baron, 311 Bath, Earls of, 190, 293 Bathe, Sir Richard, and Sir James Michael de, 314 Bathurst, Earls, 293 Bavaria, Palatinate Princes of, 96 Beaconsfield, Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of, 304 Bears, British, 164 Beaucaire, fair at, 123 Beaufort, Duke of, 306 Beaumont, Lord, 295 Becket, Gilbert, father of Thomas a, 146 Bedford, Duke of, 306 Beer, Hanseatic trade in, 104 Beerage, origin of term, 310 and note Beevor family, the, 298 Behring's Straits, 340 Belgium, 266 — guilds of, 144 Belper, Lord, 304 Beluchistan, 57 Bennet, Richard, 315 Bennet, Thomas, mercer, 315 Beresford-Hope family, the, 298 Bergen, Hanseatic settlement in, 106, 107, 109 Berkeley family and estate, the, 290 Berlin, Patterson in, 274 Berwick, commercial prosperity of, 172, 225 Berwick, Lord, 298 Besant, Sir Walter, quoted, 215 Bibliophile, joys of a, 251, 252 Bideford, George Buck, mayor of, 302 Biscay, Bay of, 36 Bismarck deprives Hamburg and Bremen of privileges, 120 Blackburn, Peel family of, 280-282 Black Sea, the, 37 Blanket, Thomas, merchant of Bristol, 202 Blankney, the Squire of, 296 Blois, gardens at, 92 Boehm, Clement, merchant, 306 Boetria, Chinese mission to, 29 Bohemian glass, 136 392 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Bokhara, products of, 134, 136 Bolton, its cloth trade, 241 Booth, Sir Felix, baronet and dis- tiller, 297 Boston, Lines, 204 commercial prosperity of, 202 Boston, Mass., Chouart and Radis- son in, 320 trade with, 274 Boswell,, James, 287 Bourne, Fox, English Merchants, 173 note, 178 note, 234 note, 235 note, 275 note Bowden, Sir Frank, 295 Boyne, Viscount, 300 note Brabant, Edward III in, 187 — merchants of, 176, 187 Bradford, 241 Brancepeth, seat of Lord Boyne, 300, 301 Brand, Thomas, mercer, 316 Brazil, Hawkins in, 219 — orchids of, 252 Bremen, 246 — Archbishop of, 119 — Baring of, 305 — its position in the Hanseatic League, 100, 103, 120 Bretons, the, capture an East Indiaman, 235 Brewers' Guild, the, 142 Brewing, titles connected with, 295=296, 3 io>3i I Brie, fair at, 124 Bristol, cloth trade of, 130 — its charter, 171 — its commercial prosperity, 201- 205,225,274 — its contribution to the fleet, 208 — merchants of, 303, 308 — merchants of, in Dublin, 172 — Patterson in, 274 — Wigrams of, 295 Brixen, Bishop of, 96 Broadcloth, English, 134 Bromley, baronetcy of, 307 Bronze, Chinese, 24, 30 — Grecian, 46 — Phoenician, 36 Bruce, Robert, incorporates Edin- burgh, 225 Bruges, fair at, 125 — Hanseatic League's factory in, 109-111 — its commercial prosperity, 124, 211 — its trade with England, 124, 245 — Venetians in, 51 Brunner, Sir John, chemist, 304 Brunswick, its position in the Han- seatic League, 103 Brussels, John Law in, 269 Bryce, George, his History of the Hudson's Bay Company, 319, 326 note Buchanan, baronetcy of, 298 Buck, George, mayor of Bideford, 302 Buckingham, Duke of, 316J BuUen, Geoffrey, mercer, 292 ; Bunhill Fields, 192 Buonarotti, Michael Angelo, 77] Burdett, Sir Francis, his marriage, 309 Burdett-Coutts, Angela, Baroness, 309 Burgh Hall, seat of the Knightleys, 313 Burghley, Lord Treasurer, 222 Burgundy, cloth of, 124 — Dukes of, assist England, 116 their government of Flanders, no Burke's Landed Gentry, 306, 312 Burke's Peerage, 300 Burmah, Marco Polo in, 57 Burnham, Lord, his arms, 295 Burrellers, 162 Burton, Baroness, 310 note Burton, Lord, brewer, 310 Burton-on-Trent, Peel's mills at, 281 INDEX 393 Bury, its cloth trade, 130, 241 — Peel's mills at, 282-284 Business house, qualities required initshead, 13, 383-385 Buxton family, the, brewers, 294, 311 Buxton, Sir Thomas Fowell, 310 Buyers, responsibility of, 366 Byrne, Daniel, Dublin tailor, 288 Byron, George Gordon, Lord, his marriage, 301 Cabot,Sebastian, discovers America, 202 Cadbury family, the, 310 Cadiz, English expeditions against, 221-223 — Medici bank in, 69 — trade of, 167 — Venetian merchants in, 62 CadwaUader ap Morris Gethin, 315 Caird, Sir James, 295 Cairo, 54 Caithness, Earl of, 314 Caius, Dr., of Cambridge, 211 Caledon, Earls of, 298 Calico-printing, Peel's interest in, 280, 282-284 California, Phoenicians in, 37 Calvert, Sir Harry, 296 Cambrai, League of, 61 Cambridge, Caius College, 211 — Craven scholarship, 297 — Sturbridge Fair near, 127-133 Campbell-Bannerman, Sir Henry, 308 Campden, Viscount, 308 Canada, its claim to the North- West, 347 Candia, muscatels of, 245 Canterbury, a Becket, Archbishop of, 146 — hops, 130 — trade of, 166 Canton, Europeans in, 23 — statue of Polo in, 57 Canute, King, founds a guild, 140 Canynge, Thomas, 202 Canynge, William, 202 Canynge the Younger, William, his career, 202-205, 303 Cape of Good Hope, the, passage around, 37,61, 85, 117 Cape Horn, passage of, 117 Cape of Storms (or Good Hope), 37 . . . Capell, Sir William, draper, 296 Carchemish, maund of, 43 Carignan, Prince de, profits by Law's scheme, 265 Caroline of Brunswick, Queen, 303 Carpets, Assyrian, 44 — Chinese, 30 Carr, Ralph, 301 Carrington family, the, 307 Carteret, Sir George, Royal Com- missioner in Boston, 320 Carthage, a Phoenician colony, 37, 47. Caspian Sea, the, 21, 134 Cassiodorus, on Venice, 49 Castlemaine, Viscount, 306 Castro, Giovanni de, discovers alum, 73 Catalonia, merchants of, 176 Catalonian leather, 124 Catholicism, Roman, its relation to trade, 100, 1 17 Caulkers' Guild, the, 142 Cecil family, the, 289, 296 Ceylon, Marco Polo in, 57 Chadwell, 238 Chaldean rule in Babylon, 41 Chamberlayne, John, on Gresham, 218 Chamberlin, his portrait of Fielder, 148 Champagne, fairs in, 124 Chancellorship of the Exchequer, origin of office of, 193 Chang Ch'ien, Chinese minister, 29 394 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Chaplin, Lord, his descent, 296 Charlemagne, at Pavia, 50 — encourages commerce, 123 Charles the Bold of Burgundy, his son's marriage, 83 — his treatment of the Hanseatic League, no Charles I, King, his relations with Chetham, 243 — on tobacco, 246 — reign of, 158 Charles II, King, 324 ; confers a baronetcy on Shaw, 310 — his charter to the H.B.C., 320 — is presented with 2 lbs. of tea, 28 — knights Dolman, 293 — on tradesmen, 291 Charles IV, Emperor, visits Lubeck, 102 Charles V, Emperor, his relations with the Fuggers, 89-91, 94-97 Charta Mercatoria, the, 176 Chatham, Pitt, Earl of, 304 Cheery ble Brothers, originals of the, 343 Cheese, trade in, 169 Chelmsford hops, 130 Chemicals, Hanseatic trade in, 104 Chemistry, commercial, 304 Cheshire, Middleton family of, 231,232 Chester, trade of, 166, 171 Chesterfield, Heathcote, merchant of, 298 Chetham, Humphrey, his career, 242-244, 293 Chichester, Earls of, 291 Chigwell, Hans de, Lord Mayor, 151 Child, Sir Francis, his bank, 273, 306, 308 Child, Sir Josiah, his career and descendants, 271-273, 306 China, conservatism of, 20, 23 — encourages commerce, 24-33 — industrial and agricultural pro- ducts of, 21-23, 33 — its literature burnt in 213 B.C., 26 — its porcelain, 14, 21, 24 — its trade routes, 28 — its trade with Russia, 132 — mines in, 24 — silk trade in, 21-23 Chinese, the, as merchants, 20, 23, 27, 34 . . their discoveries forgotten, 20,34,168 their habits of thought, 19 their relations with the Han- seatic League, 108 Chioggia, salt of, 58 Chios, island of, 56 Chippenham, Goldney family of, 302 Chocolate, duty on, 28 Chouart, Medard, trades in Canada, 319 . Churchill, Lord. See Marlborough Cilicia, timber of, 37 Citta di Castello, 75 Civita Vecchia, 73 Clarke, General, 299 Clarke, William, merchant, 299 Clarke-Travers, baronetcy of, 298 Clifden, Viscount, 308 Cloncurry, Lord, his interest in wool, 294 and note Cloth trade, English, 124 ; in Bristol, 202 — its connection with the aristoc- racy, 293, 294, 302 — its origin, 162, 169, 230, 231, 240-242, 245 Cloth trade, Fuggers interest in, 80-93, 128 Cloth trade, Russian, 135 Clothworkers, the Worshipful Com- pany of, 142, 162 INDEX 395 Clough, Richard, Gresham's manager, 215, 216 Cnut, Danish merchant, 172 Coal trade, English, 159, 172 — aristocratic interest in, 290, 291 Cochin China, 57 Cock, Ralph, merchant of New- castle, 301 Cockermouth, Fletcher of, 311, 312 Cockin's Sound, 297 CoggeshaU, Buxtons of, 294 Coinage, Chinese, 24, 30, 31 — debased, 262, 263, 266, 276 — English, 105 — Hanseatic League's, 105 — standardization of, 123 — undertaken by the Fuggers, 87 Cokayne, Sir William, skinner and Lord Mayor, 297 Colbert, establishes the French East India Co., 265 Colchester, 204 Cole, Sir Nicholas, 300, 301 Colicut, 61 Collier family, the, wine merchants, 310 Cologne, its position in the Han- seatic League, 100, 113 Columbus, Christopher, discovers America, 57, 61, 206 Commerce, application required in, 12, 13,97, 144,211,318 — competition the spice of, 13, 181 — dignity of, IO-18, 287, 290, 317, 348, 364 — early conditions of, 164-179, 247. 361,362 — exploration due to, 327-331 — fantastic developments of, 250- 270 — foundation of the state, 3-5, 7, 11,17,170,191,206,243 — Hanseatic methods of, 104 — imagination required in, 12, 15, 16, 178, 224, 231, 270, 286 Commerce, influence of progress on, 132, 144,362-365 — modern conditions of, 362-365 — opportunities offered by, 385 — organization required in, 363, 367. 378-380 — patriotism in, 173 — Phoenician methods of, 40, 361, 362 — Plato on its organization, 45 j — restrictions placed on, 5, 105, 128, 169, 172-174, 177, 178, 202, 292 — risks to be taken in, 16, 249 — romance of, 218, 224, 250, 277, 280, 286, 325, 348, 350 — stimulated by religion, 53, 121, 133 — tributes to the benefits of, 14, 17 — undesirable policies in, 7-10, 12, 174-176 — universal principle of, I, 137, 167, 287 — wealth dependent on, 3, 63, 167, 201, 206, 293 Commonwealth, the, 158 Comnenus, Emperor, 53 Company of the Indies, the, 265 Compasses, invention of, 168 Compton, 2nd Lord, 316 Compton Bassett, 299 Confucius, encourages trade, 26, 27 — his Book of History, 22 Conservatism in Commerce, 370 Constance, Bishop of, 96 — Peace of, 55 Constantinople, its trade with England, 128 — Medici Bank in, 65, 69 — relations with Venice, 49, 5 1-56, — sack of, 55 — taken by the Turks, 61, 75 — tulip trade of, 254, 255 Conti, Prince de, associate of Law, 261, 266 396 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Coopers' Guild, the, 142 Copper mines of Schwarz, 87 Coral, trade in, 32 Cordwainers' Guild, the, 142 Corinth, 46 Cork, merchants of, 298, 299 Corn trade, unfair dealing in, 174 Cornwall, tin mines of, 36, 44, 164 Cottesloe, Lord, 312 note Cotton trade, Assyrian, 44 English,! 36, 242, 245 Lancashire, 280-285 Courtrai, fair at, 125 Coutts, Thomas, his descendants, 309 Coutts' Bank, 308 Coventry cloth, 245 — Earls of, 296, 297 Coventry, Sir John, mercer and mayor, 296 Covifper, Lord Chancellor, 303 Craig, Sir Gibson, 298 Cranbrook, Hardys, Earls of, 291 Cranfield, Lionel, merchant, 308 Cranford, 287 Craven, Earls, their descent, 297 Craven, Sir William, merchant tailor and mayor, 297, 315 Crete, under Venetian rule, 56 Crockery, trade in, 245 Cromer, Earl of, 306 Crompton, Samuel, his spinning mule, 284 Cromwell, Sir Richard, 292 Crown Jewels, history of, 212 Crown of Thorns, the reputed, 56 Crusades, the, their effect on trade, Cubitt, building firm of, 295 CuUen, Viscount, 297 Cumberland, coal trade of, 291 — Flemish colony in, 170 Cunard baronets, the, 295 Curriers' Guild, the, 142 Curry, Thomas, Canadian trader, 329 Curzola, battle of, 56 — woods of, 52 Cutlers' Guild, the, 142 Cutlery, Sheffield, 131 Cyprus, 47 _ — copper mines of, 37 — cotton from, 242, 245 Dacre, barony of, 316 D'Aguesseau, chancellor, 268 Daily Telegraph, 295 Daimio of Omi, Sasaki, 350 Dalmatia, 52 Damascus silk, 245 Dan, tribe of, 122 Danes destroy Norwich, 171 Dantzig, English merchants in, 298 — trade of, 203 Dardanelles, the, 37 Darien Company, the, 274, 277 Dartmouth, Earls of, 296 Darwin, Charles, 253 Dash wood. Baronets, 312 note David I, King of Scotland, en- courages trade, 170, 225 Defoe, Daniel, on Child, 306 on Commerce, 17 on Sturbridge Fair, 1 29-1 3 1 on tradesmen, 292 The Complete English Trades- man, 317 note De la Pole family, history of the, 180 De la Pole, Anne, 189 De la Pole, Edmund, 189 De la Pole, John, 182, 185 De la Pole, Katherine, 185, 189 De la Pole, Michael, 189 De la Pole, Nicholas, 180 De la Pole, Richard, merchant of Hull, 182-185 De la Pole, William, of Middlesex, 180 De la Pole, William, of Totnes, and Ravensrod, 181 INDEX 397 De la Pole, William, son of William, merchant of Hull, 182, 184-189, 200, 286, 293, 318, 362 — his life in Antwerp, 185 — his relations with Edward III, 184-188 Delpino, Doge, 60 Demosthenes, father of, 47 Denmark, Hanseatic League trades with, 107 — its control of the Baltic, 100, loi — its trade with England, 203, 215 — its trade with Russia, 109 — King of, desires an English gold- smith, 152 Department Store, analysis of the, 3637385 — Chief or Head of, 382-385 — in Japan, 20 — Manager of the Counting House, 380 — Managers of Selling, 373-378 — Manager of Staff, 371-373 — Managers of Systems, 378-380 — Supervisors of Buildings, 368 — Supervisor of Expenses, 381 — Supervisors of Merchandise, 368-371 Derome bindings, 251 Desiderio, King, 50 Desmarets, royal comptroller, 261 De Tabley, Lords, descent of, 288 Devon, Earl of, 296 Devonshire, De la Pole family in, 180 Dewar, Sir John, 295 Diarmaid Macmurchada, King, 290 Dickens, Charles, Nicholas Nickleby, 343 Dilke, Anne, daughter of Fisher, 306 Dishonesty, folly of, 174-176 Disraeli, Benjamin, 304 Dobbs, Arthur, opposes the H.B.C., 327-329 Dogs, trade in, 30 Dolman, William and Thomas, 293 Domesday Book, the, 158 Donauworth, 96 Dorien-Smith family, the, 307 Dormer, barony of, 313 Dormer, Sir Michael, mercer and mayor, 313 Dorset, Earls of, 291 Douai, 124 Dove, Anna, 299 note Dover, Earl of, 297 — trade of, 166 Drake, Sir Francis, 297 — accompanies Hawkins 220, 221 — his death, 223 — his fleet, 208 — in the East Indies, 233, 234 Drapers, the Worshipful Company of, 142, 148, 149, 296 Drayton Park, seat of Sir Robert Peel, 286 Drogheda, merchants of, 299, 309, 314 Drugs, trade in, 245 Drummond's Bank, 314 Dryden, baronetcy of, 315 Dublin, commercial prosperity of, 172 — Daniel Byrne of, 288 — guilds of, 141 — Lord Cloncurry in, 294 — merchants of, 298, 299, 303 Duckett, Sir Lionel, Lord Mayor and merchant, 230 Duddery, Defoe on, 129 Dudley family, the, 291 Dudley, Lord Robert, supports Hawkins' slave-traffic, 220 Dumbarton, trade of, 166, 225 Dumfries, merchants of, 299 Duncombe family, the, 316 Dundee, Wedderburns of, 299 Dunston Hill, Carr of, 301 Duntze, Sir John, m.p., and merchant, 303 Dunwich, port of, 171 398 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Durham, Earl of, 311 — palatinate of, 301 Dutch trade in the East Indies, 28, 234 in fish, 150 in Russia, 109 Dyer, Sir William, Bt., 289 Dyers' Guild, the, 142 Dyes, Chinese, 21 — Phoenician, 36 Dyke, near Forres, 342 Dymoke family of Scrivelsby, King's Champions, 313 Earrings, Chinese, 26 East India Company, the. Child a director of, 273, 306 — deals in tea, 28 — its foundation, 221, 231-237, 245 — purchases Manhattan Island, 334 — Smith, Governor of, 307 East Indies, 61, 221 spice trade of, 147, 198, 271 Eastland Company, the, 245 Eaton, Wild family of, 315 Echigo,Lordof, 351, 352 Echigoya, shop of Hachirobei, 352, 358 Eden, Garden of, 42 Edgar, King, 166 Edict of Nantes, the, 248 Edinburgh, Goldsmiths' Company of, 226 — guilds of, 141 — Heriot Hospital, 228 — its early history, 172, 225 — Law family in, 260 — merchants of, 298, 308, 309, 314 — St. Giles', 227 Edric the Wild, 315 Edward I, King, encourages trade, 129, 151, 176-178, 183, 190 — his conquest of Wales, 180 — pageant in honour of, 150 Edward II, King, 183 — remits the fine on Bristol, 202 Edward III, King, 146, 160, 314 — grants charter to the Skinners, 154 — his French wars, 150, 156, 185 — his need of money, 193 — his Scottish wars, 184 — rewards the de la Poles, 184-188, 293 Edward IV, King, his treatment of Canynge, 204, 205 — incorporates the Ironmongers, IS9 Edward VI, King, Gresham's rela- tions with, 211-214 Eggs, Chinese, 31 Egremont, Earl of, his interest in coal, 291 Egypt, carrying trade of, 39, 41 — fairs in, 122 — Venetian trade with, 59, 62 Egyptian drugs, 245 — grain, 47 — precious stones, 171 Eichstadt, Bishop of, 96 Eldon, John Scott, Earl of, 303 Electricity, its effect on progress, 18, 374> 375 Elehingen, Abbot of, 96 Elephants, Indian, 30 Elephants' tusks, trade in, 219 Elizabeth, Queen, at Greenwich, 160 — Gresham's services to, 214-218 — Hawkins' relations with, 221-223 — her descent, 292 — her navy, 208, 220 — her relations with the City Com- panies, 160, 162 — incorporates the E.I.C., 232 — status of trade under, 10, 141 Elliott, Sir Thomas, 292 ' Ellison family, of Hebburn, the, 301 Eltham, Shaw of, 310 INDEX 399 Elton baronetcy, the, 303 Ely, 130 Elzevir bindings, 251 Emery, trade in, 44 Employes, their relations with the employer, 9, 372 England, allied against Louis XIV, 326 — commercial prosperity of, 14-17, 215,223 — development of its navy, 207, 221-223 — early commerce in, 164-179, 180 — fairs held in, 125-133 — Hanseatic League trades with, 107, no — its trade relations with Germany, 170 — its Union with Scotland, 279 — makes war on France, 185, 188 — Medici bank in, 65 — nation of shopkeepers, 364 — Venetian trade with, 51, 59, 60 English cotton trade, 136 — guilds, formation and history of, 140-163 — gold and silverwork, 152 — ironwork, 159 — wool trade, 105, 130, 182, 183 Ennis, Sir John, baronet and merchant, 299 Eresby, Baron Willoughby de, 298 Erewhonian principles, 288 Erythraean traders, the, 31 Essex, Earls of, 296 Esslingen, 96 Este, Duke Ercole d', 75 Este, IsabeUe d', her marriage, 74 Ethelred II, King, encourages commerce, 126, 169 Euripides, his mother, 47 European War, the, 299 Euxinus, the, 37 Evance, Sir Stephen, Governor of the H.B.C., 325 Exelby, William, his claim to gentility, 289 Exeter, guilds of, 141 — its merchant ships, 208 — merchants of, 303 — trade of, 130, 166, 1 71 Exploration, aided by commerce, 297. 327-331, 340 Eyre, Sir Simon, draper, 149 Ezekiel, Prophet, on Tyre, 41, 122 Faber, J., engraver, 246 Fairfax, Lord, 316 Fairs, Chinese, 21 — English, 126-133 — in France and the Netherlands, 123-125 — in Venice, 53 — Leipzic, 138 — Nijni Novgorod, 133-138 — origin of, 1 21-123, 127 Falkiner, Sir Riggs, 299 Fan-li, Chinese merchant, 27 Fanshawe, Viscount, 297 Farming, its relations with com- merce, 2, 17, 27 Farnham, hops from, 130 Faulkland, Viscountess, 316 Fawsley, Knightleys of, 312 Ferdinand, King, guardian of the Fuggers, 96 Fergana, Persia, 29 Fermanagh, Viscounts, 296 Fermor, Sir Hatton, 297 Ferrante, King, 78 Ferrara, Duke of, 72, 74 Feudal System, the, 98 Feversham, Earl of, 317 Ficino, Marsilio, 77 Fielder, Thomas, fruit-broker, 148 Fife, Law family of, 260 Finland, trade of, 203 Finlay, James, Canadian trader, 329 Fish trade, English, 112, 150 — of Bristol, 202 400 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Fishmongers, the Worshipful Com- pany of, 142,150-152,193 Fitz Alwyn, Henry, first Lord ^ Mayor of London, 148, 190, 295 Fitz Harding, Robert, Bristol mer- chant, 290 Fitzstephen, William, on London, t 171 Fitzwarren, merchant of London, 191 Fitz William, Earls, 296 Fitz William family, the, 289, 302 Fitz Wygram, baronetcy of, 295 Flanders, Hanseatic trade with, 103, 104, 107 — its trade with England, 208, 240 — linen trade of, 128 — political unrest in, 1 10 — Venetians in, 59 — William HI in, 276 — weavers emigrate to England from, 125, 126, 240, 241 — woollen trade of, 125, 170, 173, 176, 182 Flanders, Countess of, her reprisals on England, 173 Flanders, Earl of, aids the Scots, 184 — his enmity with England, 190 Flax, Chinese, 21 — Lombardy, 60 Fletcher, Philip, 312 Fletcher, Sir Richard, merchant, 311, 312 Fletcher- Vane, baronetcy of, 312 Fletchers' Guild, the, 142 Flodden, battle of, 293, 299 Florence, Arti Majori, 142 — its factories, 76 — its wars, 61 — Laurentian Library in, 68 — merchants of, 176, 183 — position of the Medici in, 63-78 — republic of, 63, 73 Folkestone oysters, 150 Ford, Sir Richard, 28 Forest of Dean, the, 159 Forester, Lord, 315 Forres, Elgin, 342, 343 Fort Albany, H.B.C. factory at, 326 Fort Nelson, H.B.C. factory at, 323 Fortunate Islands, the, 32 France claims the Hudson's Bay territory, 326, 327 — close aristocracy in, 291 — English war on, 185, 188 — its trade with England, 173, 176, 182 — its trade with the Hansa, 112 — Law and the financial condition of, 261-270 Francis I, King of France, rival of Charles V, 89, 252 Francis, Simon, Mayor of London, 190 Frankfort - on - Maine, Rothschilds of, 305 Franklin, Benjamin, discovers elec- tricity, 375 Franklin, Sir John, explorer, 340, 348 Fraser, Canadian pioneer, 348 Frederick HI, Emperor, his rela- tions with the Fuggers, 81, 82, 170 Frederick Barbarossa, at Venice, 55 Frederick of Denmark, King, 119 Freising, Bishop of, 96 French East India Company, the, 264, 307 French millinery, 134 — trade in laces, silks, wines, and fashions, 128, 171 Friends, eminent in trade, 309, 310 Frobisher, Joseph, Canadian pio- neer, 297, 329 Fruit, Chinese trade in, 27, 29, 31 — English trade in, 148, 245 — Grecian trade in, 47 — Hanseatic trade in, 104 Fry family, the, 310 INDEX 401 Fugger, House of, English loan due to, 212 — its coat of arms, 81, 83, 84 — its counting-house, 84 — its dignities 95-97 — its rise and history, 13, 79-97 ■ — its trade with England, 128 — undertakes coining, banking, and mining, 87 Fugger, Andrew, 80-82, 91 Fugger, Anthony, 85, 87 — as head of the House, 94-97, 199, 286 — burns the Emperor's bond, 94, 227 Fugger, George, 82, 84, 85 Fugger, Hans, weaver and dyer, 79, 81 Fugger, Hans Jacob, 96, 97 Fugger, Hieronymus, 87, 95 Fugger, Jacob, brother of Andrew, 80-82 Fugger, Jacob, son of Andrew, 81 Fugger, Jacob, son of Jacob, as head of the House, 82, 86-94 128, 186,229,361,362 — his banking interests, 88-92 — his mining interests, 87 — in Venice, 86 Fugger, Luke, 81 Fugger, Mark, 82 Fugger, Matthew, 81 Fugger, Peter, 82 Fugger, Raymond, 85, 87, 94 Fugger, Ulrich, son of Hans, 80 Fugger, Ulrich, son of Jacob, as head of the House, 82-87 Fugger, Ulrich, son of Ulrich, Fuhtchou Emporium, 32 Fuji-San, Japan, 352 Fujiwara family, the, 350 Fur trade, Astor's American, 331- 334 — English, 108, 154 •^ London sales, 322 Fur trade, German, 128 — Hudson's Bay Company's, 319, 321-325, 330, 340 — Russian, 171 — Venetian, 57 Gainsborough, Earls of, 308 Gama, Vasco da, his discovery, 37, 61 Gascoyne, wine merchants of, 160, 161 Gascoyne, Sir Crisp, brewer and Lord Mayor, 296 Gateshead, merchants of, 300, 301 — Park House 301 Gauls, the, 38 Gavelkind, law of, 272 Geary, J. R., 358 Genesis, book of, 122 Genoa, its rivalry with Venice, 54, 56-58, 124 Genoese merchants, imprisoned in London, 205 in England, 128 in France, 124, 125 George III, King, his coronation, 313 George IV, King, 288 German bankers in England, 305 — fur trade, 331 — goldsmiths, 152 — guilds, 144 — trade relations with England, 170,171,176,203 Germany, allied against Louis XIV, 326 Gethin of Voelas, 315 Ghent, linen of, 128 Ghirlandajo, Master of Michel- angelo, 77 Gibbon, on the Crusades, 54 Gibraltar, 36 Gilbert, Sir William, lolantbe, 299 note Giles, on Chinese trade routes, 28 Girdlers' Guild, the, 142 402 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Gladstone, William Ewart, Thomas, and Sir John, 304 Glamis, Lord, 314 Glanusk, barony of, 290 Glasgow, 172, 225 — merchants of, 298, 299, 308, 314 Glass, Bohemian, 1 36 — English, 131 — invention and manufacture of, 24 — Phoenician, 36 — Venetian, 60 Glassworkers, their social position in France, 291 note Gloucester, its cloth, 245, 294 — its wine, 171 — Whittington house at, 192 Glove trade, the, 135 Glyn, Sir Richard, banker, 309 Godolphin, Lord Treasurer, Patter- son's letter to, 277-279 Gold, the common denominator of trade, 15,39, 51, 104, 114, 127 Gold mines in China, 24, 26 Golden Fleece, the, 162 Goldney family, the, 302 Goldsmid baronetcy, the, 305 Goldsmiths as bankers, 273, 275 Goldsmiths' Company of Edin- burgh, 226 Goldsmiths, the Worshipful Com- pany of, 142, 152-154 Gore, Gerard, merchant tailor and his descendants, 307 Gore-Booth, baronetcy of, 307 Gormanston, Lord, 299 Goschen, Lord, banker, 308 Gossenbrot, merchant of Augsburg, 85 Gournay, Norman house of, 309 Government, working staff of the, II Gowran, Lord, 294 Grabent, 79 Grado, Patriarch of, 49 Grain, Assyrian trade in, 44 — Chinese trade in, 21, 24 — Phoenician trade in, 41 Granacci, sculptor, 77 Grant brothers, merchants in Man- chester, 343 Gravesend, 321 Greece, architecture in, 6 — its commercial prosperity, 44-47 — its trade with England, 128, 150 Greek guilds, 139 Greek Empire, the, 55 Green, Valentine, engraver, 148 Greenland, Cockin's Sound, 297 Greenland passage, the, 106 Greenwich, Queen Elizabeth at, 160 Gregory, John, Canadian pioneer, 329 Grenada, Charles V aj, 94 Gresham, JameS, lawyer, 208 Gresham of Gresham, John, 208 Gresham, Sir John, his career, 209- 211, 213 Gresham, Sir Richard, his career, 209 Gresham, Thomas, merchant and priest, 209 Gresham, Sir Thomas, as a Mercer, 14s — Duckett, friend of, 230 — his career, 210-218, 286, 318, 362 — his wise commercial policy, 112, 113, 120 Greville family, the, 294 Grimsby, its fish trade, 181, 182 Grocers, Worshipful Company of, the, 142, 146-148 — Canynge, Master of, 202 — wait on Richard II, 193 Grolier bindings, 251, 252 Guest family, the, 294 Guilds, formation of, 1 39-145, 176 — English, formation and history of, 140-163 INDEX 403 Guinea, Hawkins in, 219 Gunpowder, Chinese invent, 34 Gurney family, the, 309 Gutenberg, inventor of printing, 34 Haarlem, tulips in, 255, 256 Haberdasheries, 145, 176 Haberdashers, the Worshipful Com- pany of, 142, 157, 158 Hachirobei, merchant prince of Japan, 3SI-354 Hachiroemon, Baron Mitsui, 354 Hague, The, Treaty of, 326 Hainault, Edward IH in, 187 Hakluyt, on Drake's capture of a Portuguese vessel, 221 Halifax, cloth trade of, 130, 241 Halifax, Earl of, friend of coloniza- tion, 328 Halkett, baronetcy of, 299 Hall-marking, system of, 153 Halnaby, seat of the Milbanks, 301 Hambleden, viscounty of, 308 Hamburg, its position in the Han- sea tic League, 100, 120 — its tijade with England,2i5, 245, 246 — merchants of, 302, 306, 313 — Patterson in, 274 Hampden, Viscount, 316 Hanbury family, the, 310, 311 Handkerchief trade, the, 135 Han Dynasty, the, 23, 29 Hanging gardens of Babylon, 43 Hanseatic League, the, as bankers, 105 — in London, 1 1 3-1 1 6, 120 — its decay, I16-120 — its formation, 98-100 — its post at Bergen, 106, 107 — its post in Bruges, 109 — its powers and range of influ- ence, 102-120 Han Wen, Emperor, 32 Hapsburg, House of, its relations with the Fuggers, 82, 89-91 Hardell, Lord Mayor, 149 Hardy, John, his speculation, 291 Hargreaves, his spinning-jenny, 281 Harington, barony and baronetcy of, 313 Harlech, barony of, 307 Harmsworth family, the, 295 Harrington, Evan, 288 Harringworth, Lord Zouche of, 297 Harrison, on tradesmen, 292 Hartlepool, its commercial pros- perity, 171 Harwood, Thomas, 298 Hatherley, first Baron, 303 Haute, Sir WiUiam, 292 Hawkins, Sir John, his career, 220- 223, 297 _ Hawkins, William, his career, 219, 220 Haworth, partner of Peel and Yates, 280-282 Haworth, Elizabeth, 280 Headley, Lord, 310 Hearne, Samuel, Canadian pioneer, 329 Heathcote, Baronets, 298 Heathcote, Gilbert, merchant, 298 Hebburn, Ellison family of, 301 Heeren, on Phoenician traders, 37 Heidelberg, 331 Helffenstein, Abbot of, 96 Helmold, on the slave trade, 1 27 Helmsley, estate of, 316 Hemp, Chinese, 30 Hend, John, Lord Mayor, 149 Hengshan, 32 Hennikers, peers and baronets, 312 note Henry I, King, 148 — encourages commerce, 126, 171 Henry H, King, 152 — encourages commerce, 170, 172, 241 Henry HI, King, encourages trade, 151,190 — his gift to de la Pole, 180 40+ ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Henry IV, King, accession of, 193 — his charter to Bristol, 201 — his relations with the Hansa, 115, 116 — his Scottish wars, 198 — incorporates the Merchant Tailors', 155 — member of a guild, 141 Henry V, King, Whittington's generosity to, 198 Henry VI, King, infancy of, 203 — member of a guild, 141, 145, 146, 148 HenryVII, King, 83 — as a Merchant Tailor, 155 — encourages trade, 206, 207 Henry VIII, King, 241, 334 — as a member of a guild, 141 — beheads the Duke of Suffolk, 189 — encourages trade, 207 . — his relation with the Greshams, 209-211 — receives a native king, 219 — rival of Charles V, 89 Henry the Navigator, Prince, 61 Henry, Alexander, Canadian trader, 329 Heraclea, 49 Herbert, William, History of the Twelve Great Livery Companies of London, 141 Heriot, George, goldsmith, 199 — his career, 226-229 Heriot, James, and George, 226 Herodotus, on Babylon, 43, 44 Herodotus, on the Phoenicians, 35 Heron-Maxwell baronetcy, the, 314 Herrings, trade in, 98, 100, 104, 112, 117, 150, 161 Herwart, Counsellor, tulip col- lector, 254 Hewitt, Sir William, 231 Heywood, Sir Benjamin, banker, 309 Hia Dynasty, the, 29 Hicks, Robert, and Sir Baptist, merchants, 308 Hicks-Beach, Sir Michael, 308 Hinde, John, mayor, 196 Hindlip, Lord, brewer, 310 Hiram, King of Tyre, 39 Hirschvogel, merchant of Nurem- berg, 8 s History of Progress in Great Britain, 127 note Hoare's bank, 309 Hochstetter, merchant of Augs- burg, 85 Hokkaido Tanko Kisen Kaisha, 358 Holden, barony of, 294 Holdernesse, Earl of, 297 Holland, allied against France, 326 — guilds of, 144 — tulip craze in, 255-258 Holland, Earl of, 296 Hollenden, barony of, 294 Holies, Sir William, merchant and mayor, 292 Holstein, merchants of, 134 Holt, seat of the Greshams, 208, 216 Holyrood Palace, Heriot in, 227 Honan, silk trade of, 21, 30, 31 Honey, trade in, 49 Hope baronetcy, the, 314 Hope, Henry, merchant, 298 Hoppu, 32 Hops, trade in, 130, 303 Horlick, Sir James, his arms, 295 Hormuzia, 32 Horsburgh, E. L. S., Lorenzo the Magnificent, 76 note Horse trade at Nijni, 135 — Fair at Sturbridge, 131, 132 — trade, Chinese, 30 Howard, family of, 293 Huddersfield, clothiers of, 130 Hudson's Bay Company, the, amal- gamated with the North-West Company, 340 — history of, 318-325 INDEX 405 Hudson's Bay Company, its rela- tions with the Indians, 322, 327, 330, 341 — its rivals, 329, 331, 332, 336-340 — its territory claimed by France, 326, 327 — Lord Selkirk's shares in, 336, 339 — Lord Strathcona's services in, 344-348 — meets with opposition, 326-329 — surrenders certain rights, 347- 349 Huguenots in England, the, 248 Hull, Charter House, 188 — commercial prosperity of, 130, 202, 203, 225 — De la Poles of, 293 — early history of, 182-184, '^^ — merchants of, 302 — subscribes towards a fleet, 204 Humber, the river, 18 1 Hunter-Blair, Sir James, banker, 309 Huntingfield, Lord, 311 Hupeh, 32 Hurrers and Milliners, the, 157] Hurt, Jonathan, 302 Hutton-in-the-Forest, seat of the Fletchers, 312 Hwang-ti, Emperor of China, 21, 23,29 Ibbetson, Sir Henry, 302 Iceland, trade of, 167, 171, 203, 241 Icknield Way, 165 Imagination, the servant of Com- merce, 12, 15, 16 Imboff, merchant of Augsburg, 85 Ina, law of, 168 India, history of Commerce in, 35 — its trade with England, 171 — Marco Polo in, 57 Indian jewels, 226, 245 — Jewish families, 304 — merchants in China, 31 2 D Indians, Red, Astor trades with, 332,333 — their relations with the H. B.C., 319, 322, 327, 330, 341 Indo-China, its trade, 24 Innholders' Guild, the, 142 Innocent, Pope, his dealings with the Medici, 75 Interest, compound, 334 Inventions, afEect commerce, 281, 284, 362, 374 Ipswich, 204 Iran, trade of, 44 Ireland, conquest of, 290 — trade of, 171, 201, 241, 242 — William III in, 323 Iron trade, Chinese, 24, 30, 31 — English, 159 — baronies connected with, 290 — development of, 18, 24, 135 Ironmongers, the Worshipful Com- pany of, 142, 159, 160, 315 Iroquois Indians, the, 327 Irving, Washington, Astoria, 333 Irwell, the river, 241, 283 Isaiah, Prophet, his description of Tyre, 40 Ischia, alum at, 73 Ise, Japan, 351,352 Islington, 238 Issus, battle of, 42 Istria, 49, 52 Italian merchants and money- lenders, 183 — workmen in Augsburg, 93 Italy, 241 — produce of, 246 Itevns, Chinese inventor, 31 Ivan the Terrible, his treatment of the Hanseatic League, 108 Iveagh, Lord, brewer, 310 Ivory, trade in, 32 Jacobite Rebellion of 1745, 302 Jade, Chinese, 26, 29, 30, 32 — Turkestan, 30 4o6 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Jaffa, Venetians in, 55 James I of Scotland, King, 226 James II of Scotland, King, 225 James IV of Scotland, King, en- courages commerce, 225 James VI of Scotland, and I of England, King, employs Heriot, 226-228 — grants a monopoly to the E.I.C., 23s . — his interest in the New River Company, 238 — his request to the colonies, 246, 247 king's letter to, 234 JamesII, King, 313 — as Governor of the H.B.C., 324, 348 — fails to obtain a loan, 316 — refuses to consider Darien pro- ject, 274 Japan, commerce of, 350-360 — department stores in, 20 — Marco Polo in, 57 Jarnac, battle of, 215 Java, 31,57 — trade vsfith, 233 Javan, I22 Jehangir, Sir Cowasjee, 304 Jejeebhoy, Sir Jamsetjec, 304 Jersey, Earls of, descendants of Child, 273, 307 Jerusalem, Sturmey's pilgrimage to, 205 — Venetians in, 55 Jesus ofLuheck, the, 220 Jewellery at Nijni, 136 — history of Crown, 212 — Phcenician love of, 37 — wrought by Heriot, 226 Jewels, Chinese, 30 Jewish merchants in England, 169, 171,304,305 Jews, characteristics of, 35, 37, 42, 225 Joan of Arc, 189 | Jocelyn, Ralph, draper, 313 John, King of England, his attitude to commerce, 113, 126, 128, 178 Johnson, Dr. Samuel, 281 — on tradesmen, 287 Joicey, Lord, 295 Julius Caesar invades Britain, 164 Jungs, tribe of the, 25 Kalmucks, the, 137 Karkhemish, mina of, 31 Kasan soap, 135 Kashg'ar, 30 Kayserheim, Abbot of, 96 Kendal, its cloth trade, 241 Kennington, Richard II at, 193 Kent ironworks, 159 Kent, Tyler's rebellion in, 195 Khaunmuragas, conquest of, 43 Khokand, Persia, 29 Khorasan, horses of, 30 Khotan, 28 — jade in, 30 — Marco Polo in, 57 — silk-worms in, 23 Kiakhta, tea trade of, 136 Kiaotchow, Gulf of, 31 King, Dr. Richard, pioneer, 341 King, first Lord, 303 King's Champion, office of, 313 Kingfisher feathers, trade in, 26 Kinloch baronetcy, the, 312 note Kirchheim, 79 Kirghizes, the, 137 Knightley family, of Fawsley, the, 312.313 Knitting machine, the, 374 Knivett, Sir Edmund, 292 Knox-Gore, baronetcy of, 307 Kublai Khan, 57 Kui-Su, 30 Kun-wus, Chinese potters, 29 Kutcha, 30 Kwei-ki, 32 Kyoto, Japan, its trade, 351-353 INDEX 407 Labrador, fur trade of, 345 Lace, trade in, 128 Lacouperie, Terrien'dej'on Fan-li, 27 Lager Lechfeld, 79 Lambourne, Lord, 312 note Lambton, Admiral Sir Hedworth Meux, 311 Lanark, Maxwell of, 314 Lancashire, woollen trade of, 240- 242 Lancaster, Captain, commands an East Indian Expedition, 232, 233 Lancaster Sound, 340 Landowners, commercial policy of, 290 Lane, Sir Thomas, Lord Mayor, 162 Lang-ya, Phoenician traders at, 31 Lanherne, Arundell of, 296 Larkbeer, cloth factory at, 305 Lascaris, Giovanni, 77 Latins, racial ability of the, 92, 93 La Tolfa, alum at, 73 Latymer, Francis Money-Coutts, Lord, 309 Lavenham, Spring ot, 293 Law, John, his career, 259-270 Lawless, Nicholas, his barony, 294 Lea, river, 237 Lead, English, 245 Leather trade, English, 104, 182, 183 Leathersellers' Guild, the, 142 Lebanon, cedars of, 39 Lee, Sir Robert, Lord Mayor and merchant tailor, 289 Lee, William, on Exelby,'289 Leeches, trade in, 133 Leeds, its commercial prosperity 130,241 — merchants of, 302, 311, 312 — Dukes of, 294 Lefroy, General Sir Henry, pioneer, 341 Legge, Thomas, Mayor of London, 296 Legislation, commerce discouraged by,s Leicester stocking-trade, 131I Leicester, Robert Dudley, Earl of, sails with Hawkins, 220 Leicester, Robert Sydney, Earl of, 307 Leighton, Sir Thomas, baronet and banker, 299 Leih-tze, describes process of tem- pering steel, 24 Leipsic, fair at, 133, 138 — Fuggers' factor at, 89 — Goschen, a publisher in, 308 Leiter, Levi Z., 293 Leith, merchants of, 304, 314 — port of, 225 Leland, on the north of England, 241 Leo X, Pope, builds St. Peter s, 88 Levant, the, English trade in, 205 — Medici banks in, 65 — Company, the, 231, 245 — merchants, 316 Leveson, Nicholas, mercer, 296 Leveson-Gower family, the, 296 Liddell, Thomas, 300 Liege, linen of, 128 Lincoln, its canal, 171 — merchants of, 203, 313 Lincolnshire, marquisate of, 307 Lindsey, Earl of, 297 Linen, Flemish trade in, 128 i — Russian trade in, 133 Linlithgow, Marquess of, 298 Lipton, Sir Thomas, 287, 295 Lisbon, Hanseatic League in, 112 — merchants in, 312 note — Vasco da Gama in, 61 Li-sze, Chinese minister, 25 Liutprand, King of the Lombards, 49 Liverpool, merchants of, 303, 304, 309 Li Wang-mus, Prince of, 30 Llangattock, 1st Lord, 317 4o8 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Lombard League, the, 56, 58 Lombardy, merchants of, 176 London, Astor in, 331 — Bethlehem Hospital, 210 — Billingsgate, 169 — Bishopsgate, 217 — Bow Church, 192 — Broad Street, 218 — calico printing of, 282 — Cheapside, 178, 179, 192, 197 — commercial centre, 215, 225 prosperity of, 166, 171, 172 — Cornhill, 178 — Crutched Friars, 199 — department stores in, 365 — development of, 178, 179 — Friday Street, 151 — Great Fire of, 156, 158, 216 — Greek Street, Soho, 246 — Gresham College, 218 — Grey Friars Monastery, 199 — Guildhall, 198, 199 — Hanseatic League in, no, 113- 116, 120 — Ironmonger Lane, 160 — Jewish merchants in, 305 — Leadenhall, 149, 179, 192 — Livery Companies of, 141-163 — Lombard Street, 246 — Lord Mayoralty of, 190, 295- 297 — Lord Strathcona in, 348 — merchants at Sturbridge, 129- 131 — Newgate, 179, 199 — Orchard Street, 246 — pageants in, 150, 196-198, 210 — Poultry, 179 — Queen Street, 209 — Royal Exchange, 160, 209, 216- 218 — Steelyard, 113, 114, 120, 322 — St. Mary Bothawe, 148 — subscribes £'ioo for a fleet, 204 — Temple Bar, 197, 217 — Tower, 212, 246, 325 London, tulip craze in, 258 — water supply of, 237, 238 Londonderry, Marquesses of, 312 — merchants of, 298 Longford, Sir Ralph, 292 Longinus, 49 Long Newton, Lionel Vane of, 312 Lonsdale, Earls of, 311, 312 Lord Mayor's Show, the, 140 Lothair of Kent, 168 Lotteries, denounced by Patterson, 276 Louis XI, King of France, 71 Louis XIV, King, 252 — declines Law's scheme, 261 — defeat of, 326, 327 Louis XV, King, 252 Louis XVI, King, 251 Louisiana, province of, 263 Lovekyn, John, Lord Mayor, 151 Low Moor Iron Works, 291 Lowther family, the, 291, 311 Lubeck, its mint, 105 — its position in the Hanseatic League, 100-103, ^j 115-118, 120 Lui-tsu, Empress of China, 21, 22 Lumley family, the, 300 Luther, Martin, effect of his prin- ciples on trade, 117, 118 Lydia, 47 Lynn, mayors of, 298 — port of, 130, 171, 184, 204 Lyon, Archibald, merchant, 314 Lyons, Laws' bank at, 263 Lysias, his trade, 47 Lysons, Samuel, on Whittington, 192 Lytchett Minster, Claude Scott of, 309 Macaulay, Lord, on Patterson, 277 Macedonians conquer Greece, 47 Mace-Ruette bindings, 251 Machiavelli, on the Medici, 66, 74 Machinery, early hatred of, 281 INDEX 409 Mackenzie, baronetcy of, 314 Mackenzie, Sir Alexander, Cana- dian pioneer, 329, 335, 348 Mackenzie, Roderick, Canadian pioneer, 329 Madagascar, 57 — orchids of, 253 Madras, Goyernor of, 299 Magna Carta, as a safeguard of commerce, 126, 178 Magnetic Poles, the, 340 Maidstone hops, 130 Maimatchin, tea trade of, 1 36 Mainz, Albert, Archbishop of, 88, 89 Mainz, Provost of, 96 Malacca, trade with, 233 Malay Peninsula, orchids of the, 252 Maldon, 204 — Strutt of, 290 Malmesbury, William of, on Bristol, 201 Malmesbury, Stumpe, clothier of, 293 Malynes, Gerard, his Lex Merca- toria, 289 Manchester, cotton trade of, 283 — Heywood, banker in, 309 — its commercial prosperity, 241, 242, 293 Manfredi, on the]J|Magnificent Lorenzo, 75 ^ Manhattan Island, Astor's property in>333. 334 Mantua, Marquis of, 74 Maquian, island of, 233 Marble, Greek, 47 Margaret of Anjou, Queen, 189 — in Bristol, 204 Marie Antoinette, Queen, 251 Mariner's compass, invention of the, 20, 34 Marjoribanks, ^baronyj and baron- ■^etcyof, 315* Marjoribanks, Christian, 226 Marlborough, J ohn, 1st Duke of, as Governor of the H.B.C., 324, 325.348 — his victories, 327 Mars, inhabitants of, 374 Marseilles, Greeks in, 46 Marsham, John, grocer, 298 Martin's Bank, 309 Mary, Queen, her death, 209 — served by Gresham, 214 Mary II, Queen, wife of jWil- Uam III, 276 Maryland, produce of, 246 Massachusetts, 38 Masuda, Y., his account of the Mitsui family, 350 Matsu-zaka, Ise, 351 Mattstedt, Andreas, Fuggers' factor, 89 Maulbraun, Abbot of, 96 Maximilian, Archduke, his im- prisonment, no. III — his marriage, 83 — reduces Bruges, 125 Maximilian, Emperor, his indebted- ness to the Fuggers, 88, 90, 95 Maxwell baronetcy, the, 314 Maxwell, Zachary, merchant, 314 McTavish, Simon, organizes the ' North- West Company, 329, 331 Meaux, monks of, 183 Mecklenberg, fair at, 127 Media, 31, 44 Medici, House of, deals in alum, 73-75 — encourages trade and arts, 128 — its arms, 65 note, 71 — its business house, 68-70 — its proud position, 63-78 Medici, Averardo Bicci de', 64 Medici, Cosimo de'. Pater Patriae, 66-70, 362 ^ educates Lorenzo the Magnifi- cent, 72 Medici, Giovanni de', 64-66, 72 Medici, Giovanni de', Cardinal, 74 4IO ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Medici, Lorenzo J^de', son of Giovanni, 66, 67 Medici, Lorenzo de', the Magnifi- cent, his early training, 71-74 — his power and influence, 74-78 Medici, Lucrezia de', 71 Medici, Piero de', II Gottoso, father of Lorenzo the Magnifi- cent, 70-74 Medici, Salvestro de', 64 Mediterranean Sea, the, 35] Meiji period, Japan, 353, 354 Meisner, Anna, 79 Mellon, Harriott, actress, 309 Mentmore, Rothschild of, 305 Menzies, house of, 314 Mercers, Worshipful Company of, 142, 14s, 146, 151, IS7 — Greshams as members of, ^209, 211 — Whittington [as 'a member of, 192, 19s Merchant-Adventurers, careers of, 15, 16, 297 Merchant Tailors, Worshipful Company of, 142, 155-157, 289 — their connection with the aris- tocracy, 288, 289, 307 Merchantry, definition of, 364 Merchants, qualities required in. Mercury, Chinese, 3 1 Meredith, George, Evan Harring- ton, 288 Mesopotamia, trade of, 35 Metallurgists, Chinese, 29] — Phcenician, 35 Methuen, barony of, 294I Meux family, the 311 Michelham, barony of, 309] | Middlesex, De la Pole family in, 180 — Lionel Cranfield, Earl of, 308 Middleton, Sir Henry, his expedi- I3 tions to the East Indies, 232- 237 Middleton, Lord, his MSS., 291 note Miike, coalfield of, 355 Milan, Lorenzo the Magnificent at, 72 — State of, 63, 73 — trade of, 58,61, 157 Milbank, Sir Mark, 301 Milbank, Sir Ralph, 301 Milbanke family, the, 301 Militos, 46 MOliners, origin of term, 157 Milner family, the, 302 Mining, as a trade, 290 — Duckett's interest in, 230 — Fugger interest in, 87, 88 Mirandola, Pico deUa, 77 Mirrors, Chinese, 31 Missals, collection of, 251 Mississippi Scheme, the, 259, 263- 270 Missouri, the river, 332 Mitsui family, of Japan, the, fits history, 350-360 Mitsui Bussan Kaisha, 353, 354, 356 Mitsui Ginko,_353, 354, 356 Mitsui Gomel Kaisha, the, 355, 356,359.360 Mitsui Kozan Kaisha, 355, 356 Mitsukoshi, the, 354 Mitsukoshi Gofukuten, 358 Mocenigo, Doge, on Venetian trade, 58 Mocha, Middleton at, 235, 236 Modena, salt mines of, 75 Molineux, draper, 316 Mond, Dr. Ludwig and Sir Alfred, chemists, 304 Money, Assyrian, 43 — coined by the Fuggers, 87 — coined in Lubeck, 105 — invented and standardized in China, 24, 30, 31 — jjVenetian, 52, 56, 50' — ^and Trade, Law's essay on, 262 Mongolia, 57 INDEX 411 Monk Chester, 172 Monkeys, Indian, 30 Monkswell, barony of, 310 Mont Casel, fair at, 125 Montefiore baronetcy, the, 305 Montfort, Count of, 96 Montgomeryshire, De la Poles in, 180 Montreal, Astor in, 332 — Lord Selkirk in, 337 — Lord Strathcona in, 344-346, 348 Moors, the, their attitude to com- merce, 112 Morea, 245 Moscow, 133 Mother-of-pearl, Indian, 32 Motir, island of, 233 Motor industry, the, 316 Mount Carmel, 36 Mountstephen, Lord, of Montreal, 348 Muh Wang, Chinese merchant, 30 Munro, General Sir Thomas, 299 Munting, on the tulip craze, 256 Murano, glass works of, 60 Muscovy Company, the, 245, 307 Musgrave's Obituary, 316 Muslins, Assyrian, 44 Myddelton family, the, 231 Myddelton, Sir Hugh, provides London's water supply, 237-239 Myddelton, Robert, his career, 232 Myddelton, Thomas, 232 Myddelton, William, his career, 232 Nagasaki, foreign trade of, 353, 354 Naples, Kingdom of, 64, 73 Napoleon I, Emperor, besieges Venice, 49 — his books, 252 — on the English, 364 Narenta, 52 Narses the Eunuch, 49 Navarino, 205 Navarre, merchants of, 176 Navy, career in the^ 1 1 Nebraska, the river," 3 32 Nebuchadnezzar, reign of, 43 Netherlands, the. Child on their trade, 271, 272 — their trade with England, 215, 226 Nevill family, the, 291, 300 Newbury, Jack of, 293, 299 Newcastle-on-Tyne, coal trade of, 172 — merchants of, 300, 301, 303 — shipping trade of, 301 — trade of, 130, 203, 204 Newcastle, Duke of, descent of 291, 292 New England, 247 New France, early settlement of, 320 Newfoundland, claimed by Eng- land, 327 New River Company, the, 238 New Severn, H.B.C. factory at, 323 Newton and Castlemaine, Baron, 306 New York, Astor in, 332-334 Nickers, work of the, 161 Nijni-Novgorod, fair at, 107-109, 128, 133-138 Nile, the river, Phoenician ships on, Ningho Emporium, 32 Nishi-jin brocades, 351 Norfolk, Duke of, engaged in the coal trade, 291 Norman Conquest, its influence on trade, 169 Normandy, traders of, 173 North, barony of, 313 Northampton, ist Earl of, 316 Northbrook, barony and earldom of, 306 Northcliife, Lord, his arms, 295 North Sea, fishing grounds in, 182 412 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Northumberland, Duke of, Gres- ham's letters to, 211, 213 — his descent, 296 North-West Osmpany, the, rivals the H.B.C., 329, 331, 336-340 North-West Passage, discovery of the, 307, 327, 328, 340 Norv^ay, Hanseatic League in, 106 — trade of, 128, 167, 171, 201 Norvirich, Gresham in, 209 — grocers of, 298 — Gurneys of, 309] — subscribes towards a fleet, 204 — trade of, 171 Nottingham, Earl of, 297 — Richard II at, 196 — Smith family of, 307 — stocking trade, 131 Nova Scotia, 314 — claimed by England, 327 — Halifax, 328 Numa Pompilia, encourages guilds, 139 Nunburnholme, Lord, 295 Nuremberg, 96 — trade of, 80 — Venetians in, 5 1 Oil, trade in, 47, 49, 171 Oji Paper Manufacturing Com- pany, 3S7 Oka, Uie river, 134 Okey, Thomas, The Story of Venice, 52 note, 55 note, 58 note, 62 note Oliphant, Mrs., The Makers oj Venice, 57 note Omi, province of, 350 Onion Fairs, 124, 132 Ontario, Lord Strathcona in, 344 Orchard, Robert, grocer and tea dealer, 246 Orchids, collections of, 212, 250, 252, 259 Organization, necessity of, in com- merce, 363, 367, 378-380 Orissa, 31 Orkney, Earl of, pirate, 172 Orkney Islands, the, its trade rela- tions writh England, 171 Orleans, Duke of, his friendship with Law, 261, 263-269 Orleans, Law's bank at, 263 — siege of, 189 Orseolo II, Doge, 52 Osaka,Japan, 351, 353 Osborne, Sir Edward, merchant and Lord Mayor, 231, 294 Ossulston, Barons, 315 Osterley House, Queen Elizabeth at, 217 Ostrogoths, the, 49 Otho III, Emperor, in Venice, 52 Oxford, Craven scholarship, 297 — De la Pole family in, 180 — Lord Strathcona in, 344 — Vintners at, 161 Oysters, English, 150, 164 Pacific Fur Company, the, 332 Padeloup bindings, 251, 252 Padua, 48 — Cosimo de' Medici in, 67 — tradeof, 56, 58 Paint, Chinese, 26 Palliser, Captain John, pioneer, 341 Palmerston, Viscount, 310 Papal power of excommunication, 73.99 — States, the, 64 Paper made in China, 34 Paper currency. Law on, 262 Paris, Chouart and Radisson in, 320 — department stores of, 365 — effect of Mississippi scheme in, 266, 268 — fairs at, 123 — Rothschilds of, 305 — tulip craze in, 258 Parsons, Sir Charles, 317 Passau, Bishop of, 96 Paste-gems, 30 Patna, trade route to, z8 INDEX 413 Patterson, William, his career, 274- 279 Pau, death of Lord Selkirk at, 339 Pauncefort-Duncombe, baronetcy of, 316 Pauncefote, barony of, 307 Pavia, Charlemagne at, 50 Pawnbrokers' arms, 65 note Peacocks, Chinese, 30 Pearls, British, 164 — Chinese, 26, 32 — Persian, 32, 44 Pease, Sir Joseph, 310 Peckover, barony of, 309 Peel, Sir Lawrence, his Sketch of Sir R. Peel, 281 note, 284 Peel, Robert, develops the cotton- industry, 280, 281, 304 Peel, Sir Robert, cotton manu- facturer and statesman, his career, 281-286, 304, 318 Peel, Sir Robert, statesman and Premier, 285 Peele, Robert, woollen manufac- turer, 280 Peele, William, farmer, 280 Pegu, trade route to, 28 Pelham family, the, 291 Peloponnesus, the, 47 Pembroke, Earl of, supports Hawkins in the slave trade, 220 Pentapolis, the, 50 Pepin, King, besieges Venice, 50 Pepperers, fraternity of the, 146 Pepys, Samuel, on Robinson, 294 — on tea, 28 Percentage, originates in Venice, Percy family, the, 302 Persia, conquest of, 42 — Greece resists, 46 — Marco Polo in, 57 — products of, 27, 29, 134 — traders of, 31, 35 Persian Gulf, as the cradle of nations, 30, 35, 42 Perth, 225 — merchant of, 194 — Earl of, 314 Peru, 163 / Pesne, portrait painter, 246^^, Peter of Portugal, Prince, 61 Petit, Sir Dinshaw Manockjee, 304 Petrograd, 133, 136 Pewterers' Guild, the, 142 Pheasants, Indian, 30 Philip II of Spain, 97 — his policy, 1 1 1 Philpot, John, his relations with Richard II, 193-195, 200 Phoenicia, conquest of, 42 — its position and its colonies, 35- 37. . Phoenicians, the, as traders, 30, 35- 42,44,46,60 — their characteristics, 35 — their trade with Cornwall, 164, 165,361 Piacenza, 48 Pickmann's History of Inventions, 254 Pillars of Hercules, the, 36 Pink, Sir Thomas, 287 Piracy, French, 182 — organized by the Hansa, 115 — practised by Vikings, 140 — practised off Bergen, 106 — Scottish, 172, 182, 194 Piraeus, port of Athens, 46 Pisa, 54 Pitch and tar, trade in, 128 Pitt, Thomas, diamond merchant, 304 Pitt, William, statesman, 304 Pius II, Pope, deals in alum, 73 Plantin bindings, 251 Plato, on trade, 45 Platonic Academy, founded by the Medici, 77 Pliny, on the silk trade, 23 Plutarch, on guilds, 139 414 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Plymouth, Hawkins family of, 219, 221 — its merchant ships,^2o8 — merchants of, 310 Po, the river, 48 Poliziano, 77 Political economy, science of, 271 Polo, Marco, his discoveries, 57, 61 — on Shansi, 21 Poltava, fair of, 133 Pomfret, Earl of, 297 Pompadour, Madame de, 252 Pontypridd, barony of, 290 Poole, 204 Porcelain, first made in China, 14, 21, 24, 29 Portland, Duke of, interested in the coal trade, 291 Portsmouth, Child, a store-dealer in, 271 Portugal, its trade in wine, 112, 128 — its trade with England, 176 — its trade with the Indies ,^1, 81;, 87, 234. 236 — Queen of, 313 Portuguese guilds, 144 — merchants, in Antwerp, 125 their vessels captured, 212, 231,233 undersell Venice, 61, 62 Potteries, Staffordshire, 165 Pottery, Grecian, 46, 47 — Phoenician, 36 Powis, Lord, 297 Precious stones, trade in, 44, 136I Preston family, the, 299 Prince Edward's Island, Lord Selkirk's emigrants to, 336 Prince Rupert's Land, 320, 347 Printing, invention of, 18, 20, 34, 83,. ii7> 374. 375 Priuli, hstorian, 61 Progress, its effect on commerce, 132 — limitations of, 5-10, 18, 25, 374, 375 Provence, merchants of, 176 Prussia trades with England, 203 Ptolemy, his geography, 61 Publicity in commerce, art of, 375- 377 Public Loans, Paterson on, 274 Pulteney, Sir John de, draper and mayor, 190, 294 Pye-Powder Courts, 131 Pyrenees, silver in the, 37 Quakers, eminent in trade, 309, 310 Quebec, French governor of, 319, 320 — General Wolfe of, 302 — Lord Strathcona on, 344, 345] Quixote, Don, 156, 294 note Raamah, merchants of, 122 Racial aiiility, 92, 93, 241, 248 Radisson, Pierre Esprit, trades in Canada, 319 Radnor, Earls of, 308, 312 note Rae, Dr. John, pioneer, 341 Ragusa, trade of, 56 Raleigh, Sir Walter, 232 1 — his chivalry, 217 Raleigh cycle works, the, 295 Rangoon, 31 Rathfagh, Lord of, 314 Ravenhill, historian of the Grocers' Company, 147 Ravenna, trade of,^49, 50, 56 Ravenser, town of, 181 Ravensrod, history of, 181, 182 Ravensworth, Earls of, 300 Rawlinson, W., on Assyria, 42 — on the Phoenicians, 35 | Rayleigh, Lord, his dairies, 290 Red River, the, 336 Regensburg, Bishop of, 96 Reid, Sir Thomas, chairman of the E.I.C., 299 Religion, aids commerce, 53, 121, 133 Revelstoke, Lord, 306 INDEX 415 Rhodes, commercial ability of, 47 Rhondda, barony of, 290 Richard I, King, 190 — his ransom, 113 Richard II, King, his relations with his merchants, 189, 193-198 Richardson, Mrs. Aubrey, The Doges of Venice, 59 note Richborough, trade of, 166 Riche, Richard, mercer, 296, 308 Richmond, Duke of, Governor- General of Canada, 338 Ripon, Marquess of, 302 Robartes, Lord, 308 Roberts, Lewis, on the Turkey Company, 245 Robinson, Sir John, Bt., cloth- worker and Lord Mayor, 294 Robinson, William, Hamburg mer- chant, 302 Robinson, Sir William, Lord Mayor of York, 302 Robson, Timothy, mayor of New- castle, 301 Rochdale, its cloth trade, 130, 241 Rochelle, Kinloch, merchant in, 312 note Rochelle, Law's bank at, 263 Rochester, trade of, 166 Rocky Mountains, fur trade in, 332 Roden, Earl of, 313 Roeskild, guild at, 140 Roggenburg, Abbot of, 96 Rokesley, Gregory de. Mayor of %■ London, 190 Rolls, Hon. C. S., 316 Roman Empire, the, Imperial crown of the Holy, 89, 90 — obtains silk from China, 23 Roman guilds, 139 — occupation of Britain, its effect on trade, 126, 127, 158, 164-166 — trade in spice, 148 Rome, Coliseum, 164 — fairs held in, 122, 216 — Medici bank in, 69 Rome, Coliseum, oysters in, 150 — St. Peter's, 88 Romney, Earl of, 297 Romulus, encourages trade, 122 Roos, Sir Mark Sykes, Vicar of, 302 Rosebery, sth Earl and Countess of, 305 Ross, Earldom of, 307 Ross, Janet, Lives of the Early Medici, 71 note, 73 note, 75 note Ross, Captain John, trader and pioneer, 329, 340 Ross, Sir John, his Arctic expedi- tion, 297 Rosse, Earl of, 317 Rosslyn, Earl of, 299 Rotenheryng, John,^merchant of Hull, 182 Rothermere, Lord, his arms, 295 Rothschild, barony and baronetcy of, 305 Rothschild family, the, Mitsui family compared with, 354 Rothwell, 95 Rotterdam, 245 Rouen, De la Pole of, 181 Rowntree family, the, 310 Royal Exchange, the, Addison on, — built by Gresham, 160 Royal Society, the, 218 Rubies, 15 Rudolph, Emperor, 52 Rugge-Price, Sir Charles, 315 Rupert, Prince, his interest in the ^Hudson's Bay Company, 320, L>324, 348 Ruskin, John, quoted, 12 Russell, WiUiam, banker, 300 note Russia, Chinese traders in, 133-136 — Hanseatic trade in, 104, 107 — Phoenicians trade with, 37 — Smith, Ambassador in, 307 — tea trade in, 27 Rutland, Earl of, 292 Ryton, Earl Craven of, 297 4i6 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE SackvUle family, the, 291 Sadlers' Guild, the, 142 St. Albans, abbot and monk of, 152 — Duke and Duchess of, 309 St. Aldwyn, Lord, 308 St. Denis, fair of, 123 St. Hieronymus, the, 85 St. Lawrence, the river, 344 St. Leonard, the, 85 St. Louis, its fur trade, 332 St. Macarius, monastery of, 133 St. Mark, body of, 50, 53 St. Nicholas, Guild of, 60 St. Oswald, Lord, 310 St. Raphael, the, 85 Sakai Celluloid Company, 357 Saki, brewing of, 351 Salisbury, 204 — Earldom of, 296 Salt, trade in, 49, 58, 75, 112, 158 — Fishmongers, the, 150 Salters, the Worshipful Company of, 142, 158 Salzburg, Archbishop of, 96 -Salzmensweiler, Abbot of, 96 Sambac, 32 Sandwich Islands, the, 333 Saracens, the, Venetian relations with, 52, 56 Saratoga, 314 Sards, tribe of the, 38 Sasaki family, the, 350 Sassoon baronetcies, the, 304 Sawbridgeworth, Herts, 246 Saxony, Duke George of, 96 Scarborough, merchants of, 302 — piracy off, 194 Schmidt, G. F., engraver, 246 Schuster baronetcy, the, 305 Schmal-kaldian War, the, 83 SciUy Islands, tin mines of, 36, 164 Scotland, development of trade in, 170, 171, 224, 225 — its aptitude for trade, 224, 335 — its cadets take to trade, 314 Scotland, its Union with England 278, 279 — Highlands of, 335 Scott, Sir Claude, banker, 309 Scott, Sir Walter, The Fortunes of Nigel, 228 Schwarz, mines of the, 87 Scrivelsby, Dymokes of, 313 Scythian weapons, 171 Scyths, tribe of the, 37, 38 Selkirk, Earl of, his Canadian venture in emigration, 335-340, 348 Semiramis, Queen, her fleet, 39 Sender, Clement, on Jacob Fugger, Senegal, expedition to, 307 Sennakherib, 30 Servius Tullius, encourages trade, 122 Settle, Elkanah, quoted, 162 Seymour family, the, 289, 291 Seymour, Jane, entertained by Gresham, 210 Shakespeare, William, Macbeth, 342 Shang Yu dynasty, the, 30 Shansi, silk trade of, 21, 31 Shantung, silk trade of, 21, 22, 31 Shao-Hao, 29 Shaw, Captain, his fire brigade fame, 299 Shaw, John, vintner, 310 Shaw, Ponsonby, banker, 299 Shaw, Sir Robert, 299 Shaw of Eltham, baronetcy of, 310 Sheba, merchants of, 122 Sheffield cutlery, 1 31 — merchants of, 302 Shene, royal palace at, 196 Shenshi, trade route through, 28 Sherbet, duty on, 28 ShibaQra Iron Works, 358 Shimogamo, Kyoto, 351 Shoguns of Japan, the, 350-354 Shuckburgh family, the, 289 Shun, Emperor of China, 24, 29 INDEX 417 Siam, 57 Siberia, Marco Polo in, 57 Siberian furs, 128 Sicily, Venetians in, 57 Sidon, trade of, 35, 37, 41 Sigismund of Tyrol, Archduke, 87 Silk trade, the, 124, 128, 136 — Chinese, zx-23 — Colonial, 246, 247 — English, 245 — established by Huguenots, 248 — Mercers' Company, 145 — Fuggers' interest in, 82, 87 — Venetian, 59, 60 Silver mines in China, 24, 26 — of Schwarz, 87 Simpson, Sir George, Governor of the H.B.C., 344, 345 Sinclair, Sir John, merchant, 314 Sinclair, Sir William, 314 Sitwell baronetcy, the, 302 Sixtus, Pope, 75 Skinners, Worshipful Company of, 142, 150, 154, 155 Skins, trade in, 25, 26, 104 Skipmyre, Dumfriesshire, 274 Slave trade, practised in Europe, 50, 127, 220 Slavery, abolition of, 310 Smiles, Samuel, his precepts, 16 Smith family of Nottingham, the, 307 Smith, Adam, on trade, 364 — on Wfealth, 3 Smith, Donald. See Lord Strath- cona Smith, Sir John, 307 Smith, Mrs., mother of Lord Strathcona, 342, 343 Smith, Sir Thomas, haberdasher and skinner, 307 Smith, W. H., his career, 308 Smithson, merchant, 296 Smuggling, prevalence of, 173 Smyrna cotton, 242, 245 Snobbery and commerce, 287-291 Soap, trade in, 135, 245 Socrates, father of, 47 Sokubei, Japanese merchant, 351 Solomon, King, his alliance with Phoenicia, 38, 39 Solon, law-giver and commercial traveller, 47 Somerset, Duke of, interested in the coal trade, 291 Somerset, Protector, 312 Sommerland Company, the, 307 Southampton, subscribes towards a fleet, 204 South- West Company, the, 332 Spain, allied against France, 326 — English hatred of, 221-223, 232 — Greek colonies in, 46 — her attitude to commerce, 112 — trade of, 60, 128, 176 Spanish Armada, the, 208, 221-223 — coin, 214 — guilds, 144 — jewels, 226 — silk stockings, 213 — wine trade, 104, 194 Spencer, Sir John, cloth-worker, 316 Speyer, Bishop of, 96 Spice trade, the, 32, 61, 87, 128, 147, 176, 205 — East Indian, 233-237, 245 Spring of Lavenham, clothier, 293 Spurn Head, 182 Stafford, Earl of, reproaches Phil- pot, 194 Stanhope, Walter, 291 Stapleton, on Fitz Aylwin, 295 Steam as a motive power, applica- tion of, 18 Sterling, origin of term, 105 Stettin, Duke of, his journal, 295 Stevenson, barony of, 314 Stewart, John, uncle of Lord Strathcona, 342-344 Stirling, 225 4i8 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Stock Exchange, tulips quoted on, 256 Stock Fishmongers, the, 150 Stockings, English, 131 — silk, presented to Edward VI, 213 Stow, on the East India Company, 221 — on Philpot, 194 — on the Royal Exchange, 216, 217 — Survey, 238 note Stowe, Earls Temple of, 307 Stralsund, Peace of, 100 Strangford, 1st Viscount, 307 Strassburg, Bishop of, 96 Stratford, de Redcliffe, Lord, 303 Strathcona and Mount Royal, Donald Smith, Lord, his career, 342-348 Strutt, Jedediah, 304 Strutt, John, miUer, 290 Stuart dynasty, the, 298 Stucley baronetcy, the, 302, 303 Stumpe, William, clothier, 293 Sturbridge Fair, 127-133 Sturgeon, trade in, 135 Sturmey, Robert, merchant-adven- turer, 205 Sudeley, Baron, 311 Sugar, trade in, 32; Suffolk cloth, 245 — Earldom of, 189, 293 Sumatra, 31, 57, English expedi- tion to, 232 Sunderland, merchants of, 300 note — Dorothy Spencer, Countess of, 308 Sung-pan route, the, 30 Surat, Middleton at, 236 Surrey ironworks, 159 | Surugacho, Yedo, 352, 354 Sussex ironworks, 159 Sutherland, Dukes of, 296 Suzub, defeat of, 43 Swan with the Two Necks, the, 161 Swansea, barony of, 290 Swaythling, barony of, 309 Sweden, Hanseatic League trade in, 107 — its trade with England, 215 Swinnerton, Sir John, Sheriff, 289 Swords, Toledo, 128 Sykes, baronetcy of, 302 Symonds, John Addington, Re- naissance in Italy, 77 Syracuse, 46, 47 Syria, trade of, 44, 47, 55, 56 Szetchuen, trade routes from, 28, 31 Tabley, Lords de, their descent, 288 Tailors. See Merchant Tailors Takahisa, 350 Takayasu, Lord of Echigo, 351 Tallow, trade in, 104 — Chandlers' Guild, the, 142 Tang King, trade route to, 28 Tankerville, Earls of, 315 Tan-kiu, Turfan, 29 Tarshish, ships of, 32, 41 — silver mines of, 37 — trade of, 122 Tartary, fur trade of, 57 Taunton, cloth trade of, 1 30 Tchihli, silk trade of, 21 Tchou dynasty, the, 29, 30 — Duke of, his ode on the silk trade, 22 Tchuhyai, pearl fisheries of, 32 Tea trade, Chinese, 134-137 — growth of, 27, 28 Teen, King of, 32 Tempest family, the, 312 Temple, Henry, 310 Temple of Stowe, Earls, 307 Ternat^, island of, 233 Tetzel, accompanied by Fuggers' representative, 89 Textiles, trade in, 44 Tharos, colony of Phoenicia, 37 Theodoric the Great, 49 Theophrastus on the peach, 27 INDEX 419 Thibet, Marco Polo in, 57 — trade route through, 30 Thirty Years' War, the, 120 Thomas, A., his barony, 290 Thomas, D. A., his barony, 290 Thompson, Richard, merchant, 302 Thorold family, the 314 Thorp Perrow, Milbankes of, 301 Thorpe's Ancient Laws, 169 note Ti, inventor of wine, 24 Tidor^, island of, 233, 234 Tilney, Francis, 306 Timber trade, Venetian, 52 Tin, Chinese, 24 — Cornish, 15, 36, 245 Tiverton, Devon, 303 Tobacco, introduction of, 232, 246, 247 — Law's monopoly of, 264 — titles connected with, 311 Togarmah, 122 Tokio, Mitsui house in, 350-355 Tolason, Lord Mayor, 148 Toledo blades, 128 Torbay, 232 Torcello, 49 Torhout, fair at,'i25 Toronto, 344 Toshin Warehousing Company, 357 Totnes, 202 — De la Poles of, 181 Toulouse, merchants of, 176 Tournevain bindings, 25 1 Tours, gardens at, 92 — Law's bank at, 263 Trade, aristocracy and, 287-317 — • Child's Observations Concerning, 271 — See Commerce" Trades' Increase, The, voyages of, 235-237 Trafford, family of, 306 Transsiberian Railway, the, 134 Trent, the river, 171 Treves, marriage of Charles the ^Bold at, 83 Treviso, 48 Trient, Bishop of, 96 Tring, Lord Rothschild of, 305 Tripoli silk, 245 Troy weight, 123 Troyes, fair at, 123 Truman, Hanbury and Co.'s brewery, 310 Tsih-moh, traders at, 31 Tsin, Duke of, his foreign policy, 25 Ts'in, Emperor of China, 25, 26 Tulip craze, the, 254-259 Tungyeh, 32 Turbines, Parsons, 317 Turkestan, jade, 30 Turks seize Constantinople, 61, -^ trade with China, 23 Turkey, home of the tulip, 254 — its trade in alum, 73 — merchants, the, 231, 245, 302, 311, 312, 313 Turner baronetcy, the, 315 Turton, Chetham of, 243 Tyler, Wat, his rebellion, 195 Tylney, Richard Child, 1st Earl, 273, 306 Tyre, fairs held in, 122 — siege of, 55 — trade of, 17, 35-42, 48 Tyrol, County, 96 Ueberlingen, 96 Ukkalamandala, 31 Ulfila's Gothic translation of the Bible, 99 Ulm, 80, 96 Ural Mountains, the, 133 Usury, practice of, 21 1 Utrecht, Treaty of, 116, 327 Valois, House of, defeated by the Hapsburgs, 89 Van Eyck, Jan, his medium, 52 Vane family of Long Newton, 312 Vanneck, Joshua, merchant,'3ii 420 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Vendome, Due de, associate of Law, 261 Venice, bankers of, 56, 62 — decay of, 62 — Fondaco dei Tedeschi, 86, 1 12 — Fuggers trade in, 82, 86, 87 — Hanseatic League in, 105, 112 — its coinage, 52, 56, 59 — its defeat by Genoa, 56, 57 — its funded debt, 55, 59 — its mercantile marine, 59 — its participation in the Crusades, 54-56 — its quarrel with the Pope, 57 — its relations with Constanti- nople, 49, 51-56, 105 — Law in, 269, 270 — Lorenzo de' Medici in, (>i, 72 — merchants of, 211, 222, 223, 226 240, 304, 361 — printing in, 375 — rise of, 48, 53, 63 — St. Mark's Cathedral, 53 — trade of, 49-62, 128 Vere, family of de, 293 Vermilion, trade in, 133 Verne, Jules, Dr. Ox's Experiment, 257 Verney, Earls, 296 Verney, Sir Ralph, mercer, 296 Verona, 48, 58 Verragano, traveller, 334 Vicenza, 58 Vienna, Rothschilds of, 305 Vikings, the, their piracy, 140 Vintners, the Worshipful Company of, 142, 160-162 Virginia, produce of, 246 Virginian Plantation, the, 307 Virility, affected by wealth, 13, 40, 81 Vivarini, his master, 52 Vivian, H. Hussey, his barony, 290 Voguell, Henry, merchant, 246 Vohlin, merchant of Augsburg, 85 Volga, the river, 134 Waechter, baronetcy, the, 305 Wakayama, Daimio of, 353 Wakefield, its cloth trade, 130, 241 Wakhan, 30 Waldemar of Denmark, King, opposes the Hanseatic League, 100, lOI Waldorf, village of, 331 Wales, conquest of, 180 Walking-sticks, Persian, 44 Walford, historian of Fairs, 124, 132. 134 Waller, Edmund, his Sacharissa, 308 Walworth, Sir William, his career, isi> 193, 195 Wandsworth, barony of, 309 Wanstead, Child's death at, 273 Warrender, Sir George, merchant and Lord Provost, 298 Wars of the Roses, the, 206 Warwick, Earl of, 296 — his descent, 294, 296, 308 Warwick, Elizabeth, daughter of an Earl of, 296 Watling Street, 165 Watson, Robert, lawyer, 343 Wax, trade in, 104, 108 Wealth, its dependence on com- merce, 3 — its effect on virility, 13, 40, 81, Webster's dictionary, 147 Wedderburn, baronetcy of, 299 Wedderburn, James, merchant, 299 Wei, China, 30 — dynasty, the, 25 Weiblingen, Abbot of, 96 Weights and measures, regulation of, 21 Weimar, its position in the Han- seatic League, 100 Weingarten, Abbot of, 96 Weld family, the, 315 Weller, Samuel, 289 INDEX Wellington, Arthur, ist Duke of, feted in London, 157 Welser family, the, 85 and note Welsh ironworks, the, 165 Wemyss, Earl of, 294 Wenlock, Lord, 302 Wentworth, Baroness, 301 Wernher baronetcy, the, 305 Westbury, Canynge, Dean of, 205 West Indies, Child's trade with, 271 — Columbus in the, 61 — English possessions in, 327 — Patterson in, 274, 278 — slave trade in, 220 Westminster, its fair, 177 — its markets, 179 — Scott, banker of, 309 Westmoreland, Earl of, 306 Westphalia, 95 — Treaty of, 120 West Wang Mu, the, 29 Weymouth, 204 Wharton, Duke of, interested in the coal trade, 291 Whitby, port of, 1 71 White, Luke, bookseller, 299 Whitehall, Court at, 219 White lead, trade in, 133 White Sea, the, 109 Whitmore, William, merchant, 315 Whittington, Sir Richard, 318 — as a Mercer, 145 — his career, 191-193, 195-200, 227 — his descent, 313 Whittington, Sir William, 313 Wigrams of Bristol, the, 295 Wilde, William, sheriff, 315 Willey, Welds of, 315 William the Conqueror, King, 180 William III, King< as a Grocer, 147 — defeats Louis XIV, 326 — incorporates the Bank of Eng- land, 276 — Patterson's advice to, 277-279 2 E 421 by William III, King, served Marlborough, 324 325 — shareholder of the H.B.C., 323 WiUiam, William Fitz, 296 Willoughby, Sir Thomas, 306 Wills family, the, 311 Wilson Line, the, 295 Wimborne, Lord, his arms, 294 Winchcombe, John, cloth mer- chant, 293 Winchester, commercial prosperity of, 202, 225 — fair of St. Giles at, 127, 171, 181 — Gresham, Prebendary of, 209 — its wines, 171 — Marquess of, 297 Wine, Armenian, 44 — Caucasian, 135 — Hanseatic trade in, 104, 112 — invented and introduced in China, 24, 29 — Italian, 49 — Portuguese trade in, 128 Wine trade, English, 160-162, 171, 176, 177 — its connection with the aristoc- racy, 310 Wine trade, French, 171 Wingfield family, the, 289 Winn family, the, 310 Winnipeg, Lake, 336 — Manitoba College, 319 note Witham, the river, 171 Wolfe, General, 302 Wolfe, General, his conquest of Canada, 329 WoUaton, Sir Thomas Willoughby of, 306 Wolsey, Cardinal, 296 — Richard Gresham, a friend of, 209 Wolverton, barony of, 309 Wood, Sir Matthew, m.p., and Lord Mayor, 303 Wood, William, serge maker, 303 422 ROMANCE OF COMMERCE Wool, Assyrian trade in, 44 — English trade in, 105, 130, 182, 183 — — Addison on, 1 5 — — its connections with the aristocracy, 294 restrictions on, 173 — Fugger trade in, 82, 87 — Grecian trade in, 46 WooUen goods, English trade in, 104 — at Sturbridge Fair, 129, 130 — ^^ in Venice, 60 — founded by Flemish weavers, 93, 126, 170, 240-242 Worcester cloth, 245 Wullenweber, Jugen, his commer- cial policy, 1 18-120 Wurtemberg, Duchy of, 96 — Duke Frederick of, on London, 21S Wurzburg, Bishop of, 96 Wu Ti, Emperor of China, 29 Wyke-upon-Hull, 183 X.Y. Company, the, 331 Yakut stones, 32 Yale University, Lord Strathcona's bequest to, 348 Yankees, as business men, 247 Yarmouth, its fishing industry, 171 — subscribes towards a fleet, 204 Yates, Nell, 282 Yates, William, partner of Peel and Haworth, 281, 282 Yaw, Emperor of China, 24 Yeddo (Tokio), 351-353 Yellow River, the, 21, 29 York, Lord Mayors of, 302 — subscribes towards a fleet, 204 — trade of, 130, 166, 171, 183, 203 York and Lancaster (84th) Regi- ment, 299 York, James, Duke of. See James II Yorkshire, woollen trade of, 240- 242 Ypres, cloth-workers of, 124, 170 Yu, Emperor of China, 24, 27 Yuman Nurma, 32 Yumen, trade route through, 28 Zante Cephalonia, 245 Zanzibar, 57 Zimmern, Helen, The Hansa Towns, 99 Zouche, of Harringworth, Lord, 297 MEMOIRS, BIOGRAPHIES, Etc. THE LIFE AND WORK OF OZIAS HUMPHRY, R.A. By Dr. G. C. Williamson. With 1 50 Illustrations. Demy 410. ^^ 3/. net. THE LIFE OF JOHN WILKES. By Horace Bleackley. With numerous Illustrations. Demy 8vo. i6s. net. 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