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Title: History of Merchant Shipping and Ancient Commerce, Vol. 2 (of 4)
Author: W. S. Lindsay
Release date: June 29, 2024 [eBook #73949]
Language: English
Original publication: London: Sampson Low, Marston, Low, and Searle, 1874
Credits: Melissa McDaniel and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY OF MERCHANT SHIPPING AND ANCIENT COMMERCE, VOL. 2 (OF 4) ***
HISTORY
OF
MERCHANT SHIPPING
AND
ANCIENT COMMERCE.
BY
W. S. LINDSAY.
_IN FOUR VOLUMES._
VOL. II.
With numerous Illustrations.
LONDON:
SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, LOW, AND SEARLE.
CROWN BUILDINGS, 188 FLEET STREET.
1874.
[_All Rights reserved._]
LONDON.
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS,
STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I. Pages 1-48
Dom John of Portugal prosecutes his researches for India—Expedition
under Vasco de Gama, 1497—Description of the ships—The expedition sails
9th July, 1497—Doubles the Cape of Good Hope, 25th Nov.—Sights land
at Natal, 25th Dec., 1498—Meets the first native vessel and obtains
information about India—Arrives at Mozambique, 10th March—Departs
for Quiloa, 8th April—Arrives at Melinde, 29th April—Sails for
Calicut, 6th August—Reaches the shores of India, 26th August—Arrives
at Calicut—Vasco de Gama disembarks and concludes a treaty with the
king—His treachery—Leaves Calicut for Cananore—Enters into friendly
relations and leaves Cananore, 20th Nov.—Reaches Melinde, 8th Jan.,
1499—Obtains pilots and sails for Europe, 20th Jan.—Doubles the
Cape of Good Hope—Death of Paul de Gama—The expedition reaches the
Tagus, 18th Sept., 1499—Great rejoicings at Lisbon—Arrangements
made for further expeditions—Departure of the second expedition,
25th March, 1502—Reaches Mozambique and Quiloa, where De Gama
makes known his power and threatens to capture the city—His unjust
demands—Arrives at Melinde—Departs, 18th Aug., 1502—Encounter
with the Moors—Levies tribute, and sails for Cananore—Disgraceful
destruction of a Calicut ship and massacre of her crew—De Gama’s
arrangement with the king of Cananore—Departure for Calicut—Bombards
the city—Horrible cruelties—Arrives at Cochym 7th Nov., where he
loads, and at Coulam—Opens a factory at Coulam—Calicut declares
war against Dom Gama—Success of the Portuguese—Desecration of the
Indian vessels, and further atrocities—Completes his factory and
fortifications at Cananore, and sails for Lisbon, where he arrives, 1st
Sept., 1503—De Gama arrives in India for the third time 11th Sept.,
1524—His death, 24th Dec., 1524—His character as compared with that of
Columbus—Discovery of the Pacific by Vasco Nuñez de Bilboa—Voyage of
Magellan
CHAPTER II. Pages 49-87
Progress of maritime discovery—Henry VII., 1485-1509—His encouragement
of maritime commerce and treaties with foreign nations—Voyages
to the Levant—Leading English shipowners—Patent to the Cabots,
1496—Discovery of the north-west coast of America, June 21, 1497—Second
patent, Feb. 3, 1498—Rival claimants to the discovery of the North
American continent—Sebastian Cabot and his opinions—Objects of the
second expedition—Third expedition, March 1501—How Sebastian Cabot
was employed from 1498 to 1512—He enters the service of Spain,
1512—Letter of Robert Thorne to Henry VIII. on further maritime
discoveries—Sebastian Cabot becomes pilot-master in Spain, 1518,
and afterwards (1525) head of a great trading and colonising
association—Leaves for South America, April 1526, in command of an
expedition to the Brazils—A mutiny and its suppression—Explores the
river La Plata while waiting instructions from Spain—Sanguinary
encounter with the natives—Returns to Spain, 1531, and remains there
till 1549, when he settles finally in Bristol—Edward VI., A.D.
1547-1553—Cabot forms an association for trading with the north, known
as the “Merchant Adventurers”—Despatch of the first expedition under
Sir H. Willoughby—Instructions for his guidance, probably drawn up
by Cabot—Departure, May 20, 1553—Great storm and separation of the
ships—Death of Sir H. Willoughby—Success of Chancellor—His shipwreck
and death at Pitsligo—Arrival in London of the first ambassador from
Russia, Feb. 1557—His reception—Commercial treaty—Early system of
conducting business with Russia—The benefits conferred by the Merchant
Adventurers upon England—The Steelyard merchants partially restored to
their former influence—Cabot loses favour with the court, and dies at
an advanced age
CHAPTER III. Pages 88-140
Henry VIII. resolves to establish a permanent Royal Navy—Derives
his first supply of men from English fishermen—Royal fleet equipped
and despatched from Portsmouth—Its first engagement—Increase of the
French fleets—Extraordinary exertions of the English to meet the
emergency—The rapidity with which they supplied men and vessels—Outfit
of the ships—The _Great Harry_—Number and strength of the fleet at
the death of Henry VIII., 28 Jan., 1547—The _Great Michael_—Trade
monopolies—Mode of conducting business—Mistaken laws—The Bridport
petition—Chartered companies—Prices regulated by law, and employment
provided—The petition of the weavers—State of the currency, A.D.
1549—Its depreciation—Corruption of the government—Recommendation
of W. Lane to Sir W. Cecil, who acts upon it, A.D. 1551, August—The
corruption of the council extends to the merchants—Accession of
Elizabeth, A.D. 1558—War with Spain—Temporary peace with France,
soon followed by another war—Demand for letters of marque—Number
of the Royal fleet, A.D. 1559—The desperate character of the
privateers—Conduct of the Spaniards—Daring exploits and cruelty of
Lord Thomas Cobham, and of other privateers or marauders—Piratical
cruises of the mayor of Dover—Prompt retaliation of the king of
Spain—Reply of Elizabeth—Elizabeth attempts to suppress piracy,
29th Sept., 1564—Her efforts fail, but are renewed with increased
vigour, though in vain—Opening of the African slave-trade—Character
of its promoters—John Hawkins’ daring expedition—Fresh expeditions
sanctioned by Elizabeth and her councillors—Cartel and Hawkins—They
differ and separate, 1565—Hawkins reaches the West Indies with four
hundred slaves, whom he sells to much advantage, and sails for
England—Fresh expeditions, 1556—They extend their operations, 1568—The
third expedition of Sir John Hawkins departs, October 1567, and
secures extraordinary gains—Attacked by a Spanish fleet and severely
injured—Reaches England in distress—Prevails on the Queen to make
reprisals—Questionable conduct of Elizabeth—Vigorous action of the
Spanish ambassador—Prompt retaliation—Injury to English trade less
than might have been supposed—Hatred of the Catholics—Increase of the
privateers, 1570—Their desperate acts, 1572
CHAPTER IV. Pages 141-181
Certainty of war with Spain—Secret preparations for the invasion
of England, and restoration of the Catholic faith—Philip intrigues
with Hawkins, and is grossly deceived—The Spanish Armada, and
England’s preparations for defence—Destruction of the Armada,
July 19, 1588—Voyages of discovery by Johnson—Finner and Martin
Frobisher—Drake’s voyage round the world, 1577—His piratical acts and
return home, 1580—First emigration of the English to America—Discovery
of Davis’s Straits—Davis directs his attention to India—Fresh
freebooting expeditions—Voyage of Cavendish to India, 1591, which leads
to the formation of the first English India Company, in 1600—First
ships despatched by the Company—The Dutch also form an East India
Company—Extent of their maritime commerce—They take the lead in the
trade with India—Expedition of Sir Henry Middleton—Its failure and
his death—Renewed efforts of the English East India Company—They gain
favour with the Moghul Emperor of India, and materially extend their
commercial operations—Treaty between English and Dutch East India
Companies—Soon broken—Losses of East India Company—Sir Walter Raleigh’s
views on maritime commerce, 1603—His views confirmed by other writers
opposed to his opinions—The views of Tobias, 1614—His estimate of
the profits of busses—The effect of these publications—Colonising
expeditions to North America—Charles I. assumes power over the
colonies—English shipowners resist the demand for Ship-Money—Its
payment enforced by law—Dutch rivalry—Increase of English
shipping—Struggles of the East India Company—Decline of Portuguese
power in India—The trade of the English in India—Increase of other
branches of English trade—Ships of the Turkey and Muscovy Company—The
Dutch pre-eminent—The reasons for this pre-eminence
CHAPTER V. Pages 182-214
English Navigation Laws—First Prohibitory Act, 1646—Further Acts,
1650-1651—Their object and effect—War declared between Great Britain
and Holland, July 1652—The English capture Prizes—Peace of 1654—Alleged
complaints against the Navigation Acts of Cromwell—Navigation Act
of Charles II.—The Maritime Charter of England—Its main provisions
recited—Trade with the Dutch prohibited—The Dutch navigation seriously
injured—Fresh war with the Dutch, 1664—Its naval results—Action off
Harwich, 1665—Dutch Smyrna fleet—Coalition between French and Dutch,
1666—Battle of June 1 and of July 24, 1666—Renewed negotiations for
peace, 1667—Dutch fleet burn ships at Chatham, threaten London,
and proceed to Portsmouth—Peace concluded—Its effects—The colonial
system—Partial anomalies—Capital created—Economical theories the
prelude to final free-trade—Eventual separation from the mother-country
considered—Views of Sir Josiah Child on the Navigation Laws—Relative
value of British and Foreign ships, 1666—British clearances, 1688, and
value of exports—War with France—Peace of Ryswick, 1697—Trade of the
Colonies—African trade—Newfoundland—Usages at the Fishery—Greenland
Fishery—Russian trade—Peter the Great—Effect of the legislative union
with Scotland, 1707—The maritime commerce of Scotland—Buccaneers in
the West Indies—State of British shipping, temp. George I.—South Sea
Company, 1710
CHAPTER VI. Pages 215-256
English voyages of discovery, 1690-1779—Dampier—Anson—Byron—Wallis
and Carteret—Captain Cook—His first voyage, in the _Endeavour_—Second
voyage, in the _Resolution_—Third voyage—Friendly, Fiji, Sandwich,
and other islands—His murder—Progress of the North American
colonies—Commercial jealousy in the West Indies—Seven Years’
War, 1756-1763—Its effect on the colonies—Unwise legislative
measures—Effect of the new restrictions—Passing of the Stamp
Act—Trade interrupted—Non-intercourse resolutions—Recourse to
hostilities—Position of the colonists—Fisheries—Shipping of North
American Colonies, A.D. 1769—Early registry of ships not always
to be depended on—Independence of United States acknowledged, May
24, 1784—Ireland secures various commercial concessions—Scotch
shipping—Rate of seamen’s wages—British Registry Act, Aug. 1,
1786—American Registry Act—Treaty between France and England,
1786—Slave-trade and its profits—Trade between England and America
and the West Indies re-opened—Changes produced by the Navigation
Laws consequent on the separation—New disputes—English Orders in
Council—Negotiations opened between Mr. Jay and Lord Grenville—Tonnage
duties levied by them
CHAPTER VII. Pages 257-289
Great Britain, A.D. 1792—War with France, Feb. 1, 1793—Commercial
panic—Government lends assistance—High price of corn—Bounties granted
on its importation—Declaration of Russia, 1780—Confederacy renewed when
Bonaparte had risen to power—Capture of merchant vessels—Do “free ships
make free goods?”—Neutral nations repudiate the English views—Their
views respecting blockades—Right of search—Chief doctrines of the
neutrals—Mr. Pitt stands firm, and is supported by Mr. Fox—Defence
of the English principles—Nelson sent to the Sound, 1801—Bombardment
of Copenhagen—Peace of Amiens, and its terms—Bonaparte’s opinion
of free-trade—Sequestration of English property in France not
raised—All claims remain unanswered—Restraint on commerce—French
spies sent to England to examine her ports, etc.—Aggrandisement of
Bonaparte—Irritation in England—Bonaparte’s interview with Lord
Whitworth—The English ministers try to gain time—Excitement in
England—The King’s message—The invasion of England determined on—War
declared, May 18, 1803—Joy of the shipowners—Preparations in England
for defence—Captures of French merchantmen—Effect of the war on
shipping—Complaints of English shipowners—Hardships of the pressing
system—Apprentices—Suggestions to secure the Mediterranean trade, and
to encourage emigration to Canada—Value of the Canadian trade
CHAPTER VIII. Pages 290-319
Mr. Fox tries to make peace with France, 1806—Napoleon’s
Proclamation—English Order in Council, April 8, 1806—Berlin Decree,
Nov. 10, 1806—Its terms, and the stringency of its articles—Napoleon’s
skill and duplicity—Russian campaign conceived—Berlin Decree
enforced—Increased rates of insurance—English Orders in
Council, 1807—Preamble of third Order in Council—Terms of this
Order—Neutrals—The Orders discussed—Embargo on British ships in
Russia—Milan Decree, Dec. 17, 1807—Preamble and articles—Bayonne
Decree, April 17, 1808—Effect of the Decrees and Orders in Council in
England—Interests of the shipowners maintained—Napoleon infringes his
own decrees—_Moniteur_, Nov. 18, 1810—Rise in the price of produce and
freights, partly accounted for by the Orders in Council—Ingenuity of
merchants in shipping goods—Smuggling—Licence system in England—Cost of
English licences—Their marketable value—Working of the licensing system
in England—Simulated papers—Agencies for the purpose of fabricating them
CHAPTER IX. Pages 320-344
Effect of the Orders in Council on American trade, A.D. 1810—Complaints
of the Americans against England—Policy of Napoleon towards
neutrals—Non-intercourse Act—Secret terms with America—Partiality
of the United States towards France—Contentions at home respecting
the Orders in Council—Declaration of war with America—Motives of the
Americans—England revokes her Orders in Council—Condemnation of the
conduct of the United States—Impressment of American seamen—Fraudulent
certificates—Incidents of the system—War with America—Necessity of
relaxing the Navigation Laws during war—High duties on cotton—Great
European Alliance—Napoleon returns to Paris—Germans advance to the
Rhine—Treaty of Chaumont—The Allies enter Paris—End of the war by the
Treaty of Paris, 1814—Napoleon’s escape from Elba—His landing in France
and advance on Paris—British troops despatched to Belgium—Subsidies
to European Powers—Fouché—Last campaign of Napoleon, and defeat at
Waterloo—Reflections
CHAPTER X. Pages 345-380
United States of America—Her independence recognised,
1783—Commercial rights—Retaliatory measures—Threatening attitude
of Massachusetts—Constitution of the United States—Good effects
of an united Government—Maritime laws and laws respecting
Neutrals—Feeling on both sides the water—Treaty between Great Britain
and United States—The right to impose a countervailing tonnage duty
reserved—Difficulty of the negotiation—Remarkable omission respecting
cotton—Indignation in France at the Treaty—The French protest against
its principles—Interest of England to have private property free
from capture at sea—Condemnation of ships in the West Indies and
great depredations—Outrages on the Americans—Torture practised by
French cruisers—The advantages of the war to the Americans—Impulse
given to shipping—Progress of American civilisation—Advances of
maritime enterprise—Views of American statesmen—The shipwrights
of Baltimore seek protection—Great Britain imposes countervailing
duties—Effect of legislative measures on both sides—Freight and duty
compared—Conclusions drawn by the American shipowners—Alarm in the
United States at the idea of reciprocity—Objections to the British
Navigation Act—Threatened destruction to American shipping—Popular
clamour—Opinions in Congress—Great influence of the shipowners—Early
statesmen of the United States—Their efforts to develop maritime
commerce—First trade with the East—European war of 1803—Its effect on
their maritime pursuits
CHAPTER XI. Pages 381-407
A special mission sent to England—Concessions made in the Colonial
trade—Blockades in the Colonies, and of the French ports in the
Channel—The dispute concerning the trade with the French Colonies—What
is a direct trade?—Reversal of the law in England—Effect in
America—Instructions to Commissioners—Proceedings of the shipowners of
New York—Duties of neutrals—Views of the New York shipowners—Conditions
with respect to private armed vessels—Authorities on the
subject—Negotiations for another treaty—Circuitous trade—Commercial
stipulations—Violation of treaties—Complaints of the Americans
against the French—Language of the Emperor—Bayonne Decree, April
17, 1808—American Non-intervention Act, March 1, 1809—Intrigues in
Paris against England—Hostile feelings in United States against
England—Diplomatic proceedings in Paris—Convention with Great
Britain—Retaliatory Acts to be enforced conditionally—Hostile
legislation against Great Britain—Bonds required—Treaty negotiations
renewed—Dutch reciprocity—Bremen reciprocity
CHAPTER XII. Pages 408-442
Earliest formation of wet docks and bonded warehouses—System of
levying duties—Opposition to any change—Excise Bill proposed, 1733—but
not passed till 1803—Necessity of docks for London—Depredations
from ships in London—The extent of the plunder—Instances of
robberies—Scuffle hunters—“Game” ships—Rat-catchers—River-pirates—Their
audacity—Light-horsemen—Their organisation—“Drum-hogsheads”—Long-shore
men—Harbour accommodation—Not adequate for the merchant shipping—East
and West India ships—Docks at length planned—West India
Docks—Regulations—East India Docks—Mode of conducting business at
the Docks—London Docks—St. Katharine’s Docks—Victoria and Millwall
Docks—Charges levied by the Dock Companies—Docks in provincial
ports, and bonded warehouses—Liverpool and Birkenhead Docks—Port of
Liverpool, its commerce, and its revenue from the docks—Extent of
accommodation—Extension of docks to the north—Hydraulic lifts and
repairing basins—Cost of new works—Bye-laws of the Mersey Board—The
pilots of the Mersey—Duties of the superintendents—Conditions of
admission to the service—Pilot-boats and rates of pilotage
CHAPTER XIII. Pages 443-488
East India Company—Early struggles—Rival company—Private
traders—Coalition effected—Their trade, 1741-1748, and
continued difficulties up to 1773—Their form of charter—Rates
of freight—Gross earnings—Evidence of Sir Richard Hotham before
the Committee of Inquiry—The effect of his evidence—Reduction of
duties, August 1784—Extent of tea trade—Opposition of independent
shipowners—India-built ships admitted to the trade—Board of Control
established, 1784—Value of the trade, 1796—Charter renewed,
with important provisions, from 1796 to 1814—Restrictions on
private traders—East India Company’s shipping, 1808-1815—The
trade partially opened—Jealousy of free-traders—Efforts of
the free-traders at the out-ports—Comparative cost of East
India Company’s ships and of other vessels—Opposition to the
employment of the latter—_Earl of Balcarras_—Her crew—Actions
fought by the ships of the Company—Conditions of entering the
service—Uniforms—Discipline—Promotion—Pay and perquisites—Abuse
of privileges—Direct remuneration of commanders—Provisions and
extra allowances—Illicit trade denounced by the Court, and means
adopted to discover the delinquents—Connivance of the officers of
the Customs—Pensions, and their conditions—Internal economy of the
ships—Watches and duties—Amusements—Gun-exercise—Courts-martial—Change
in the policy of the East India Company—Results of free-trade with
India, and of the Company’s trading operations—China trade thrown open,
1832-1834—Company abolished, 1858—Retiring allowances to commanders and
officers—Compensations and increased pensions granted—Remuneration of
the directors—Their patronage
CHAPTER XIV. Pages 489-538
Progress of shipping—_Thetis_, West Indiaman—A “Free-trader”—Internal
economy—Provisioning and manning—Shipping the crew—Crimps and
agents—Duties on departure of ship—Watches—Duties of the Master—Who
has control over navigation—Making and shortening sail—Tacking,
etc.—Ordinary day’s work, how arranged—Right of the Master over
the cabin—Authority and usages in the English, Dutch, and Prussian
marine—Danish and Norwegian system—Duties of Chief Mate—His duties in
port—Tacking “’bout ship”—Reefing topsails—Log-book—Mate successor in
law to the Master—Mode of address to Chief and Second Mates—Duties of
Second Mate—Ordinary day’s work—Care of spare rigging—Stores—Third
Mate—His general duties—Carpenter—Sail-maker—Steward—Cook—Able seamen,
their duties—Division of their labour—Duties of ordinary seamen—Boys or
apprentices—Bells—Helm—“Tricks” at the helm—Relieving duty—Orders at
the wheel—Repeating of orders at wheel—Conversation not allowed while
on duty—Colliers.
APPENDICES.
PAGE
Appendix No. 1 541
Appendix No. 2 555
Appendix No. 3 557
Appendix No. 4 559
Appendix No. 5 561
Appendix No. 6 563
Appendix No. 7 564
Appendix No. 8 570
Appendix No. 9 572
Appendix No. 10 576
Appendix No. 11 578
Appendix No. 12 583
Appendix No. 13 585
Appendix No. 14 586
Appendix No. 15 588
Index 593
[Illustration:
THE
LIVERPOOL AND BIRKENHEAD
DOCKS.
_Published by Sampson Low, Marston, Low & Searle,
Crown Buildings 188 Fleet Street, London._
_Engraved by Edw^d. Weller. Red Lion Square_]
MERCHANT SHIPPING.
CHAPTER I.
Dom John of Portugal prosecutes his researches for
India—Expedition under Vasco de Gama, 1497—Description of
the ships—The expedition sails 9th July, 1497—Doubles the
Cape of Good Hope, 25th Nov.—Sights land at Natal, 25th Dec.,
1498—Meets the first native vessel and obtains information about
India—Arrives at Mozambique, 10th March—Departs for Quiloa,
8th April—Arrives at Melinde, 29th April—Sails for Calicut,
6th August—Reaches the shores of India, 26th August—Arrives
at Calicut—Vasco de Gama disembarks and concludes a treaty
with the king—His treachery—Leaves Calicut for Cananore—Enters
into friendly relations and leaves Cananore, 20th Nov.—Reaches
Melinde, 8th Jan., 1499—Obtains pilots and sails for Europe, 20th
Jan.—Doubles the Cape of Good Hope—Death of Paul de Gama—The
expedition reaches the Tagus, 18th Sept., 1499—Great rejoicings
at Lisbon—Arrangements made for further expeditions—Departure of
the second expedition, 25th March, 1502—Reaches Mozambique and
Quiloa, where De Gama makes known his power, and threatens to
capture the city—His unjust demands—Arrives at Melinde—Departs,
18th Aug., 1502—Encounter with the Moors—Levies tribute, and
sails for Cananore—Disgraceful destruction of a Calicut ship,
and massacre of her crew—De Gama’s arrangements with the king
of Cananore—Departure for Calicut—Bombards the city—Horrible
cruelties—Arrives at Cochym 7th Nov., where he loads, and at
Coulam—Opens a factory at Coulam—Calicut declares war against Dom
Gama—Success of the Portuguese—Desecration of the Indian vessels,
and further atrocities—Completes his factory and fortifications
at Cananore, and sails for Lisbon, where he arrives, 1st Sept.,
1503—De Gama arrives in India for the third time, 11th Sept.,
1524—His death, 24th Dec., 1524—His character as compared with
that of Columbus—Discovery of the Pacific by Vasco Nuñez de
Bilboa—Voyage of Magellan.
[Sidenote: Dom John, of Portugal, prosecutes his researches for India.]
While the Spaniards under Columbus were prosecuting their researches
for India among the islands and along the coasts of a new-found world,
Dom John, of Portugal, was vigorously following up the voyages of
discovery which Prince Henry had commenced in the early part of the
fifteenth century. “He had heard,” remarks Gaspar Correa,[1] “from a
Caffre or Negro king of Benin, who in 1484 took up his quarters in
Lisbon, many marvellous things about India, and its affairs.” But
though this sable monarch spoke of “Prester John,” he does not appear
to have had any idea of the position of the golden land, over which he
was the traditional ruler. Dom John, however, resolved to ascertain
this fact, and despatched “secretly two young men of his equerries, to
learn of many lands, and wander in many parts, because they knew many
languages.”
“The king,” continues Correa, “promised them a large recompense for
their labour, and for such great services as they would be rendering
him; and for as long as they should continue in this service, he
would take good care for the support of their wives and children.” He
directed them to separate and to go by different roads, giving to each
of them letters of acknowledgment of the recompense which he promised
them if they returned alive, or to their sons and widows if they should
die in this service. He likewise ordered a plate of brass like a medal
to be given to each of them, bearing an inscription engraved in all
languages, with the name of ‘_The King Dom Joam of Portugal, brother
of the Christian King_,’ which they might show to Prester John, and to
whomsoever they thought fit.[2]
[Sidenote: Expedition under Vasco de Gama, 1497.]
[Sidenote: Description of the ships.]
The celebrated expedition of Vasco de Gama which followed this inquiry
is generally described as consisting of three vessels, one of 120 tons,
another of 100 tons, and the third somewhat less.[3] Correa says
they were all very similar in size and equipment, in order that each
ship might avail itself of any part of the tackle and fittings; and
he describes their outfit and cargoes as follows: “The king ordered
the ships to be supplied with double tackle and sets of sails, and
artillery and munitions in great abundance; above all, provisions, with
which the ships were to be filled, with many preserves and perfumed
waters, and in each ship all the articles of an apothecary’s shop for
the sick; a master, and a priest for confession. The king also ordered
all sorts of merchandise of what was in the kingdom and from outside of
it, and much gold and silver, coined in the money of all Christendom
and of the Moors. And cloths of gold, silk, and wool, of all kinds and
colours, and many jewels of gold, necklaces, chains, and bracelets, and
ewers of silver and silver-gilt, yataghans, swords, daggers, smooth
and engraved, and adorned with gold and silver workmanship. Spears and
shields, all adorned so as to be fit for presentation to the kings and
rulers of the countries where they might put into port; and a little of
each kind of spice. The king likewise commanded slaves to be bought
who knew all the languages which might be fallen in with, and all the
supplies which seemed to be requisite were provided in great abundance
and in double quantities.”
[Illustration: SAN GABRIEL.]
Such was the equipment of De Gama’s ships for this perilous and unknown
voyage; and, though a man of indefatigable energy, he had to accomplish
a task of an extraordinary character; no less than the discovery of
a land of which nothing was known, but the vague idea that it lay
beyond distant seas “where there would not be navigation by latitude
nor charts, only the needle to know the points of the compass, and the
sounding plummets for running down the coast.”[4]
On the Sunday fixed for the purpose of offering prayers before the
departure of this memorable expedition, the king, with his nobles and
most of the leading families of Lisbon, assembled in that beautiful
cathedral which still adorns the northern bank of the Tagus, to hear
mass from the Bishop Calçadilha, who with deep solemnity offered up
prayers, beseeching God “that the voyage might be for His holy service,
for the exaltation of His holy faith, and the good and honour of the
kingdom of Portugal.” At the conclusion of mass, the king stood before
the curtain where Vasco de Gama and his brother Paulo de Gama placed
themselves, with the captains of the expeditions, on their knees, and
devoutly prayed that they might have strength of mind and body to carry
out the wishes of the king, to increase the power and greatness of his
dominion, and to spread the Christian religion into other and far
distant lands.
[Sidenote: The expedition sails 9th July 1497.]
[Sidenote: Doubles the Cape of Good Hope, 25th Nov.]
[Sidenote: Sights land at Natal 25th Dec.]
With these professed objects and amid splendid demonstrations, in which
the whole population of Lisbon took part, Vasco de Gama set sail on the
9th of July 1497. Favoured by a northerly wind and fine weather, the
expedition reached St. Iago, Cape Verde Islands, in thirteen days from
the time of its departure. Having replenished his stock of provisions,
De Gama shaped his course to the south, and on the 4th of November
anchored in the bay of St. Helena, on the west coast of Africa. Though
aided by the skill and knowledge of Pedro d’Alemquer, Dias’s pilot, it
was not until the 22nd November that he succeeded in doubling the now
famous Cape of Good Hope, entering on the 25th the bay to the eastward
of it, which Dias had named San Bras. Here he encountered one of those
storms so frequent on the Agulhas banks, which Correa graphically
describes.[5] The ships were in imminent danger, the crews mutinied and
resolved to put back; and the fine weather, as had been anticipated,
did not restore either contentment or resignation. At length on Sunday,
the 17th of December, they passed the Rio do Iffante, the limit of
the discoveries of Dias, and on the 25th of that month sighted land.
In commemoration of the birthday of Christ, De Gama gave to this spot
the name of Costa de Natal. Continuing his course along the coast to
the north-east, he arrived on the 22nd of January, 1498, at a river
which he named the Rio de Bons Sinaes[6] (now called the Quillimane),
where he was detained for a month, owing to an outbreak of scurvy
among the crew. His ships, too, had suffered so severely, that they
had to be careened and thoroughly caulked, and many of the ropes
and shrouds replaced by others, to provide which the transport, as
unworthy of repair, was broken up, and the best of her spars and stores
appropriated to the equipment of the other vessels.
[Sidenote: Meets the first native vessel, and obtains information about
India.]
When the ships were repaired “they sailed with much satisfaction along
the coast, keeping a good look-out by day and night,” and at length
fell in with a small native vessel, in which there was an intelligent
Moor. From this man, whom the captain-major luxuriously entertained, a
great deal of information was obtained as to the character and habits
of the people on the coast; and, when spices were presented to him,
he intimated that he knew where they could be obtained abundantly.
Ultimately the Moor, who appears to have been a trader or broker in the
produce of the East, agreed to conduct De Gama to Cambay of which he
was a native, asserting that it was a rich country, and “the greatest
kingdom in the world.”
[Sidenote: Arrives at Mozambique, 10th March.]
Having arrived at the island of Mozambique, which was then in the
territory of the king of Quiloa, Vasco de Gama sent the Moor on shore
with a scarlet cap, a string of small coral beads, and other presents,
to conciliate the natives, and induce them to visit his ships. The
sheikh of the district was naturally suspicious at first of the
strangers, whom he took for Turks, the only white men known to him
who had ships unlike the trading vessels of India. When, however, he
was satisfied of their friendly intentions, he paid the Portuguese
ships a visit in great state; but, on being shown samples of the
merchandise brought to exchange for the produce of the East, though
making many professions of assistance and friendship, he seems to have
treacherously designed obtaining unlawful possession of them. In this
scheme, however, he was frustrated by the Moor, who, faithful to his
new friends, revealed the plot to De Gama, who was thus enabled to
proceed in safety on his voyage.
[Sidenote: Departs for Quiloa, 8th April.]
From Mozambique the expedition proceeded to Quiloa, described as an
important city, trading in “much merchandise,” which came from abroad
in a great many ships from all parts, especially from Mecca. Here were
“many kinds of people,” including Armenians, who “called themselves
Christians” like the Portuguese; here also pilots could be obtained for
Cambay. But the sheikh of Mozambique, frustrated in his treacherous
designs, had anticipated the arrival of the expedition, by sending a
swift boat to inform his chief, the king of Quiloa, that the strangers
“were Christians and robbers who came to plunder and spy the countries,
under the device that they were merchants, and that they made presents
and behaved themselves very humbly in order to deceive, and afterwards
come with a fleet and men to take possession of countries; and,
therefore, he knowing that, had wished to capture them, and they had
fled from the port.” This king appears to have been as treacherous as
his sheikh; but though after sending many presents, he endeavoured,
by means of false pilots, to run De Gama’s ships on the shoals at the
entrance of his port, his plan signally failed.
[Sidenote: Arrives at Melinde, 29th April.]
Soon after leaving Quiloa, the expedition fell in with a native vessel,
which conducted them in safety to Melinde, described as a city on the
open coast, containing many noble buildings, surrounded by walls, and
of a very imposing appearance from the sea. Here they anchored in front
of the city, “close to many ships which were in the port, all dressed
out with flags,” in honour of the Portuguese, whose reputation for
wealth and power had spread along the coast to such an extent as to
induce the king’s soothsayer to recommend that they should “be treated
with confidence and respect, and not as Christian robbers.” Large
supplies of fresh provisions were sent on board of the vessels; and the
king having spoken with his “magistrates and counsellors,” resolved
that they should be received in a peaceable and amicable manner,
because “there were no such evil people in the world as to do evil to
any who did good to them.”
The king having arranged to visit the Portuguese ships, Vasco de Gama
received him with royal honours, presenting him with many articles
of European manufacture, which were highly prized. After frequent
interchanges of civilities, the king informed De Gama that Cambay, of
which he was in search, did not contain the produce he desired, for it
was not of the growth of that country, but was conveyed thither “from
abroad, and cost much there.” “I will give you pilots,” he added, “to
take you to the city of Calicut, which is in the country where the
pepper and ginger grows, and thither come from other parts all the
other drugs, and whatever merchandise there is in these parts, of which
you can buy that which you please, enough to fill the ships, or a
hundred ships if you had so many.”[7]
[Sidenote: Sails for Calicut, 6th Aug.]
Towards the close of May, 1498, the expedition was again ready to
sail, but finding they had little chance of successful progress, De
Gama resolved to wait till the change of the monsoons. The interval
was spent in a more thorough repair of their ships. The pilots whom
the king had furnished appear to have been well skilled in their
profession, and were not surprised when Vasco de Gama showed them the
large wooden astrolabe he had brought with him, and the quadrants of
metal with which he measured at noon the altitude of the sun. They
informed him that some pilots of the Red Sea used brass instruments
of a triangular shape and quadrants for a similar purpose, but more
especially for ascertaining the altitude of a particular star, better
known than any other, in the course of their navigation. Their own
mariners, however, they explained, and those of India were generally
guided by various stars both north and south, and also by other notable
stars which traversed the middle of the heavens from east to west,
adding that they did not take their distance with instruments such as
were in use amongst the Red Sea pilots, but by means of three tables,
or the cross-staff, sometimes described as Jacob’s staff. In those days
the seamen of the eastern nations were, indeed, as far advanced in the
art of navigation as either the Spaniards or the Portuguese, having
gained their knowledge from the Arabian mariners, who, during the
Middle Ages, carried on, as we have seen, an extensive trade between
the Italian republics and the whole of the Malabar coast.
[Sidenote: Reaches the shores of India, 26th August.]
After a passage of twenty (or twenty-three) days, Vasco de Gama first
sighted the high land of India, at a distance of about eight leagues
from the coast of Cananore. The news of the strange arrival spread
with great rapidity, and the soothsayers and diviners were consulted,
the natives having a legend, “that the whole of India would be taken
and ruled over by a distant king, who had white people, who would do
great harm to those who were not their friends;”[8]—a prophecy which
has been remarkably fulfilled, not merely by the Portuguese, but more
especially as regards the government of India by the English people.
The soothsayers, however, added that the time had not yet arrived for
the realisation of the prophecy.
[Sidenote: Arrives at Calicut.]
[Sidenote: Vasco De Gama disembarks,]
On the arrival of the expedition at Calicut,[9] multitudes of people
flocked to the beach, and the Portuguese were at first well received;
for the king, having ascertained the real wealth of the strangers, and
that Vasco de Gama had gold, and silver, and rich merchandise on board,
to exchange for the pepper, spices, and other produce of the East,
immediately sent him presents of “many figs, fowls, and cocoa-nuts,
fresh and dry,” and professed a desire to enter into relations with
the “great Christian king,” whom he represented. Calicut, the capital
of the Malabar district, was then one of the chief mercantile cities
of India, having for centuries carried on an extensive trade with
Arabia and the cities of the West, in native and Arabian vessels.
Hence among its merchants were many Moors,[10] who, holding in their
hands the most profitable branches of the trade, naturally “perceived
the great inconvenience and certain destruction which would fall upon
them and upon their trade if the Portuguese should establish trade in
Calicut.”[11] These men therefore took counsel together, and at length
succeeded in persuading the king’s chief factor, and his minister of
justice, that the strangers had been really sent to spy out the nature
of the country, so that they might afterwards come and plunder it at
their leisure. But, as Correa remarks, “it is notorious that officials
take more pleasure in bribes than in the appointments of their
offices,” so the factor and the minister did not hesitate to receive
bribes, both from the Moors and from the strangers, and recommended
the king, whose interests were opposed to his fears, to open up a
commercial intercourse with Vasco de Gama. Accompanied by twelve men,
of “good appearance,” composing his retinue, and taking with him
numerous presents, De Gama at last presented himself on shore. The
magnificent display of scarlet cloth, the crimson velvet, the yellow
satin, the hand-basins and ewers chased and gilt, besides a splendid
gilt mirror, fifty sheaths of knives of Flanders, with ivory handles
and glittering blades, and many other objects of curiosity and novelty,
banished, at least for the time, any doubts in the mind of the Malabar
monarch with regard to the honest intentions of the strangers.
[Sidenote: and concludes a treaty with the king.]
Having concluded a treaty, whereby it was stipulated that the
Portuguese should have security to go on shore and sell and buy as they
pleased, and that they should be placed in all respects on the same
footing as other foreign merchants, the king added his desire that the
stranger should be treated “with such good friendship as if he was own
brother to the king of Portugal.”[12]
[Sidenote: His treachery.]
De Gama was fully satisfied with the arrangement, and had he been
dealing with the king only, it seems probable that everything would
have gone on well; the more so as the Malabar monarch was already
realising large profits from the new trade. But the merchant Moors
were less easily satisfied. They knew from the covetous character
of the king that so long as the Portuguese were willing to buy, he
would continue to supply whatever they required, and that thus the
market would be stripped of the articles best adapted for their annual
shipments to the Red Sea. They felt that “whenever the Christians
should come thither, he would prefer selling his goods to them to
supplying cargoes for the Moors;” and that, in the end, they would
be “entirely ruined;” a plea, indeed, repeatedly used in many other
countries whenever competition first made its appearance. The Moors
further argued that the Portuguese could not be merchants, but “evil
men of war,” for they paid whatever price was demanded for the produce
they required, and made no difference between articles of inferior and
superior qualities. But the king refused to listen to their complaints
until he had obtained all he desired from the strangers; then, giving
heed to the reports of the Moors, and to the entreaties of his factor
and minister, who had been doubly bribed, he turned round upon Gama,
and by stratagem endeavoured to capture him and his ships. Finding it
unsafe to remain any longer in port, the expedition, although only half
laden, prepared to take its departure from Calicut, after a sojourn
of about seventy days, the captain-major remarking that he was “not
going to return to the port, but that he would go back to his country
to relate to his king all that had happened to him; that he should
also tell him the truth about the treachery of his own people with the
Moors; and that, if at any time he should return to Calicut, he would
revenge himself upon the Moors.”[13]
[Sidenote: Leaves Calicut for Cananore.]
Terrified by this threat of revenge, the king repented, and believing
that the expedition would proceed to Cananore, wrote a letter to the
king of that place giving him an account of all that had taken place
and of his ill-treatment of the Portuguese, and, at the same time,
entreating him to induce De Gama to return to his country, that he
might “see the punishment he would inflict on those who were in fault,
and complete the cargo of his ships.” The Portuguese, however, had
seen enough of the fickle ruler of Calicut, and declined to accede
to his urgent entreaties to return. In the king of Cananore they
found a monarch equally disposed to trade, and one who, at the same
time, having consulted his soothsayers, had decided that it would be
alike profitable and politic to enter into commercial relations with
strangers who could, if they pleased, destroy their enemies at sea or
ruin their trade on land. How they were received and how they conducted
their trade with this monarch is told at much length by Correa, in
his quaint and graphic relation of the incidents of this remarkable
voyage.[14]
[Sidenote: Enters into friendly relations,]
Suffice it to state that, after many fine speeches on both sides, the
king swore eternal friendship with the Christian king of Portugal, and
as a trustworthy proof of their oaths, presented to De Gama a sword,
with a hilt enamelled with gold, and a velvet scabbard, the point of
which was sheathed with that precious metal.
Abundant presents followed these solemn pledges—pledges made only to be
broken; while gifts of golden collars, mounted with jewels and pearls,
and chains of gold, and rings set with valuable gems, were offered to
and accepted by the Portuguese as tokens of a friendship which was
to last “for ever,” but which in a few years afterwards they rudely
destroyed. “A factory,” said the king, “you may establish in this
country; goods your ships shall always have of the best quality, and
at the prices they are worth.” But as the sequel shows, in the case
alike of the Portuguese, the Dutch, and the English, around the factory
there arose fortifications, and from these there went forth, not merely
traders to collect the produce of the country, but conquerors to
overthrow ancient dynasties, and claim as their own the land to which a
few years before they had been utter strangers.[15]
[Sidenote: and leaves Cananore, 20th Nov.]
[Sidenote: Reaches Melinde, 8th Jan., 1499.]
Having fully completed their cargoes, the Portuguese ships took their
departure from Cananore on the 20th of November, 1498, but finding
that the monsoons were not then sufficiently set in to be favourable
for the homeward voyage, they anchored at “Angediva,”[16] an island
on the coast of Malabar, where there were good water springs, and
where they “enjoyed themselves much.” After remaining there ten
days, they departed on their voyage to Melinde. They were, however,
delayed for a time by corsairs, fitted out at Goa, in the hope that
the Portuguese ships might be captured by stratagem, a hope which was
rudely demolished; the fleet of “fustas” were entirely destroyed, and
Vasco de Gama arrived, homeward bound, without further molestation or
misfortune, safely at the African port (Melinde), on the 8th January,
1499.
Having been received with great rejoicings, De Gama, in reply to the
affectionate welcome of the king, made a glowing speech, in which by
the way he remarked that “the king, our sovereign, will send many ships
and men to seek India, _which will be all of it his_, he will confer
great benefits on his friends, and you will be the one most esteemed
above them all, like a brother of his own; and when you see his power,
then your heart will feel entire satisfaction.”
[Sidenote: Obtains pilots, and sails for Europe, 20th Jan.]
A letter, written “on a leaf of gold,” was then prepared for the
king of Portugal, in which all that had taken place at Melinde was
mentioned, with many requests that the Christian sovereign would
send his fleets and men to his ports. Rich presents were at the same
time placed in the charge of De Gama to be delivered on the part
of his majesty of Melinde to the king and queen of Portugal; while
presents of a similar kind, and scarcely less valuable, were given
to De Gama and his officers. In return for these handsome gifts, De
Gama, “desiring that the king of Portugal should excel all others in
greatness,” ordered to be put into the boats ten chests of different
sorts of uncut coral, a considerable quantity of amber, vermilion, and
quicksilver; numerous pieces of brocade, velvet, satin, and coloured
damasks, with many other things which he considered it was “not worth
while to take back to Portugal, as of little value there.” The king,
besides furnishing him with pilots, presented to them various things
that might be useful or pleasant on the voyage; such as jars of ginger,
preserved with sugar, for the captain-major, and for Paul de Gama,
“which they were to eat at sea when they were cold,” and two hundred
cruzados in gold, “to be distributed among their wives.” Thus enriched
and replenished, the expedition set sail for Europe on the day of St.
Sebastian, the 20th of January, 1499.[17]
[Sidenote: Doubles the Cape of Good Hope.]
Having shaped a course along the coast, the captains gave orders to
note with care the various headlands, and every conspicuous landmark,
especially the outlines and marks presented by the land when seen
astern of the vessels, and also to note down the names of the towns and
the rivers, and their position from the more conspicuous headlands,
for the guidance of future voyagers. With a fair wind, and under the
direction of the native pilots, who were familiar with the navigation,
the expedition passed swiftly through the Mozambique channel, and
without calling at any place, rounded, in fine weather, the dreaded
Cape of Good Hope, and saw “the turn which the coast takes towards
Portugal with shouts of joy, and prayers and praises for the benefits
that had been granted to them.”
[Sidenote: Death of Paul de Gama.]
“When it was night,” continues Correa in his narrative, “the Moorish
pilots took observations with the stars, so that they made a straight
course. When they were on the line they met with showers and calms, so
that our men knew that they were in the region of Guinea. Here they
encountered contrary winds, which came from the Straits of Gibraltar,
so that they took a tack out to sea on a bowline, going as close to the
wind as possible. They sailed thus, with much labour at the pumps, for
the ships made much water with the strain of going on a bowline, and in
this part of the sea they found some troublesome weed, of which there
was much that covered the sea, which had a leaf like _sargarço_,[18]
which name they gave to it, and so named it for ever. Our pilots got
sight of the north star at the altitude which they used to see it in
Portugal, by which they knew they were near Portugal. They then ran due
north until they sighted the islands, at which their joy was unbounded,
and they reached them and ran along them to Terceira, at which they
anchored in the port of Angra, at the end of August. There the ships
could hardly keep afloat by means of the pumps, and they were so old
that it was a wonder how they kept above water, and many of the crews
were dead, and others sick, who died on reaching land. There also Paul
de Gama died, for he came ailing ever since he passed the Cape; and off
Guinea he took to his bed, and never again rose from it.”[19]
[Sidenote: The expedition reaches the Tagus 18th Sept, 1499.]
The death of Paul de Gama was a source of the greatest grief to his
brother Vasco. His body was buried in the monastery of St. Francis with
much honour, and amidst the lamentations of the crews, and the chief
inhabitants of the island, who followed it to the grave. The crews
having, chiefly by death, been reduced to fifty-five, and many of the
men being in a weak state, the government officers of Terceira sent an
extra supply of seamen on board, to navigate the ships to Lisbon, for
which port the expedition sailed as soon as the vessels had received
the necessary refit, reaching the Tagus on the 18th of September, 1499,
after an absence of two years and eight months, on one of the most
remarkable and interesting voyages on record.
But the news of the arrival of the fleet at Terceira had preceded its
actual arrival at Lisbon, more than one adventurer having started
thence while De Gama was detained, so as to secure the reward for
bringing the first good tidings to the king, then at Cintra.
It spread, indeed, far and wide. Another road had been discovered to a
country which, famed for its riches, had been the envy of the Western
nations from the earliest historic period, as well as the dream of the
youth of every age and land since the days of Solomon and Semiramis.
Well might Lisbon be in a state of the greatest ecstasy when the
tidings of the great discovery reached its people. They were indeed
tidings of the highest importance, not merely to them, but to the
people of every maritime and commercial city of Europe.
[Sidenote: Great rejoicings at Lisbon.]
The information reaching the king at midnight, he resolved to start
with his retinue early in the morning for Lisbon, to receive further
intelligence, and to welcome the ships on their entry into the Tagus.
There the glad tidings were confirmed. The king waited at the India
House until the ships arrived at the bar, where there were boats with
pilots, who brought them into port, decorated with numerous flags, and
firing a salute as they anchored. When Vasco de Gama landed on the
beach before the city, he was received by “all the nobles of the court,
and by the Count of Borba and the Bishop of Calçadilha; and he went
between these two before the king, who rose up from his chair, and did
him great honour,” conferring upon him the title of “Dom,” with various
grants and privileges, and creating him high admiral, an office which
the Marquis of Niza, his lineal descendant, holds to this day. “Then
the king mounted his horse, and went to the palace above the Alcasoba,
where his apartments then were, and took Vasco de Gama with him, who,
on entering where the queen was, kissed her hand, and she did him great
honour.”[20]
While rewards were freely bestowed upon all persons who had taken part
in the expedition, costly offerings were made to the monastery of
Belem, with gifts to numerous churches, as also to various holy houses
and convents of nuns, that “all might give thanks and praises to the
Lord for the great favour which He had shown to Portugal.” The king,
with the queen, went in splendid state and in solemn procession from
the cathedral to St. Domingo, where Calçadilha preached on the grandeur
of India, and its “miraculous discovery.”
[Sidenote: Arrangements made for further expeditions.]
Soon afterwards the king arranged to send another fleet, consisting
of large and strong ships of his own, with great capacity for cargo,
which, if navigated in safety, “would bring him untold riches.” All
these matters his majesty talked over very fully with Vasco de Gama,
who was to proceed as captain-major, if he pleased, in any fleet fitted
out from Portugal to India, with power to supersede all other persons,
and to appoint or discharge at his will the captains or officers of any
of the vessels belonging to every expedition for India that might be
equipped from the Tagus.
Indeed, the first expedition had yielded such immense profits, that
arrangements for various others were readily entered into without
delay. Correa states that a quintal of pepper realised eighty cruzados,
cinnamon one hundred and eighty, cloves two hundred, nutmegs one
hundred, ginger one hundred and twenty, while mace sold for three
hundred cruzados the quintal.[21] So great were the profits, that when
the accounts of the cost of the expedition were made up, by order
of the king, and added to the prices paid for the merchandise when
shipped, it was found that “the return was fully sixty-fold.”
[Sidenote: Departure of the second expedition, 25th March, 1502.]
The second expedition, however, under Vasco de Gama’s direct control,
was destined for other and less laudable objects than commerce.[22]
Dom Manuel had resolved to punish “the treachery of the king of
Calicut.” Ten large ships were therefore prepared, fitted with heavy
guns and munitions of war of every kind then known, besides abundance
of stores, and with these, and five lateen-rigged caravels, Dom Vasco
set sail for India on Lady-day, the 25th March, 1502, to wreak his
sovereign’s “vengeance” on those contumacious kings of the East who had
not treated his subjects with the respect which he felt was due to the
representatives of “a great Christian monarch.” In this instance, as
has been the case before and since in numerous other instances, solemn
prayers were offered that the depredations about to be committed in the
name of God and under the banner of a Christian king might be attended
with success. “I feel in my heart,” exclaimed De Gama, addressing his
sovereign, “a great desire and inclination to go and make havoc of him
(the king of Calicut), and I trust in the Lord that He will assist me,
so that I may take vengeance of him, and that your highness may be much
pleased.” But though “vengeance is _Mine_, saith the Lord,” has been
the text of every Christian church from the earliest ages, a solemn
mass and numerous prayers were offered in the cathedral, at which the
king was present and all his court, to invoke Heaven to strengthen the
arm of Dom Gama in his openly-avowed mission of vengeance.
In the fifteen sail of vessels composing the second expedition, there
were “eight hundred men at arms, honourable men, and many gentlemen of
birth, with the captain-major and others, his relations and friends,
with the captains.”[23] Each soldier had three cruzados a month, and
one for his maintenance on shore, besides the privilege of shipping on
his own account two quintals of pepper, at a nominal rate of freight,
and subject only to a small tax, “paid towards the completion of the
monastery at Belem.” Considerably greater space was allowed in the ship
to the masters, pilots, bombardiers, and other officers, a practice
which prevailed to our own time in the ships of the English East India
Company.
“When the fleet was quite ready to set sail from the river off Lisbon,
after cruising about with a great show of banners, and standards, and
crosses of Christ on all the sails, and saluting with much artillery,
they went to Belem, where the crews were mustered, each captain with
his crew, all dressed in livery and galas, and the king was present,
and showed great favour and honour to all.”[24] Here the fleet lay
for three days, and when the wind became fair, the king went in his
barge to each ship, dismissing them with good wishes, the whole of the
squadron saluting him with trumpets as they took their departure.
[Sidenote: Reaches Mozambique and Quiloa, where De Gama makes known his
power,]
With the exception of some sickness, when crossing the equator in the
vicinity of Guinea, of which one of the captains and a few of the men
died, the expedition had a favourable passage round the Cape of Good
Hope, but immediately afterwards encountered a heavy gale, which lasted
for six days. During this storm most of the vessels were dispersed
and one of them lost, though her crew and cargo were saved. When the
weather moderated, each ship, in accordance with previous instructions,
steered for Mozambique as the appointed rendezvous, where they again
assembled under the captain-major, some of them, however, having
joined company before reaching that place. Here the sheikh, who does
not appear to have been the same person who held that office on Gama’s
first expedition, sent to the ships presents of cows, sheep, goats,
and fowls, for which, however, the captain-major paid, and ordered
a piece of scarlet cloth to be given to him. From Mozambique the
expedition proceeded to Quiloa, but remembering the treachery of the
king of that place, De Gama, after he had moved his fleet within range
of the town, sent the following message to his sable majesty: “Go,” he
said to an ambassador whom the king had sent on board, “go and say to
the king that this fleet is of the king of Portugal, lord of the sea
and of the land, and I am come here to establish with him good peace
and friendship and trade, and for this purpose let him come to me to
arrange all this, because it cannot be arranged by messenger. And in
the name of the king of Portugal, I give him a safe conduct to come and
return, without receiving any harm, even though we should not come to
an agreement; and if he should not come, I will at once send people on
shore, who will go to his house to take and bring him.”[25]
[Sidenote: and threatens to capture the city.]
The king, on receipt of this apparently friendly, but very peremptory
message, was with his chiefs amazed and greatly alarmed. Having held
a council, he despatched a reply to the captain-major, that he would
send him a signed paper to the effect that he and his crew might land
freely, if no injury were done to him or the city. De Gama, however,
resolved to put pressure upon the king; who, over persuaded by a crafty
and rich Moor, ventured on board the ship of the Portuguese admiral,
with large, and, so far as we can judge, true professions of friendship
and amity.
But the captain-major required something more than this. “If,” said
he, “the king of Quiloa became a friend of the king, his sovereign, he
must also do as did the other kings and sovereigns who newly became his
friends, which was that each year he should pay a certain sum of money
or a rich jewel, which they did as a sign that by this yearly payment
it was known that they were in good friendship.”[26] In a word, that he
should subject himself and his dominion to the government of Portugal.
The African king seems to have clearly understood and felt the force of
this plausible mode of abdicating his sovereign rights, for he replied,
“That to have to pay each year money or a jewel was not a mode of good
friendship, because it was tributary subjection, and was like being a
captive; and, therefore, if the captain-major was satisfied with good
peace and friendship without exactions, he was well pleased, but that
to pay tribute would be his dishonour.” The captain-major, however,
cared little for anything except submission. “I am the slave of the
king, my sovereign,” he haughtily replied, “and all the men whom you
see here, and who are in that fleet, will do that which I command; and
know for certain, that if I chose, in one single hour your city would
be reduced to embers; and if I chose to kill your people, they would
all be burned in the fire.” Thus the Western nations, under the plea
of peace and friendship, and on the pretence at first of only desiring
to establish factories for the purposes of peaceful and mutually
beneficial commerce, became lords of the East, and for centuries
exercised a dominion founded on despotism and injustice over its
native sovereigns. The king of Quiloa might remonstrate as he pleased,
submission was his only course. “If I had known,” he replied, with
great warmth and energy, “that you intended to make me a captive, I
would not have come, but have fled to the woods, for it is better to be
a jackal at large than a greyhound bound with a golden leash.”[27] “Go
on shore and fly to the woods,” said the now exasperated representative
of the Christian king—“go on shore to the woods, for I have greyhounds
who will catch you there, and fetch you by the ears, and drag you to
the beach, and take you away with an iron ring round your neck, and
show you throughout India, so that all might see what would be gained
by not choosing to be the captive of the king of Portugal.” And this
Christian speech was accompanied with an order to his captains “to go
to their ships, and bring all the crews armed, and go and burn the
city.”
[Sidenote: His unjust demands.]
As De Gama refused to grant the king even one hour for consultation,
he submitted, and this submission, having been ratified on a leaf of
gold, and signed by the king and all who were with him, presents were
exchanged, while the rich Arab, whose treachery soon afterwards became
known, was left on board, by way of security for the delivery of other
articles which had been promised; but the king sent word that Mahomed
Arcone “might pay himself, since he had deceived him.” On receipt of
this information the captain-major became very angry with the rich
Moor, and ordered him and the Moors who had accompanied him to be
“stripped naked, and bound hand and foot, and put into his boat, and
to remain thus roasting in the sun until they died, since they had
deceived him; and when they were dead he would go on shore and seek
the king, and do as much for him, lading his ships with the wealth of
the city, and making captive slaves of its women and children.” It was
not, however, necessary to carry into effect these terrible threats.
The Moor sent to fetch from his house a ransom, valued at 10,000
cruzados (£1,000 sterling), which he gave with other perquisites to the
“Christian” ambassador, who immediately afterwards pursued his voyage
to Melinde.
[Sidenote: Arrives at Melinde.]
On arriving in sight of the port, the king, who had already received
the news, was prepared with “much joy to welcome his great friend Dom
Vasco de Gama;” while the fleet anchored amidst a salvo of artillery.
The king with haste embarked in a barge which he had ready, to visit
and pay his respects to the captain-major, “bringing after him boats
spread with green boughs, accompanied by festive musical instruments;
and De Gama, as soon as he was aware that it was the king, went to
receive him on the sea, the two at once embracing and exchanging many
courtesies.”[28]
[Sidenote: Departs 18th Aug., 1502.]
An exchange of presents continued for the three days the fleet
remained at Melinde, and much rejoicing and festivity prevailed.
Fresh provisions of every kind were sent in abundance for each of
the vessels, as also tanks for water, which the king of Melinde had
prepared in anticipation of the arrival of the expedition, with pitch
for the necessary repairs to the ships, and coir sufficient for a
fresh outfit of hawsers and cordage for the whole expedition. On the
day of departure the king went on board, and gave De Gama a valuable
jewelled necklace for his sovereign, worth three thousand cruzados, and
others of not much less value for himself, with various other gifts,
among which were a bedstead of Cambay, wrought with gold and mother of
pearl, a very beautiful thing, and he gave him letters for the king,
and a chest full of rich stuffs for the queen, with a white embroidered
canopy for her bed, the most delicate piece of needlework, “like none
other that had ever been seen.”[29]
[Sidenote: Encounter with the Moors.]
Soon after their departure the expedition fell in with five ships,
which had been fitting out in the Tagus for India when Vasco de Gama
sailed, and which had been placed under the command of his relation
Estevan de Gama. The combined fleets proceeding on their voyage, called
at the “port of Baticala,[30] where there were many Moorish ships
loading rice, iron, and sugar, for all parts of India.” The Moors,
on the approach of the Portuguese, prepared to offer resistance to
them entering the harbour, by planting some small cannon on a rock
which was within range of the bar. The boats, however, belonging to
the Portuguese ships made their way into the harbour without damage,
although amid showers of stones from the dense mass of people who had
collected to resist their approach, until they reached some wharves,
which had been erected for the convenience of loading the vessels
frequenting the port. The Moors then fled in great disorder, leaving
behind them a large quantity of rice and sugar, which lay on the wharf
ready for shipment, and the Portuguese returned to their boats in order
to proceed to the town, which was situated higher up the river. On
their way, however, a message was sent from the king of Baticala to
say that, though he “complained of their carrying on war in his port,
without first informing themselves of him, whether he would obey him or
not, he would do whatever the captain-major commanded.” Upon which De
Gama replied, “that he did not come with the design of doing injury to
him, but when he found war, he ordered it to be made; for this is the
fleet of the king of Portugal, my sovereign, who is lord of the sea of
all the world, and also of all this coast.”[31]
[Sidenote: Levies tribute, and sails for Cananore.]
In this spirit the trade between Europe and India, by way of the Cape
of Good Hope, was opened by the Portuguese. It was thus continued by
them and the Dutch for somewhere about a century, and perpetuated in
the same domineering manner by the servants of the English East India
Company, even until our own time.[32] To the demand for gold or
silver, the king of Baticala could only reply that he had none. His
country was too poor to possess such treasure, but such articles as
his country possessed he would give as tribute to Portugal; and having
signed the requisite treaty of submission, he despatched in his boats
a large quantity of rice and other refreshments for the fleet, on the
receipt of which the captain-major set sail for Cananore.
[Sidenote: Disgraceful destruction of a Calicut ship, and massacre of
her crew.]
On the passage the expedition encountered a heavy storm, and sustained
so much damage, that it was necessary to anchor in the bay of Marabia
for repairs. Here they fell in with a large Calicut ship from Mecca,
laden with very valuable produce, which the captain-major pillaged, and
afterwards burned, because the vessel belonged to a wealthy merchant
of Calicut, who he alleged had counselled the king of that place
to plunder the Portuguese on their previous voyage. Nor were these
Christian adventurers satisfied by this act of impudent piracy; they
slaughtered the whole of the Moors belonging to the ship, because they
had stoutly resisted unjust demands, the boats from the fleet “plying
about, killing the Moors with lances,” as they were swimming away,
having leapt from their burning and scuttled ship into the sea.[33]
On the arrival of the expedition at Cananore, De Gama related to
the king how gratified his sovereign had been by the reception which
his fleet had formerly received, and presented him with a letter and
numerous presents. He then narrated the course of retaliation which he
intended to pursue with the king of Calicut, expressing a hope that the
merchants of Cananore would have no dealings with those of Calicut,
for he intended to destroy all its ships, and ruin its commerce. This
vindictive policy seems to have gratified the jealous Cananore king,
for “he swore upon his head, and his eyes, and by his mother’s womb
which had borne him, and by the prince, his heir,” that he would assist
the captain-major in his work of revenge by every means in his power.
Upon which De Gama “made many compliments of friendship to the king
on the part of the king his sovereign, saying that kings and princes
of royal blood used to do so amongst one another; and maintained good
faith, which was their greatest ornament, and was of more value than
their kingdoms.”[34]
[Sidenote: De Gama’s arrangements with the king of Cananore.]
Having arranged how the king of Calicut and his subjects were to be
disposed of, his majesty of Cananore returned to his palace, and
matured with his council the measures to be taken so as to carry out
wishes of his friend and ally the king of Portugal. In matters of
trade it was agreed that a fixed price should be set upon all articles
offered for sale, and that there should be no bargaining between the
buyer or seller for the purpose of either lowering or raising prices.
The chief merchants of the city and natives of the country were to
arrange with the factors from the ships what the prices were to be,
and these “should last for ever.” A factory was to be established where
goods were to be bought and sold; and all these things were written
down by the scribes, so as to constitute an agreement, which both
parties signed. When completed, De Gama took counsel with his captains,
and settled that two divisions of the fleet should cruise along the
coast, “making war on all navigators, except those of Cananore, Cochym,
and Coulam,”[35] while the factors should remain on shore, with a
sufficient number of men to buy and gather into their warehouse at
Cananore, “for the voyage to the kingdom, much rice, sugar, honey,
butter, oil, dried fish, and cocoa-nuts, to make cables of coir and
cordage.”
[Sidenote: Departure for Calicut.]
[Sidenote: Bombards the city.]
[Sidenote: Horrible cruelties.]
Having arranged all these matters to the satisfaction of everybody
at the place, except the Moorish merchants, who were “very sad” when
they saw their ancient trade by the Red Sea passing into the hands of
strangers, Dom Gama sailed with his combined fleet for Calicut, where,
on arrival, he found the port deserted of its shipping, the news of
his doings at Onor and Baticala having reached the ears of the people
of Calicut; the king, however, sent one of the chief Brahmins of the
place, with a white flag of truce, in the vain hope that some terms
of peace might be agreed upon. But the captain-major rejected every
condition, and ordering the Indian boat to return to the shore, and the
Brahmin to be safely secured on board of his ship, he bombarded the
city, “by which he made a great destruction.” Nor was his vengeance
satisfied by this wanton destruction of private property, and the
sacrifice of the lives of many of the inhabitants of the city; while
thus engaged “there came in from the offing two large ships, and
twenty-two sambacks and Malabar vessels from Coromandel, laden with
rice for the Moors of Calicut:” these he seized and plundered, with
the exception of six of the smaller vessels belonging to Cananore. Had
the acts of this representative of a civilised monarch been confined
to plunder, and the destruction of private property at sea and on
shore, they might have been passed over without comment as acts of too
frequent occurrence; but besides this, they were deeply dyed with the
blood of his innocent victims. The prayers he had offered to God with
so much solemnity on the banks of the Tagus proved, indeed, a solemn
farce; his own historian adding the shameful statement, that after
the capture of these peaceable vessels, “the captain-major commanded
them” (his soldiers) “to cut off the hands, and ears, and noses of all
the crews of the captured vessels, and put them into one of the small
vessels, in which he also placed the friar, without ears, or nose, or
hands, which he ordered to be strung round his neck with a palm-leaf
for the king, on which he told him to have a curry made to eat of what
his friar brought him.”[36]
Perhaps no more refined acts of barbarity are to be found recorded
in the page of history than those which Correa relates with so much
simplicity of his countryman; they would seem, indeed, to have been
almost matters of course in the early days of the maritime supremacy of
the Portuguese, and may in some measure account for the unsatisfactory
condition into which that once great nation has now fallen. Supposing,
however, the exquisite barbarism of sending to the king the hands,
ears, and nose of his ambassador, _to whom Dom Gama had granted a safe
conduct_, not enough to convey to the ruler of Calicut a sufficiently
strong impression of the greatness, and grandeur, and power, and
wisdom, and civilisation of the Christian monarch, whose subjects he
had offended, the captain-major ordered the feet of these poor innocent
wretches, whom he had already so fearfully mutilated, “to be tied
together, as they had no hands with which to untie them; and in order
that they should not untie them with their teeth, he ordered them” (his
crew) “to strike upon their teeth with staves, and they knocked them
down their throats, and they were thus put on board, heaped up upon the
top of each other, mixed up with the blood which streamed from them;
and he ordered mats and dry leaves to be spread over them, and the
sails to be set for the shore, and the vessel set on fire.”[37]
[Sidenote: Arrives at Cochym, 7th Nov., where he loads,]
In this floating funeral pile eight hundred Moors, who had been
captured in peaceful commerce, were driven on shore as a warning to
the people of Calicut, who flocked in great numbers to the beach to
extinguish the fire, and draw out from the burning mass those whom
they found alive, over whom “they made great lamentations.” When the
friar reached the king with his revolting message, and deprived of
his hands, ears, and nose, an object of the deepest humiliation, he
found himself in the midst of the wives and relations of those who
had been so shamefully massacred, bewailing in the most heart-rending
manner their loss, and imploring the king to render them aid and
protection from further injury. Although the king’s power was feeble
compared to that of the Portuguese, with their trained men of war, and
vastly superior instruments of destruction, the sight of his faithful
Brahmin, _whom he had despatched in good faith_ to offer any conditions
of peace which Dom Gama might demand, led him to resolve with “great
oaths” that he would expend the whole of his kingdom in avenging the
terrible wrongs which had been inflicted upon his people. Summoning
to his council his ministers and the principal Moors of the city, he
arranged measures for their protection from the even still greater
dishonour and ruin which was threatened with awful earnestness by their
invaders. The Moors, with one voice, “offered to spend their lives and
property for vengeance.” In every river arrangements were made for the
construction of armed proas, large rowing barges and sambacks, and as
many vessels of war as the means which their country afforded could
produce. But long before this fleet was ready, Dom Gama had sailed with
his expedition for Cochym, where he arrived on the 7th of November,
having on his passage done as much harm as he could to the merchants of
Calicut, many of whose vessels he fell across in his cruise along the
coast.
Cochym, like Cananore, had resolved from the first to court the
friendship of Portugal. Its rulers conceived it more to their interests
to submit to the conditions of Dom Gama, however humiliating, than
to resist his assumed authority. Consequently when his fleet made
its appearance, the king of Cochym was ready to receive him with
every honour; and when his boat, with its canopy of crimson velvet,
very richly dressed, approached the shore, the king, accompanied by
his people, came to the water-side to meet him, prepared to secure
his friendship by any submission, however abject. Numerous rich and
valuable presents having been interchanged, arrangements were made to
provide the cargo the captain-major required, on similar conditions to
those which had been entered into at Cananore.
[Sidenote: and at Coulam.]
When the queen of Coulam, a neighbouring and friendly state, where the
pepper was chiefly produced, heard of the wealth which the king of
Cochym and his merchants were making by their commercial intercourse
with the Portuguese, she sent an ambassador to Dom Gama to entreat him
to enter into similar arrangements with herself and her people, saying
that “she desired for her kingdom the same great profit, because she
had pepper enough in her kingdom to load twenty ships each year:” but
Dom Gama was a diplomatist, or at least a dissembler, as well as an
explorer. To fall out with the king of Cochym did not then suit his
purpose, which he would very likely have done had he allowed the queen
of Coulam to share in the lucrative trade without his sanction; but he
nevertheless appears to have made up his mind to reap the advantage
of the queen’s trade under any circumstances. Consequently, he sent
word to the queen “that he was the vassal of so truthful a king, that
for a single lie or fault which he might commit against good faith,
he would order his head to be cut off; therefore he could not answer
anything with certainty, nor accept her friendship, nor the trade which
she offered, and for which he thanked her much, without the king (of
Cochym) first commanded him.”[38]
[Sidenote: Opens a factory at Coulam.]
After this palaver he recommended that she should ask the king of
Cochym’s permission to open up commercial intercourse with the
Portuguese, an arrangement he was not likely to assent to, as besides
curtailing his profits, he would lose the revenue he derived from the
queen’s pepper, which now passed through his kingdom for shipment. The
king was naturally perplexed and “much grieved, because he did not wish
to see the profit and honour of his kingdom go to another.” So after
talking the matter over with De Gama’s factor, he resolved to leave it
entirely in the hands of the captain-major, and informed the queen’s
messenger that the matter was left altogether to his good pleasure, no
doubt himself believing that the trade would be therefore declined. But
the king of Cochym had made a sad mistake, for the Portuguese navigator
was a diplomatist far beyond the king’s powers of comprehension; to
his discomfiture and amazement Gama informed the ambassador of Coulam
“that he was the king’s vassal, and in that port was bound to obey him
as much as the king his sovereign, and, therefore, he would obey him in
whatever was his will and pleasure; and since the queen was thus his
relation and friend, he was happy to do all that _she_ wished!”[39]
Consequently he despatched two of his ships to load pepper, at “a river
called Calle Coulam,” sending the queen a handsome mirror and corals,
and a large bottle of orange-water, with scarlet barret-caps for her
ministers and household, and thirty dozen of knives with sheaths for
her people. Soon afterwards he established a factory in her kingdom.
While Dom Gama was employed loading his ships with the produce of
India for Portugal, the king of Calicut had prepared a fleet which he
hoped would capture and destroy the fleet of the Christian monarch who
had done his people such grievous wrongs. It consisted of “several
large ships, and sambacks, and rowing barges, with much artillery
and fighting men, and two captain-majors.” But the king of Calicut,
either anxious to avoid war, or to obtain information of the condition
and power of the vessels then under Dom Gama, sent a confidential
Brahmin to Cochym, with a letter to the captain-major, in which, after
stating the force now at his command, he expressed a wish that there
should be “no more wars nor disputes”[40] between them, and that he
would make compensation for the injury his people had sustained on
the previous voyage; but the Brahmin received no better reception
than his predecessor had done. He was tied to the bits, or framework
that surrounds the main-mast; an iron shovel, full of embers, was put
“close to his shins, until large blisters rose upon them, whilst the
interpreter shouted to him to tell the truth,” as to whether the king
his master meant what he said in the letter he had addressed by him
to Dom Gama; but as he would not speak, “the fire was brought closer
by degrees, until he could not bear it,” and when he had told all
he knew, the captain-major “ordered the upper and lower lips of the
Brahmin to be cut off, so that all his teeth showed; and he ordered the
ears of a dog on board the ship to be cut off, and he had them fastened
and sewn with many stitches on the Brahmin, instead of his, and he sent
him in the Indian boat to return to Calicut!”[41]
[Sidenote: Calicut declares war against Dom Gama.]
The king, as well he might, when his mutilated and insulted ambassador
presented himself, at once ordered his fleet to proceed in search of
the Portuguese, and to intercept them on their way from Cochym back
to Cananore, where they had gone to fill their ships with the ginger
which had been collected for them at that place. Dom Gama’s departure
was, however, delayed for a few days. He had to permanently establish
his factory at Cochym, and make arrangements for its protection
during his absence, and for the purchase and storage of produce ready
for the ships which would annually be despatched to India from the
Tagus. He had also to found a Portuguese colony, the first colony
of Europeans in India, for which purpose he “left carpenters, and
caulkers, blacksmiths, turners, and cordage-makers, who were to refit
the ships which had to remain at Cochym,” as well as other “workmen and
men-at-arms,” in all sixty persons, to whom “the factor was to give
their pay, and a cruzado per month for their maintenance.”
[Sidenote: Success of the Portuguese.]
[Sidenote: Desecration of the Indian vessels,]
When Dom Gama had completed his arrangements at Cochym, he sailed for
Cananore. The king of Calicut with his fleet lay in wait for him.
“Coming along the coast with a light land breeze, there were so many
sail” that the Portuguese did not see the end of them. In the van
there might be as many as “twenty large ships, with many fustas and
sambacks.” These Dom Gama ordered his caravels, each of which carried
thirty men with four heavy guns below, and six falconets, and ten
swivel-guns on deck, to attack, which they did with great vigour, and
soon brought down the mast of the flag-ship of the Moors, killing many
of the crew, and sinking three of the large vessels. Amid this havoc,
Dom Gama himself bore down with the rest of his fleet, and, as the wind
freshened, he came with great force through the midst of his opponents,
“doing wonders” with his artillery, and firing both broadsides as he
passed, shattering them both in hull and rigging, and leaving the
Calicut fleet almost a helpless mass.
[Sidenote: and further atrocities.]
But conquest and submission were not enough for this Portuguese
marauder. His fiendish spirit of revenge seems to have had no limits.
He “sent the boats with falconets and swivel-guns, and in each boat
twenty armed men, with crossbow-men, to go to the ships which were
becalmed, and shoot at them above, and kill the crews. This they did,
so that the Moors threw themselves into the sea, and went swimming
round the ships.” Gama then “sent his boat to the ships and caravels,
to tell the crews to flock to the Moorish ships and plunder them, and
set them on fire.”[42] After which he proceeded on his course for
Cananore, “giving the Lord great praise and thanks for the great favour
which He had shown him.”[43]
[Sidenote: Completes his factory and fortifications at Cananore, and
sails for Lisbon,]
Having finished his work of colonization and horrible cruelty, Dom
Gama, concluding that his heavy guns were not likely to be again
required on his homeward voyage, left them at Cananore, and completed
his cargoes, set sail for Portugal. He did not, however, forget
before he took his departure, to induce the king to send his masons
to erect a high stone wall round the Portuguese settlement, where the
guns were deposited, having a strong gate, of which the king was to
keep the key, “so that the Portuguese should remain at night shut in
under his key.”[44] The king was “much pleased with this arrangement,
and promised the captain-major that it would be done at once; for
he thought that the captain-major did it with the desire that the
Portuguese should remain subject to him.” Poor innocent-minded,
good-natured king!
[Sidenote: where he arrives, Sept. 1, 1503.]
Having called at Melinde for a day, to take in a fresh stock of sheep,
fowls, and water, Dom Gama proceeded on his course with a fair wind,
and “without even meeting with any storm or hindrance, but only winds
with which all his sails served.”[45] On the 1st of September, 1503, he
reached Lisbon, anchoring “before the city,” with “ten ships laden with
very great wealth, after leaving such great services accomplished in
India.”
When the king of Portugal heard the news of Dom Gama’s arrival he was
greatly rejoiced, and sent the captain of his guard to bid him welcome,
he himself proceeding on horseback with many people to the cathedral,
“to give much praise to the Lord before the altar of Saint Vincent,” an
example which the captain-major and all his captains soon afterwards
followed; when prayers were ended, he kissed the hand of the king, who
bestowed many favours upon the officers and crews of the ships, while
granting to Dom Gama and his heirs “the anchorage dues of India,” and
conferring upon him and his descendants the title of the “admiral of
its seas for ever.”
[Sidenote: Dom Gama arrives in India for the third time, 11th Sept.,
1524.]
The re-discovery of the route to India by way of the Cape of Good
Hope, proved an immense source of wealth to Portugal. The profits of
her merchants on the products of the East were enormous, and for many
years, as regarded the rest of Europe, this trade was kept a close
monopoly. Lisbon then became the entrepôt which the Italian republics
had so long held for the spices and other produce of India; and the
palaces of her traders with that country, which still adorn, even amid
their decay, and, in too many instances, their ruins, the banks of the
Tagus, testify to the wealth of their original owners and occupants.
Though Dom Gama now desired to remain at home to reap the fruits of his
discovery and enjoy the rewards and honours conferred upon him by his
sovereign, the state of affairs in India too soon required his presence
in that country. The example he himself had set of tyranny formed the
basis for a despotic rule on the part of the Portuguese governors or
factors, which at even this early stage required a remedy, and no
one was considered so competent to correct this evil as its author.
Consequently, according to the testimony of Correa, “on the 11th
September, 1524, there arrived at the bar of Goa, Dom Vasco de Gama, as
Viceroy of India.”
From the same source we learn that the viceroy was on this occasion
accompanied by his two sons, Dom Estevan de Gama, who was
captain-major of the expedition, and afterwards governor of India,
and Dom Paulo de Gama, who unfortunately lost his life in a war with
Malacca. The viceroy had now another object to serve than that of
trade. He was to be the future ruler of India, and, as such, a regal
display became necessary to give the natives a proper impression
of his greatness and power. Correa remarks (p. 381) that he “was
served by men bearing maces, by a major-domo, and two pages with gold
neck-chains, and many esquires.” All the forms of kingly state appear
to have been adopted. He had “rich vessels of silver and rich tapestry
of Flanders; and for the table at which he sate, brocade cloths;” he
had also a “guard of two hundred men with gilt pikes, clothed with
his livery,” and an army of “brilliant soldiery.” Nor was he without
kingly power, and even something more. While his rule extended over
“all persons who might be found eastward of the Cape of Good Hope,” he
himself established laws[46] “that, under _pain_ of _death_ and loss
of property, no one should navigate without his license.” Every person
likewise who came to India, even with a commission from the king of
Portugal, was liable to be dismissed without compensation or appeal,
should he not, in the opinion of the viceroy, prove competent for the
office to which he had been nominated.
[Sidenote: His death, 24th Dec., 1524.]
Such stringent laws may have been necessary from the state of things
which then existed in India. That he was strict in his administration,
even to tyranny, over his own people, cannot be doubted; and it is
well known that his brief rule was embittered by his hostile relations
with his predecessors, whom he accused of various mal-practices, and
ordered to be sent back to Lisbon. In the midst of these difficulties
he was seized with a fatal illness; and having, as Correa states, “set
his affairs in order, like a good Christian, with all the sacraments
of the church, and ordered that his bones should be conveyed to the
kingdom of Portugal, he died on Christmas Eve, 24th December, 1524.”
[Sidenote: His character, as compared with that of Columbus.]
Although the first voyage of Dom Gama may be read with satisfaction, no
language can be found sufficiently strong to denounce his subsequent
career, and especially his diabolical conduct towards the Moors and
natives on his second expedition to India.[47] And to that conduct,
too faithfully adopted by his successors, may in a great measure be
attributed the loss, as well as the gain, of the Portuguese empire in
the East. But though Dom Gama was a man of no mean abilities, and of
indomitable courage, who evidently thoroughly understood his profession
as a seaman, he cannot for an instant be compared, either as an
individual or as a navigator, with his great contemporary Columbus. Dom
Gama, in his voyage to India, had with him pilots who had frequently
sailed along the western shores of Africa, and one, at least, who had
doubled the Cape of Good Hope under Bartholomew Dias, while the crews
of his ships consisted of his own countrymen, and partly, too, of his
own dependants. But Columbus was a stranger among strangers; and the
seamen who manned his vessels were altogether devoid of confidence in
a commander into whose service they had been forced by the imperative
order of their sovereigns. His voyages of discovery lay across unknown
seas, amid a wilderness of waters, which both ancient and modern
mariners had alike portrayed in the most gloomy colours; and so far
from having the benefit of the services of any pilot who had ever
attempted to navigate that then mysterious ocean, most persons in his
service considered the voyages on which he was about to embark as alike
visionary and dangerous.
[Sidenote: Discovery of the Pacific, by Vasco Nuñez de Bilboa.]
While the Portuguese were prosecuting their valuable discoveries in the
East, the Spaniards were following up their less lucrative but more
important researches to the West. In their voyages to the Caribbean
Sea, and along the shores of the Mexican Gulf, they had heard rumours
of great seas still further to the West; but it was not until 1513, a
few years after a small colony had been established at Darien, that
one of their countrymen, Vasco Nuñez de Bilboa, discovered the Pacific
Ocean. The discovery was hailed with great joy by the Spaniards, who,
having been restricted by the Pope to confine their researches to the
West, now hoped to find within the prescribed limits another road to
that far-famed Cathay, which had proved such a vast source of wealth to
their rivals the Portuguese.
[Sidenote: Voyage of Magellan.]
It was not, however, until Magellan [Fernando de Magalhaens], a
Portuguese by birth but in the service of the King of Spain, discovered
the straits which bear his name that the Spaniards were enabled to
derive any advantages from this great addition to their knowledge.
Furnished by the King of Spain with five small vessels, the largest
of which was only one hundred and thirty tons, their crews in all
amounting to only two hundred and thirty-four men, this daring
adventurer and most intrepid mariner set sail in September 1519 from
S. Lucar for the Brazils, anchored at Rio, and thence pursued his way
over these unknown seas to the south, until he reached the straits,
where he encountered very severe weather. After many difficulties
and great hardships he reached that beautiful and fertile group of
islands in the Pacific which he named the Ladrones. Thence proceeding
to the Philippines, Magellan, a navigator second only to Columbus, and
superior in many respects to Vasco de Gama, unfortunately lost his
life in an engagement with the natives. But in November, 1521, the
expedition reached the Moluccas, the object of their search. Thence,
but greatly reduced in strength and number, they steered for the Cape
of Good Hope, which they doubled on the 6th of May, 1522, and anchored
at St. Lucar on the 6th of September of that year, having been the
first to accomplish a voyage round the world.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] As is well known, there is considerable variation in the dates
assigned to different portions of Vasco de Gama’s voyages by different
writers. It has been thought, on the whole, best on this occasion
to follow those given by Gaspar Correa, whose narrative has been
translated from the Portuguese and edited for the Hakluyt Society
by the Hon. H. E. J. Stanley (now Lord Stanley of Alderley): Lond.
1869. Correa states that he went to India sixteen years after it was
discovered, which would be therefore in 1514, and that he had access
to the Journals of Joam Figueira, a priest who accompanied De Gama in
his first voyage. Correa, when in India, was secretary to the governor,
Alfonzo d’Albuquerque; and died at Goa, some time before 1583.
[2] The two young men were named, respectively, Pero de Covilhan, and
Gonsalvo de Pavia. Though accounts differ, they seem to have travelled
together by Venice, Alexandria, and Cairo, to Mecca, where they
separated. One of them (and here again accounts vary) went on to Aden,
Cananore, Calicut, and Goa (Mr. Stanley and Mr. Major think this was
Covilhan), the other to Abyssinia. It is certain that Pavia died soon
afterwards, probably at Cairo; and that, by the agency of a Spanish
Jew, Covilhan was able to send home word that India could be reached
by sea by continuing the coasting voyage from Guinea round the Cape to
Sofala. Mr. Major, therefore (p. 339), is justified in stating that
to him belongs the honour of the _theoretical_ discovery of the Cape.
His report to the king, however, did not reach Portugal till shortly
after Bartholomew Dias and Joam Infante had started, in August 1486.
Covilhan, on his way home, went to Abyssinia, and was detained there
for the rest of his life (33 years).
[3] The author is of opinion that the vessels engaged under Vasco de
Gama were, as in the case of Columbus, much larger than historians
have represented, though very much alike, as Correa describes,
especially in the size of their yards and sails. Unable to find any
work which furnished an illustration of any kind of these vessels,
he applied to his friend Mr. Edward Pinto Basto, of Lisbon, for
information on the subject. After considerable research, (for which
he is greatly indebted,) Mr. Basto furnished the author with the
drawing—see following page—which in his letter he describes as a
“sketch representing the _San Gabriel_ passing the Cape of Good Hope
on November 25th, 1497. This sketch,” he remarks, “is copied from an
original picture in Lisbon that belonged to D. Ioam de Castro, and I
have no doubt,” he adds, “that it is a correct representation of Gama’s
ship. I have spoken,” he continues, “to the Marquis of Nisa, whom you
know, and who is the lineal descendant of the renowned navigator, and
he confirms that opinion. The expedition,” he adds, “sailed from Lisbon
(Belem) on July 9th 1497. It consisted of the _San Gabriel_, commanded
by Vasco de Gama; _San Raphael_, commanded by his brother Paulo de
Gama; _Birrio_, under charge of Nicolas Coelho; and a transport which
was a storeship to carry provisions, called a naveta.” Mr. Pinto
Basto confirms the opinion the author entertained with regard to the
dimensions of these ships. “The _San Gabriel_,” he says, “had a high
poop and forecastle. The tonnage in those days was calculated by the
number of pipes of wine the vessel could carry. The _San Gabriel_
was constructed to carry 400 pipes,” equivalent to about 400 tons
measurement, or about from 250 to 300 tons register, which is much more
likely to have been the size of the vessels engaged on so distant and
hazardous an expedition than those which historians describe. It should
be added that Correa calls De Gama’s ship the _Sam Rafael_.
[4] Correa, p. 33.
[5] Correa, pp. 55-57.
[6] Ibid. p. 74. Note.
[7] Correa, p. 128.
[8] Correa, p. 146.
[9] Our calico (in French, _calicot_) derives its name from Calicut, as
muslin from Mosul, &c.
[10] It should be remembered that with most of our early writers and
navigators “Moor” was a generic name for Muhammedan. The governor of
Calicut is called by the Portuguese “Zamorin,” a corruption, probably,
of “Samudri-Rajah.”
[11] Correa, p. 156.
[12] Correa, p. 176.
[13] Correa, p. 222.
[14] Correa, p. 225, _et seq._
[15] Ibid., p. 232.
[16] Correa, p. 239. The termination of the name (like Laccadive,
Maldive, &c.) shows it to have been an island, but its exact situation
has not been determined.
[17] Correa, p. 259.
[18] Sargarço (or as it is more usually written Sargaço) is the
Portuguese name for what is known (botanically) as the “Nasturtium
aquaticum.”—Linschoten, Hist. Orient., pt. iii. p. 34.
[19] Correa, pp. 264-5.
[20] Correa, p. 269.
[21] A cruzado is worth about 2s.; a quintal equivalent to 128 lbs.
[22] Cabral was originally selected to command this expedition; but
the king, having some doubts of his ability, though on his previous
voyage to India in 1500-1 he had discovered the Brazils, gladly availed
himself of De Gama’s expressed desire to take charge of it; another
fleet was to be despatched in the following year (Correa, p. 279).
There were two grievances against the king of Calicut, the original one
of De Gama, and his subsequently similar treatment of Cabral.
[23] Correa, p. 282.
[24] Ibid. p. 283.
[25] Correa, p. 292.
[26] Correa, p. 294.
[27] Correa, pp. 295-6.
[28] Correa, p. 303.
[29] Ibid., p. 306.
[30] The names “Baticala” and “Cochym” have been retained as those used
by Correa; the more modern names are “Batticola” and “Cochin.”
[31] Correa, p. 311.
[32]
“Degenerate trade, whose minions could despise
The heart-born anguish of a thousand cries;
Could lock with impious hands its teaming stores,
Whilst famished nations died along its shores;
Could mock the groans of fellow men, and bear
The curse of kingdoms peopled with despair;
Could stamp disgrace on man’s polluted name,
And barter with their gold eternal shame.”—CAMPBELL.
[33] Correa, p. 315.
[34] Correa, pp. 321-2.
[35] Correa, p. 324.
[36] Correa, p. 331.
[37] Correa, pp. 331-2.
[38] Correa, p. 349.
[39] Ibid., p. 352.
[40] Correa, p. 358.
[41] Correa, pp. 363-4.
[42] Correa, pp. 371-2.
[43] Ibid., p. 373.
[44] Correa, p. 373.
[45] Ibid., p. 377.
[46] Correa, p. 397.
[47] The Popish nations of the south of Europe have, throughout all
history, been remarkable for atrocities of cruelty found among no
other races. But neither the cruel persecution of the Jews by the
_soi-disant_ deliverers of the Holy City, nor the greatly exaggerated
crimes of the Hindus and Muhammedans, who may at least have believed
they were ridding their native land of robbers and oppressors by the
Indian mutiny of 1856-7, can compare with the cruelties of Vasco
de Gama, or with the atrocities of the mob at Palermo during the
insurrection of 1849.
CHAPTER II.
Progress of maritime discovery—Henry VII., 1485-1509—His
encouragement of maritime commerce, and treaties with foreign
nations—Voyages to the Levant—Leading English ship-owners—Patent
to the Cabots, 1496—Discovery of the north-west coast of America,
June 21, 1497—Second patent, Feb. 3, 1498—Rival claimants to the
discovery of the North American continent—Sebastian Cabot and
his opinions—Objects of the second expedition—Third expedition,
March 1501—How Sebastian Cabot was employed from 1498 to 1512—He
enters the service of Spain, 1512—Letter of Robert Thorne to
Henry VIII. on further maritime discoveries—Sebastian Cabot
becomes pilot-master in Spain, 1518, and afterwards (1525) head
of a great trading and colonising association—Leaves for South
America, April 1526, in command of an expedition to the Brazils—A
mutiny and its suppression—Explores the river La Plata while
waiting instructions from Spain—Sanguinary encounter with the
natives—Returns to Spain, 1531, and remains there till 1549,
when he settles finally in Bristol—Edward VI., 1547-1553—Cabot
forms an association for trading with the north, known as the
“Merchant Adventurers”—Despatch of the first expedition under Sir
H. Willoughby—Instructions for his guidance, probably drawn up
by Cabot—Departure, May 20, 1553—Great storm and separation of
the ships—Death of Sir H. Willoughby—Success of Chancellor—His
shipwreck and death at Pitsligo—Arrival in London of the first
ambassador from Russia, Feb. 1557—His reception—Commercial
treaty—Early system of conducting business with Russia—The
benefits conferred by the Merchant Adventurers upon England—The
Steelyard merchants partially restored to their former
influence—Cabot loses favour with the court, and dies at an
advanced age.
[Sidenote: Progress of maritime discovery.]
The re-opening of the route to India by way of the Cape of Good Hope
and the discovery of the West Indian Islands gave, at an early period,
an impetus to the maritime commerce of England, and consequently
rendered the reign of Henry VII. more important, so far as concerns her
naval history, than that of any previous English monarch.
[Sidenote: Henry VII., 1485 to 1509.]
Like the sovereigns of more ancient times, Henry was not only a
merchant on his own account, but a great encourager of maritime
expeditions; in that he often himself furnished the ships and advanced
the requisite capital for their equipment. Indeed, it seems probable
that the vast sums found in his exchequer at his death were, in a
great measure, derived from his own successful commercial adventures.
Although the pursuit of trade may be sometimes deemed incompatible with
regal functions and dignity, there can be no doubt that the example
and practice of Henry VII. extended the field for maritime adventure
among his subjects, and at the same time aroused the cupidity of the
English nation by the prospect of incalculable wealth derivable from
intercourse with distant foreign lands.
[Sidenote: His encouragement of maritime commerce,]
Beyond the encouragement he afforded to maritime discovery, Henry
adopted various measures to promote, as he conceived, the interests of
the merchant navy, among others removing the differential duties which
had been in force against English shipping; but unfortunately, as has
been too frequently the case in the conduct of the navigation laws of
England, he adopted a policy of protection almost as ruinous to her
commerce as that which had previously conferred special advantages
upon the shipping of foreign nations. Thus we find a law of his first
parliament[48] prohibiting the importation of Bordeaux wines in any
other than English, Irish, and Welsh bottoms, these vessels being
manned with sailors wholly of their own countrymen, a law which was,
two years afterwards, even further extended and enlarged, the reasons
assigned being “that great minishing and decay hath been now of late
time of the navy of this realm of England, and idleness of the mariners
within the same, by the which this noble realm, within short process of
time, without reformation be had therein, shall not be of ability, nor
of strength and power, to defend itself.” Of course such reasoning was
then unanswerable; indeed, has been held to be so even in our own time.
Accordingly it was enacted[49] that no wines of Gascony or Guienne
should be imported into England unless in ships belonging to the king
(of which, by the way, his Majesty had a goodly number) or to his
subjects; nay more, any such wines imported in foreign bottoms were to
be forfeited.
Many arguments might, indeed, at that time have been urged in favour
of these stringent laws, more especially as the policy of the Italian
republics aimed at monopolising in their own ships the transport of all
they required, and at rendering their ports the entrepôt for the supply
of goods not merely for their own peoples, but for all other nations.
Although a difference of opinion has ever existed as to the best means
of attaining these objects, Henry VII. lays down sound principles
of political economy and liberal sentiments with regard to the
advantages to be derived from free intercourse with all nations, in his
instructions to the commissioners appointed to negotiate treaties of
commercial reciprocity with foreign countries. “The earth,” he says,
“being the common mother of all mankind, what can be more pleasant and
more humane than to communicate a portion of all her productions to
all her children by commerce?” This opinion, though at variance with
the laws prohibiting the importation of French wines except in English
ships, was practically carried into effect with the maritime states of
Italy. His chief object in doing so may have been to obtain reciprocal
advantages in their ports, and such was no doubt the case, for it is
well known that Henry VII. materially reduced his import duties on the
goods of Venice and of other Italian cities, and that he afterwards
entered into a liberal commercial treaty with France.
[Sidenote: and treaties with foreign nations.]
[Sidenote: Voyages to the Levant.]
On the 1st July, 1486, Henry likewise concluded a treaty with James
III. of Scotland, by which a cessation of hostilities by sea and land
was stipulated and mutual good will exchanged; while he also procured
privileges for English fishermen in Norway and Sweden with the view
of giving greater scope to the enterprise of English ship-owners.[50]
These liberal measures produced the desired effect. We now[51] read of
“tall ships” belonging to London, Southampton, and Bristol making their
annual voyages to the Levant; their principal trading places at first
being Sicily, Crete, Chios, and sometimes Cyprus, Tripoli, and Beyrout
in Syria. Their outward cargoes consisted chiefly of fine kerseys of
divers colours, coarse kerseys, and other kinds of cloths, in return
for which they obtained silks, camlets, rhubarb, malmseys, muscatel
and other wines, sweet oils, cotton, wool, Turkey carpets, galls,
pepper, cinnamon and other spices. These details, with particulars of
the more important of these voyages, were copied by Hakluyt himself
“from certaine auncient Ligier bookes”[52] of Sir William Locke,
mercer, of London, Sir Wm. Bowyer, Alderman, and Master John Gresham.
Many of these accounts are interesting and instructive, and two of
them may be referred to with advantage as illustrative of the size and
character of the ordinary English merchant vessels then trading with
the Mediterranean. One of the smaller class, named the _Holy Cross_, is
described as “a short ship of 160 tons burthen.” She traded with Crete
and with Chios, and her last voyage seems to have been an unfortunate
one. Having been a full year at sea in performance of this voyage, “she
with great danger returned home, where, upon her arrival at Blackwall,
her wine and oil casks were found so weak that they were not able to
hoist them out of the ship, but were constrained to draw them as they
lay, and put their wine and oil into new vessels, and so unload the
ship.” As to the ship herself, she is described as having been “so
shaken in this voyage and so weakened that she was laid up in the dock
and never made voyage afterwards.”
As there is no reason for doubting the accuracy of the above statement,
it is clear that these English merchantmen must have been badly-built
vessels and very slow sailors. Indeed, the description of the voyage
of a larger vessel confirms this opinion so far as regards speed. She
is spoken of as “the good ship _Matthew Gonson_, of burthen 300 tons,”
and the names of her owner, “old Mr. William Gonson, Pay-master of the
King’s Navie,” and of her principal officers are also given. The whole
number of this ship’s company is represented to have been one hundred
men; she is said to have had “a great boat which was able to carry
ten tons of water, which at our return homewards we towed all the way
from Chio until we came through the Strait of Gibraltar into the main
ocean,” as well as a long-boat and skiff; while it is remarked that,
“we were out upon this voyage eleven months, and yet in all this time
there died of sickness but one man.”
These are the only extant narratives furnishing any insight into the
working of English merchant ships at the beginning of the sixteenth
century; but the trade with the Levant must then have been of
considerable importance, as an English consul was established at Chios
in the year 1513,[53] while English factors were about that period sent
to Cuba and the other countries in the West discovered and colonised by
the Spaniards.
[Sidenote: Leading English shipowners.]
[Sidenote: Patent to the Cabots, 1496.]
Among the earliest and most enterprising men engaged in the trade with
the West Indies may be mentioned Mr. Robert Thorne, of Bristol, than
whom the age produced no more shrewd and intelligent merchant. Having
established agents in Cuba and placed others on board of the Spanish
fleet, he expended large sums of money in procuring exact descriptions
and charts of the newly-discovered seas, and, by his representations,
the king was, in a great measure, induced to follow the example of
Spain and Portugal, and to encourage voyages of discovery. Indeed
before Vasco de Gama had doubled the Cape of Good Hope or Columbus
discovered the West Indian Islands, the ship-owners of Bristol had
found their way to Iceland, and had almost, if not quite, reached
the coasts of Newfoundland. There is, however, no well-authenticated
account of any of these voyages to the West till 1496, when Henry
granted, March 5th, a patent to John Cabot, a Venetian by birth, who
had settled at Bristol, and to his three sons, Lewis, Sebastian, and
Sanctus, giving them authority to “sail to all parts, countries, and
seas of the East, of the West, and of the North, under our banner and
ensign, with four ships of what burden or quantity so ever they be, and
as many mariners or men as they will have with them in the said ships,
upon their own proper costs and charges.”[54] Cabot and his followers
are therein authorised to set up the royal banner “in every village,
town, castle, isle, or mainland by them newly found,” and to subdue,
occupy, and possess all such regions, and to exercise jurisdiction
over them in the name of the king of England. They were also to enjoy
the privilege of exclusive resort and traffic to all places they might
discover, reserving one-fifth of the clear profit of the enterprise to
the crown.
[Sidenote: Discovery of the north-west coast of America, 21 June, 1497.]
The expedition proposed under this patent did not, however, actually
set sail till the beginning of the year 1497. On the 21st of June of
that year, Sebastian Cabot, in the ship _Matthew_, of Bristol, a
vessel of two hundred tons burthen, first discovered, according to the
common opinion, Newfoundland,[55] being the first Englishman (for he
was born at Bristol) who had landed in America. How far he proceeded
south has been a question of much controversy; it is, however,
generally admitted that his voyage north and south was confined within
the 67th and 38th degrees of north latitude, and that it did not occupy
altogether more than six months. In the account of the privy purse
expenses of Henry VII. there is the following entry: “10th of August,
1497. To hym that found the New Isle, 10_l._,” and Hakluyt states, in
the dedication of his second volume to Sir Robert Cecil, that “all that
mighty tract of land from 67 degrees northward to the latitude almost
of Florida was first discovered out of England by the commandment of
Henry VII.” The same authority, quoting from Peter Martyr, further
says, “He” (Cabot) “was thereby brought so far with the south, by
reason of the land bending so much to the southward, that it was there
almost equal in latitude with the sea Fretum Herculeum, having the
North Pole elevated in manner in the same degree. He sailed likewise in
this tract so far towards the west that he had the island of Cuba on
his left hand in manner in the same degree of longitude.”[56]
[Sidenote: Second patent, 3 Feb., 1498.]
[Sidenote: Rival claimants to the discovery of the North American
continent.]
That one of the Cabots discovered the northern continent of America,
at the period named, is well authenticated, and in Biddle’s memoirs of
him many other authorities are quoted in confirmation of this fact.[57]
But if any doubt still remains, the second patent, granted on the
3rd of July, 1498, by Henry VII., the original of which was found by
Mr. Biddle in the Rolls Chapel, sets this question finally at rest.
That document indeed only named the father, “John,” but the previous
patent was in the names of “John Cabot and his sons,” and it does
not follow that the discovery of the “Lande and Isles” is intended
to be attributed to the personal action of the elder Cabot. However,
though the continent of America was first discovered by an expedition
commissioned to “set up the banner” of England, this in no way detracts
from the honour justly due to Christopher Columbus, who had five years
previously made known, for the first time, the existence of a world
in the West. Although his great discoveries were confined to the West
Indian Islands and to a portion of the South American continent,
they revealed the important fact that rich lands, hitherto unknown,
lay in a certain quarter of the globe, and could be reached with no
extraordinary difficulty or danger by intrepid and skilful mariners.
Again, as Columbus did not sight the continent of America until August
1498, in the course of his third voyage, he could hardly then have been
ignorant of the discoveries made by Cabot on the 24th of June, 1497,
which created nearly as much noise in Europe as his own had done a few
years before, and were considered of such vast importance that Henry
VII., whose court was then filled with the agents of various foreign
powers, fitted out the second expedition under the decree of 3rd July,
1498, which had for its object commercial intercourse with a continent
the existence of which was unknown to Columbus, except, perhaps, by
common report, until six months afterwards.
The discovery of a new world of vast extent is, however, too high
an honour to be conferred on any one man. While the great Genoese
navigator fully deserves the credit of having explored the mysteries
of the Atlantic Ocean, and of having shown the existence of rich
continental lands to the west, Sebastian Cabot is entitled to the
honour of having been the first to discover that portion of those
lands now constituting the United States of America; and to Great
Britain more than to any other country is due the fame of the thorough
exploration and first colonisation of a world destined to surpass in
wealth and power the greatest of modern nations.
[Sidenote: Sebastian Cabot, and his opinions.]
Cabot, like Columbus and all of the navigators of the fifteenth
century, was of opinion that Cathay (China or India) could be reached
by sailing to the west, and more especially to the north-west, an
opinion which has prevailed even to our own times. Consequently the
vessels under his first patent sailed from Bristol to discover a
north-west passage to that country; and it was only when Cabot found
his voyage to the north and north-west impeded by ice and land
respectively, that he turned to the south in the hope, no doubt, of
finding either a western passage or reaching the countries which had
been discovered by Columbus.
[Sidenote: Sebastian Cabot.]
For this voyage of 1498, English merchants adventured small stocks
of different kinds of merchandise, besides despatching various small
vessels, all of which were placed under charge of Sebastian Cabot;[58]
so that England commenced trading operations with America in the course
of the very first year after its discovery. Henry VII. appears also to
have taken a pecuniary interest in this expedition, for in the account
of the privy purse expenses there are the following entries:—
“22nd March, 1498. To Lancelot Thirkill of London, upon a prest (loan
or advance) for his shipp going towards the New Islande, 20_l._”
“Delivered to Lancelot Thirkill (for himself), going towards the New
Isle, on prest, 20_l._”
“April 1st, 1498. To Thomas Bradley, and Lancelot Thirkill, going to
the New Isle, 30_l._”
“To I. Carter, as going to the New Isle, in rewerde, 2_l._”
[Sidenote: Object of the second expedition.]
[Sidenote: Third expedition, March 1501.]
The object of this second expedition seems to have embraced
colonisation as well as commerce, for, in the words of the patent, it
extended “to all such masters, mariners, pages and other subjects, as
of their own free will, will go and pass with him in the same ships,
to the said Lande or Isles.” Three hundred men altogether are said to
have gone with Cabot on this occasion, but there is no description
of the vessels in which they embarked, beyond the expression in the
patent that they were to be of the “bourdeyn of C.C. tonnes or under.”
Nor are there any clear and well-authenticated accounts of the voyage.
It, however, does not appear to have been so successful as had been
anticipated; and as the great interest which the discoveries had at
first excited languished soon afterwards, no further patents were
granted by Henry until March 1501, when he commissioned three merchants
of Bristol and three Portuguese to proceed in search of lands to the
west. Sebastian Cabot himself would seem to have abandoned for a
time any further expedition from England, and to have either sought
employment in Spain or perhaps settled for a time in America, as we
lose sight of him for a few years about that period. Nor are there any
authentic accounts of the result of the expedition fitted out under
the patent of 1501, nor of one subsequently issued by Henry VII., the
last during his reign, and bearing date 9th December, 1502; but an
intercourse, which had for its object both trade and colonisation, was,
from the following entries in the account of the privy purse expenses,
evidently maintained for some years afterwards:—
“17th November, 1503. To one that brought hawkes from the Newfounded
Island, 1_l._”
“8th April, 1504. To a preste (priest) that goeth to the New Island,
2_l._”
“25th August, 1505. To Clays going to Richmond with wylde catts and
popyngays of the Newfound Island; for his costs, 13_s._ 4_d._”
“To Portugales” (Portuguese) “that brought popyngays and catts of the
Mountaigne with other stuff to the King’s grace, 5_l._”
[Sidenote: How Sebastian Cabot was employed from 1498 to 1512.]
No mention is made of Cabot in either of these patents, but as it is
certain that he did not enter the service of Spain until the 13th of
September, 1512, and as it is hardly possible to suppose that so active
a mind would have remained unemployed during the intermediate period,
it may therefore be presumed that for a portion at least of that time
he was in some manner engaged on the coast of America. In confirmation
of this opinion, the Calendars of Bristol of the year 1499 contain the
following entry:—
“This yeare, Sebastian Cabot, borne in Bristoll, proferred his service
to King Henry for discovering new countries; which had noe greate or
favorable entertainment of the king, but he, with no extraordinary
preparation, set forth from Bristoll, and made greate discoveries.”[59]
If Cabot was thus employed, the omission of any mention of his name in
the patents of 1501 and 1502 is in some measure accounted for; and, in
support of the Bristol records, it may be mentioned that Navarette,
in describing from the records in the Spanish archives the voyage of
Hojeda, who sailed from Spain on the 20th of May, 1499, says,[60]
“What is _certain_ is that Hojeda in his first voyage found certain
Englishmen in the neighbourhood of Caquibaco.”
[Sidenote: He enters the service of Spain, 1512.]
When it is considered that Cabot did not enter a foreign service for
many years after this period, and that he was the only man in England
at that time fully competent to conduct an expedition to America, it
is likely that the Englishmen Hojeda saw were no other than Sebastian
Cabot himself with his exploring party. Having been stopped the year
before by the failure of provisions while sailing southward, it is
natural to suppose that he would in a new expedition resume his former
search, till at length he reached that part of the coast where Hojeda
met with the party of Englishmen, and where the “great discoveries”
mentioned in the Bristol manuscript were no doubt made. It is, however,
a remarkable fact that while the name of Amerigo Vespucci, the pilot
who accompanied Hojeda, is now for ever associated with the whole of
that vast continent, no headland, cape, or bay has preserved the memory
of Sebastian Cabot. But the mysterious disappearance of his “maps and
discourses,” which he had prepared for publication,[61] may account
in a great measure for the name of Cabot having been unnoticed in
connection with America, and may be adduced as a reason why doubts have
so long existed as to his occupations between 1498 and 1512. Had these
documents been preserved, they would assuredly have supplied abundant
information on this point. Peter Martyr says,[62] that Cabot did not
leave England until after the death of Henry VII., which occurred
in 1509; and Herrera, the Historiographer of the king of Spain,
records the additional fact that, in 1512, he entered the service of
Ferdinand, who, anxious to secure the services of so distinguished a
navigator, “gave him the title of his Captain, and a liberal allowance,
and retained him in his service, directing that he should reside at
Seville, to await orders.”[63]
No specific duties were, however, assigned to him beyond the general
revision of the Spanish maps and charts then extant, till, in 1515, he
became a member of the Council of the Indies, with the expectation of
commanding in the following year another expedition for the discovery
of a north-west passage to India.[64] But the death of Ferdinand put
an end to this scheme, and the troubles which then ensued in Spain
induced Cabot to return to England, where, shortly afterwards, he was
appointed to prepare an expedition similar to that which Ferdinand,
shortly before his death, had proposed. The result, however, of this
further attempt in the same direction, in 1517, while it confirmed the
opinion which had been formed of Cabot’s ardent love of enterprise and
dauntless intrepidity, proving, as all other similar expeditions have
done, a failure, though, in this instance, chiefly as it would seem
from the cowardice of Cabot’s companion Sir Thomas Pert, retarded for a
time any renewed efforts in that most forbidding, but favourite region
of discovery. Then, and for years afterwards, many persons were so
impressed with the idea that the rich lands of Cathay could be reached
either by passage directly across the North Pole, or to the east or
west of it, that it has been a subject of almost constant discussion;
and the following extracts from a letter addressed by the intelligent
Robert Thorne to Henry VIII. describe pretty accurately the opinions
prevailing in his time:—[65]
[Sidenote: Letter from Robert Thorne to Henry VIII. on further maritime
explorations.]
“Yet these dangers or darknesse hath not letted the Spanyards and
Portingals and other to discover many unknowen realms to their great
perill. Which considered (and that your Grace’s subjects may have the
same light) it will seem your Grace’s subjects to be without activity
or courage, in leaving to doe this glorious and noble enterprise. For
they being past this little way which they named so dangerous (which
may be two or three leagues before they come to the Pole, and as much
more after they pass the Pole), it is cleere, that from thencefoorth
the seas and landes are as temperate as in these partes, and that then
it may be at the will and pleasure of the mariners to choose whether
they will sayle by the coasts that be cold, temperate, or hot. For
they, being past the Pole, it is plain they may decline to what part
they list.
“If they will go toward the Orient, they shall enjoy the regions of all
the Tartarians that extend toward the midday, and from thence they may
go and proceed to the land of the Chinas, and from thence to the land
of Cathaio Orientall, which is, of all the mainland, most orientall
that can be reckoned from our habitation. And if, from thence, they
doe continue their navigation, following the coasts that returne
toward the Occident, they shall fall in with Malaca, and so with all
the Indies which we call oriental, and following the way, may returne
hither by the Cape of Buona Speransa, and thus they shall compasse
the whole worlde. And if they will take their course, after they be
past the Pole, toward the Occident, they shall go in the backeside
of the new foundland, which _of late was discovered by your Grace’s_
subjects, until they come to the backeside and south seas of the Indies
Occidental. And so continuing their voyage, they may return through
the Strait of Magellan to this countrey, and so they compasse also the
world by that way; and if they go this third way, and after they be
past the Pole, goe right toward the Pole Antarctike, and then decline
towards the lands and islands situated between the Tropicks, and under
the Equinoctiall, without doubt they shall find there the richest
landes and islands of the world of golde, precious stones, balmes,
spices, and other thinges that we here esteeme most; which come out of
strange countries, and may return the same way.
“By this it appeareth, your Grace hath not onely a great advantage of
the riches, but also your subjects shall not travell halfe of the way
that other doe, which goe round about as aforesayd.”
Mr. Thorne further explains that as the Spaniards and Portuguese had
found a way by the south to the rich lands of the East, and had thus
gained a material advantage over English traders, his Majesty ought not
to rest until a way was found by the north, “because the situation of
this your realme is thereunto nearest and aptest of all other; and also
for that you _have already taken it in hand_.[66] And in mine opinion
it will not seeme well to leave so great and profitable an enterprise,
seeing it may so easily, and with so little cost, labour, and danger,
be followed and obtayned.” “The labour is much lesse,” he goes on to
say, “yea, nothing at all where so great honour and glory is hoped for;
and considering well the courses, truly the danger and way, shorter to
us than to Spain or Portugal, as by evident reasons appeareth.”
[Sidenote: Sebastian Cabot becomes Pilot-Master in Spain, 1518,]
Such were the arguments which had been used in the sixteenth century to
induce the crown of England to fit out another expedition and discover
an easier route to the world of “gold, balmes, and spices;” but beyond
the failure of Cabot’s enterprise, a fearful scourge, the _sweating
sickness_, had, from July to December of the year 1517, spread death
and dismay, not only through the English court and city of London,
but throughout the whole kingdom.[67] Suspending even the ordinary
operations of commerce, it necessarily checked any further expeditions
of discovery, so that Cabot would probably have remained for a time
without employment, had he not been induced by the more promising
aspect of affairs in Spain to return to that country. In 1518 he was
appointed Pilot-Master to the Spanish monarchy, returning to Spain with
Charles V. from England in 1520.
Though the functions of this office were of so much importance that no
pilot was allowed to proceed to the Indies without previous examination
and approval by him, they supply few incidents for record in his life.
But a misunderstanding between Spain and Portugal soon brought him
conspicuously forward in connection with the discoveries then being
made by adventurous Spaniards, who were directing their attention to
the Moluccas, through the passage which Magellan had been fortunate
enough to find near the extreme southern point of the American
continent. Portugal maintained that these discoveries fell within
the limits assigned to her under the Papal Bull, and remonstrated
in the strongest terms against any attempt on the part of Spain to
carry on commerce in that quarter of the world.[68] A conference was
consequently held to consider the claims of Portugal, to which the men
most famed for their nautical knowledge and experience were invited. At
the head of the list[69] stands the name of Sebastian Cabot, and in
the roll of those present there will also be found that of Ferdinand,
the son of Christopher Columbus. This conference was held at Badajos in
April, 1524, and, on the 31st of May, its members solemnly proclaimed
that the Moluccas were situate by at least twenty degrees within the
Spanish limits.
[Sidenote: and afterwards (1525) the head of a great trading and
colonising association.]
As rumours had reached Spain that the king of Portugal (in spite
of the decision of this conference) was determined to maintain his
pretensions by force, a company, under Spanish protection, was formed
at Seville to prosecute the trade with these eastern islands. Cabot
was appointed chief of this association, and among its members appears
the name of his sincere friend Robert Thorne[70] of Bristol, then a
resident in Spain. The agreement, which was executed at Madrid on the
4th of March, 1525, stipulated that the king of Spain was to receive
from the company four thousand ducats, besides a share of the profits
of the expedition, and that a squadron of at least three vessels,
of not less than one hundred tons,[71] and of one hundred and fifty
men each, should be furnished and placed under the command of Cabot,
who was to receive the title of Captain-General. But many vexatious
obstacles were thrown in the way of the expedition. Instead of pushing
directly across the Pacific after traversing the Straits of Magellan,
Cabot had instructions to proceed deliberately to explore on every
side, particularly the western coast of the continent,[72] where the
Portuguese traded.
[Sidenote: Leaves for South America, April 1526, in command of an
expedition to the Brazils.]
[Sidenote: A mutiny and its suppression.]
As Portugal had hitherto monopolised the lucrative commerce of that
new-found region, the utmost alarm was excited when it became known
that a Spanish expedition was preparing to sail under the charge of
so daring and intrepid a mariner as Sebastian Cabot. Remonstrances
in every conceivable form were addressed to the government of Spain;
threats and entreaties were alternately used to terrify or to soothe
the navigator himself, and even assassination was openly spoken of
as not an unmerited punishment to defeat “so nefarious a project.”
The king of Portugal himself had, more than once, in the most public
manner, asserted that it would be “the utter destruction of his poor
kingdom” if he was deprived of the monopoly of the trade with the
Moluccas.[73] Although the opposition did not prevail, the influence
which had been used delayed the departure of the expedition until
April 1526, and the seeds of discontent had been so extensively sown
among the fleet, that a mutiny on the coast of Brazil, not unlike
what Columbus had encountered on his first great voyage of discovery,
threatened the annihilation of the Spanish fleet. Cabot, like Columbus,
when similarly situated, saw that his only safety lay in extreme
boldness, for, like him, he belonged to that rare class of men whose
powers unfold at trying moments. He knew that by a daring exercise of
that rightful authority, to which the habit of command on the ocean
lends a moral influence, men ready to commit murder may be awed into
passive instruments. He therefore seized the three leaders of the
mutiny, though they were his confidential officers, and the men next
to himself in authority, and placing them in a boat, ordered them to
be pulled on shore and there left. The effect throughout the fleet
of these bold and summary proceedings was instantaneous. Discord
disappeared with the chief conspirators, and, during the five years of
service through which the expedition passed, full as they were of toil,
peril, and privation, the voice of discontent was never afterwards
heard.
[Sidenote: Explores the river La Plata while waiting instructions from
Spain.]
Having expelled the only individuals who, in the event of his death,
had been named in succession to the command of the expedition, Cabot
felt that he would not have been justified in proceeding with the
squadron on the long and perilous voyage originally contemplated. He
therefore put into the La Plata, and sent advice to the king of what
had occurred, by John Barlow, one of the Englishmen who had accompanied
him; resolving in the meantime to explore that great river, in
attempting which his predecessor in the office of pilot-major, Diego de
Solis, had not long before been slain.[74]
[Sidenote: Sanguinary encounter with the natives.]
Running boldly up the river, which, until very recently, was the dread
of navigators, Cabot reached a small island about half a league from
the northern shore, and nearly opposite to the present Buenos Ayres.
Here the natives made a very formidable show of resistance, but were
repulsed. Proceeding seven leagues farther up the river, he erected
a fort. Having completed this work, and taken every precaution for
the safety of the ships, he commenced the exploration of the Parana,
taking care, as he proceeded, to build small forts, on which he could
fall back with his boats and caravels in case of disaster, until he
reached its junction with the Paraguay, which he ascended thirty-four
leagues. Here everything presented a new aspect, with indications of a
comparatively higher state of civilisation; but the natives engaged in
the cultivation of the soil, being jealous of the strangers, and under
the impression that they had come to take away their produce, seized
three of Cabot’s men, who had incautiously strayed from the main body,
and a sanguinary conflict ensued, in which three hundred of them were
killed, and twenty-five of the Spaniards.
When Cabot returned to his ships, he made arrangements to convey to
the king intelligence of his discoveries, and entered more fully into
detail of the incidents which had occurred since he left, especially
of those which had compelled him to abandon the voyage originally
contemplated. The prospects were so promising that Charles V. resolved
to fit out a fresh expedition to aid Cabot in the prosecution of
further discoveries; means were, however, wanting to furnish the
promised aid, the Cortes having, in the same year, refused a grant of
money solicited by the king for pressing necessities of State. It was
therefore hopeless to expect that they would vote fresh supplies for
remote and hazardous expeditions. But though Cabot’s residence in the
La Plata was measured tediously by hope deferred, and finally blasted,
it was not passed in inactivity, his researches while there having
ultimately proved of great value to the commerce of Spain.
[Sidenote: Returns to Spain, 1531, and remains there till 1549, when he
settles finally in Bristol.]
[Sidenote: Edward VI., A.D. 1547-1553.]
On Cabot’s return to Spain, in 1531, he resumed his former position of
pilot-major, and about eighteen years afterwards, or fifty-three years
after the date of his first commission from Henry VII., he, then an
old man, returned to Bristol, the place of his birth in 1549. Whatever
may have been the motives of the king of Spain for consenting to the
departure of his pilot-major, he soon became alarmed at the event. To
England the services of a man of Cabot’s skill and knowledge was then
invaluable. The youth who had then just ascended the English throne had
already given such evidence of capacity as to excite the attention of
Europe, and anticipations were universally expressed of the memorable
part he was destined to perform. Edward VI. saw the advantages to be
derived from the services of Sebastian Cabot. Naval affairs had from
his boyhood seized his attention as a sort of passion. Even when a
child “he knew all the harbours and ports both of his own dominions
and of France and Scotland, and how much water they had, and what was
the way of coming into them: and, hence,”[75] Charles V., seeing the
mistake he had made in parting with Cabot, endeavoured by various
means, though without avail, to induce him to return to Spain.[76]
But for some time after his arrival in England Cabot lived in
comparative retirement, devoting himself to the consideration of
questions of importance to navigators, and endeavouring to improve
the means whereby they were enabled to shape their courses with
greater safety and certainty across the ocean. Not the least important
of his studies was the variation of the compass; if not the first
he was among the first who showed the extent of these variations in
different places, and who attempted to frame a theory on this important
subject. His earliest transatlantic voyage had carried him to a quarter
where the variations of the needle are most sudden and striking. Nor
are they much less sudden in the La Plata, where, from Cabot’s long
residence, they must have secured his deliberate attention and careful
consideration. But, in the absence of his “maps and discourses,” there
are now no means extant of ascertaining the nature of the theory he
had formed, though it must have been of a practical character, as the
seamen brought up in his school, and sailing under his instructions,
were particularly attentive in noting the variations of the needle.[77]
Though seeking retirement, his knowledge and experience, were of too
varied and valuable a character to be allowed any lengthened repose.
Frequently consulted, and his advice generally adopted, many adventures
owe their origin to his genius; and one of the greatest of these, which
arose out of the then prevailing stagnation of trade, is especially
worthy of note. “Our merchants,” remarks Hakluyt,[78] “perceived the
commodities and wares of England to be in small request about us and
near unto us, and that their merchandise, which strangers, in the time
and memory of our ancestors, did earnestly seek and desire, were now
neglected and the price thereof abated, although they be carried to
their own parts.”
[Sidenote: Cabot forms an association for trading to the North,]
Cabot, having been consulted as to the best mode of remedying this
depressed state of things, recommended, after a conference with the
merchants of London, “that three ships should be prepared and furnished
out for the search and discovery of the northern part of the world,
to open a way and passage to our men for travel to new and unknown
kingdoms.”[79]
So general was the desire to secure a continuation of Cabot’s
services, that, notwithstanding his advanced age, the Letters Patent
incorporating the association for carrying out the expedition he had
recommended declared him to be governor, an office he was to enjoy
“during his natural life, without a moving or dismissing from the same
room.” But the association had to encounter the opposition of the
Steel-yard, the powerful foreign body whose monopoly had long exercised
a very prejudicial influence on English manufactures and commerce.
[Sidenote: known as the Merchant Adventurers’ Company.]
For the interests, therefore, of England, and to afford a fair
field in the then known markets of the world to her merchants and
manufacturers, it became necessary to break down the monopoly exercised
by the Germans, from their privileged site on the banks of the Thames,
and the “Merchant Adventurers’ Company,” with Sebastian Cabot as its
governor, was made the instrument of effecting this desirable change.
Edward himself, fully alive to the necessity of abolishing the foreign
monopoly, seems, by the records in his journals,[80] to have taken
great interest in the formation and progress of this company of English
traders, and, in spite of the vast influence of the Steel-yard, to have
afforded to his merchants every facility in his power for the despatch
of the expedition which Cabot had recommended.
[Sidenote: Despatch of the first expedition under Sir H. Willoughby.]
“Strong; and well-seasoned planks for the building of the requisite
ships were provided,” and to guard against the worms, “which many times
pearceth and eateth through the strongest oak,” it was resolved for
the first time in England, though sheathing had been used for some
years previously in Spain, “to cover a piece of the keel of the shippes
with thinne sheets of lead.”[81] Sir Hugh Willoughby, “a most valiant
gentleman and well borne,” and highly recommended for his “skill in the
services of war,”[82] was placed in command of the expedition. Nor were
these the only requisite qualities, for it seems to have been thought
no slight recommendation that he should be of “tall and commanding
stature.” Richard Chancellor, the second in command, with the title
of Pilot-Major, is described as a man of highly-cultivated intellect
and refined manners, combined with great shrewdness and powers of
observation, and withal a skilful and intrepid seaman.
[Sidenote: Instructions for his guidance, probably drawn up by Cabot.]
Following the example of Portugal when she sent forth Vasco de Gama,
and of Spain when Columbus was first despatched on his famous voyage,
Edward had letters of safe conduct prepared for his expedition of
discovery to the North, which were written in the Latin, Hebrew,
and Chaldee tongues, and addressed to kings, princes, and foreign
potentates and states.[83] By these addresses the people of strange
nations were to be propitiated and enlightened as to the advantages
they would derive from friendly intercourse with England. But all the
instructions for the government of the expedition, which have been
justly regarded as models, and as reflecting the highest credit on his
sagacity, good sense, and comprehensive knowledge, were prepared by
Cabot himself; they contain thirty-two voluminous articles. After the
regulations to enforce discipline and obedience, it is therein required
that “all courses in navigation are to be set and kept up by the advice
of the captain, pilot-major, masters, and masters’ mates, with the
assents of the counsailers and the most number of them, and in voyces
uniformely agreeing in one to prevaile, and take place, so that the
Captaine-generall shall in all counsailes and assemblies have a double
voyce.” A log-book is ordered to be kept containing the courses steered
and the observations on the winds, weather, and tides: the daily
altitude of the sun at noon, and the position of the moon and stars,
attention to these matters being carefully and specially enjoined. The
captain is also required to record the “names of the people of every
island, with the commodities and incommodities of the same, their
natures, qualities, and dispositions, the site of the same, and what
things they are most desirous of, and what commodities they will most
willingly part with, and what mettals they have in hils, mountains,
streames, or rivers, in or under the earth.”
But beyond these special and minute instructions for the navigation
of the fleet, and for the discovery of new branches of commerce or
sources of mineral wealth, the most rigid attention is enjoined to the
moral and religious duties of the crews, so “that no blaspheming of
God, or detestable swearing be used in any ship, nor communication of
ribaldrie, filthy tales, or ungodly talke to be suffred in the company
of any ship, neither dicing, carding, tabling, nor other devilish games
to be frequented, whereby ensueth not only povertie to the players, but
also strife, variance, brawling, fighting, and oftentimes murther, to
the utter destruction of the parties, and provoking of God’s most just
wrathe and sworde of vengeance. These, and all such like pestilences,
and contagions of vices, and sinnes to be eschewed, and the offenders
once monished and not reforming, to be punished at the discretion of
the captaine and master, as appertaineth.” It is likewise ordered “that
morning and evening prayer, with other common services appointed by the
King’s Majestie, and lawes of this realme, to be reade and saide in
every ship daily by the minister in the Admirall, and the marchant or
some other person learned, in other ships, and the Bible or paraphrases
to be read devoutly and Christianly to God’s honour, and for his grace
to be obtained and had by humble and heartie praier of the navigants
accordingly.”
Indeed, the whole document is full of admirable advice and of the
soundest principles, as valuable to the success of the commercial
adventure as to the discipline and comfort of every person engaged in
the expedition.[84]
Descending to minute details, the cook or steward is required to give
weekly, or oftener if desired by their superiors, an exact account of
the victuals, such as “flesh, fish, biscuit, meat, bread,” as also
of “beer, wine, oil, or vinegar,” with any other things under his
charge. Incompetent officers and incapable seamen are to be discharged,
whenever a suitable opportunity occurs of getting rid of them. Economy
is strictly enjoined, and cleanliness in the cook’s room rigidly
enforced. The best clothes of the sailors are only to be used when
mustered in good array for the honour and advancement of the voyage.
Various instructions are given for the security of health and general
good management of the crew, and the sailors are warned against people
who “can swim in the sea in havens, naked, armed with bows and shafts,
who are desirous to seize the bodies of the sailors, which they covet
for meat.”
[Sidenote: Departure 20 May, 1553.]
On the 20th of May, 1553, the squadron dropped down the river Thames to
Greenwich, and its departure is thus quaintly described:—
“The greater shippes are towed downe with boates and oares, and the
mariners being all apparelled in watchet or skie-coloured cloth, rowed
amaine and made way with diligence. And being come neere to Greenwich
(where the court then lay), presently upon the newes thereof, the
courtiers came running out, and the common people flocked together,
standing very thicke upon the shoare: the Privie Counsel, they lookt
out at the windowes of the court, and the rest ranne up to the toppe of
the towers; the shippes hereupon discharge their ordinance, and shoot
off their pieces after the manner of warre and of the sea, insomuch
that the toppes of the hilles sounded therewith, the valleys and the
waters gave an eccho, and the mariners they shouted in such sort that
the skie rang again with the noyse thereof. One stood in the poope of
the ship, and by his gesture bids farewell to his friendes in the best
manner hee could, another walkes upon the hatches, another climbes the
shrowds, another stands upon the maine yard, and another in the top of
the shippe. To be short, it was a very triumph (after a sort) in all
respects to the beholders. But (alas) the good King Edward (in respect
of whom principally all this was prepared) hee only by reason of his
sicknesse was absent from this shewe, and not long after the separation
of these ships, the lamentable and most sorrowful accident of his death
followed.”[85]
[Sidenote: Great storm and separation of the ships.]
[Sidenote: Death of Sir H. Willoughby.]
Amidst these great rejoicings, mingled with many lamentations and
numerous misgivings, this celebrated expedition took its departure from
the Thames. After leaving Harwich the ships had favourable winds, but,
anticipating severe weather as they proceeded northwards, arrangements
were made that in the event of separation, they were to rendezvous
at the Castle of Wardhouse in Norway. Their anticipations were soon
realised. Violent storms arose. The ships, though superior to most
of the vessels of the period, were ill adapted to contend against
the angry gales of the Northern Ocean. Sir Henry, with two of the
ships, having been separated from the one under the command of Richard
Chancellor, failed to make the contemplated progress to the eastward,
and wintered in Lapland. But the rigour of the climate proved far more
severe than had been anticipated. After terrible sufferings, he and the
whole of the crews of the two ships perished, through cold, famine, and
disease, amidst the ice and snow of the Arctic regions.
[Sidenote: Success of Chancellor.]
The pilot-major, Chancellor, was more fortunate. He reached the
“Wardhouse” with his ship in safety, and having remained there
several days, resolved to proceed, notwithstanding the disheartening
representations which were made to him. Passing through unknown seas,
he at last reached the Bay of St. Nicholas, where he anchored, and
afterwards landed at a castle on the beach not far from the place
where the town of Archangel has since been built. The natives, “being
amazed with the strange greatnesse of the shippe (for in those parts
before they had never seen the like), beganne presently to avoyde and
to flee;” but Chancellor, in accordance with his instructions, “looked
pleasantly upon them, comforting them by signs and gestures,”[86]
and by numerous acts of courtesy and kindness he soon secured their
confidence and friendship. Having gained in time an imperfect knowledge
of their language, this remarkable seaman made a long tour through a
portion of the interior, visiting Moscow, where he was well received.
Here he opened the first commercial intercourse between Russia and
England, which soon proved a source of great wealth to the people of
both countries.
[Sidenote: His shipwreck and death at Pitsligo.]
[Sidenote: Arrival in London of the first Russian ambassador, Feb.
1557.]
Though his task must have been of the most arduous character, he seems
to have performed it with so much skill and judgment that the Emperor
of Russia readily entered into his plans for promoting commercial
intercourse between England and Russia, and despatched with him an
ambassador to negotiate treaties on the most liberal bases, at the
same time granting to the “Association of Merchant Adventurers” and
“their successors for ever” special privileges. Chancellor, however,
did not live to reap the fruit of his labours and receive the rewards
and honours to which he was so well entitled. On his return to England,
his ship was dashed to pieces during a furious gale at Pitsligo, in the
north of Scotland; and, in his praiseworthy and successful exertions
to save the life of the Russian ambassador, he unfortunately lost his
own.[87] But mourning is only for a season. The lamentations on the
loss of so many brave men, and especially on Chancellor, were drowned
in the shouts of rejoicing which soon afterwards welcomed the Russian
ambassador to the city of London. On the 27th February, 1557, he was
met twelve miles from the City by “fourscore merchants with chaines of
gold and goodly apparell,” with their retinue of servants and “horses
and geldings” more gaudily adorned than themselves, and on reaching
the boundaries of the City, the “Lord Mayor, accompanied by all the
aldermen, received him, accompanied by Viscount Montague and other
members of the court of the Queenes Majestie, together with a great
number of merchants and notable personages riding before, and a large
troupe of servants and apprentices following.”
So great, indeed, we are told, were the crowds of people that lined his
path that the ambassador had much difficulty in reaching his lodging
“in Fantchurch Streete,” where he was provided with every luxury
befitting his dignity and the importance of the embassy on which he had
come, till he finally left London on the 3rd of May following.[88]
[Sidenote: His reception.]
[Sidenote: Commercial treaty.]
Nor, indeed, were the attentions shown to this first Russian envoy
bestowed in vain. Before he set out homewards, in “the noble shippe
the _Primrose_,” a valuable commercial treaty was concluded with
Russia, which continued in force almost until our own day, to the
great advantage of the people of both countries, but especially of the
English.
[Sidenote: Early system of conducting business with Russia.]
It is not a little curious now to look back to the early history of
that trade and the mode whereby it was conducted, nor is it either
uninteresting or uninstructive. The correspondence between the Company
and its agents in Russia furnishes ample means for showing how it was
conducted, and provides, probably, the earliest specimens extant of the
English mode of conducting business with foreign countries, and of the
care and precision with which it was carried on. Nothing can be clearer
than the Company’s letter of instructions and bill of parcels,[89]
containing as it does in the shortest possible space all that was
necessary for the guidance of their agents.
[Sidenote: The benefits conferred by the Merchant Adventurers upon
England.]
To the Company of Merchant Adventurers, and more especially to its
first governor, Sebastian Cabot, England is deeply indebted. They
were among the earliest traders who gave an impetus to her over-sea
commerce, aiming as they did to make England a depôt for foreign
produce, and her ships the carriers by sea for the merchants of
other nations as well as their own. “For we must take care,” remarks
the Company in one of those letters to its agents, “to utter good
quantitie of wares, especially the commodities of our realme, although
we afford a good peny-worth to the intent to make others that have
traded thither, wearie, and so to bring ourselves and commodities in
estimation, and likewise to procure and have the chiefe commodities of
that country in our hands as waxe and such others, _that other nations
may be served by us and at our hands_.”[90]
It was by these means that England obtained her mercantile
pre-eminence, achieving her maritime superiority by such methods rather
than by any complicated scheme of legislative enactments, and in this
she was assuredly far more indebted to the discoveries and wise policy
of Sebastian Cabot, than to the so-called “celebrated Navigation
Laws of Oliver Cromwell,” a hundred years afterwards. Barrow in his
history frankly owns that Cabot’s knowledge and experience, combined
with his zeal and penetration, were the means, not only of extending
the foreign commerce of England, but of keeping alive the “spirit of
enterprise which even in his lifetime was crowned with success, and
which ultimately led to the most happy results for the nation”;[91] and
Campbell observes “that with equal justice it may be said of Sebastian
Cabot, that he was the author of our maritime strength, and opened the
way to those improvements which have rendered us so great, so eminent,
so flourishing a people.”[92]
But the Merchant Adventurers, besides leading the way to and developing
the trade with Russia, were instrumental in the establishment of the
whale fishery of Spitzbergen, and in the equally great, if not more
important, fisheries on the banks of Newfoundland. Nor were their
efforts confined to discoveries of new sources of wealth at sea, for,
besides their extensive commercial operations with the interior of
Russia where they had established various agencies, they entered into
trading relations with Persia. Writing to one of these agents, they
remark, “We have further hope of some good trade to be found out by
Master Anthonie Jenkinson, by reason we do perceive by your letters,
that raw silk is as plentiful in Persia as flax is in Russia, besides
other commodities that may come from thence.”[93]
[Sidenote: The Steel-Yard merchants partially restored to their former
influence.]
[Sidenote: Cabot loses favour with the court,]
The untimely death of Edward VI. (6 July, 1553), while it operated as
a severe check on the advancing commercial prosperity of England, was
no less inauspicious to the fortunes of Sebastian Cabot, who had given
to it the first great impulse. The generosity of the youthful monarch,
his ingenuous and enterprising spirit, and his fondness for maritime
affairs, offer a melancholy contrast to the sullen bigotry of Mary.[94]
Without one spark of feeling for the commercial interests of the
people whom she had been called to govern, or one thought about their
happiness, she deputed all such matters to her husband, who reduced
Cabot’s pension one half, and materially curtailed the influence he so
long possessed, it may be with some gain to his own peace of mind in
his now declining years, though to England’s loss. Foreign traders with
England had now their former special privileges partially restored,
while the Steel-Yard merchants, bringing the influence of Germany to
bear upon Philip II., were thus enabled to obtain relief from the Act
passed by Edward VI. They were not, however, satisfied with these
changes in their favour, for “at an assembly of the Houses at Lubeck,
an Edict was published against all Englishmen, forbidding all trade or
commerce with them.”[95]
[Sidenote: and dies at a very advanced age.]
From this time Cabot sank into comparative insignificance. Sixty-one
years had elapsed since the date of his first commission from Henry
VII.; he was now a very old man, and the powers of nature, fast failing
through age, were still more rapidly exhausted by the usage he received
from the court. The exact date of his death is not known, nor has
any record been left where he was buried. He who, with Christopher
Columbus, had presented a new world to his sovereign, died like him
neglected, if not despised, and at last so thoroughly unknown, that
England cannot point to the spot of earth where rests all that was
mortal of one of her best and bravest seamen.[96]
FOOTNOTES:
[48] 1 Hen. VII. c. 8.
[49] Hen. VII. c. 8; see Parl. Hist. vol. i. p. 407.
[50] Rymer’s ‘Fœdera,’ vol. xii. p. 335.
[51] According to Hakluyt, “In the yeeres of our Lord 1511, 1512, &c.,
till the year 1534” (ii., p. 96).
[52] Hakluyt’s remark here is worthy of note, “Neither did our
merchants onely employ their owne English shipping before mentioned,
but sundry strangers also—Candiots, Raguseans, Venetian galiasses,
Spanish and Portugal ships” (II., p. 96).
[53] Macpherson, vol. ii. p. 46.
[54] Macpherson, vol. ii. p. 11. The charter of patent is dated at
Westminster, March 5, 1495-6.—Rymer, xii. p. 595.
[55] A close examination of the story of Cabot shows that the spot
first seen by him could not have been Newfoundland. Moreover, Ortelius,
who had Cabot’s own map before him, places an island of St. John in
lat. 56° N., off the coast of Labrador, with which the account of its
general sterility and the abundance of Polar bears agrees much better
than with Newfoundland. The present Isle of St. John’s, off the coast
of Newfoundland, was so called by Cartier, A.D. 1534 (Hakluyt, iii. p.
204). The second patent, too, speaks of “land and islands” as distinct
discoveries of the first voyage. The fact is, all the territory round
that neighbourhood was called “New Land,” as in the Stat. 33 Henry
VIII., and Robert Thorne (ap. Hakluyt, i. p. 214) speaks of “_our New
found lands_.” Thus, West Indies once meant the whole of America. That
Cabot reached 67½° of N. lat. cannot be doubted, as Ramusio, in the
Preface to the third volume of his ‘Voyages,’ distinctly states that
the navigator had written to him to that effect (Ramusio, iii. 417).
The presumption is, further, strong that John Cabot, the father, did
not make any voyages, but that all the credit of the new discoveries
is due to Sebastian and his brothers. Indeed, Sir George Peckham (ap.
Hakluyt, iii. p. 165) asserts this as a fact. Sir Humphrey Gilbert,
too, while saying that Sebastian was specially sent, makes no allusion
to the father.
[56] Hakluyt, ibid.
[57] A very interesting memoir of Sebastian Cabot, recently published
(1869) by Mr. J. F. Nicholls, the City Librarian of Bristol, enables us
to add some particulars of his life (and of that of his father) which
have been only just discovered. Thus we learn from Mr. Rawdon Brown’s
‘Venetian Calendars’ that John Cabot (the father) was made a citizen of
Venice, A.D. 1476; and from the Spanish State Papers, vol. i. p. 177,
under date July 25, 1498, “that the people of Bristol sent out every
year two or three light ships, _caravelas_, in search of the island of
Brazil and the seven cities, according to the fancy of that Italian
Cabot; and that _they have done so for the last seven years_,” (i. e.,
_before_ Columbus had landed on Guanahani). Mr. Nicholls further quotes
from a hitherto unpublished tract by Hakluyt, only lately discovered
(see Wood’s Maine Hist. Soc., 1868), the following remarkable words.
“A great part,” says Hakluyt, “of the continent (of America) as well
as of the islands was first discovered for the king of England by
Sebastian Gabote, an Englishman, born in Bristowe, son of John Gabote,
in 1496; naye, more, Gabote discovered this large tracte of prime
lande two years before Columbus saw any part of the continent.” Again,
under the date of Aug. 24, 1497, Mr. Rawdon Brown quotes from the
Venetian Archives this passage: “Also some months ago, his Majesty
Henry VII. sent out a Venetian (so called, naturally, as having been
made a Venetian citizen), who is a very good mariner, _and has good
skill in discovering new islands_, and he has returned safe ... and
next spring his Majesty means to send him with twenty ships.” All this
shows the strong presumption that the first charter was granted _after_
discoveries that Cabot had made previously on his own or his father’s
account. Mr. Nicholls also gives an engraving of a remarkable portrait
of Cabot, then a very old man, and a copy of the unique map of his
travels, dated 1544, preserved in the Bibliothèque at Paris. On this
map it is stated in Latin and Spanish that John and Sebastian Cabot
together discovered the New Land on June the 24th, 1494, and that Cabot
himself “made this figure extended in plane” (i. e. the Map) in 1544.
The street in Bristol where Canynge, and probably the Cabots, lived is
still called ‘Cathay.’
[58] ‘Memoir of Sebastian Cabot,’ by Biddle, p. 86, Lond., 1832.
[59] ‘Memoirs, Historical and Topographical, of Bristol and its
neighbourhood, from the earliest period down to the present time,’ by
the Rev. J. W. Seyer, vol. ii. p. 208.
[60] Tom. iii. p. 41.
[61] In a tract addressed to Sir Philip Sydney and published in 1582,
Hakluyt says: “But, shortly, God willing, shall come out in print all
his (Sebastian Cabot’s) own mappes and discourses drawne and written
by himselfe;” at the same time, stating that these were then in the
“custody of Mr. William Worthington.”
[62] Peter Martyr speaks of Cabot as “his very friend whom I use
familiarly, and delight to have him sometimes keep me company in
mine own house; for being called out of England, by command of the
Catholic King of Castile, after the death of King Henry VII., he was
made _one of our council_, as touching the affair of the New Indies,
looking daily for ships to be furnished for him, to discover this hid
secret of nature (i. e. why the seas in these parts ran with so swift
a current from the east to the west), this voyage is appointed to be
begun in March in the year next following, being the year of Christ
1516.”—Decades, ii. c. 12.
[63] Herrera, dec. i. lib. ix. cap. xiii.
[64] R. Eden’s ‘Munster,’ Lond., 1553. Cabot calls himself on the map
previously referred to “Captain and Pilot-Major of his sacred Imperial
Majesty the Emperor Don Carlos the Vth.” Robert Thorne (said by Stowe
to have been born in 1492) was one of the most eminent of the Bristol
merchants of his days. He died in London in 1532, and is buried in the
Temple Church. At his death he forgave all his debtors, at the same
time leaving £4440 for charitable purposes, and £5140 to poor relations.
[65] Hakluyt, vol. i. p. 112.
[66] A note on the margin of Hakluyt (vol. i. p. 213) adds, “in the
eighth year of his reigne” i. e. 1516-7. This letter is not dated, but
cannot be earlier than 1517, when Henry VIIIth’s voyage of discovery
was undertaken.
[67] This malady had broken out before. It appears from the history of
Bristol to have been very severe in 1486. Erasmus directly attributes
it to the dirty habits of the English people at that period, and to the
utter want of ventilation in their houses. Nicholls’s Life of Cabot, p.
33.
[68] Peter Martyr, dec. vi. cap. ix.
[69] Peter Martyr, dec. vi. cap. x.
[70] Nicholls says, that Thorne entered into this adventure chiefly
that two English friends of his might go in one of the ships, and bring
back an account of the lands discovered.—‘Life of Cabot,’ p. 115.
[71] The ships of the expedition must have been much larger than one
hundred tons to have required or even found suitable accommodation for
so many men.
[72] Peter Martyr, dec. vii. cap. vi.; Herrera, dec. iii. lib. ix. cap.
iii. Letter from Robert Thorne to Dr. Ley, ambassador to the Emperor
Charles V. Appendix. No. I.
[73] Peter Martyr, dec. vii. cap. vii.
[74] Peter Martyr, dec. iii. cap. x.
[75] Burnet’s ‘History of the Reformation,’ vol. ii. p. 225.
[76] Strype’s ‘Historical Memorials,’ ii. p. 190.
[77] Biddle’s ‘Life of Sebastian Cabot,’ pp. 177-180.
[78] Hakluyt, vol. i. p. 243.
[79] Hakluyt, vol. i. p. 243.
[80] Burnet’s ‘History of the Reformation,’ vol. ii., from the Cotton
MSS.
[81] Hakluyt, vol. i. p. 243.
[82] Ibid. vol. i. p. 244.
[83] Strype’s ‘Memorials,’ vol. ii. p. 76. The Coronation Medal of
Edward VI. gives his titles in Greek, Latin, and Hebrew.
[84] Hakluyt, vol. i. pp. 226-229.
[85] Hakluyt, vol. i. p. 245, who calls the place “the Ward-house,”
probably a small fort or guard-house.
[86] Hakluyt, vol. i. p. 246.
[87] Chancellor was drowned, according to Hakluyt, Nov. 7, 1556 (vol.
ii. p. 286).
[88] Hakluyt, vol. i. pp. 286, 287.
[89] Appendix No. 2.
[90] Hakluyt, vol. i. p. 297.
[91] Barrow’s ‘Chronological History,’ &c., p. 36.
[92] Campbell’s ‘Lives of the Admirals.’
[93] Hakluyt, vol. i. p. 307.
[94] Among the first acts of Elizabeth, when she ascended the throne,
was to address a letter on the subject of commercial intercourse “To
the right mightie and right victorious Prince, the Great Sophie,
Emperor of the Persians, Medes, &c., &c., and the people on this side
and beyond the river of Tigris.”
[95] Treaties of Commerce, by Wheeler, ed. of 1601, p. 97.
[96] The last public appearance recorded of Cabot was his dining on
board the pinnace _Seathrift_, Capt. W. Burroughs, at Gravesend, on
April 27, 1556. But he is known to have been alive on May 27, 1557,
when Philip of Spain compelled him to resign his pension. It further
appears that Eden (see his ‘Taisnerus’ in the King’s Library, British
Museum) was present at his death; but he has not noted either the place
or date thereof.—J. F. Nicholls, ‘Life of Cabot,’ p. 186, Lond. 1869.
One of the most eminent early members of the Merchant Adventurers’
company was Sir Andrew Judde, the founder of Tonbridge School, whose
name appears as the owner of two ships despatched to Russia in 1577,
one of them being commanded by Anthony Jenkinson, who went on the first
embassy from England to Persia. Judde in early life had been to Guinea,
and had brought back some gold dust for Edward VI., as is recorded on
his monument in St. Helen’s Church, Bishopsgate. Hakluyt thus describes
an elephant’s head which he saw in his house. “This head divers have
seen in the house of the worthy merchant Sir Andrew Judde, where also I
saw it and beheld it, not only with my bodily eyes, but more with the
eyes of my mind and spirit considering by the worke, the cunning and
the wisdome of the work maister.” Judde was Lord Mayor in 1550-1, and
took an active part against Wyatt in his rebellion.—Rivington, ‘Histy.
of Tonbridge School,’ 4to., 1869, p. 10.
CHAPTER III.
Henry VIII. resolves to establish a permanent Royal Navy—Derives
his first supply of men from English fishermen—Royal
fleet equipped and despatched from Portsmouth—Its first
engagement—Increase of the French fleets—Extraordinary exertions
of the English to meet the emergency—The rapidity with which
they supplied men and vessels—Outfit of the ships—The _Great
Harry_—Number and strength of the fleet at the death of Henry
VIII., 28 Jan., 1547—The _Great Michael_—Trade monopolies—Mode of
conducting business—Mistaken laws—The Bridport petition—Chartered
companies—Prices regulated by law, and employment provided—The
petition of the weavers—State of the currency, A.D. 1549—Its
depreciation—Corruption of the government—Recommendation of W.
Lane to Sir W. Cecil, who acts upon it, A.D. 1551, August—The
corruption of the council extends to the merchants—Accession of
Elizabeth, A.D. 1558—War with Spain—Temporary peace with France,
soon followed by another war—Demand for letters of marque—Number
of the royal fleet, A.D. 1559—The desperate character of
the privateers—Conduct of the Spaniards—Daring exploits and
cruelty of Lord Thomas Cobham, and of other privateers or
marauders—Piratical cruises of the mayor of Dover—Prompt
retaliation of the king of Spain—Reply of Elizabeth—Elizabeth
attempts to suppress piracy, 29th Sept., 1564—Her efforts fail,
but are renewed with increased vigour, though in vain—Opening of
the African slave trade—Character of its promoters—John Hawkins’
daring expedition—Fresh expeditions sanctioned by Elizabeth and
her councillors—Cartel and Hawkins—They differ and separate,
1565—Hawkins reaches the West Indies with four hundred slaves,
whom he sells to much advantage, and sails for England—Fresh
expeditions, 1556—They extend their operations, 1568—The third
expedition of Sir John Hawkins departs, October 1567, and secures
extraordinary gains—Attacked by a Spanish fleet and severely
injured—Reaches England in distress—Prevails on the Queen to make
reprisals—Questionable conduct of Elizabeth—Vigorous action of the
Spanish ambassador—Prompt retaliation—Injury to English trade less
than might be supposed—Hatred of the Catholics—Increase of the
privateers, 1570—Their desperate acts, 1572.
[Sidenote: Henry VIII. resolves to establish a permanent Royal Navy.]
Beyond the encouragement afforded by Henry VIII. to the development
of the maritime commerce of his own people, England is mainly
indebted to that monarch for her first organised Royal Navy. Though
her merchants’ ships had hitherto been her chief means of defence from
foreign invasion, and had played a conspicuous part in all her naval
engagements, they were frequently dangerous instruments during periods
of peace. Commissioned in war “to burn, plunder, and destroy,” they
were with difficulty restrained from following similar avocations on
their own account when peace had been restored. The patriot of to-day
too often became the pirate of to-morrow.
[Sidenote: Derives his first supply of men from English fishermen.]
In his attempts, however vain, to suppress the lawless acts of his own
people, as well as to clear the English Channel of foreign buccaneers,
Henry, soon after his accession, saw the necessity of forming a
standing royal navy. Among his many and varied abilities, he was his
own engineer, and with workmanlike understanding, he likewise planned
improvements in the mode of shipbuilding, conducting experiments in
the construction of the hulls, and in plans for rigging and sailing.
The few ships the government then possessed had fallen into decay, and
a royal cruiser carrying the flag of England was rarely seen in the
Channel. Ample materials, however, to man a fleet were to be found in
the vast numbers of her own fishermen, and especially from among those
employed in Iceland, which, before the discovery of Newfoundland, had
become the chief rendezvous for these hardy men. Taught by necessity
the arts of war as well as of peace, they, in following their usual
peaceful employments, were always armed. Yet, though a fleet worthy of
the name was built and equipped, the process, from the want of the
requisite funds, was necessarily tedious, and the first result far from
satisfactory.
In the meantime the war between Charles and Francis had broken out.
French and Flemish cruisers captured prizes, or fought battles, in the
mouths of English rivers or under the windows of English towns, and
both belligerents too frequently made what they deemed lawful prey
of the ships of England. Even when the courts of Brussels and Paris
were making professions of good-will, the cruisers of both governments
openly seized English traders, and Henry had for a time to submit,
and to leave those of his subjects who resided on the coasts to such
inadequate defences as they could themselves provide. So daring were
the acts of these piratical cruisers that two French ships attempted
even to cut out two merchantmen from the harbour of Dartmouth, and only
failed in this exploit through the bravery of the mayor and inhabitants
of that town, who attacked them with their boats; nay, more, the rival
fleets of France and Spain did not scruple to test their strength in
deadly combat in the harbour of Falmouth,[97] and not unfrequently
placed, at other times, embargoes on vessels entering the Thames.
[Sidenote: Royal fleet equipped and despatched from Portsmouth.]
[Sidenote: Its first engagement.]
[Sidenote: Increase of the French fleets.]
The London merchants declared that, although the country was nominally
at peace, their ships could not venture out of port; but every
remonstrance, though made in no measured terms at the courts of Paris
and Brussels, and received with courtesy and verbal apologies, was
practically ineffectual in suppressing these wanton depredations.
Unfortunately, at this juncture, Henry could not afford to declare
war, as his exchequer was very poorly furnished; but the country itself
had not sunk so low as to be unable to defend its own coasts and its
own traders. Sufficient money having, through the aid of the London
merchants, been at last found for their immediate purposes, a small but
admirably equipped fleet was silently fitted out at Portsmouth, secrecy
being observed as far as possible, in the hope of taking the offenders
by surprise. Sweeping out into the Channel, this fleet soon fell across
four French ships of war which had been plundering English merchant
vessels in the vicinity of Mount’s Bay, and closing against heavy odds,
sunk one of them and drove the other three from the coast.[98] The
time had, indeed, arrived when it became essential to the independence
of England that a fleet sufficient to command the Channel should be
permanently maintained. France, having resolved on open war, was
straining every nerve to humiliate her old and inveterate rival. One
hundred and fifty of her ships of war and twenty-five swift galleys
had assembled at the mouth of the Seine ready to convoy transports
with sixty thousand troops on board; the intention being to occupy the
Isle of Wight as a prelude to a further attack on Portsmouth, and the
destruction of the small English fleet collecting at Spithead.
[Sidenote: Extraordinary exertions of the English to meet the
emergency.]
[Sidenote: The rapidity with which they supplied men and vessels.]
To meet this imposing force Henry VIII., warmly backed by his people,
made extraordinary exertions. One hundred and forty thousand English
soldiers, with a few German contingents, supported his efforts; but
there were only sixty available ships of all sorts, though of these
several were larger than any of the French. The requisite number was,
however, soon supplied. Indeed, throughout the whole history of England
there is no instance on record in which her people were not prepared
to make any sacrifices to provide a fleet for the protection of their
shores, or to redress their wrongs; and now the fact that France was
attempting to rival England on her own element, at once supplied all
that was wanting. But on this, as on many previous occasions, the royal
squadron, that is the ships actually the property of the Crown, formed
only a small part of the naval strength of the country. So thoroughly,
however, did the English people throw themselves into the scale, that
they relinquished in numerous cases their ordinary occupations, and
though the Iceland and Irish fishing fleets were about to sail, nearly
all the fishermen who had previously been employed in these vessels
entered for the navy, their wives and daughters taking their places,
and keeping up the necessary supply of fish for the markets, though
frequently driven into harbour by the French cruisers.[99] Numerous
vessels of various sizes, belonging to Plymouth, Dartmouth, Falmouth,
Fowey, Truro, Dittisham, Totnes, Poole, Rye, Bristol, and other places,
which, during the winter, had been cruising as privateers, joined the
royal fleet, under the Admiral at Spithead, the two services absorbing
the whole of the effective male inhabitants of the seaports, amounting
to sixteen thousand hands, distributed over one hundred sail of
fighting vessels of one sort and another. Some of the best families
in England sought employment in this fleet, and in the long muster
roll there will be found, either in command of the King’s ships or of
privateers equipped by themselves, names which will ever be remembered
as famous in the history of their country. On the first occasion when
England possessed an organised navy, we find a Russell, a Berkeley, a
Clinton, a Seymour, a Dudley, a Willoughby, a Chichester, and a St.
Clair proudly rejoicing to occupy their places as leaders.
It is not our province to narrate the desperate actions which ensued
on the waters of the Solent, the chief scene of the struggle, or how,
after terrible slaughter and numerous engagements, the French were
repulsed. It is rather our object to ascertain, so far as is possible,
of what nature were the vessels of which the fleets were composed.
[Sidenote: Outfit of the ships.]
Previously to the reign of Henry VIII. no reliance can be placed on
any details with respect to English ships; indeed it was only when in
his reign the royal navy became a regular and permanent branch of the
government service, that any careful record was kept of the fittings of
vessels so employed. Happily one of these accounts has been preserved
in the Cottonian collection at the British Museum, and this document
derives further elucidation from another manuscript in the Harleian
collection, explaining, as this does, many antiquated or obsolete
words in the former. In Appendix (3) will be found the substance of
the ‘Inventory of the Great Barke,’ which is the oldest account extant
of the details of an English ship; but whatever antiquaries may have
written about this ‘Great Barque,’ she appears to have been simply a
large merchant ship of the period, which on the sixth day of October,
in the twenty-third year of the reign of Henry VIII. (A.D. 1531), was
_viewed_ or inspected by Christopher Morris, a government officer, for
the purpose of being employed in the public service.
[Sidenote: The _Great Harry_.]
The largest and most important vessel built at this period in England
appears to have been King Henry’s _Harry Grace à Dieu_.[100] Two
representations of this ship are extant, one in the Pepysian Library
in Magdalen College, Cambridge, another in an original picture of Hans
Holbein, published by Allen in 1756.[101] The drawings however differ
so widely that it is probable they refer to different vessels.
With the exception of the very high forecastle, an extra range of
cabins on her poop, and her extraordinary rig, she does not materially
differ from the wooden line-of-battle ships of much later times. All
accounts agree in describing the _Harry Grace à Dieu_ as the largest
English man-of-war up to the period of her construction; but Henry
VIII. had also previously built a vessel called the _Regent_, of one
thousand tons, to carry a crew of eight hundred men, a ship, however,
surpassed by a French one, the _Cordilier_, which carried one thousand
one hundred men. The _Harry Grace à Dieu_ was destroyed by fire when
lying at Woolwich on the 27th of August, 1563.
[Illustration: HARRY GRACE A DIEU.—FROM PEPYSIAN LIBRARY, CAMBRIDGE.]
[Sidenote: Number and strength of the fleet at the death of Henry
VIII., 28 Jan., 1547.]
On the death of Henry VIII. an account was taken of everything
appertaining to the navy of England, and in the ‘Archæologia’ will
be found the names of all the royal “shippes, galleys, pynnasses,
and row-barges, with their tonnage, number of soldiers, mariners,
and gunners.”[102] In this official inventory, taken by a commission
specially appointed for the purpose, the _Great Harry_ appears at the
head of the list, and is there recorded as being of one thousand
tons; if, however, the calculation had been made on the mode of
admeasurement usual in England up to the middle of the present century,
and known as the old measurement (O.M.), her capacity must have been
considerably greater. Besides this great ship, twelve others of the
royal navy are mentioned of from one hundred and forty to seven hundred
and fifty tons, fourteen galleys of from sixty to four hundred and
fifty tons, five pynnasses of from fifteen to eighty-five tons, and
eleven row-barges, each of twenty tons, stationed at Portsmouth. In
the arsenal at Deptford Stronde there were six vessels, the largest
being four hundred and fifty tons, while four other vessels of from
twenty to four hundred tons were stationed in Scotland. The crews of
these vessels when fully manned consisted of one thousand eight hundred
and eighty-five soldiers, seven hundred and fifty-seven gunners, and
five thousand one hundred and thirty-six seamen. According to a return
printed by the navy-office in 1791, the gross measurement of the
fleets belonging to the Crown at the death of Henry VIII. amounted to
twelve thousand four hundred and fifty-five tons, which shows that the
average size of the vessels then belonging to the royal navy, including
the _Great Harry_, was under two hundred and forty tons each. On the
following page will be found an illustration of one of the galliases,
called the _Galley Subtille_, selected from among the fourteen or
fifteen curious contemporary water-colour drawings by Anthony Anthony
of Henry VIII.’s vessels, preserved in the MSS. department of the
British Museum.
[Illustration: THE GALLEY “SUBTILLE.”—FROM THE ROLL OF THE KING’S
GALLIASES, 1546.]
[Sidenote: The _Great Michael_.]
But the Scottish people previous to this time, jealous of the honour
of their independent action in the matter of ship-building, constructed
under James IV. a vessel of even larger dimensions than the _Great
Harry_ of England. Lindsay of Pitscottie gives a circumstantial
description of her, received from Sir Andrew Wood of Largs, the
quartermaster, and from Robert Bartyne her master-skipper.[103] “In
1512,” he says, “the King of Scotland, King James IV., rigged a great
ship called the _Great Michael_, which was the greatest ship and of the
most strength that ever sailed in England or France; for this ship was
of so great stature, and took so much timber, that, except Falkland,
she wasted all the woods of Fife, which was oak wood, besides all
timber that was gotten out of Norway; for she was so strong, and of so
great length and breadth, to wit, she was twelve score (240) feet of
length and thirty-six feet by two within her sides. All the wrights of
Scotland, and many other strangers, were at her device, by the king’s
commandment, who wrought very busily upon her; but it was a year and
a day ere she was complete. This great ship cumbered Scotland to get
her to the sea. From the time that she was afloat, and her masts and
sails complete, with ropes and ancores effiering thereto, she was
counted to the king to be thirty thousand pounds of expences, besides
her artillery, which was very costly to the king, and besides all the
rest of her furniture.[104] She had three hundred mariners to sail her;
she had six score gunners to use her artillery, and had a thousand
men of war, besides her captains, skippers, and quartermasters.” The
historian says further, “if any man believe that this description of
the ship is not of verity as we have written, let him pass to the gate
of Tillibarden, and there before the same ye will see the length and
breadth of the _Great Michael_ planted with hawthorn by the wright that
helped to make her.” This circumstantial account shows that she was
deemed a marvellous effort of naval architecture. “This schip lay still
in the road, and the king tuik great plesour everie day to cum down and
sie huir, and would dyne and sup in her sundrie tymes, and be showing
his Lordes his ordour and munitioun.”[105]
[Sidenote: Trade monopolies.]
The commerce of England during the reign of Henry VIII. and his
immediate successor had been almost wholly monopolised by the two
very powerful corporations to which we have already referred. But
the association of German merchants having become unpopular, a
large portion of their trade soon afterwards fell into the hands of
the “Merchant Adventurers.” To this influential fraternity English
merchants were admitted on payment of a small fine; the government
of the day, in their ignorance of the requirements of trade and
navigation, having hitherto divided the commerce so far as practicable
between these two companies, attempting at the same time to fix the
boundaries of their respective rights by charters. But towards the
close of the reign of Edward VI., when the interests of the English
merchants greatly predominated, and when a committee which had been
specially appointed to inquire discovered that the Steel-Yard
traders, though exempted from the alien duties, had largely defrauded
the revenue by giving rights of denizenship to foreigners, the
Crown deprived them of many of their most valuable privileges, and
practically revoked their charter.
[Sidenote: Mode of conducting business.]
[Sidenote: Mistaken laws.]
Nor is it surprising that foreigners should have so long held in their
hands the largest share of the maritime commerce of England, though
when Henry VIII. ascended the throne there were no reliable accounts
of its extent. A sort of haphazard mode of conducting business was
then the rule of her merchants, who had then no means of early and
accurate information of what their foreign competitors were doing, or
of the quantity or quality of merchandise they themselves required;
moreover, their commercial laws were so ill defined and so liable to
uncertain and extraordinary changes that no dependence could be placed
upon them. Hence it was that Henry endeavoured to give consistency
to his legislative measures, though even these (as might have been
expected) were in most instances far from perfect; as, for instance,
when he attempted to regulate the price of labour, and to determine
by law what sum each employer should pay to the labourers and others
they employed.[106] No doubt there was more pretence for such a system
where, as in most parts of England, there were still large ranges of
common and unenclosed forest land on which the labourer might feed a
cow, where his pigs, ducks, and geese might range, and where he could
obtain his fuel without charge. Moreover, in those days labour was not,
as now, a marketable commodity, it being then a recognised principle
of law to apportion out, so far as seemed possible, the rights of the
various classes of society, and to determine the price of such labour,
not according to the demand, but according to the presumed cost of the
necessaries of life.
[Sidenote: The Bridport petition.]
Naturally in such attempts to regulate prices, Henry VIII. and his
ministers committed many ludicrous as well as palpable mistakes, and
admitted the justice of demands equally indefensible. For instance,
when the bailiffs and burgesses of Bridport presented, in 1529, a
petition to Parliament, stating that the inhabitants of their town
had been accustomed from time immemorial to manufacture the greater
portion of the large cables, etc., required for the royal navy and for
merchant shipping, by which their town was “right well maintained,”
asserting further that “evil disposed persons” resident in the vicinity
had begun to do similar work to the injury of their town, an Act of
Parliament ordered that all hemp grown within five miles of the town of
Bridport should be sold only in that town, and that no person within
the same distance from that highly favoured seaport should manufacture
any hempen goods under pain of forfeiting what they had manufactured!
The first principles of sound political economy being then unknown,
class interests, as a natural consequence, were protected either by
the help of favoured corporations, under royal charters, or by special
enactments.[107]
[Sidenote: Chartered companies.]
Of these some still survive to remind us of a period in the history
of England when the favoured few had means placed at their disposal
of accumulating wealth denied to the great mass of the community.
Although most of these charters are now objects of no value except
to satisfy the curiosity of antiquaries, others remain vesting their
possessors with a power which, if ever it did, can no longer render any
public service. For centuries the vast organisation of these companies
penetrated the entire trading life of England. Laws were framed to
protect them in all their operations, and to provide that no person
should supply articles he had not been educated to manufacture, nor
any manufacturer be permitted to sell what he had produced on the best
terms he could obtain: the Legislature also decided for him the price
at which each article was to be sold.
[Sidenote: Prices regulated by law, and employment provided.]
In London, a control council in communication with the Council and
the Crown[108] attempted to regulate every branch of trade. Its duty
was to determine prices and fix wages, so that each might be kept in
harmony with the acts of the Legislature; to arrange the conditions
of apprenticeship, and discuss all minor details. In company with the
Lord Mayor and other civic dignitaries, its members inspected the
shops and stores of the respective traders, and received and examined
into their complaints. In connection with the municipal authorities
of London there were local councils in nearly every provincial town
who fulfilled similar duties, reporting to the control body or the
Privy Council such matters as were to be submitted to Parliament. When
these representations had been duly considered, the necessary statutes
were passed and forwarded through the chancellor to the mayors of the
various towns and cities. By these arrangements no person was allowed
to commence any description of trade or manufacture till he had served
a regular apprenticeship, and had proved himself competent to exercise
his craft to the satisfaction of the authorities. But the care of the
Legislature was not extended solely to able-bodied adults; attempts
were made to compel every child to be brought up to some special
business or calling.[109] Such a principle may have been plausible
in theory, but it broke down in practice; the Legislature, however,
insisted that the mayors in towns and the magistrates in counties
should find means to apprentice every child to agriculture, so that
they might not be drawn to “dishonest courses,” whenever the parents
were unable to pay the fees for apprenticeship in other trades.
[Sidenote: The petition of the weavers.]
Although it may now be a matter of surprise that such laws remained so
long in force, we find even in our own time considerable sections of
the community who would if they could[110] have all legislation adapted
to suit their own wants, like the ropemakers of Bridport, or the
weavers of the whole realm, who in the reign of Philip and Mary,[111]
induced the Legislature to pass an Act containing the following
extraordinary provisions: “Foreasmuch as the weavers of this realm,
have, as well at this present parliament as at divers other times,
complained that the rich and wealthy clothiers do in many ways oppress
them, some by setting up and keeping in their houses divers looms, and
keeping and maintaining them by journeymen and persons unskilful, to
the decay of a great number of artificers which were brought up in the
said science of weaving with their families and their households; some
by engrossing of looms into their hands and possession and letting them
out at such unreasonable rents as the poor artificers are not able to
maintain themselves, much less to maintain their wives, families, and
children; some also by giving much less wages and hire for weaving and
workmanship than in times past they did, whereby they are enforced
utterly to forsake their art and occupation wherein they have been
brought up. It is, therefore, for remedy of the premises, and for the
avoiding of a great number of inconveniences which may grow if in time
it be not foreseen, ordained and enacted by authority of this present
parliament, that no person using the feat or mystery of cloth-making
and dwelling out of a city, borough, market town or corporate town,
shall keep or retain or have in his or their houses or possession, any
more than one woolen loom at a time, nor shall by any means, directly
or indirectly, receive or take any manner of profit, gain or commodity,
by letting or selling any loom or any house wherein any loom is or
shall be used or occupied, which shall be together by him set or let,
upon pain of forfeiture for every week that any person shall do the
contrary to the tenor and true meaning hereof, twenty shillings.”[112]
In this unwise Act, the spirit of which still prevails among many of
the working classes of England, and still forms in many other countries
the basis of commercial legislation, another clause provided that
weavers who lived in towns might have two looms but no more, so that as
many persons as possible might be employed in their own houses, and,
without the aid of capitalists, earn and obtain their own independent
living—thus treating capital and labour as not merely distinct
interests, but as opposed to each other.
[Sidenote: State of the currency, A.D. 1549.]
[Sidenote: Its depreciation.]
The currency was then as it is now, a question on which a multiplicity
of opinions were entertained; but the coins of the realm were in those
days tampered with by the State to an extent sufficient to afford even
a chancellor of the exchequer of our own time an excuse for attempting
to mulct the sovereign of one per cent. of its gold to cover the cost
of coinage and provide a seigniorage for the Crown. In 1549 a pound
weight of silver was coined into 7_l._ 4_s._, out of which the Crown
retained 4_l._ for seigniorage and cost of minting, paying the merchant
only 3_l._ 4_s._ for his silver.[113] Of course the prices of all
articles rose to the level of the metallic value of the current coin,
and that, too, in the teeth of the numerous statutes passed to regulate
prices, and in defiance of proclamations forbidding sales except on
conditions specified by law. Indeed, coins of the realm became mere
tokens, and though convenient enough for the people at home, were of
no value abroad beyond that of the amount of pure metal they might
happen to contain; hence exchanges with foreign countries ceased to
be any longer intelligible. The measure of corn worth formerly, on an
average, ten shillings and sixpence, sold in 1551 for six shillings and
eightpence, and rose to thirty shillings in the following year.
[Sidenote: Corruption of the government.]
[Sidenote: Recommendation of W. Lane to Sir W. Cecil,]
To make matters worse, there were in those days men high in authority
who reaped pecuniary advantages from the debasement of the currency.
Indeed those of the Lords of the Council who had provided funds for the
suppression of the rebellion adopted the following extraordinary if not
nefarious means of repaying themselves. They addressed a warrant to
the Master of the Mint, setting forth that “Whereas our well-beloved
councillor, Sir William Herbert, in suppressing the rebels had not only
spent the great part of his plate and substance, but also had borrowed
for the same purpose great sums of money for which he remained
indebted,” and requesting that the officers of the Mint might receive
at his hands two thousand pounds weight in bullion in fine silver, the
said bullion to be coined and printed into money current according to
the established standard, the money so made to be delivered to the said
Sir William Herbert, with all such profits as would otherwise have gone
to the Crown after deducting the expenses of the coining.[114] By this
transaction Sir William realised a profit of 6710_l._, and as similar
privileges were extended to the remaining Lords of the Council, and
other favoured persons about court, more than 150,000_l._ worth of
base silver coins were thus thrown at once upon the market, producing,
as might have been anticipated, numerous commercial complications and
disasters. By such means as these monarchs, as well as councillors, at
that period of English history paid their debts. Edward VI. records
in his journal[115] that Yorke, the Master of the Mint, by a process
easily enough understood by men of business, but unintelligible
as described by his Majesty, had undertaken to pay all his debts,
amounting to something more than 120,000_l._, and to remain accountable
for the overplus. The description of this process will be found at
length in a letter from William Lane, merchant of London, to Sir
William Cecil, wherein, too, its evils are exposed, with much excellent
advice for his guidance in the future.[116]
[Sidenote: who acts upon it, A.D. 1551, August.]
Although Sir William appears to have consigned to the official
pigeon-hole this thoroughly sensible document, the common sense of
the London merchant in time produced its effect upon the government;
and, towards the close of the following year, the Council had no course
left but to accept the advice of Mr. Lane and of other merchants of the
City. However oppressive upon the people at large, there was no way of
overcoming the difficulty, or of meeting the sufferings which the issue
of base money had created, but by the desperate remedy of proclaiming
that all the holders of coin must rest satisfied with receiving in
exchange for it the value of the pure silver it contained. This loss,
however, would have been so serious to many persons, the silver coin
consisting of at least fifty per cent. of alloy, that the Council
did not venture at first to do more than order that the shilling in
future was to pass for ninepence, and the groat for threepence, a
proclamation which did not remedy the evil. Every holder of coin felt
that the second fall must follow sooner or later, yet, in the face of
this certainty, the Council ordered a fresh issue of 80,000_l._ worth
of silver coins, of which no less than two-thirds was alloy, and, in a
fortnight afterwards, a further issue of 40,000_l._ in coins of which
three-quarters was alloy.[117] The falling process once begun had to
be completed, and the second proclamation, which appeared within two
months of the first, ordered that the shilling should pass for no more
than sixpence, nor the groat for more than twopence!! Proceedings
such as these could not fail to seriously affect every branch of the
national commerce.
[Sidenote: The corruption of the Council extends to the merchants.]
English cloth had hitherto borne the palm in the markets of Europe.
Genoese and Venetian shipowners had bought the woollens of England
as cargoes for their vessels in preference to all other similar
manufactures. Portuguese ships sailed with them from the Thames for
the Brazils, Peru, and the Indies, East and West. The Germans on
the Rhine, and the Magyars on the Danube, were clothed in English
broadcloth. But the spirit of deception which had pervaded the Council
in the debasement of its coin extended to the merchants, and the
guilds became powerless because their members were corrupt. Huge bales
of English goods lay unsold on the wharves at Antwerp, because they
were “fraudulent in weight, make, and size.” Such was the state of
commercial affairs in England when Edward VI. closed his reign, and
it was only by the sale of the crown lands, and other property, that
the government was enabled to remedy the many evils which a debased
currency had created.
[Sidenote: Accession of Elizabeth, A.D. 1558.]
[Sidenote: War with Spain.]
Nor did commercial affairs improve when Mary ascended the throne.
Though her marriage with Philip of Spain may have given English
merchants an increased knowledge of the West Indies, Mexico, and South
America, that unfortunate union became the source of so much trouble,
that the maritime commerce of England decreased during the five years
of her reign, and, when Elizabeth succeeded her sister, was even more
depressed than it had been at the death of Edward. The events that
followed did not tend to improve it. The war with Spain, the immediate
result of her accession, if it developed the energy and daring of
English seamen, and opened wider and richer fields for buccaneering,
almost annihilated for a time the now limited legitimate commerce of
England.
[Sidenote: Temporary peace with France, soon followed by another war.]
[Sidenote: Demand for letters of marque.]
Having broken off all political connection with Spain, and having
reserved only such commercial and maritime intercourse as it was
necessary to maintain between the two countries, Elizabeth found it
desirable to make a hasty, though honourable, peace with France,
more especially as that country had meditated the annexation of
Scotland. But the death of Francis II., king of France, husband of
the unfortunate Mary Queen of Scots, changed the face of affairs, and
the return of this princess to Scotland created new and harassing
complications. France after his death was torn by civil and religious
wars, and Elizabeth finding it necessary for her own security to
support the Protestants in that country, a war again ensued, which
in this instance perhaps more than in any other created immense
excitement, especially among the maritime population of England.
Religious sentiments, in the case of a misunderstanding with Spain,
blended with the love of pecuniary gain, had raised, as in the war
of the Crusades, people to a state of speculative fury against their
hereditary enemies far more bitter and far stronger than had ever
happened before. And when it became known that one Clarke, an English
shipowner, with only three vessels, had in a cruise of six weeks
captured and carried into Newhaven as prizes no less than eighteen
vessels, whose cargoes were valued at 50,000_l._, applications to the
Queen for letters of marque poured in from all parts of the kingdom.
[Sidenote: Number of the royal fleet, A.D. 1559.]
[Sidenote: The desperate character of the privateers.]
Such applications were granted with little discrimination, a conduct
easily accounted for by the fact that when England found herself
actually at war with the then second power in the world, the whole
of her naval force in commission consisted of only seven coast-guard
vessels, the largest not exceeding one hundred and twenty tons, and
eight brigs and schooners, which had been purchased from the merchant
service, and fitted with guns. Besides these she had in harbour and fit
for service only twenty-three vessels of war, one of them measuring
eight hundred tons, and nearly new; the others, which had seen service,
consisting of one vessel of seven hundred tons, together with some of
from six hundred to two hundred tons, the remaining portion of the
fleet being sloops, or similar small craft. These were all that were
left of the royal fleet which Henry VIII. had created. Poverty-stricken
through the impolitic measures adopted by Edward VI. and his
improvident council, and by the contentions during the reign of Philip
and Mary, England, for the time finding herself unable to create or
maintain a fleet of her own which could cope with the navy of France,
much less with that of Spain, had, therefore, in a great measure to
depend on the privateers whom she licensed. Knowing the weakness of the
government whom they professed to serve, and the importance attached
to their services, the owners of these vessels felt no hesitation in
far exceeding the limits of their licence, whenever they could with
impunity increase their own wealth. The rich merchantmen of Spain and
Flanders, although there had been no formal declaration of war, became
the objects of their prey, and were much more eagerly sought after than
the poor coasters of Brittany. Under the pretence of retaliation for
sufferings inflicted on English subjects by the Spanish Inquisition,
and often without any professions at all, English merchants and English
gentlemen, whose estates lay contiguous to the sea coast, or on the
creeks and navigable rivers, fitted out vessels as traders, under vague
and questionable commissions, and sent them forth, heavily armed, to
plunder on the high seas whatever ships, including not unfrequently
those of their own countrymen, they might consider worthy of their prey.
[Sidenote: A.D. 1561.]
Indeed, men belonging to the best families in England then became
lawless rovers, especially as one of them, Sir Thomas Seymour, had
formed the idea of establishing a private sovereignty among the Scilly
Islands, where, as on the coast of Ireland, there were numerous narrow
channels affording safe and convenient rendezvous for any desperate
cruiser, who levied war on his own account whenever he thought the
government neglected its duty, or whenever, by a fortunate chance,
richly laden vessels happened to cross his path. The annals of the
period[118] frequently mention traders which had sailed from Antwerp
to Cadiz, never having reached their destination; no danger of the sea
had impeded their progress, but, when hugging the land, they had met
a mysterious stranger, who had ordered them to heave-to, and deliver
their cargo: boats from the nearest shore in league with the cruiser,
were frequently in attendance, and, during the course of the night,
carts and waggons were ready at some sheltered nook on the beach to
relieve the boats of their loads, and to convey bales of goods or tubs
of spirits to the convenient cellars of the country squires.[119]
Sometimes the unsuspecting trader was pounced upon during the course
of the night by a lugger full of armed men, which had lain in wait for
her, hidden, during the day, among the rocks or in one of the inlets on
the coast.
[Sidenote: Conduct of the Spaniards.]
[Sidenote: A.D. 1563.]
No doubt the Spaniards had, in many instances, provoked acts of piracy
by rousing a spirit of revenge for the cruel sufferings Englishmen
had sustained at the hands of the Inquisition. Thus Dorothy Seely,
when petitioning the Lords of Elizabeth’s Council for recovery of the
losses and sufferings of her husband, who, with others of the Queen’s
subjects, had been thrown into a Spanish prison, prays that she and
“the friends of such of Her Majesty’s subjects as be there imprisoned,
afflicted and tormented against all reason, may be allowed to fit out
certain ships for the sea at their own proper charges, and to capture
such Inquisitors, or other such Papistical subjects of the King of
Spain, as they can take by sea or land, and to retain them in prison
in England with such torment and diet as Her Majesty’s subjects had
suffered in Spain.... Or that it may please Her Majesty to grant unto
the Archbishop of Canterbury and the bishops the like commission
in all points for foreign Papists, as the Inquisition has in Spain
for the Protestants, that thereby they may be forced not to trouble
her subjects repairing to Spain, or that there may be hereupon an
interchange or delivery of prisoners.”[120]
[Sidenote: Daring exploits and cruelty of Lord Thomas Cobham,]
Not the least daring of the English aristocratic freebooters were the
sons of Lord Cobham of Cowling Castle. Having distinguished themselves
during their youth in Wyatt’s rebellion, they had grown up after the
type of their boyhood, lawless Protestants, half knight-errants of the
Reformation, and half pirates roving the seas, with a combined spirit
of revenge and love of plunder. Thomas Cobham, the most intrepid and
daring of the sons, was one of many whom Elizabeth was, for some time,
powerless to suppress, even had she been so disposed. Indeed, he was
continually at war on his own account with the enemies of the truth
wherever he could combine the service of the cause of Protestantism
with pecuniary gain. Although in his case there may have been more
of the crusader than of the marauder, he had become so desperate a
rover, that Elizabeth was at last forced to proclaim him an outlaw,
but she was evidently not anxious about his capture. Alike cruel
and daring, Cobham had resolved not to be outdone in this respect
by the Inquisitors of Spain. Froude says of him[121] that, whilst
cruising in the Channel, he caught sight of a Spanish ship, which had
been freighted in Flanders for Bilbao, with a cargo valued at eighty
thousand ducats, and forty prisoners who were going to Spain to serve
in the galleys, and that he chased her into the Bay of Biscay, where he
fired into her, killed the captain’s brother and a number of his men,
and, boarding her when all resistance had ceased, sewed up the captain
himself and the survivors of the crew in their own sails, and flung
them overboard. Having scuttled the ship, Cobham made off with the
booty to his pirate’s den in the south of Ireland.
Though English hearts had often been broken with the news of brothers,
sons, or husbands wasting to skeletons in the dungeons of Cadiz, or
burning to ashes in the Plaza at Valladolid, the eighteen drowned
bodies, with the mainsail for their winding sheet, which were washed
upon the Spanish shores, tended only to increase the horrors and to
magnify the punishments to which English prisoners in Spain had long
been subjected.[122]
[Sidenote: and of other privateers or marauders.]
English privateers, however, licensed by the Crown, still swarmed
in the Channel, and though limited by their commissions to make war
only on acknowledged enemies, were unwilling to be restricted to
less lucrative game. Flemings and Spaniards, if laden with valuable
cargoes, were still too frequently the objects of their plunder, under
the pretext that as neutrals they had articles on board which the
government of England held to be contraband of war.
[Sidenote: Piratical cruises of the mayor of Dover.]
Among these lawless rovers were to be found the mayor of Dover,[123]
and other leading inhabitants, who, not satisfied with the capture, in
a few months of the summer of 1563, of from six to seven hundred French
prizes, appear to have plundered many neutral vessels, sixty-one of
which were Spanish, for the most part laden with very valuable cargoes.
Nor were the depredations of these pirates confined to the capture of
neutrals. Their own countrymen were not safe from their rapacious
talons, and it is recorded that rich harvests were often reaped by the
plunder of the small English vessels employed in the valuable trade
between Antwerp and London. Indeed, the vessels of no nation were safe;
even the fishermen on the coast became occasionally the objects of
their prey, and were stripped not merely of their cargoes of herrings,
but of their ropes and anchors, and left to perish of hunger.
[Sidenote: Prompt retaliation of the king of Spain, 1564.]
Philip of Spain could now no longer endure the lawless outrages his
people had suffered, so in January 1564 he issued a sudden order for
the arrest of every English vessel in his harbours, with their crews
and owners. Estimating that his people had suffered by them to the
extent of one million and a half of ducats, he seized thirty of their
vessels then in the ports of Spain, and imprisoned their crews as
security for the repayment of this loss, at the same time excluding,
by a general order, all English traders from the ports of the Low
Countries.[124]
[Sidenote: Reply of Elizabeth.]
With the French war still upon her hands Elizabeth was obliged to
endure the affront, limiting her remonstrance to a request that the
innocent might not be made to suffer for the guilty, and, while
admitting that, in the confusion of the times and the imperfectly
understood views of international maritime law, wrong might have been
done to his subjects, she, as an earnest of her good intentions,
proposed a joint commission to inquire into his claims. At the same
time she prohibited Flemish vessels from entering her ports, and
instructed her ambassador to say to Philip that whatever injury might
have been done to subjects of Spain, she had even greater grounds for
complaint, and that until her ships and subjects were released, and
redress afforded for the wrongs they had sustained, she prohibited all
importations of Spanish merchandise.
[Sidenote: Elizabeth attempts to suppress piracy, 29 Sept., 1564.]
As it did not suit Philip any more than Elizabeth to go to war, he
listened to the remonstrances of her ambassador; the English ships,
and those of their crews who had survived the terrible sufferings of a
Spanish prison, were released, and the commissioners commenced their
inquiry at Bruges. But although all letters of marque expired on the
declaration of peace with France, and the marauders had had to seek
in many cases other fields for their depredations, Elizabeth, in this
instance evidently meaning what she wrote, instructed Sir Peter Carew,
then at Dartmouth, to fit out an expedition with speed and secresy,
and clear the seas of any “pirates and rovers” which might still haunt
the coasts of Devonshire and Cornwall, or who, with that taste for a
lawless life which the nature of these commissions had engendered,
lurked in the western rivers, or had their rendezvous among the
numerous creeks on the shores of Ireland.
[Sidenote: Her efforts fail,]
Elizabeth’s efforts were, however, not crowned with success. The
land-owners, who had too long been in league with the pirates,
rendered every assistance to defeat Sir Peter Carew’s attempts for
their suppression. At Berehaven, O’Sullivan Bere afforded them the
protection of his castle, covering their vessels with its ordnance,
and mustering a fleet of small craft and a sufficient number of men to
bid defiance to the Queen’s authority,[125] thus giving fresh courage
to the pirates. Fresh outrages were consequently committed on Spanish
commerce, and fresh demands made by Philip that pirates who had been
taken and convicted should in no case be pardoned, that the Queen’s
officers in the western harbours should no longer allow these marauders
to take in stores or to frequent her ports, that rewards should be
offered for their capture and conviction, and that all persons on shore
who aided these lawless expeditions should be severely punished.
[Sidenote: but are renewed with increased vigour, though in vain.]
In reply to these peremptory demands Elizabeth “resolved to show to the
world that she intended to deal honestly in that matter.”[126] More
ships of war were sent to sea to prosecute the search with greater
vigour, yet, in the October following, a vessel from Flanders to Spain
laden with tapestry, clocks, and various household articles, belonging
to Philip himself, was intercepted and plundered. So audacious an act
seems to have excited real alarm to Elizabeth and her Council. Orders
were issued to make strict inquiry along the coast so as to discover
the haunts of the pirates, with a view to their immediate trial and
conviction; harbour commissioners were appointed to inquire and report
upon all vessels entering or leaving places within their jurisdiction;
rules were framed for the detection and detention of suspicious
vessels, and any landed proprietors or other persons on the coasts who
harboured or encouraged them were threatened with severe punishment.
But the pirates whom the law had sent forth as privateers had become
too strong for the law itself. Somehow or other, those of them who had
been captured were soon free, and again at their lawless work; not one
was hanged as he ought to have been, and the worst that befel them was
a short-lived alarm.
[Sidenote: Opening of the African slave trade.]
Philip fortunately was not in a warlike humour, and Elizabeth’s excuses
that she could do no more than she had done to suppress the piratical
acts of her subjects were accepted by the court of Spain. Moreover,
a new trade had arisen, affording employment thoroughly congenial to
these marauders. The New World, not long discovered in the West, had
been suffering so severely from a scarcity of labour, that a supply
from other countries was urgently demanded by the colonists. The native
Indian, unaccustomed to domestic life or to regular habits of industry,
would not, or could not, be taught to familiarise himself with the ways
of civilised man; as the forest supplied everything sufficient for his
wants, the proud lord of the soil would not subject himself to the
dominion of the invaders, while he refused to accept their servitude.
Hence it was that as the Europeans advanced, the Indians retired, red
men decaying as the white men increased; but the English pirates soon
found them substitutes. On the shores of Western Africa, which they had
frequented in quest of the Spanish merchant vessels from India, men of
a quiet and peaceable nature were to be found basking in the sunshine
in harmless idleness, and, too frequently, in a state little better
than that of “the beasts that perish.”
Vast in number, and with little or no occupations, they offered a
profitable source of commerce to such persons as were disposed to
enter upon the traffic of human beings, and who would not hesitate to
forcibly transport the superabundant population of Africa to meet the
rapidly increasing demands for labour in the Western world.
In those days, when the transition from privateering to piracy was easy
of accomplishment, the pirate soon became a practised and desperate
slaver. There were then no laws to prevent this inhuman traffic. Indeed
the nobler Spaniards, who first peopled the tropical portion of the
vast American continent and the West India Islands, were of opinion
that, in the innocent and docile children of Africa might be found, if
kindly treated, servants who would labour without repugnance, and who,
while replacing the native Indians, would materially improve their own
then wretched condition. The Spanish settlers therefore encouraged the
exchange, and, as emigrants from other nations flocked in great numbers
to the newly discovered West, the demand for African labour soon became
enormous.
[Sidenote: Character of its promoters.]
When the freebooters of England found it either necessary or expedient
to seek elsewhere other opportunities for their lawless and plundering
propensities, no employment could have been more agreeable to their
habits than that of a slave trade on the coast of Africa, and thus a
commerce, which, if it had been conducted from the first by honest
men, on a well-defined system of immigration, might have proved of
immense benefit to every one connected with it, became, in the hands
of worthless adventurers, one of the most depraved and demoralising
recorded in history. Good, possibly, in its original intentions, this
trade, from its earliest dawn, was made infamous by the desperate class
of men engaged in it from its commencement, and it maintained its
character for infamy, unredeemed by any civilising influences, even to
our own time.
A privateer accustomed to plunder would naturally acknowledge no right
of opinion on the part of those he captured: a slave was an article to
be dealt with like any other article of commerce, and to be disposed of
in any market where the highest price could be obtained. The consent
of the negro himself to exchange a state of even starvation and misery
for one of comparative comfort was an idea which did not enter the
brains of those who first developed the trade; nor was it, indeed,
ever entertained by their successors. Throughout the whole of three
centuries during which it was carried on, no man on either side of the
Atlantic seems to have attempted to introduce a legitimate system of
immigration between the two great continents. What a blessing it would
have been to mankind had some such system been adopted! What myriads
of human lives would have been saved, while the rich lands of the
Southern States of America and the equally luxuriant islands of the
West, over many portions of which rank grass now grows, would have been
beehives of industry and homes of peace, prosperity, and plenty. But,
established in sin, the African slave trade thus continued, through its
long term of existence, a sink of iniquity.
[Sidenote: John Hawkins’ daring expedition.]
Though the Portuguese were, in after years, more largely engaged in
this nefarious traffic than the people of any other nation, the fact
must not be overlooked that John Hawkins, of Plymouth, so famous
afterwards in the naval annals of England, was among its earliest
promoters. In connection with one Thomas Hampton, he fitted out in
October 1562, three vessels, the largest being only a hundred and
twenty tons register, with which he sailed for Sierra Leone.[127]
Having collected, “partly by the sword” and by other equally
questionable means, three hundred negroes, he crossed the Atlantic
to St. Domingo, where he disposed of them to considerable advantage,
investing the proceeds in hides, half of which he took to England,
despatching the remainder in Spanish vessels to Cadiz, under the care
of his partner in the transaction. Philip the Second of Spain, however,
confiscated the cargo on its arrival at Cadiz, while Hampton himself
narrowly escaped the Inquisition; and a peremptory order was sent to
the West Indies prohibiting English vessels from trading there. But
Hawkins fitted out another expedition to proceed thither, in spite of
every warning. Indeed the prospect of large profits was so tempting,
that he even induced Lord Pembroke and other members of the English
Council of State to take shares privately in this adventure. Moreover,
if the letter of Philip’s ambassador can be relied upon,[128] Elizabeth
herself had no objection to a share in any profits that might be
realised, and placed one of the best ships of her navy at his disposal!
[Sidenote: Fresh expeditions sanctioned by Elizabeth and her
councillors.]
Under the patronage of the queen of England and of many of her
councillors, Hawkins set sail from Plymouth on a second slave-hunting
expedition, on the 18th of October, 1564. His fleet consisted of the
_Jesus of Lubeck_,[129] of seven hundred tons, very fully armed, of his
old vessel, the _Solomon_, which had been somewhat enlarged, and of two
small sloops, of a light draught of water, suited to enter rivers and
shallow waters.
[Sidenote: Cartel and Hawkins.]
“A rival expedition sailed at the same time and for the same purpose
from the Thames, under David Cartel, to whom the Queen had also given
a ship. Cartel had three vessels, the _Minion_, Elizabeth’s present;
the _John the Baptist_, and the _Merlin_. The _Merlin_ had bad luck;
she had the powder on board for the nigger hunt, fire got into the
magazine, and she was blown to pieces. Cartel, therefore, for a time
attached himself with his two remaining ships to Hawkins, and the six
vessels ran south together. Passing Teneriffe on the 29th of November,
they touched first at the Cape Verde Islands, where the natives
being very gentle and loving, and more civil than any other, it was
proposed to take in a store of them. But the two commanders could not
agree; Hawkins claimed the lion’s share of the spoil, and when they
quarrelled, the _Minion’s_ men, being jealous, gave the islanders to
understand what was intended to be done with them, so that they avoided
the snares laid for them.”[130]
[Sidenote: They differ, and separate.]
[Sidenote: 1565, Hawkins reaches the West Indies with four hundred
slaves, whom he sells to much advantage,]
Hawkins and Cartel then parted company, the former shaping his course
for the coast beyond the Rio Grande, and filling up, as he proceeded,
the hold of his ship with negroes, whom he had entrapped among the
rivers and islands. Between purchases from the Portuguese, who were
the first to establish factories and barracoons on these coasts, and
the spoils made by his own desperate crews, Hawkins in a few weeks
had collected on board of his ships no less than four hundred slaves,
with whom he shaped his course for the West Indies, and came to an
anchor close to the tower of Barbaratto. Finding that the interdict had
arrived from the king of Spain forbidding the colonists, under pain of
death, to admit any foreign vessels at any of the Spanish possessions,
or have any dealings with them, Hawkins was entreated to leave. But
he was not the man to be thwarted in his object whenever he felt that
he had power to enforce it. Under the pretence that his ship was in
distress and required refitting, he intimated that if he was refused
the necessary supplies he should be obliged to send his men on shore
to take them. The menace produced its effect by affording the governor
a pretext for yielding and allowing the inhabitants to purchase the
negroes, for whose services there was a rapidly increasing demand. In
a few days half the cargo was disposed of, when Hawkins proceeded with
the rest to the Rio de la Hacha, where he disposed of them to great
advantage, in defiance of the king’s interdict, and the remonstrances
of the governor.
[Sidenote: and sails for England.]
With the proceeds of human beings, stolen from their homes, and sold
under cover of his guns to the Spanish planters, Hawkins, having washed
the pens in which he had cooped his unfortunate victims, sailed in
high spirits for England. On his way home he made a cruise through the
Carribean Sea, surveying, in the ostensible fulfilment of his mission,
the islands, and mapping down the currents and the shoals. He then
shaped his course round Cuba, steered through the Bahama Channel, and
along the coast of Florida, to examine the capabilities of the country,
as he explained, but more likely, from his marauding propensities,
to see if he could pick up any of the treasure ships of Spain. He at
length reached Padstow Harbour, and thence proceeded to London, where
he rendered to his co-partners an account of his spoils, and for a time
was the lion of the metropolis. Lord Pembroke and his colleagues in the
Council realised a clear profit of sixty per cent. on their adventure,
and it was generally supposed that Elizabeth was not uninterested in
the spoils which the ship she had supplied had assisted in realising,
unconscious, it may be hoped, that her favourite captain had done
anything to offend her friend and ally the king of Spain.
[Sidenote: Fresh expeditions.]
Thus encouraged, the slave trade flourished. Nor was it surprising
that the vast profits which Hawkins had secured should have induced
others to fit out slaving expeditions. The merchants of London felt
no hesitation in supplying the requisite funds.[131] They did not
inquire very minutely into the mode in which their employés conducted
their business. Ostensibly their capital was required to fit out
vessels to carry on the trade of immigration from the coast of Africa,
where labour was too abundant, to the shores of the newly discovered
country, which had no bounds to its vast and rich territory, and where
labour was in still greater demand. If these roving Englishmen ruined
the colonies Spain had established and menaced the safety of her
merchant fleets, that was a matter of no concern to England; and if
they pillaged a few of them when a favourable opportunity occurred, the
capitalists who supplied the means received a bonus on their investment
beyond the ordinary dividend, and did not of course trouble themselves
to inquire how it had been obtained.
[Sidenote: 1566.]
As might have been anticipated, slave fleets were fitted out at most
of the leading ports; they had orders, it is true, not to approach the
West Indies, or break the laws or injure in any way the subjects of the
king of Spain; but when they returned richly laden, no formal inquiries
were made whether these riches had been obtained from the freightage of
some Spanish vessel which the silent ocean had engulfed, or from the
proceeds of the slaves the freebooters had landed at some rendezvous on
the shores of the West India Islands or on the American colonies, in
concert with the planters, whose profits were measured by the number
of Africans whom they could obtain to cultivate the soil on which they
had settled. “Your mariners,” remonstrated the Spanish ambassador with
Elizabeth, “rob my master’s ships on the sea, and trade where they are
forbidden to go; they plunder our people in the streets of your towns;
they attack our vessels in your very harbours, and take our prisoners
from them; your preachers insult my master from their pulpits, and when
we apply for justice we are answered with threats.”[132]
[Sidenote: They extend their operations.]
[Sidenote: 1568.]
[Sidenote: The third expedition of Sir John Hawkins.]
These freebooting expeditions continuing for some years practically
unchecked, Elizabeth at last felt uneasy for her relations with Spain.
Her attempts to suppress them, which were always languid, had been
laughed at and evaded. Though the Channel was less infested with
privateers than it had been at the commencement of her reign, or during
that of her immediate predecessors, they had extended and increased
their ravages on the ocean and in distant lands. With the Huguenots of
Rochelle, under Condé’s flag and with Condé’s commission, they had made
a prey of the property of Papists; and, like the crusaders of former
ages, had, on the plea of propagating and extending the Protestant
faith, plundered Papists wherever they could be found. But when Hawkins
(now Sir John Hawkins) prepared to fit out a third expedition, this
time on a much more extensive scale, the Spanish ambassador gave
notice to Elizabeth that unless it was prohibited serious consequences
would follow. Of course Sir John was reprimanded by the Council, and
enjoined to respect the laws which closed the ports of the Spanish
colonies against unlicensed traders. The reprimand, however, was but
an empty display of friendship to the king of Spain, made merely to
satisfy for the moment the demands of his ambassador. The slave trade
had proved much too profitable to be thus relinquished. It had become
a large source of profit to Elizabeth and many of her most influential
counsellors, and consequently Hawkins had no difficulty in persuading
her Majesty that he himself would not only be ruined if prevented from
sailing with the expedition he had equipped, but that the crews whom he
had engaged would be driven to misery and ready, therefore, to commit
acts of folly which might seriously injure her merchants and endanger
the well-being of her kingdom. “The voyage,” he promised, “would give
no offence to the least of her Highness’s allies and friends.... It
was only to lade negroes in Guinea, and sell them to the West Indies,
in truck for gold, pearls, and emeralds, whereof he doubted not but to
bring home great abundance, to the contention of her Highness, and the
benefit of the whole realm.”[133]
[Sidenote: departs, October 1567,]
His arguments, or it might be the greatness of the temptation, overcame
his sovereign’s scruples, and in October 1567, Hawkins sailed from
Plymouth with five well-appointed vessels, including the Queen’s ship,
the _Jesus_, which carried his flag, and among his crew was Francis
Drake, his kinsman, who afterwards became famous or infamous, as our
readers may interpret his career, in the maritime history of England.
[Sidenote: and secures extraordinary gains.]
The voyage was prosperous beyond Sir John’s most sanguine expectations.
At Sierra Leone he formed an alliance with an African tribe, then at
war with their neighbours; sacked a densely peopled town, was rewarded
with as many prisoners as his ships could carry; and, in the spring
of the following year, found himself among the Spanish settlements
conducting a business fully answering his most glittering hopes. Where
the ports were open he found an easy market for his slaves, and when
the governors resisted his attempts to open negotiations, he carried
his purpose by force of arms, for in either case the planters were
eager to deal with him. Ere the summer was over he had amassed a
very large sum of money[134] in bars of gold and silver, and other
commodities, materially enhanced by even more desperate and depraved
measures than that of slave dealing, as stray vessels, with valuable
property on board, too frequently became objects of his plunder.
[Sidenote: Attacked by a Spanish fleet and severely injured.]
Having suffered severely during a gale of wind, which he encountered
in the Gulf of Mexico, and finding also that the bottoms of his ships,
foul with sea-weed and barnacles, required cleaning, he put into St.
Jean d’Ulloa to refit; but the day after he entered a Spanish fleet
made its appearance at the mouth of the harbour, consisting of thirteen
men of war, the smallest of them larger than the _Jesus_; and though
Hawkins, if he had been on the open sea, might have managed to make his
escape from this very formidable force, it was sheer madness to seek
an engagement. “If he could,” remarks Froude,[135] “have made up his
mind to dispute the entrance of a Spanish admiral into one of his own
harbours, he believed that he could have saved himself, for the channel
was narrow and the enemy’s numbers would give him no advantage. But
neither his own nor Elizabeth’s ingenuity could have invented a pretext
for an act of such desperate insolence; at best he would be blockaded,
and, sooner or later, would have to run. The Spaniards passed in and
anchored close on board the Englishmen. For three days there was an
interchange of ambiguous courtesies. On the fourth, Philip’s admiral
had satisfied himself of Hawkins’ identity.” He had been commissioned
specially to look for him, “and by the laws of nations he was
unquestionably justified in treating the English commander as a pirate.”
The formality of summoning him to surrender was dispensed with. The
name of Hawkins had become so terrible, that the Spanish admiral dare
not give him any warning of his intentions. But, taking possession
of the mole during the night, and mounting batteries upon it, and
guns on every point of land where they could be brought to bear, the
Spaniards opened fire upon the _Jesus_ and her comrades. Though taken
by surprise, and while many of their boats’ crews were in the town,
“the English fought so desperately, that two of the largest of the
Spanish ships were sunk, and another set on fire.” The men on shore
forced their way on board to their companions, and, notwithstanding
the tremendous odds, the result of the action still seemed uncertain,
when the Spaniards sent down two fire ships, and then Hawkins saw that
all was over, and that vessels and treasures were lost. “The only hope
now,” continues Froude in his graphic description of the encounter,
“was to save the men. The survivers of them now crowded on board two
small tenders, one of fifty tons, the other rather larger, and leaving
the _Jesus_ and the other ships, the gold and silver bars, the negroes,
and their other spoils to burn or sink, they crawled out under the fire
of the mole, and gained the open sea. There their position scarcely
seemed less desperate. They were short of food and water. Their vessels
had suffered heavily under the fire; they were choked up with men,
and there was not a harbour on the western side of the Atlantic into
which they could venture to run; in this emergency a hundred seamen
volunteered to take their chance on shore, some leagues distant down
the coast, and after wandering miserably in the woods for a few days,
they were taken and carried as prisoners to Mexico. Hawkins and Drake
and the rest made sail for the English Channel, which, in due time, in
torn and wretched plight, they contrived to reach.”
[Sidenote: Reaches England in distress.]
Immediately on their arrival at Plymouth, Drake rode in all haste to
London with a schedule of the property of which he represented they had
been plundered by the Spaniards, and prayed that he and Sir John, and
his brother William Hawkins, might be allowed to make reprisals under
the commission which they held from the Prince of Condé. Relating what
had taken place in a way least prejudicial to themselves, Elizabeth,
smarting under the great loss she had sustained through the failure
of the expedition, listened eagerly to what they had to say, and
was prepared to meet their wishes after hearing from the Bishop of
Salisbury, whom she had consulted, that “God would be pleased to see
the Spaniards plundered”—a theory which too generally then prevailed
among all ranks of Protestants.
[Sidenote: Prevails on the Queen to make reprisals.]
[Sidenote: Questionable conduct of Elizabeth.]
It was, however, no easy matter to accomplish. It would have been too
monstrous an outrage to have openly seized any of the rich Spanish
vessels which then lay in her ports, or to have fitted out a fleet
for Hawkins, granting him liberty to plunder as many of them as he
could catch in the Channel. Some other means must be devised as there
was not sufficient pretext for wanton violence. It required grave
consideration, for it would expose the Queen’s government to reproach
if any of the subjects of her “good ally” king Philip suffered wrong in
English waters. While hesitating what to do, some English privateers,
sailing under the flag of the Prince of Orange, and holding his letter
of marque, brought into Plymouth Spanish and Portuguese prizes,
with treasure on board said to be worth 200,000 ducats. The Spanish
ambassador lodged a complaint with Elizabeth, and expressed his alarm
for the safety of the large amount of treasure which was on board these
vessels. Here an excellent opportunity presented itself for obtaining
the recompense to which she considered herself entitled. With many
expressions of regret for the insecurity of the seas, she offered
either to convey the treasure by land to London and to transport
it thence, or to permit the Duke of Alva, then in the Netherlands
endeavouring to suppress the rebellion, to take it in his own ships to
its destination. The ambassador, not without misgivings, accepted the
latter alternative; nor, indeed, were his fears groundless. Elizabeth
landed the treasure under the plea that “the audacity of the pirates”
had rendered it necessary that she should keep it on shore under her
own charge, as it would have been unsafe at sea even under convoy of
her own fleets.
[Sidenote: Vigorous action of the Spanish ambassador.]
The Spanish ambassador was amazed. He could not suppress his
astonishment; but, when he urged that the money was required
immediately for the payment of his master’s troops, Elizabeth simply
pleaded the insecurity of transport, remarking that she would keep it
in perfect safety, though afterwards admitting that, as she was in
want of money, her vigorous government had retained it “as a loan.”
No sooner had the ambassador ascertained that this “loan” was to be
appropriated, one half in doubling the English fleet, and the other
in enabling the Prince of Orange to raise a second army against Alva,
than he drew up a statement of the circumstances in Spanish and English
for circulation in the city of London, and despatched his secretary
in a swift boat to urge Alva to immediate reprisals. As the English
trade with Flanders, though less than what it had been, was still a
considerable source of the wealth of the London merchants, the Spanish
ambassador hoped that they would join him in his protest and force the
Queen to reimburse the treasure she had so unceremoniously retained for
her own purposes. The Duke of Alva acted on the instant by arresting
every English resident in the Low Countries, seizing such English ships
as were in its ports, sequestering their cargoes, and imprisoning their
crews; while couriers rode post haste across France to Spain, so that
Philip might extend the embargo to every port within his dominions
before the English had time to depart.
[Sidenote: Prompt retaliation.]
Elizabeth had hoped that her frivolous excuse for seizing the treasure
would be accepted: at least she had no idea that such prompt reprisals
would have been made; but, though the shock was great, she had taken
a step from which, after the reprisals by Spain, she felt she could
not at the time retreat. Forthwith a retaliating edict of the most
stringent character appeared, ordering the immediate imprisonment of
every Spaniard and Netherlander found in England, and the arrest of
every vessel in her ports or in the Channel owned by any of Philip’s
subjects. That very night the mayor and aldermen of the city of London
went round to the houses of all the Spanish merchants, sealed up their
warehouses, and carried them off from their beds to the Fleet prison.
Even without Philip’s treasure the value of the Spanish and Flemish
goods thus detained far exceeded the confiscation of Alva.[136] But the
suppression of trade which these acts created caused great discontent
in London, and there were many persons in England, especially among the
old aristocracy, who felt that Elizabeth’s conduct had been far from
creditable, and was a gross affront to her professed friend and ally,
the king of Spain.
[Sidenote: Injury to English trade less than might have been supposed.]
The injury to English trade proved, however, less complete than the
Spanish minister had anticipated. An eventual open rupture with Spain
had long been foreseen and prepared for. But changes in the course
of commerce were made with greater ease than he had calculated upon.
Fresh openings of ports in the Baltic afforded new facilities for
intercourse; and Hamburg readily took the place of Antwerp as the
mart through which English goods could be carried into Germany. The
merchants of London had also found new and more distant fields for
their enterprise. They had pushed their way to Moscow, penetrated
to Persia, and had opened out, by way of the Straits of Gibraltar,
direct commercial intercourse with Constantinople and Alexandria,
the ancient centres of the commerce of the world, and even with the
Catholic state of Venice. Rochelle supplied the best wines and fruits
of France; while its privateers intercepted the vessels sailing from
the Catholic harbours, and their cargoes lay ready for export in the
Huguenot storehouses. English spirit and energy having converted the
loss feared by an exclusion from the Spanish and Flemish trades into
gain, Elizabeth and her ministers became even more imperative in
their demands. Alva, who had come to England to arrange, if possible,
terms of conciliation and renewed intercourse, was informed that, if
relations between Spain and England were to be re-established, the
king himself must send a direct commission for that purpose; and, as
a proof of Elizabeth’s determination to maintain the position she had
taken in this affair, the ships which escorted Alva back to Dunkirk
actually cut out from Calais roads a dozen rich Spanish merchantmen,
and sent them to the Thames.
[Sidenote: Hatred of the Catholics.]
Whenever a ship could be found with a Catholic owner she was plundered
by the English rovers. In harbour, in the Channel, or on the open sea,
they became alike objects of their eager prey. While some of these
freebooters were content to lie in wait for such vessels as contained
Flemish prisoners whom they would set at liberty, others resolutely
entered Spanish ports to rescue the English vessels, crews, and cargoes
which had been detained in them. But their patriotism, like their
religious enthusiasm, was ever blended with a love of plunder, for
they invariably helped themselves to any valuables they came across
in their cruises by land or by sea. To the yet deeper distress of
Philip, the houses of the largest Spanish merchants in London were not
merely searched and ransacked by Elizabeth’s police, but the plundered
furniture of his chapel, the crucifixes and the images of the saints
were borne in mock procession through the streets, and burnt in
Cheapside amid the jeers of the populace, who cried as they saw them
blazing, “These are the gods of Spain—to the flames with them and their
worshippers.”[137]
[Sidenote: Increase of the privateers, 1570.]
[Sidenote: Their desperate acts.]
While such insults were of too frequent occurrence on shore, the
agressions of the privateers had rather increased than diminished
in the Channel. Elizabeth felt that, for the safety of the kingdom
against invasion, she must chiefly depend on the force which could
be maintained in the immediate neighbourhood of her own shores, and
that it was quite as safe, and much more economical, to encourage
the voluntary action of her subjects than to rely entirely upon a
royal standing navy. Throughout the whole of the English coast, and
especially in the Channel ports, the sea-going population regarded
Papists generally as their natural enemies and their legitimate prey.
Between forty and fifty vessels, corsairs or privateers, for the
difference was not easily discernible, held the coast from Dover to
Penzance. The English, French, or Flemish seamen, of whom their crews
were promiscuously composed, were united by a common creed and a common
pursuit. At one time they sailed under a commission from the Prince
of Orange; at another under one from the Queen of Navarre. In every
English harbour they had abundant stores ready for their use. Prizes
were brought in almost every day to Dover, Southampton, or Plymouth and
other western ports, where the cargoes were openly sold and the vessels
refitted and armed. At times their acts were of the most desperate
character: thus, three ships with valuable cargoes from Flanders, bound
to a port in Spain, were captured outside the Goodwins, and, because
they had stoutly resisted these privateers or pirates, the crews were
ruthlessly flung into the sea, and left to perish before the eyes of
their murderers.
[Sidenote: 1572.]
When, somewhat later, the Spanish people heard that Hawkins was fitting
out a squadron to cruise for the gold fleet, they were furious, and
were roused to the highest pitch of anger. Philip, however, still
lagged behind his subjects. A war with England would have been then
a serious matter; he knew that in any such emergency France would
send an army over the Rhine and revolutionise the Netherlands. He was
therefore obliged to endure these continued insults and the piratical
depredations upon the ships and merchandise of his subjects. It was
the lesser of two evils. Encouraged by the richness of the spoils and
the impunity with which the capture of Spanish property could be made,
the English merchants and sailors were tempted to such an extent from
their legitimate trade by the more exciting and far more lucrative
occupation of bucaneering, that in the fourteenth year of Elizabeth’s
reign the burden of all the vessels in the kingdom which were engaged
in ordinary commerce scarcely exceeded fifty thousand tons.[138] The
largest merchantman which then sailed from the port of London was only
two hundred and forty tons register. Indeed, one hundred and fifty
vessels of all kinds, most of them small coasters, comprised the whole
fleet engaged in lawful commerce from the harbours of Cornwall and
Devonshire; but so numerous were the pirates that no unarmed ship in
the Channel worthy of their notice could escape from their clutches.
Nor did they confine themselves to depredations at sea. Some of the
crews of the more daring cruisers harassed the Spanish coast, sacking
villages, plundering mansions, pilfering churches and convents, and
had, moreover, the audacity to drink success to piracy out of the
silver sacramental vessels which they had stolen. If not in all cases
furnished with the Queen’s letter to “burn, plunder, and destroy,”
they too frequently exercised that calling; and if ever England was
justified in claiming the “Dominion of the Narrow Seas,” she had at no
period of her history greater claims to it than when these freebooters,
in vessels of every kind, poured forth from her ports, and scoured the
English Channel like a flock of locusts—an eternal disgrace to the
name they bore, and to the flag under which they had been launched for
peaceful purposes upon the ocean.
FOOTNOTES:
[97] Froude’s ‘History of England,’ vol. iii. p. 248.
[98] Froude’s ‘History of England,’ vol. iii. p. 250, _et seq._
[99] State Papers, vol. i. p. 828.
[100] Macpherson states that the name of the _Great Harry_ was first
given to the _Lion_, a Scotch ship belonging to Andrew Barton, which
was taken by Lord Edward Howard in 1511 (vol. ii. p. 39).
[101] Mr. Spedding, in his elaborate edition of Lord Bacon’s works,
has given this plate (reduced) as the title-page of his second volume;
and in editing Lord Bacon’s paper entitled ‘The History of the Winds,’
has suggested that Bacon, when speaking of a ship “of 1200 tons,” must
have had in his mind either this ship or the _Prince Royal_, which was
built in 1610 by Phineas Pett of Emmanuel College, Cambridge (vol. v.
p. 79). The whole of Bacon’s short treatise, and his details about the
masts, sails, and rigging of large ships, is most interesting. See
also Appendix No. 4: ‘Furniture of the _Harry Grace à Dieu_,’ Pepys’
Library, Cambridge.
[102] Appendix, No. 4, 5.
[103] See also Macpherson, vol. ii. p. 42.
[104] 30,000_l._ Scots, estimated by the quantity of silver in the
coins, was equivalent to about 50,000_l._ present value.
[105] The _Great Michael_ was afterwards sold to the king of France.
[106] From the middle of the thirteenth to the close of the sixteenth
century, wheat, which has always, in a greater or less degree,
regulated the price of all other commodities, averaged about seven
shillings the quarter; sometimes, however, reaching twenty shillings,
and at other times sinking as low as eighteenpence the quarter. When
the price was above the average, importation was allowed (3 Edw. IV.
ch. 2); when below, exportation to foreign markets might be made (10
Hen. VI. ch. 1). By an Act of Henry VIII. the price of beef and pork
was fixed at one halfpenny a pound, and mutton at three farthings. Fat
oxen realised twenty-six shillings each, fat wethers three shillings
and fourpence, and fat lambs twelvepence a piece. The best description
of beer sold for one penny a gallon, while table-beer could be had for
half that price. Spanish and Portuguese wines were sold at a shilling
the gallon, but French and German sold for eighteenpence. These were
the highest prices which could be obtained by the law, which in those
days regulated all such matters; and if any fault was discovered in
either the quality or the quantity, the dealers were punished by fine
equivalent to four times the value of the wine which had been sold (28
Hen. VIII. ch. 14). These prices would appear ridiculously low were it
not that, owing to the subsequent increase of the value of money, a
penny then would purchase as much wine or beer as a shilling would now.
[107] Macpherson, ii. p. 70.
[108] Froude’s ‘History of England,’ vol. i. p. 52, etc.
[109] 27 Henry VIII. cap. 25, and Macpherson ii. p. 85.
[110] The _spirit_ of the “Trades Unions” of the present day is almost
as exclusive as anything in the Middle Ages.
[111] 2 & 3 of Philip and Mary, cap. 11.
[112] Macpherson (under A.D. 1544) notices a similar case on the part
of the makers of coverlets at York (ii. p. 92).
[113] Harleian MSS. 660. See also, for debasement of the currency in
the later years of Henry VIII., Hawkins’ ‘Silver Coins of England.’
Lond., 1841.
[114] Froude, Harleian MSS. 660.
[115] Burnet.
[116] MS. Domestic, Ed. VI.
[117] Froude, vol. v. p. 349.
[118] Domestic MSS., reign of Elizabeth.
[119] An organised system of smuggling, only less desperate in the way
in which it was carried out, prevailed along the west coast of Sussex
in 1826-1831.
[120] Froude, vol. viii. chap. xii. To this petition there was attached
the following curious addition:—“Long peace, such as it is by force
of the Spanish Inquisition, becometh to England more hurtful than
open war. It is the secret and determined policy of Spain to destroy
the English fleets and pilots, masters and sailors, by means of the
Inquisition. The Spanish king pretends that he dare not offend the Holy
House, while it is said in England we may not proclaim war against
Spain for the revenge of a few, forgetting that a good war may end all
these mischiefs. Not long since, the Spanish Inquisition executed sixty
persons of St. Malo in France notwithstanding an entreaty to the king
of Spain to stay them. Whereupon the Frenchmen armed and manned forth
their pinnaces, and lay in wait for the Spaniards, and took a hundred
and beheaded them, sending the Spanish ships to the shore with the
heads, leaving in each ship only one man to relate the cause of the
revenge, since which time the Spanish Inquisition has never meddled
with those of St. Malo.”
[121] Froude, vol. viii. p. 447.
[122] In the midst of such terrible outrages it is surprising how peace
with Spain was so long maintained, and this can only be accounted
for by the strong religious feeling which then prevailed to such an
extent among the people of both countries, that their governments,
even if they had the power and inclination, do not seem to have used
sufficient vigour in suppressing their individual revenge and love
of plunder. Numerous vessels cleared from the ports of England and
France to prey upon Spanish, Portuguese, and any other Papists whom
they might encounter; and although their acts were not formally
recognised by Elizabeth, the officers of customs were not restrained
from supplying them with stores, arms, ammunition, and, indeed, with
whatever they required for their lawless exploits. In December 1562 one
of these piratical rovers, commanded by Jacques le Clerc, called by the
Spaniards Pié de Pálo (“Timber leg”), sailed from Havre, and captured
a Portuguese vessel worth forty thousand ducats, as well as a Biscayan
ship laden with iron and wool, and afterwards chased another “Papist”
ship into Falmouth, where he fired into her and drove her on shore.
The captain of the Spaniard appealed for protection to the governor of
Pendennis, but the governor replied that the privateer was properly
commissioned, and that without special orders from the Queen he could
not interfere. Pié de Pálo then took possession of her as a prize, and
afterwards anchored under the shelter of Pendennis, waiting for further
good fortune. As it was the depth of winter, and the weather being
unsettled, five Portuguese ships, a few days later, were driven in for
shelter. Ascertaining the insecurity of their position, they attempted
to escape to sea again, but Pié de Pálo dashed after them and seized
two out of the five, which he brought back as prizes.—Froude, vol.
viii. pp. 450, 451.
[123] Flanders MSS., Rolls House.
[124] Flanders MSS., Rolls House.
[125] Sir Peter Carew to the Council, April 17, 1565, MSS. Domestic,
Eliz., vol. xxxvi.
[126] Council Register, August 1565.
[127] Hakluyt, vol. iii. p. 594; first voyage of Mr. John Hawkins.
Macpherson thinks that this expedition was the first English slaving
cruise (ii. p. 135).
[128] Da Silva to Philip, Nov. 5, 1563, MS. Simancas.
[129] So called from the port whence she had been purchased by Queen
Elizabeth.—Macpherson, ii. 140.
[130] Froude, vol. viii. p. 474.
[131] These expeditions usually consisted of from two to four vessels,
ranging from sixty-five to two hundred and fifty tons register each;
and one or two pinnaces for the purpose of navigating shallow waters,
ascending rivers and creeks, landing and shipping cargo, and so forth.
They were, as a rule, fitted out and armed, ostensibly for protection,
by a number of adventurers, who, having associated themselves together
for the purpose, either chartered the requisite number of vessels, or
found the capital to purchase and equip them for sea, the capital being
divided into shares. Of these the person in charge of the expedition
and the masters of the vessels generally held a considerable number. In
a few instances, especially when the expedition consisted of only one
vessel and a pinnace, the captain himself was the sole owner of ship
and cargo. The rendezvous of these vessels after sailing from England
was either Madeira or the Cape Verde Islands, whence they sailed
wherever profit or plunder guided their course. Their profits in some
instances were enormous.
[132] Froude, Da Silva to Elizabeth, October 6, 1567, Spanish MSS.,
Rolls House.
[133] Sir John Hawkins to Elizabeth, Sept. 15, 1567, Domestic MSS.,
Rolls House.
[134] The sum has been estimated at no less than one million of pounds
sterling.
[135] Froude’s ‘History of England,’ vol. ix. p. 360.
[136] Froude, vol. ix. p. 370, _et seq._; and Macpherson, ii. p. 146.
[137] Froude, vol. ix. p. 430.
[138] Domestic MSS., 1572.
CHAPTER IV.
Certainty of war with Spain—Secret preparations for the invasion
of England, and restoration of the Catholic faith—Philip intrigues
with Hawkins, and is grossly deceived—The Spanish Armada, and
England’s preparations for defence—Destruction of the Armada,
July 19, 1588—Voyages of discovery by Johnson—Finner and Martin
Frobisher—Drake’s voyage round the world, 1577—His piratical
acts and return home, 1580—First emigration of the English to
America—Discovery of Davis’s Straits—Davis directs his attention
to India—Fresh freebooting expeditions—Voyage of Cavendish to
India, 1591, which leads to the formation of the first English
India Company, in 1600—First ships despatched by the Company—The
Dutch also form an East India Company—Extent of their maritime
commerce—They take the lead in the trade with India—Expedition
of Sir Henry Middleton—Its failure and his death—Renewed
efforts of the English East India Company—They gain favour
with the Moghul emperor of India, and materially extend their
commercial operations—Treaty between English and Dutch East India
Companies—Soon broken—Losses of East India Company—Sir Walter
Raleigh’s views on maritime commerce, 1603—His views confirmed
by other writers opposed to his opinions—The views of Tobias,
1614—His estimate of the profits of busses—The effect of these
publications—Colonising expeditions to North America—Charles
I. assumes power over the colonies—English ship-owners resist
the demand for ship-money—Its payment enforced by law—Dutch
rivalry—Increase of English shipping—Struggles of the East India
Company—Decline of Portuguese power in India—The trade of the
English in India—Increase of other branches of English trade—Ships
of the Turkey and Muscovy Company—The Dutch pre-eminent—The
reasons for this pre-eminence.
[Sidenote: Certainty of war with Spain.]
It was impossible for Philip to endure any longer the insults and
injuries sustained by his people. Their patience had become exhausted;
no wonder! The flag of Spain, they said with much truth, no longer
afforded them protection. To make matters worse, the English minister
at the court of Madrid, during the whole of the time that these wrongs
were being perpetrated by English cruisers, was professing the most
sincere friendship in the name of his Queen. “It was she,” he said,
“who had the greatest reason to complain, as the Duke of Alva, without
the slightest provocation, had arrested English ships and goods in the
harbours of the Low Countries.”
[Sidenote: Secret preparations for the invasion of England, and
restoration of the Catholic faith.]
But, though anxious to avoid war with England, Philip was not to
be deceived by the professions of friendship and fair words of her
minister. He, however, waited his time. When that time came he proposed
to himself measures of retaliation which he conceived to be worthy of
the proud and powerful Spanish nation. With this view ever before him,
he kept his secret and matured his arrangements until he felt that
he could accomplish effectually his plans. To be slow and silent, to
take every precaution for success, and then to deliver suddenly and
unexpectedly the blow so long seriously but vaguely impending, was the
policy he intended to pursue. When he did strike, he said to himself,
the blow he intended should be terrible. His coasts had been plundered,
his commerce destroyed, his colonies outraged by English desperadoes,
in whose adventures he had heard that the Queen herself had become a
partner. The seizure of his treasure he felt and knew was simply piracy
on a gigantic scale, committed by the government itself. English
harbours had been the home of a Dutch privateer fleet; ships built
in England, armed in England, and manned by Englishmen had held the
Channel under the flag of the Prince of Orange; and if Alva attempted
to interfere with them, they were sheltered by English batteries. Dover
had been made a second Algiers, where Spanish gentlemen were sold by
public auction. The plunder of the privateers was openly disposed of
in the English markets, even royal purveyors being occasionally its
purchasers. Philip felt, and not without cause, that he was free in
equity from any obligations to a nation which had set at defiance the
usages of civilised countries, or to a government which had permitted
and even aided these piratical expeditions. Open war would have been
the legitimate remedy; but that did not suit his policy, and he
thought that the wrongs and insults his people had sustained demanded
a retribution of a more terrible character. He had also his own ends
to serve on behalf of the Catholic faith, and he knew that if, while
inflicting a summary though revolting punishment upon England, he could
restore the people to the Church of their fathers, Catholic Europe
would applaud his conduct, while the Pope would of course readily
grant him pardon for any crimes he might commit for so just an end. In
a word, the design he had been so long secretly maturing was nothing
short of an invasion of England, the murder of Elizabeth, and the
establishment of Mary Queen of Scots on the throne of that country.
[Sidenote: Philip intrigues with Hawkins, and is grossly deceived.]
Some of the old aristocracy of England, including the Duke of Norfolk,
had too readily become converts to his views of restoring the
supremacy of the Catholic Church. Froude in his ‘History of England’
relates with even more than his usual ability[139] an extraordinary
intrigue whereby Philip thought he had secured for his scheme the
services of Sir John Hawkins! The greatest freebooter of that
freebooting age, with whose reputation Philip had become so terribly
familiar that he had never read his name on a despatch without scoring
opposite to it a note of dismay, had, by some unaccountable means,
worked upon his credulity to such an extent that this negro hunter, who
had sacked Spanish towns and plundered Spanish churches, was supplied
by Philip with large sums of money to fit out a naval expedition, with
the full conviction that he would render material aid to the cause of
Spain in the invasion of England, and in the restoration of the Roman
Catholic supremacy! Even the Spanish ambassador resident in England,
who had no suspicion of treachery, was delighted at so important an
acquisition to the Catholic cause, “and told the king that he might
expect service from Hawkins of infinite value,”[140] as he had “sixteen
vessels, one thousand six hundred men, and four hundred guns, all at
his disposition, ready to go anywhere and do anything which his Majesty
might command, so long as it was in the Queen of Scots’ service.” With
this fleet increased to twenty vessels, and equipped with Philip’s
money, and manned in part with English seamen, whom he had further
duped Philip into releasing from the Seville dungeons, Hawkins sailed
for the Azores to lie in wait for the Mexican gold fleet!
[Sidenote: The Spanish Armada and]
[Sidenote: England’s preparations for defence.]
Cherishing the vain hope that the English freebooter would render him
powerful assistance, Philip despatched, after three years’ careful
preparation, his famous Armada, comprising all the naval forces then
at the disposal of the Peninsula. He had the most perfect confidence
in the result. The invasion and subjugation of England were to his
mind matters that could not admit of doubt; nor had the government and
people of this country much hope of resisting so formidable a fleet,
consisting as it did of one hundred and thirty-two ships and twenty
caravels, amounting together to fifty-nine thousand one hundred and
twenty tons, exclusive of four galliasses and four galleys, the whole
manned by thirty-two thousand seven hundred and nine men of all ranks,
under the command of the Duke of Medina Sidonia. But, though the
defence appeared to be hopeless, the feeling of despair seems never to
have entered the minds of the English people, who with one accord made
the most strenuous efforts to meet this apparently overwhelming force.
London, ever foremost in its loyalty, furnished Elizabeth with large
sums of money, the citizens rivalling with each other in the amounts
they raised, and furnishing double the number of ships and men required
by the royal edict. The same patriotic spirit pervaded the whole of
the country, especially the seaport towns and the merchant marine. The
collective force of the English fleet has often been published,[141]
and in abstract may be stated as follows:
Ships. Tons. Mariners.
The Queen’s ships, under Admiral Lord}
Howard of Effingham, consisted of } 34 11,850 6,279
Serving with the Lord High Admiral 10 750 230
Serving with Sir Francis Drake 32 5,120 2,348
Fitted out by the City of London 38 6,130 2,710
Coasters with the Lord High Admiral 20 1,930 993
Coasters with Lord Henry Seymour 23 2,248 1,073
Volunteers with the Lord High Admiral 18 1,716 859
Victuallers (store transports?) 15 ... 810
Sundry vessels, of which particulars are}
wanting } 7 ... ...
--- ------ ------
197 29,744 15,785
=== ====== ======
[Sidenote: Destruction of the Armada, July 19, 1588.]
This return shows that almost two-thirds of the comparatively small
force, which achieved in less than twenty-four hours the destruction
of the Armada of Spain, consisted of merchant vessels, many of which
must have been small craft, for though the number of vessels exceeded
those of Spain, the tonnage and proportion of their crews were only
about one half; yet so thoroughly complete was the defeat of the great
fleet which Philip had been so many years in preparing, that out of the
one hundred and thirty-eight sail despatched from the Tagus to invade
England, only fifty-three returned to Spain, the remainder being either
sunk, destroyed, captured, or wrecked upon the English coasts.[142]
[Sidenote: Voyages of discovery by]
While events were maturing which, with the assistance of Hawkins,
ultimately led to the complete overthrow of the Spanish intrigues,
English seamen were exploring seas then unknown, in search, it may
be, of plunder, like their compeers in the English Channel, but
professedly, though not in all cases ostensibly, to discover other
lands, and to develop new sources of commerce. The spirit of enterprise
which had fitted out fleets of privateers was equally ready to adapt
itself to more laudable, if not in every instance to more legitimate
sources of gain, and, during the whole of the disreputable exploits
and expeditions to which we have briefly alluded, the rage in England
for commercial adventure had become quite as great as that which had a
century before prevailed in Spain and Portugal.
[Sidenote: Johnson,]
[Sidenote: Finner,]
The voyages of Hawkins to the coast of Guinea and to the West Indies
in 1562 and 1563 had given fresh vigour to the spirit of adventure. In
1565 Richard Johnson, Alexander Kitching, and Arthur Edwards were sent
by the Russia Company into Persia by way of the Caspian Sea, a journey
in those days of great peril and of the most tedious character, where
they obtained for their employers numerous commercial privileges. In
December of the following year, George Finner, a shipowner of Plymouth,
set sail on his own account with three ships and a pinnace to Guinea
and the Cape Verde Islands, where he had a desperate but successful
encounter with seven large Portuguese vessels off Terceira.
[Sidenote: and Martin Frobisher.]
In 1576 the celebrated Martin Frobisher equipped an expedition with the
view of reaching China by a north-west passage. It consisted of only
the _Gabriel_ of twenty-five tons, and of another vessel of similar
size, the _Michael_, with a pinnace of ten tons; yet the difficulties
to which the English merchant ships were exposed, by reason of the
length of the voyage to India by way of the Cape of Good Hope, combined
with the hostile policy of the Portuguese and Spaniards, induced this
daring and skilful seaman to venture upon this perilous undertaking.
But though it failed, as all similar undertakings have failed,
Frobisher discovered Greenland, and reached the straits which now bear
his name in 63° 8´ north latitude.
[Sidenote: Drake’s voyage round the world, 1577.]
In 1577 Francis Drake, the colleague of Hawkins, and alike famous and
notorious, undertook his memorable voyage round the world.[143] Two
years before Oxenham had, it is true, but unknown to Drake, built a
pinnace in which he sailed down one of the streams flowing into the
Pacific, and had the honour of being the first English navigator who
had ventured upon the waters of that great ocean; to Sir Francis,
however, is due the credit of its more complete exploration. For this
distant and hazardous voyage he had been provided with five vessels:
the _Pelican_, of one hundred tons, commanded by himself as admiral,
the _Elizabeth_ of eighty tons, the _Swan_ of fifty, the _Marigold_ of
thirty, and the _Christopher_, a pinnace, of fifteen tons; the crew of
the whole amounting to one hundred and sixty-four men. With these small
vessels, having cleared out ostensibly for Alexandria in Egypt, on the
3rd of December, 1577, he reached the river La Plata on the 14th of
April, 1578, and entered Port St. Julian, where Magellan’s fleet had
anchored a few years before, on the 20th of June of the same year, and
having passed the Straits of Magellan was driven back southwards to
Cape Horn.
[Sidenote: His piratical acts, and return home, 1580.]
It is not our province, much less our pleasure, to furnish details of
Drake’s piratical proceedings on the coasts of Chili and Peru. We may
merely state that the capture of a Spanish vessel with 150,000_l._ of
silver on board, off Payta, crowned all his previous successes of that
character. Resolving to return home by a north-west passage, he sailed
one thousand four hundred leagues without seeing land, a marvellous
expedition in those days, until, in 48° north latitude, he fell in
with the American continent, making thence one of the Pellew Islands
and the eastern coast of Celebes. After encountering many perils, and
failing of course to find any passage to the North, he reached the Cape
of Good Hope, and finally arrived in England on the 3rd of November,
1580. A large portion of the treasure he had captured was sequestered
by government at the instance of the Spanish ambassador, and restored
to its rightful owners, but a considerable surplus remained to satisfy
the exploring freebooter, and to stimulate the cupidity of fresh
adventurers.[144]
The success of Drake paved the way to a new and more brilliant epoch in
the history of maritime commerce. The love of adventure mingled with
hopes, however vain, of obtaining incalculable wealth, combined with
the knowledge that the Queen, shutting her eyes to Drake’s heinous
delinquencies, had dined on board his ship and conferred on him the
honour of knighthood,[145] all tended to incite hosts of enterprising
mariners to offer to undertake remote and hazardous expeditions. In
the course of sixteen years from the date of his return, no fewer
than six of these were equipped and despatched to the southern seas,
the commanders mingling the peaceful pursuits of trade with the
depredations of pirates whenever circumstances tempted them to plunder;
but by these successive voyages the general outline of the main
continents of Asia and America became tolerably well understood.
[Sidenote: First emigration of the English to America.]
Somewhere about this period Sir Walter Raleigh[146] furnished the
first accurate information respecting the eastern sea-board of North
America. In an expedition consisting of two small barks, fitted out
by him, Sir Richard Greville, and others, the configuration of the
coasts of Florida and Virginia became known, and as these districts
were represented as “scenes laid open for the good and gracious Queen
to propagate the gospel in,” the natives being “soft as wax, innocent,
and ignorant of all manner of politics, tricks, and cunning,” a fresh
expedition, headed by Sir Richard Greville, himself laid the foundation
of many practical plans for their colonisation. These were happily
attended, even in their infancy, with considerable success. Indeed the
many inducements offered in the shape of a rich soil, pliable natives,
hopes of gold, and of the propagation of the Protestant faith could
hardly fail to encourage emigration on, for those times, a tolerably
extensive scale.
[Sidenote: Discovery of Davis’s Strait.]
[Sidenote: 1585.]
[Sidenote: Davis directs his attention to India.]
It was also about this period that John Davis made the discovery of
the straits which bear his name, Convinced that a north-west passage
to India must sooner or later be discovered, the merchants of London
fitted out two small vessels, the _Sunshine_ of fifty tons with
twenty-three hands, commanded by Davis himself, and the _Moonshine_
of thirty-five tons and nineteen men, commanded by Captain William
Bruton. These vessels sailed from Dartmouth on the 7th of June, 1585,
and reached as far north as latitude 66° 40´, discovering the straits
justly named after him. A second voyage during the following summer
inspired Davis with such hopes of success that he wrote to one of his
owners, William Sanderson, a mathematical instrument maker, “that
he had gained such experience that he would forfeit his life if the
voyage could not be performed, not only without further charge, but
with certain profit to the adventurers.” In his third voyage, during
which he sailed with open water up the same straits as far as 73° north
latitude, he was equally sanguine of success, and on his return to
England, after again failing in his object, he writes, “The passage
is most probable, and the execution easy,” an opinion which, more
or less, prevailed even until our own time. But his fourth voyage
was altogether so unsuccessful that the owners of the ships under
his charge were led to direct their attention to India by way of the
Cape of Good Hope, and to these regions Davis made no less than five
voyages, but was, unfortunately, killed in his last voyage by some
Japanese pirates off the coast of Malacca, in December 1605.
[Sidenote: Fresh freebooting expeditions.]
The destruction of the Spanish Armada, somewhere about the close of
Davis’s last attempt to discover a north-west passage to India, had
rendered the voyage to that favoured land by way of the Cape of Good
Hope a much less perilous undertaking than it had previously been.
England had now become “Mistress of the seas,” and her people embraced
the maritime position they had achieved in their characteristic
manner. Many more freebooting expeditions were now launched than had
previously been attempted. The fleets of Spain and Portugal having for
the time been swept from the seas, the shipowners of London, who had
lent their aid to destroy the Armada, quickly followed up the blow by
an expedition on their own account against the country whose vessels
of war they had destroyed. Other cities and towns, too, eagerly joined
them in their daring adventures. Ipswich, Harwich, and Newcastle sent
their quota of vessels, and Elizabeth herself, subscribing sixty
thousand pounds, furnished six ships towards this very questionable
expedition, the whole fleet numbering one hundred and forty-six
vessels.[147] Not satisfied with ravaging the coasts of Spain and
Portugal, and capturing a great number of the ships of the enemy, these
too enterprising shipowners captured sixty sail of vessels belonging to
the Hanse Towns destined for the Peninsula.
A private expedition of this character so deeply mortified the
Spaniards that Elizabeth, though a very prominent participator in it,
at first thought of releasing the vessels belonging to the Hanse Towns;
but on ascertaining that the Hanseatic League meditated serious designs
of revenge for the loss of their shipping privileges in England (having
held a meeting at Lubeck to take hostile measures against England), she
ordered the whole of the ships and property which had been captured to
be condemned, with the exception of two of the smallest vessels, which
were despatched to carry the unwelcome news to the Hanse Towns of the
misfortunes of their comrades.
[Sidenote: Voyage of Thomas Cavendish to India, 1591, which leads to
the formation of the first English East India Company, in 1600.]
Amid the many cruises now made in search of gain not the least
important, however unfortunate, was the voyage undertaken to the East
Indies by Thomas Cavendish[148] in 1591; its object, like most of the
expeditions of the period, being to cruise against the Portuguese,
who by this time had formed there important and valuable settlements,
especially at Ormuz and along the coast of Malabar. Although his
expedition proved a failure, the merchants of London ascertained
from those who had been engaged in it, more fully than they had done
from any previous navigators, the immense value of the Eastern trade
and the vast profits realisable by its systematic development. Their
representations urged the establishment of factories and the carrying
on by such agencies a very extensive and lucrative trade. Each
successive voyage added to the experience of the shipowning classes,
and hence various private individuals undertook similar enterprises,
incited, perhaps, as much by the love of adventure as by the hope of
profit.
Such were the preludes to the East India Company, by far the largest
and most important commercial undertaking recorded in history. Through
Mr. Thorne, an English merchant, whom we have already noticed as
resident at Seville while Cabot was chief pilot of Spain, a complete
knowledge was obtained of the course of the Spanish and Portuguese
trade with the East, as he furnished a report on this subject to
certain merchants resident in London, many of whom had for some time
considered the project of establishing direct relations of their own
with India. Consequently in the year 1600, on the petition of Sir John
Hart of London, Sir John Spencer, Sir Edward Micheburn, William Candish
or Caundish, and more than two hundred other merchants, shipowners,
and citizens of London, this great company was formed, having a common
seal as a body corporate, under the title of the Governor and Company
of merchants trading to the East Indies. The Company was allowed
many powers and privileges by the Crown, including that of punishing
offenders either in body or purse, provided the mode of punishment was
not repugnant to the laws of England. Its exports were not subjected
to any duties for the four first voyages, important indulgences were
granted in paying the duties on imports, and liberty was given to
export 30,000_l._ each voyage in foreign coin or bullion, provided
6,000_l._ of this sum passed through the Mint. But not exceeding six
ships, and an equal number of pinnaces, with five hundred seamen, were
allowed to be despatched annually to whatever station might be formed
in India, with the additional provisoes that the seamen were not at
the time required for the service of the royal navy, and that all gold
or silver exported by the Company should be shipped at either London,
Dartmouth, or Plymouth.[149]
[Sidenote: First ships despatched by the Company.]
The stipulated capital of 72,000_l._ having been raised, almost as soon
as the association had been mooted, the Company equipped five vessels
to open the trade, consisting of the _Dragon_, of six hundred tons, her
commander, according to the practice of the day, receiving the title of
“Admiral of the Squadron;” the _Hector_, of three hundred tons, with
the vice-admiral in command; two vessels of two hundred tons each; and
the _Guest_, a store ship of one hundred and thirty tons.[150] The men
employed in this expedition were four hundred and eighty, all told;
the cost of the vessels and their equipment, 45,000_l._, while their
cargoes absorbed 27,000_l._, the whole of the remaining capital of
the Company. They had on board twenty merchants as supercargoes, and
were fully provided with arms and ammunition—an exceedingly necessary
precaution in those days. The voyage proved successful; relations were
formed with the king of Achin, in Sumatra, and a pinnace having been
despatched to the Moluccas and a factory established at Bantam, the
ships returned to England richly laden.
[Sidenote: The Dutch also form an East India Company.]
But the English East India Company soon found in their trade with India
a much more formidable rival than either the Spaniards or Portuguese.
The people of the Netherlands had long been successful navigators.
They had for more than a century carried on a large and profitable
commercial intercourse with England, and, at the commencement of the
reign of Elizabeth, the value of the trade between the two countries
was estimated at 2,400,000_l._ per annum, then considered so large
that the merchants engaged in it were said to “have fallen into the
way of insuring their merchandise against losses by sea by a joint
contribution.”[151] This is the first notice of any mutual assurance
association in England, though the principles and practice of insurance
were probably known to the ancients, and would seem to be referred to
in the compilation popularly known by the name of ‘The Rhodian Law.’
[Sidenote: Extent of their maritime commerce.]
[Sidenote: They take the lead in the trade with India.]
[Sidenote: Expedition of Sir Henry Middleton.]
[Sidenote: Its failure and his death.]
The separation of the Dutch provinces from the crown of Spain had
induced their merchants to seek more distant and more lucrative
channels of employment for their ships, while their superior
information respecting Spanish and Portuguese affairs gave them a
marked advantage over their English competitors in the valuable trade
of the East. They had now supplanted the Portuguese[152] in the
Moluccas, driven them out of their most valuable trade with Japan, and
become the predominant naval power in the Indian seas, a power they
long maintained. Finding England, however, a more stubborn rival, they
employed all their influence and artifices to molest the ships of the
Company and other English traders. Just, in fact, as the Moors had
endeavoured to ruin the Portuguese in the opinion of the native princes
of India, so the Dutch, having expelled the Portuguese from the chief
trade of the East, now resorted to any expedient, either by secret
intrigue or open force, to drive the English merchant vessels from the
same localities. But the profits realised in their first expedition had
inspired the London merchants with fresh energy. Having obtained a new
charter (31st of May, 1609) for fifteen years, the Company set about
constructing the _Trades’ Increase_, of one thousand two hundred tons,
the largest ship hitherto built for the English merchant service. At
her launch, and at that of her pinnace, of two hundred and fifty tons,
bearing the equally appropriate name of the _Peppercorn_, the Company
gave a great banquet, at which the dishes were of china-ware, then a
novelty in England. With these vessels, and a victualling bark of one
hundred and eighty tons, and the _Darling_, of ninety tons, Sir Henry
Middleton, who had been placed in command, set sail for Mocha, on the
Red Sea, where, ensnared on shore by the Muhammedans, eight of his
crew were massacred, sixteen others disabled, and he himself severely
wounded. Proceeding thence to Bantam, the _Trades’ Increase_ was
unfortunately wrecked, and here Middleton, broken down by misfortunes
and disasters, died, thus closing one of their most unfortunate
expeditions on record.
[Sidenote: Renewed efforts of the English East India Company.]
The Company, however, persevered in their Eastern undertakings, and in
1611 despatched two other expeditions to the Indies; one consisting
of a single ship, the _Globe_, which, though absent for nearly five
years, owing to the artifices of their opponents, realised two hundred
and eighteen per cent. on the capital invested; the other, consisting
of the _Clove_, the _Hector_, and the _Thomas_, comparatively small
vessels, which, though absent only three years, was even more
successful: another expedition, which immediately followed, though
absent only twenty months, earned in that time a profit of no less than
three hundred and forty per cent.[153]
[Sidenote: They gain favour with the Moghul Emperor of India, and
materially extend their commercial operations.]
Having opened negotiations with the Moghul emperor of India, Jehangir,
the Company obtained the privilege of establishing a factory at Surat,
and in return for the payment of certain fixed custom duties, secured
their vessels and property against the hostility of the Portuguese,
and their still more formidable rivals the Dutch. They also contrived
to obtain a footing in Japan, through the influence of one William
Adams, a native of Kent, who, having been pilot in one of the earliest
Dutch expeditions, had settled there, and had gained the confidence of
the emperor, from whom he received many favours. It is to be regretted
that the intercourse thus formed was allowed to fall into abeyance
after the death of Adams[154] in 1631, and that Europe, during the long
period since, has, till quite recently, derived little or no benefit
from a commerce likely to become second only to that of China.
When, in 1614, the English Company despatched the _New Years Gift_,
of six hundred and fifty tons; the _Hector_, of five hundred; the
_Merchant’s Hope_, of three hundred; and the _Solomon_,[155] of two
hundred tons, they for the first time consolidated their profits into
one common stock. In this expedition they were fortunate enough to
repel the Portuguese in their attack upon one of the ports belonging
to the Moghul emperor, thus materially strengthening their relations
with that powerful Indian monarch. An event so fortunate was promptly
followed by the despatch of Sir Thomas Roe as ambassador from England
to his court, where he resided until the year 1619. Numerous privileges
were then granted to the Company, whose ships now traded with Achin,
Tambee, and Jewa, in Sumatra, where they established factories, as well
as to Surat, in the dominion of the Moghul, to Ferando in Japan, and
to Bantam and Batana, in Java. They also carried on trading operations,
to a greater or less extent, with Borneo, Banda, Malacca, Siam,
Celebes, and the coasts of Malabar and Coromandel.[156]
[Sidenote: Treaty between the English and Dutch East India Companies,
soon broken.]
So prosperous had their affairs now become, that in 1617, when the
stock of the Company had reached a premium of two hundred and three
per cent., the Dutch East India Company were induced to suggest an
amalgamation of the two companies, with a view to crush their common
enemy, the Portuguese, and to exclude all other shipping from obtaining
a footing in India. Though this scheme was never carried into effect,
the two companies concluded, in 1619, a treaty of trade and friendship,
whereby they should cease from rivalry, and apportion the profits of
the different branches of commerce between them.[157] But the treaty,
like most others of a similar character, was made only to be broken,
and in the course of the following year the Dutch governor-general
really, though erroneously, under the impression that the English
had gained undue advantages, attacked their possessions of Lantore
and Pulo-Penang. A long series of hostile acts ensued, including the
massacre of various Englishmen by the Dutch in Amboyna, and numerous
conflicts between the merchant vessels of both countries, resulting
in the exclusion of the English from the valuable trade of the
Archipelago, and in losses most disastrous to the Company.
[Sidenote: Losses of the East India Company.]
Thus, in a few years after the conclusion of a treaty which professed
so much and performed so little for the benefit of either party, the
Dutch had gained so complete an ascendency over the English traders,
that, notwithstanding their valuable acquisition of the island of Ormuz
in the Persian Gulf, and the prospect of still being able to conduct
a lucrative trade with the East, the Directors seriously meditated
relinquishing all they had gained, and liquidating the affairs of the
Company. They had already abandoned their scheme of the Greenland[158]
fishery, which had been incongruously intermingled with their East
Indian adventures, and had withdrawn from Japan, notwithstanding the
great encouragement they had received for the prosecution of its
valuable trade. With an increased capital of more than one million and
a half, their stock had decreased one half in value, and so powerful
had the Dutch now become, that the Company for the time seems to have
lost all hope of being able to compete against them and the Portuguese,
who still maintained an important position in India. This great rivalry
for maritime supremacy, which commenced during the reign of Elizabeth,
formed one of the most important subjects for discussion during the
whole lifetime of her successor.[159]
[Sidenote: Sir Waiter Raleigh’s views on maritime commerce, 1603.]
Sir Walter Raleigh gives a graphic account[160] of the state of things
then existing, and of the condition of the English mercantile marine
shortly before the union of the crowns of England and Scotland. In this
remarkable paper, which contains many commercial principles far in
advance of the age in which the author lived, Sir Walter states that
the merchant ships of England were not to be compared with those of
the Dutch, and that while an English ship of one hundred tons required
a crew of thirty men, the Dutch would sail such a vessel with one
third that number. Illustrative of the wise and progressive policy of
the Dutch, he enumerates various instances where that country had an
immense advantage over England, and where, following the example of
ancient Tyre and of more modern Venice, Holland became the depôt of
numerous articles “not one hundredth part of which were consumed” by
the Dutch, while she gave “free custom inwards and outwards for the
better maintenance of navigation and encouragement of the people to
that business.”
Directing attention to the liberal policy of some other of the nations
of his time, Sir Walter mentions the fact that France offered to the
vessels of all nations free custom twice and sometimes three times each
year, when she laid in her annual stock of provisions, and also in such
raw materials as were not possessed by herself in equal abundance,
adding that La Rochelle was an entirely free port, a small toll levied
for the repair of the harbour alone excepted. Denmark also granted free
custom throughout the year, with the exception of one month between
Bartholomew-tide and Michaelmas. The merchandise of France, Spain,
Portugal, Turkey, Italy, and England were then transported chiefly by
the Dutch into the east and north-east kingdoms of Pomerania, as well
as into Poland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Germany, and Russia, and some
other countries of the south. Sir Walter, with great force, adds, “and
yet the situation of England lieth far better for a store-house to
serve the south-east and the north-east kingdoms than theirs do, and we
have far the better means to do it if we apply ourselves to do it.”
Sir Walter says with equal truth that, although the greatest fishery
in the world is on the coasts of England, Scotland, and Ireland,
Holland despatches annually to the four great towns on the Baltic,
Königsburg, Elbing, Stettin, and Dantzig, herrings worth 620,000_l._,
while England does not send a boatload; nor even a single herring up
the Rhine to Germany, whose people purchase annually from the Dutch
fish to the value of 400,000_l._ “We send,” remarks this enlightened
statesman, “into the east kingdoms yearly only one hundred ships,
and our trade chiefly depends on Elbing, Königsburg, and Dantzig,”
while “the shipowners of the low country send thither about three
thousand ships, trading with every city and port and town, making their
purchases at better rates than we do on account of the difference
of coin.” “The Hollanders,” he continues, “send into France, Spain,
Portugal, and Italy, from the east kingdoms, passing through the Sound
yearly, with Baltic produce, about two thousand merchant ships, and
we have none in that course. They traffick into every city and port
around about this land with five or six hundred ships yearly, and we,
chiefly, to three towns in their country and with forty ships; the
Dutch trade to every port and town in France, and we only to five or
six.” Sir Walter estimated, that the Low Countries at the time he wrote
(1603-4) possessed as many vessels of all sorts as eleven kingdoms of
Christendom, including England; that they built one thousand ships
annually, and “yet have not a tree in their whole country;” and that
all their home products might be carried in a hundred ships. Nor does
his complaint end here. He alleges that “our Russian trade was going
to ruin,” and that, though for seventy years the English had carried
on a very considerable commercial intercourse with Moscow, they had
only four vessels engaged in that trade in the year 1600, and only “two
or three” in 1602, whereas the Hollanders, who, about twenty years
previously, had only two ships in the trade, had now increased the
number of their vessels to thirty or forty, and were still increasing.
[Sidenote: His views confirmed by other writers opposed to his
opinions.]
[Sidenote: The views of Tobias, 1614.]
Making every allowance for the spirit of exaggeration adopted,
doubtless with the laudable intention of inciting English merchants and
shipowners to greater exertions, “so that our ships and mariners might
be trebled,” there is, nevertheless, in the paper he presented to King
James a very large amount of valuable information with regard to the
merchant shipping of the period, and much still more valuable advice.
It is manifest from what he states that in consequence of the laws
which even then greatly favoured foreign shipping, the English stood
no chance of competing with the Dutch. But though the shipowners of
England were loud in their complaints against the privileges granted to
foreign nations, neither their rulers nor they themselves were disposed
to entertain Raleigh’s liberal policy. They preferred that of one
“Tobias, gentleman fisherman and mariner” [what a number of Tobiases we
have had since then!] who afterwards published a pamphlet entitled “The
best way to make England the richest and wealthiest kingdom in Europe,”
in which he recommends the construction of one thousand busses upon a
“national design,”—“each ward in London to provide one Busse, every
company, and, if needs be, every parish, one,” in order to compete with
the Dutch. To encourage these investments he furnishes an estimate of
the capital required and of the probable profits.
[Sidenote: His estimate of the profits of busses.]
A busse, measuring from sixty to eighty tons, complete for sea, with
her fishing implements and appurtenances, would cost, he estimates,
somewhere about 500_l._ sterling, and such a vessel, he calculated,
would hold good for twenty years with very little expenditure in
the way of repairs, and only about 80_l._ annually for the wear and
tear of her tackle, ropes, masts, and sails. Presuming that the
busse caught herrings equal to one hundred last of barrels, which
he values at 10_l._ per last, she would earn in the gross 1000_l._;
and as he calculates that her expenses, exclusive of tear and wear,
would not exceed 335_l._,[161] he shows a large and tempting profit to
those corporations, companies, and parishes who might be induced to
act on his advice. Having satisfied, as he conceives, all pecuniary
considerations, he appeals to their patriotism by showing the advantage
to the nation of having ready for its service in the hour of need
“lusty-fed younkers bred in the Busses, who could furl a top-sail or
sprit-sail, or shake out a bonnet in a dark and stormy night, and not
shrink from their duty like the surfeited and hunger-pinched sailors
who made the southern voyages.” Nor were the proverbial remarks of the
Dutch forgotten, who taunted the English with the sneer, “that they
would make them wear their old shoes.”
[Sidenote: The effect of these publications.]
Although this appeal did not produce the desired patriotic effect,
it directed public attention to the depressed state of the merchant
shipping interest of England, which reached so low an ebb in 1615 that
there were only ten ships belonging to the port of London of more than
two hundred tons burthen.[162] In that year the corporation of the
Trinity House presented a petition to the King pointing out, in very
strong terms, the evil results which would ensue from a perseverance
of such neglect of the shipping interest, and recommending a highly
protective policy; but numerous persons who were deeply interested in
maintaining the merchant navy in a high state of prosperity, opposed
altogether any measure prohibiting, as had been proposed, the export of
British commodities in foreign bottoms. When, however, extremes meet,
the necessity of a change becomes apparent, and the unfair advantages
so long granted to foreign nations as against English shipping had
at length roused the people to adopt those retaliatory measures
of legislation which, ignoring Raleigh’s sound advice, eventually
culminated in the highly protective maritime laws of Cromwell.
[Sidenote: Colonising expeditions to North America.]
But amid the depression which then prevailed, English shipowners
did not overlook the advantages to be derived from trading with the
newly discovered world of North America. Though the expeditions to
that country, promoted by Sir Walter Raleigh and his relations, had
terminated disastrously, the merchants of London and Bristol frequently
despatched small vessels thither with trinkets and articles of little
value, exchanging them profitably for the skins and furs of the native
Indians. In 1602 Captain Gosnold[163] made for the first time the
voyage direct across the Atlantic, without sailing by way of the
Canaries round the West Indies and through the Gulf of Florida, as
had been the previous practice of navigators. In 1606, two maritime
companies, under charter from King James, were authorised to colonise
and plant the American coast within the 34th and 41st degrees of
latitude. One of these, known as the South Virginia Company, afterwards
formed the provinces of Maryland, Virginia, and North and South
Carolina; and the second, the “Plymouth Adventurers,” was empowered
to establish plantations as far as the 45th degree of latitude, their
assignment of territory embracing Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York,
and other New England towns. In the same year the “London Company” sent
out two ships and founded “James-Town” in Virginia; and in 1612 Bermuda
was also settled.
[Sidenote: 1625.]
[Sidenote: Charles I. assumes power over the colonies.]
When Charles I. ascended the throne he commenced putting into
execution one of those doubtful prerogatives of the crown which,
pushed too far, led to a fatal revolution. Either under the pretence
or conviction that the government of the transatlantic colonies could
be more advantageously carried on by himself and his council, through
the intervention of a governor resident on the spot and appointed
by the Crown, he assumed the direct government of Virginia, and not
only treated the charter of the Company as annulled, but broadly
declared that colonies founded by adventurers, or occupied by British
subjects, were essentially part and parcel of the dominion of the
mother country.[164] The Company very justly complained that they had
expended 200,000_l._ in the Virginian undertaking alone, and as yet
had not received any returns. Nevertheless the whole of that province,
as also the West India Islands not previously taken possession of and
colonised, were occupied, under the authority of the Crown of England,
within a few years afterwards. About that period also the Bahama
Islands were appropriated, together with North and South Carolina,
Georgia, Tennessee, and the southern part of Louisiana. This immense
territory was granted to Robert Heath and his heirs, and afterwards
conveyed by him to the Earl of Arundel. In like manner Maryland,
previously considered a part of Virginia, became the property of Lord
Baltimore, a Roman Catholic, a grant afterwards productive of deep
religious animosities, when the Puritans were driven to Virginia. In
1641 Lord Willoughby made a settlement at Surinam on the southern
continent of America. The commercial results of these colonisation
schemes were at first slow and unsatisfactory, but they eventually
exercised a vast influence on merchant shipping, and contributed
essentially to the gradual consolidation and greatness of England.
The French, whose commercial navy was now beginning to emerge from
obscurity and insignificance, formed settlements in Acadia, the present
Nova Scotia, and extended their dominion into the territory now known
as the New England States. But in 1620 both they and the Dutch, who had
founded the town of New Amsterdam (now the city of New York and capital
of the province), were dislodged by English adventurers.[165]
[Sidenote: English shipowners resist the demand for ship-money.]
Passing on to events in England connected with merchant shipping, by
far the most conspicuous about this period were the attempts of that
unwise and unfortunate monarch Charles I. to burden the mercantile
community with the expense of a fleet which his, perhaps natural,
anxiety to support the Palatinate had rendered necessary. Demanding
from the city of London and from the other seaports the requisite
number of ships or their equivalent in money, the people of the
maritime towns not actually dependent upon trade passively resisted,
thereby making the burden yet more intolerable to those who remained on
the coast. The proclamation which consequently followed, commanding the
parties who had withdrawn to return to their dwellings, brought about
the famous struggle of Hampden, who resisted the writs as illegal. The
first writ recited that certain “Thieves, pirates, and robbers of the
sea, as well Turks,[166] enemies of the Christian name, as others,
gathered together and wickedly took by force, and spoiled the ships,
goods, and merchandise, not only of the King’s subjects, but the
subjects of our friends in the sea, which hath been defended by the
English nation.” The writ went on to recite how men “were carried away
into captivity, and the merchant shipping of the kingdom endangered
by the preparations made to molest our merchants. Accordingly, the
Princely honour of the King required that force should be employed to
defend the kingdom, guard the seas, and give security to shipping.”
Upon these grounds Ship-money was demanded by the King, without the
sanction and authority of Parliament, and, out of this unconstitutional
proceeding arose the quarrel which had so fatal a termination for that
ill-advised monarch. The city of London petitioned the King, setting
forth that they were exempted by their privileges from the demand. But
the King persevered; Hampden was defeated in the courts of law, which,
under the influence of corrupt judges, pronounced the writ legal, and
thus the levy of Ship-money, at first peculiar to the maritime towns,
was imposed upon the entire kingdom.
[Sidenote: Its payment enforced by law.]
This great struggle was no doubt the proximate cause of the final
severance of the merchant vessels from the royal navy, as, after the
Restoration, the constitutional action of Parliament provided the
requisite funds for the maintenance of a royal navy on a permanent
footing, so that the shipowners were relieved from duties which at
intervals pressed heavily on their class, and only contributed to
the cost of a national navy in a rateable proportion together with
their fellow subjects. Combined with other concurring causes which
supervened, these legislative measures gave hereafter no ordinary
impulse to the merchant shipping of England. But they engendered
a sanguinary civil war, besides a series of much more sanguinary
struggles with the Dutch, to disenthrall the English merchant service
from the state of dependence in which it had lingered during many ages.
[Sidenote: Dutch rivalry.]
While England was fighting for political freedom, the Dutch, having
already become a free republic, were the real masters of the seas. They
were now at the height of their maritime glory. Their merchant ships
penetrated to every quarter of the globe. No wonder then that they
openly and derisively claimed the dominion of the Narrow Seas. We may
now smile at such absurd pretensions, but these were then the cause
of deep alarm and excitement in England, for statesmen well knew that
the dominion of the Narrow Seas was an attribute of real and material
power. It was at this period that the great Selden wrote his celebrated
work,[167] which was honoured with every mark of royal approbation and
popular commendation. The Dutch, having a vast number of merchantmen
afloat, feared the increasing naval power of England, but nevertheless
made all the encroachments they dared. Their busses fished on her
coasts and were fired upon, but at last paid the stipulated sum
of 3000_l._, tribute to the King, to obtain his consent to their
prosecution of the coast fisheries for one summer, undertaking to
continue the payment annually. This personal bribe to the King did not,
however, render the proceedings of the Dutch more palatable to the
parties who conceived themselves damnified.
[Sidenote: Increase of English shipping.]
[Sidenote: Struggles of the East India Company.]
Sir William Monson states that the shipping of the port of London had
so augmented during the first fifteen years of the reign of Charles
I. that it was now able to supply a hundred sail of stout vessels
capable of being converted into men-of-war; while ten large ships had
during that period been added to the effective force of the Royal
Navy; but that, so far as regards the East India Company, there was no
improvement. Their commanders in the Indian seas had still to fight
their way harassed and outraged by the Dutch and the Portuguese at
every point. Whatever may have been the state of the relations of the
sovereigns of the various European subjects who trafficked in India, it
was the proverb of the sailors of those days, “that there was no peace
beyond the line.” Sanguinary encounters were constantly taking place,
and the trade of the English to India at the period to which we refer
had become so precarious that the most enterprising of her capitalists
could hardly be induced to embark in it. Even in 1646, when the Company
obtained possession of Madras,[168] which for a long period was the
chief seat of their commerce and power, only 105,000_l._ was subscribed
for the new stock rendered necessary by this acquisition. It was
feared that the Company would not, in their commercial operations, be
able to contend successfully with the formidable Dutch and Portuguese
monopolies which had been established in the East, and, though Portugal
and Spain were then beginning to decline from the exalted position they
had so long held, Holland, in possession of public liberty and a wise
system of commerce, was in the zenith of her commercial and maritime
greatness, and proved a rival whom the most enterprising of English
merchants might well hesitate to encounter.
[Sidenote: Decline of the Portuguese power in India.]
But by this time the rapacious extortions of the Portuguese, combined
with their cruelties, had so excited the natives of India against them,
that there was great rejoicing when the overwhelming naval power of
the Dutch dealt a fatal blow to their ascendency in the East. When,
however, the Dutch power predominated, the people of India, in shaking
off the yoke of their former tyrants, found that they had only changed
their oppressors. In 1638 the Dutch expelled the Portuguese from the
trade of Japan, and in 1656 Ceylon was surrendered to them. Their
settlements at the Cape of Good Hope formed from an early period a
convenient point whence they could direct their shipping eastwards;
and the most common vessels they then employed in the trade (as may be
seen from the imperfect sketch on next page) were so much in advance
of even the best vessels then in the service of the English East India
Company, that it is not, for these and other reasons, surprising that
the Company should have had considerable difficulties in competing
successfully with the Dutch, and at times in raising capital sufficient
for their purposes.
[Illustration]
[Sidenote: A.D. 1621.]
[Sidenote: The trade of the English in India.]
In a return presented to Parliament on the 29th of November, 1621,
there will be found an account of the trade carried on by the Company
with the East Indies during the previous twenty years, and of the
difficulties they had then to encounter. Out of eighty-six ships which
they had in that time despatched, eleven were surprised and seized
by the Dutch, nine were lost, five were worn out by long service,
going from port to port in India, and only thirty-six had returned
home with cargoes, the remaining twenty-five being then in India, or
on their way home. Indeed it is surprising that they were able to
maintain any position whatever in India in opposition to the Dutch,
whose settlements at that time prove that they enjoyed a virtual,
and sometimes a real, monopoly of the trade in spices, cloves,
nutmegs, mace, and cinnamon, the products exclusively of their Eastern
possessions, including the Banda Islands, Moluccas, Ceylon, Sumatra,
Tonquin, with part of Bengal and along the coast of Coromandel, besides
stations at Surat and Gombroon, and important factories on the Malabar
coast.[169]
But though the Dutch have the credit of first introducing tea into
general use in Europe, they were unfortunate in their attempts to
establish themselves in China. The expensive embassy they sent to
Pekin proved of no service to them, and although they afterwards took
possession of Formosa, they soon got involved in a war with the Chinese
in which they were so rudely handled by the Governor of Tchi-chieng,
that they were compelled to evacuate it, and all their attempts to
displace the Portuguese, who since 1517 had carried on a trade between
the Chinese ports and Europe, proved unavailing.
[Sidenote: Increase of other branches of English trade.]
Although unsuccessful in the East, as compared to of other the
Dutch, the maritime commerce of England now rapidly increased in
other quarters. The Merchant Adventurers’ Company still carried on
a successful trade, having not yet shaken off the old prejudices in
favour of associations, though Lord Bacon had made it a reproach “that
trading in companies was most agreeable to the English nature, which
wanteth that same general vein of a republic which runneth in the
Dutch, and serveth them instead of a company.”[170] The Turkey Company
now conducted an important and profitable commercial intercourse with
the Levant;[171] London having in a great measure superseded Venice in
that valuable traffic, even supplying that city with articles of Indian
produce. By this time, also, English merchants had become importers of
Indian produce into Constantinople, Alexandria, Aleppo, and many other
Mediterranean ports.
[Sidenote: Ships of the Turkey and Muscovy Company.]
The Turkey Company alone despatched their ships, not yearly, but
monthly, indeed almost weekly, thus securing a large proportion of that
important trade;[172] while the Muscovy Company, on the other hand, in
virtue of their exclusive monopoly, enjoyed with their own ships almost
undisputed possession of the maritime commerce of the Baltic.[173]
[Sidenote: The Dutch pre-eminent.]
[Sidenote: The reasons for this pre-eminence.]
But though English merchant shipping now stood higher than ever it
had done, the Dutch were still far in advance of England, as of all
other nations. Their commercial marine had been gradually arriving
at its then high state of prosperity, through the efforts of many
centuries;[174] the commerce of the north of Europe having, as we
have seen, concentrated itself at a somewhat remote period in the Low
Countries, and more especially in Holland, where after the destruction
of Antwerp, when the States shook off the yoke of Spain, a fortunate
combination of circumstances, improved by industry and economy,
concurred to render them thus powerful in their commercial marine.
No doubt the freedom of her government, tended materially to improve
these natural, physical, and adventitious causes. Her fisheries formed
a nursery for her seamen, from which her fleets could be constantly
reinvigorated with hardy and able sailors. In addition to these
highly favourable circumstances, Holland, during the long period that
other nations of Europe were engaged in intestine or international
wars, contrived generally to avoid intermingling in their affairs or
quarrels, moreover was often able to adhere to this policy, partly
through her prudence, and, still more so, as her comparatively small
territory inspired little jealousy in surrounding nations. Like Tyre
of old and Venice in her earlier history, Holland escaped from kindred
causes convulsions which overthrew more powerful neighbours.
But apart from other considerations, the maintenance of the power of
Holland may be ascribed in great measure to the care with which she
always preserved her navy, so necessary in those times, if not to
create, at least to maintain her commercial and maritime prosperity.
While Spain and Portugal, either from internal corruptions, the
supineness of their rulers, or national decay, neglected their navies,
Holland zealously maintained a predominating naval force at sea, and
was thereby enabled, if not to perpetuate her naval greatness, at
least to retard its decline and fall. To her own people and to every
foreigner who sought an asylum in her territories, she granted the
fullest religious and political freedom, and though it is difficult to
trace any special free-trade enactments, as regards her navigation,
to which her maritime success can be ascribed, abundant reasons for
that success may be seen in her policy of non-intervention with the
affairs of other nations, and in the facilities she afforded for the
importation of every material suitable for ship-building purposes, and
of the wool for her manufactures, which the English people preferred
parting with to working it up at home. But, above all, the Dutch owed
their success in maritime pursuits to many of the ancient laws of
England, which, as we have seen in numerous instances, actually forbad
any English exports in home bottoms, thus enabling the Dutch to grasp
and keep to themselves large and valuable portions of the carrying
trade, and thus laying the foundation of their wealth and greatness.
When the English were at last awakened by the advice of Sir Walter
Raleigh and other writers who followed him to a full consciousness of
their own strength and of their previous legislative errors, they, with
characteristic energy, resolved to adopt the most effective measures
then in their power to remedy existing evils, although in attempting
to remove the yoke which ancient custom, combined with their own
inconsistent and absurd laws, had imposed, they by rushing into the
opposite extreme laid the foundation for those stringent navigation
laws which, curiously enough, a republic was the first to enforce.
[Illustration]
That they had maritime opponents of no ordinary kind to contend
against, may be seen in the illustrations of some of the Dutch ships of
the period which have been preserved. In the Print-room of the British
Museum there will be found a drawing by Hollar of the stern of one of
their largest and finest Indiamen, from which the above is a copy.
No doubt this vessel was built, like the English Indiamen of much more
modern times, so as to be applicable for war when the necessity arose,
as well as for the ordinary purposes of commerce; but neither England
nor any other nation possessed at that period any vessel engaged
in commerce which could be compared to her either in dimensions,
construction, or equipment. Indeed the finish of the stern of one of
the finest modern vessels of the English navy, _The Asia_, constructed
towards the close of the first quarter of the present century, and of
which this cut is an illustration, shows no very marked improvement
during the two centuries which had elapsed.
[Illustration]
FOOTNOTES:
[139] Froude, vol. x. p. 259, _et seq._
[140] Don Guerau to Philip, MSS. Samancas.
[141] It will be found in detail in the Cottonian MSS. at the British
Museum. The English fleet was commanded by Lord Howard of Effingham,
Drake, Hawkins, and Frobisher.
[142] See also Macpherson, ii. pp. 185, 186. The tables in the College
Hall of Westminster School are made of Spanish chestnut, said to have
been taken from some of the ships of the Armada.
[143] This was the second voyage round the world, but the first made by
English ships. A chair is preserved in the Bodleian Library at Oxford
made of the wood of the _Pelican_.
[144] In ‘Maritime and Inland Discovery,’ vol. ii. p. 156, the date of
Drake’s return is given as Sept. 26, 1580; and this is also the date
given in the ‘World Encompassed,’ p. 162.
[145] There must have been strong reasons indeed to have induced
Elizabeth to have conferred such honours upon Francis Drake. On the
26th May, 1572, long before war had been declared between England
and Spain, he had set out with his brothers John and Joseph on an
expedition of pure piracy in two small vessels, manned by seventy-three
seamen almost as daring as himself. Starting from the Gulf of Florida,
he landed near St. Martha, where he built a fort and commenced an
attack on the house of the Spanish governor, which he had ascertained
contained a very large amount of bar-silver. Defeated in his designs
to plunder it, he set out with eighteen Englishmen, part of his crew,
and thirty runaway slaves, whom he had entered into his service, for
Vera Cruz, which he plundered. Thence he proceeded again toward Nombre
de Dios, capturing on the road a caravan of mules laden with silver,
appropriating as much of it as he and his gang of marauders could carry
away, and returned to England with his ill-gotten spoils in August 1573.
[146] Raleigh’s first personal expedition was in 1595; but he had
already assisted in equipping no less than seven, the earliest in 1585
(‘Maritime and Inland Discovery,’ ii. pp. 205-209).
[147] Macpherson, ii. p. 189. Sir Francis Drake commanded the naval and
Sir John Norris the military forces on this occasion.
[148] The first voyage of Cavendish is worthy of more note than it
has received. Starting in July, 1586, he circumnavigated the globe,
passing through the Straits of Magellan westwards, in eight months less
than Drake. He was the first English navigator to discern the value of
the position of St. Helena, to describe with accuracy the Philippine
Islands, and to bring home a map and description of China. He is
believed to have been only twenty-two years of age when he took the
command in his first most adventurous voyage. In a third voyage he was
shipwrecked in 1591 or 2 on the coast of Brazil, and died there.
[149] Pattern-pieces for the silver intended for circulation in the
East Indies, bearing the name of Queen Elizabeth and the date 1601,
exist in various collections. No coins, however, were actually struck
from the dies of the patterns.
[150] See further details in Macpherson, ii. pp. 216-218. The money
actually sent out he states to have been Spanish.
[151] Anderson’s ‘Annals of Commerce,’ vol. ii. p. 208, quoting
from Guicciardini. The Dutch sent fourteen ships to India in 1602.
Macpherson, ii. p. 227.
[152] It is likely that the great value of their new trade with the
Brazils led the Portuguese to care less for the rich but more distant
and dangerous trade with the far East.
[153] See Meadows Taylor’s ‘Man. of India Hist.,’ pp. 289-322; ‘Mar.
and Inl. Discov.,’ vol. ii. pp. 195-198.
[154] The tomb of Adams is still in existence, is fenced round, and
treated with the greatest respect by the Japanese people.
[155] Accounts differ in the names of the four vessels.
[156] See further details on all these matters in ‘Calendar of State
Papers, East India, 1617-1621,’ in the ‘Polls series,’ Lond. 8, 1872.
[157] The text of this treaty is given by Macpherson, ii. pp. 293-295.
[158] The English Greenland fisheries seem to have paid best between
1598 to 1612.—Macpherson, ii. p. 265.
[159] However great our objections to every form of monopoly, it may
well be questioned whether the merchant shipping of England could
at this period have made any advance against the Dutch, Spaniards,
Portuguese, Venetians, and others in their commercial intercourse
with the East unless some inducement had been offered to great
corporations to take the first and most hazardous risks of competing
with established rivals. Indeed, most persons in England at this time
felt, and not without valid reasons, that it would be impossible for
individual capitalists to cope successfully with the powerful maritime
associations which had in a great measure absorbed the most lucrative
branches of commerce throughout the world. For these reasons the East
India Company had been established, and for precisely similar reasons
the English Government had been induced in 1606 to grant a charter to a
company formed for trading to the Levant, though in this instance each
individual traded on his own account subject to general regulations
framed for the guidance of the whole of the members of the association.
[160] ‘Select observations of the incomparable Sir Walter Raleigh
relating to trade, as it was presented to King James.’—Published,
London, 1696. See also Macpherson, vol. ii. pp. 233-239.
[161] Made up thus:—a hundred last of barrels, 72_l._; salt, 88_l._;
men’s wages for four months, 91_l._; and their provisions during that
time, consisting of bread, 21_l._; beer, 42_l._; bacon and butter,
18_l._; and peas, 3_l._
[162] See miscellaneous and interesting details relative to English
trade for the year 1615, with Sir Dudley Diggs’ ‘Defence of Trade,’
etc., in Macpherson, vol. ii. pp. 279-282.
[163] Captain Gosnold had been employed in several of the previous
voyages. He appears to have traded direct with the Indians, in lat.
42°, in peltry, sassafras, and cedar-wood. He was also the first to sow
English corn in the Island of Martha’s Vineyard (so named by him). In
the following year (1603) two ships from Bristol and one from London
traded successfully to the same parts (Macpherson, ii. pp. 229-246,
etc.). The most remarkable of all these expeditions was that of
Captain John Smith, who sailed from London in 1607, and is deservedly
considered the real founder of the colony of Virginia (see ‘True
Travels, Adventures, etc., of Captain John Smith,’ Lond. 1627). Captain
Smith is the hero of a famous old ballad, called ‘The Honor of a London
’Prentice; being an account of his matchless manhood and boyhood.’
[164] Mr. Lucas has recently brought together and edited, with some
excellent notes, the most important of the ‘Charters of the Old English
Colonies in America,’ Lond. 8, 1850. Among these will be found three
charters, one to Virginia, to Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode
Island respectively, Massachusetts’ second charter, and that to New
Hampshire and Maine. With these are also the “proprietary” charters to
Maryland, the Carolinas, Pennsylvania, and Delaware; and also those of
New York, New Jersey, and Georgia. The careful study of these documents
shows clearly on what liberal terms our ancestors commenced colonising,
when we bear in mind that, according to the theory of those times,
colonies were assumed to be the property of the Crown.
[165] The first settlement of the Puritans was at New Plymouth, in
1621; the second and more important expedition secured Massachusetts,
in 1627 and 1628, under the Plymouth Company (Macpherson, ii. p. 307).
[166] It is certain that the Barbary corsairs had come to the “chops”
of the Channel and captured English merchantmen with impunity, though
this rare occurrence was used by Charles and his advisers merely as a
pretext for their questionable demands (Macpherson, ii. pp. 284 and
302). The earliest treaty between England and Algiers for the mutual
protection of shipping is dated April 10, 1682 (Hertslet, ‘Treaties,’
etc., vol. ii. p. 58).
[167] ‘Mare Clausum, 12mo. 1636.’
[168] The rajah of Bijnagar built, in 1646, for the English the
original Fort St. George, at Madras, to mount twelve guns (Meadows
Taylor, p. 389).
[169] Macpherson gives some interesting details of the respective
values of the Indian and Turkey trades, from a curious pamphlet
published by Mr. Munn, in 1621, and entitled, ‘A Treatise, wherein it
is demonstrated that the East India trade is the most national of all
trades’ (ii. pp. 297-300).
[170] Letter of advice to the King on the breach with the new Company,
Feb. 25, 1615, vol. v., p. 259.
[171] In the Appendix No. 6, will be found a list of the vessels then
employed in the trade between England and Turkey.
[172] Roberts’ ‘Map of Commerce,’ p. 270, ed. 1700, original edition
being 1638.
[173] The cargoes from England of the vessels of the Muscovy Company
chiefly consisted of the cloths of Suffolk, Gloucestershire,
Worcestershire, and Coventry, dyed and dressed; kerseys of Hampshire
and York; lead, tar, and a great quantity of Indian spices, indigo and
calicoes; their return cargoes consisting of raw silks from Persia,
Damascus and Tripoli; galls of Mosul and Tocat; camlets, grograins,
and mohairs of Angola; cotton and cotton yarns of Cyprus and Smyrna,
and sometimes the gums of India and drugs of Egypt and Arabia, with
the currants and dried fruits of Zante, Cephalonia, and the Morea.
The recital of cotton among these imports indicates that already the
English had commenced the important business of weaving calicoes; and
indeed, in a work published in 1641, Manchester is pointed out as the
place where the raw material was made up, and when manufactured into
“fustians, dimities and vermilions,” became an article of export for
her merchantmen, a branch of business which has since reached an extent
altogether unexampled in the history of commerce and navigation.
[174] Mons. Huet, in his celebrated ‘History of the Dutch Trade,’
claims for the Dutch the honour of having enjoyed their trade and
navigation for a thousand years.
CHAPTER V.
English Navigation Laws—First Prohibitory Act, 1646—Further
Acts, 1650-1651—Their object and effect—War declared between
Great Britain and Holland, July 1652—The English capture
prizes—Peace of 1654—Alleged complaints against the Navigation
Acts of Cromwell—Navigation Act of Charles II.—The Maritime
Charter of England—Its main provisions recited—Trade with the
Dutch prohibited—The Dutch navigation seriously injured—Fresh
war with the Dutch, 1664—Its naval results—Action off Harwich,
1665—Dutch Smyrna fleet—Coalition between French and Dutch,
1666—Battle of June 1 and of July 24, 1666—Renewed negotiations
for peace, 1667—Dutch fleet burn ships at Chatham, threaten
London, and proceed to Portsmouth—Peace concluded—Its effects—The
Colonial system—Partial anomalies—Capital created—Economical
theories the prelude to final free trade—Eventual separation
from the mother country considered—Views of Sir Josiah Child
on the Navigation Laws—Relative value of British and Foreign
ships, 1666—British clearances, 1688, and value of exports—War
with France—Peace of Ryswick, 1697—Trade of the Colonies—African
trade—Newfoundland—Usages at the Fishery—Greenland Fishery—Russian
trade—Peter the Great—Effect of legislative union with Scotland,
1707—The maritime Commerce of Scotland—Buccaneers in the West
Indies—State of British shipping, temp. George I.—South Sea
Company, 1710.
[Sidenote: A.D. 1640-1650.]
[Sidenote: English Navigation Laws.]
[Sidenote: First Prohibitory Act, A.D. 1646.]
Although the English people were jealous of the maritime power of
Holland, and had often been annoyed by her arrogance, the two nations
were still at peace. England, distracted by civil war, was not then
prepared to adopt legislative measures which had for their object
the curtailment of the commerce and maritime influence of the Dutch;
but her rulers felt that they ought not to further encourage that
influence by granting to the ships of their rivals the same advantages
in her colonies they had so long possessed in her home ports. The
possessions of England were steadily increasing in population and
importance, and though she could not have contemplated such a
country as America has now become,[175] she saw sufficient in its
early progress to justify the resolution to exclude the Dutch from
participating in a trade she had herself established, and which bade
fair to afford a large amount of valuable employment to her merchant
shipping. Consequently, as soon as the English Parliament found time
amid the domestic troubles, it enacted that no one in any of the ports
of the Plantations of Virginia, Bermuda, “Barbadoes, and other places
in America,” should suffer any goods or produce of the manufacture or
growth of the plantations to be carried away to foreign ports except in
English ships.[176]
[Sidenote: Further Acts, 1650,]
[Sidenote: 1651.]
The shipowners of England speedily discovered that, under the
circumstances in which they were placed, they were now legislating
in a direction which, if not the wisest, was the only one that could
at the time afford them relief and increase the means of obtaining
remunerative employment for their property. Through their influence
the policy thus initiated was pursued and strengthened. Four years
afterwards they procured the passing of an Act prohibiting all foreign
ships whatever from trading with the plantations of America except
with a regular licence. And on the 9th of October of the following
year the measure which for nearly two centuries was known as the
“celebrated” Navigation Act of Cromwell came into operation. By
this Act the navigation of the Dutch received a very serious blow;
declaring as it did that no goods or commodities whatever of the
growth, production, or manufacture of Asia, Africa, or America should
be imported either into England, or Ireland, or any of the plantations
of Great Britain, except in British-built ships, owned by British
subjects, and of which the master and three-fourths of the crew
belonged to that country. The unequivocal object of this clause was to
secure to England, without however considering the interests of her
colonists, the whole carrying trade of the world, Europe alone excepted.
[Sidenote: Their object and effect.]
Having done all that then appeared possible to secure the carrying
trade of Asia, Africa, and America, the English Parliament now
sought to obtain as much as was practicable of the import trade of
Europe. Accordingly they further enacted that no goods of the growth,
production, or manufacture of any country in Europe should be imported
into Great Britain except in British ships, owned and navigated by
British subjects, “_or in such ships as were the real property of the
people of the country or place in which the goods were produced, or
from which they could only be, or most usually were exported_.”[177]
This stringent provision could only be aimed at the carrying trade of
the Dutch, who had little or no produce of their own to export, and
who for the reasons already mentioned had obtained a virtual monopoly
of the carrying trade to many foreign markets. In such acts as these
the long stifled feelings of animosity, animated by deep commercial
jealousy which had been smouldering for years against the Dutch, at
last found expression and relief. So strong indeed had these feelings
become, that when the States despatched an embassy to England to
solicit a revocation of the navigation laws just passed, it was found
necessary to appoint a guard to protect the envoys from the popular
resentment openly expressed against them.
[Sidenote: War declared between Great Britain and Holland, April 1652.]
England had now asserted the practical right to carry on her own
over-sea trade in her own ships, and to obtain as much foreign trade
as she could by her own industry and energy, and as this action was
practically a defiance of the maritime supremacy of Holland, a struggle
was evidently impending which could only be decided by an appeal to
arms. But the Dutch amused the English Parliament with negotiations
for a treaty, although in point of fact they had nothing to give as
an equivalent for any concessions that England might make. In the
meanwhile they got together one hundred and fifty vessels, and placing
them under the command of Martin Tromp,[178] declared war against her
in April 1652. As the desperate and sanguinary struggles which followed
are matters of general history, it will be sufficient for our purpose
if we recapitulate some only of the leading facts which show the effect
of the war upon the merchant shipping of both countries.
The Dutch were at first, if not throughout, by far the heavier
sufferers. Within a month of the declaration of war Blake captured
one hundred of their herring fleet, together with twelve frigates of
their convoy, sinking the thirteenth. He also made efforts to intercept
five East Indiamen under the Dutch flag, which had endeavoured to get
into port by sailing round Scotland, and he contrived to carry six
more frigates into Yarmouth Roads. About the same period Sir George
Ayscough, the admiral commanding in the Channel, having thirty-eight
ships under him, made an attempt to stop the passage of a fleet of
Dutch merchantmen, sailing under the protection of De Ruyter, another
distinguished Dutch admiral, but after a furious engagement he was
compelled to retire into Plymouth, and to leave a free passage for De
Ruyter’s convoy down Channel.
[Sidenote: The English capture prizes.]
[Sidenote: Peace of 1654.]
The English, however, again took possession of the Channel, and
scarcely a day passed without Dutch prizes being brought into English
ports: many of these having made long voyages to distant parts of
the world, were on their homeward voyage without apprehension of
war. Nor is it surprising that booty so valuable should have whetted
the appetite of the English people for war. But happily, on the 5th
of April 1654, a treaty of peace was concluded. Cromwell’s enemies
complained that in the treaty no mention was made of the sole right
of the English to the fishing on their own coast, nor of any annual
tribute to be paid by the Dutch for that privilege, which had been the
case in the reign of Charles. They were displeased also that he gave up
the right of search which Parliament had insisted upon; and, further,
that he did not limit the number of Dutch men-of-war to be thereafter
employed for the protection of their commerce. Cromwell, however,
required in the treaty an admission of the English sovereignty of the
seas, and the Dutch consented to strike their flag to the ships of
the Commonwealth.[179] We may add that this treaty made no reference
to the obnoxious Navigation Act, although this was in all probability
the actual cause of the war; as on this point neither Cromwell, the
Parliament, nor the nation felt disposed to yield in the smallest
degree.
[Sidenote: Alleged complaints against the Navigation Acts of Cromwell.]
It has been asserted that these laws at first occasioned loud
complaints, to the effect “that while our own people (the English) had
not shipping enough to import from all parts the goods they wanted,
they were, nevertheless, by the Navigation Act debarred from receiving
new supplies of merchandise from other nations, who only could, and
till then, did import them.”[180] At a later period it was said “No
doubt the people were right, the injustice was not seen at first, but
the complaints being unheeded, the wrong dropped out of sight.”[181]
No sudden revulsion, however, of a long established policy ever takes
place without deep complaints from the parties whose monopoly, real
or virtual, has been destroyed. But in this instance these alleged
complaints had doubtless their origin in the mortification felt by
foreign agents in London, whose principals abroad had for centuries
enjoyed an undue share of the shipping trade of this country.
[Sidenote: Navigation Act of Charles II.]
[Sidenote: The Maritime Charter of England.]
During the ten years which followed the passing of the Act of 1651,
the Legislature became more and more convinced of the efficacy of
these prohibitive laws, and was prepared to render them practically
even more stringent. If Charles II. could have reversed any of
Cromwell’s legislative measures with advantage or popularity, he and
his court would gladly have taken such a step. But Charles and his
ministers perceived the advantages which had already accrued from the
legislation of the preceding government, and in the first year of his
actual reign[182] passed an Act (12 Charles II.) which obtained even
from Sir Josiah Child, a liberal and enlightened merchant, the title
of ‘The Maritime Charter of England.’[183] This Act may be deemed the
complement of the Acts of 1646 and 1651, and its principles continued
in force until the year 1849, when, under a totally different state
of circumstances, they gave way to a system more liberal and better
adapted to preserve that share of the trade of the world, both as
manufacturers and carriers of merchandise, which Great Britain had
acquired on the transfer of the maritime power of the Dutch to her own
people two centuries before.
[Sidenote: Its main provisions recited.]
[Sidenote: Trade with the Dutch prohibited.]
The Act of Charles apparently modified Cromwell’s law, by making the
prohibition of “the importation of foreign commodities, except in
British ships, or in ships belonging to the country or place where the
goods were produced,” to apply only to the goods of Russia and Turkey
and to certain other specified articles, which could not be imported
into the United Kingdom except in British ships. But as the enumerated
articles comprehended almost all the chief articles of freight, it can
scarcely be said that any relaxation of the principles of Cromwell’s
law was thus sanctioned. At all events, the supplemental statute of
the 14th Charles II. fully carried into effect the declared intentions
of the Legislature. By this Act all importation of a long list of
enumerated goods, whether from Holland, the Netherlands, or Germany,
was prohibited under any circumstances and in any vessels, British or
foreign, under the penalty of the seizure and confiscation of the ships
and goods.
[Sidenote: The Dutch navigation seriously injured.]
It would be vain to deny that, whatever prospective results in after
times were produced by these laws, the Dutch trade and navigation
suffered most seriously from them. The triumphant career of Blake
against the Spanish navy in the Mediterranean had previously crippled
the maritime power of Spain. The English had acquired a vast territory
in North America, and rich islands in the West Indies with a virgin
soil. In the East they had surmounted their first difficulties in
making settlements, and only required such protection as their own
government could supply to become the general carriers of Indian
produce to the chief consuming nations of Europe. As it was idle to
expect relaxations of their prohibitive systems from France, Spain, or
Portugal, the Parliament and the people saw clearly the necessity of
maintaining at all hazards the maritime superiority of England, and by
such means too as were then within their reach.
[Sidenote: Fresh war with the Dutch, 1664.]
[Sidenote: Its naval incidents.]
[Sidenote: Action off Harwich, 1665.]
The Dutch perceived in these regulations the augury of their maritime
downfall, and a fresh war in consequence supervened, the origin of
which we need not here discuss; indeed many circumstances concurred
to bring about this second rupture. France had endeavoured, by secret
intrigues, to embroil the English and the Dutch, in order that when
their fleets had been crippled and destroyed, she might step in and
acquire an undisputed maritime ascendency. The conduct of the Dutch
on the coast of Africa in excluding the African Company from trading
to that country had given great umbrage. The King sent a fleet there,
doubtless with no friendly intentions. On the other hand the Dutch
complained that the English had forbidden the importation of Dutch
commodities into England. The two countries were therefore ripe for
a fresh war, but the Dutch endeavoured to gain time, so that their
fleet of merchantmen might reach home previously to the declaration
of war. Charles, however, without waiting for a formal declaration of
hostilities, seized one hundred and thirty of their ships, laden with
wine and brandy, homeward bound from Bordeaux, conveying them into
English ports, where they were condemned as lawful prizes. Though such
an act was rightly condemned as unjustifiable by the law of nations,
the voice of the people forced the King into the war, and his desire
to gain prize-money only accorded too well with the eagerness of
the shipowners to plunge into another struggle with their powerful
commercial opponents. War was consequently again declared, and a battle
off Harwich took place on the 3rd (or 14th N. S.) of June 1665. The
Dutch fleet under Cortenaar, Evertz, and Cornelis van Tromp, son of
the famous Martin Tromp, was ordered to seek out the English, whose
fleet was under the command of the Duke of York, Prince Rupert, and the
Earl of Sandwich. It is unnecessary to detail the particulars of this
celebrated engagement; suffice it to say that the Dutch lost nineteen
ships, burnt and sunk, with about six thousand men. The English lost
only four vessels, and about fifteen hundred men; but the Dutch
retired, with their remaining ships, to their own coasts, and the Duke
of York refrained from pursuing them.[184]
[Sidenote: Dutch Smyrna fleet.]
In the meantime the Dutch Smyrna fleet and several of their East
Indiamen, not daring to enter the English Channel, took refuge in the
port of Bergen in Norway; but a plot was concerted between the kings
of England and Denmark to seize these ships, worth several millions,
and to divide the spoil. Through mismanagement, however, the scheme
was defeated, and the Earl of Sandwich, who had been sent to carry
out this intrigue, was so severely handled by the governor of Bergen,
that the English ships were compelled to return home. A strong fleet
of ninety-three ships, well equipped, under the command of De Ruyter,
was then despatched from Holland to convey home the valuable merchant
ships from Bergen, but a storm severely damaged this expedition, and
ultimately twenty of the ships fell into the hands of the English.
[Sidenote: Coalition between the French and Dutch, 1666.]
[Sidenote: Battle of June 1,]
In the following year the affairs of England looked alarming, the
States-General having induced the king of France to declare war
against England, at the same time subsidising the king of Denmark, to
enable him to keep a fleet at sea in the service of the allies. It is
irrelevant to our main purpose to describe the tactics of the English
and allied fleets; it will be only necessary to remind our readers that
the English admirals, Monk and Prince Rupert, engaged the Dutch fleet
under De Ruyter and Cornelis Van Tromp on the 1st of June, 1666, off
the coast of Flanders, and, after a bloody struggle for four days, the
English lost two admirals and twenty-three great ships, besides smaller
vessels, six thousand men, and two thousand six hundred prisoners,
while the losses of the Dutch amounted to four admirals, six ships,
two thousand eight hundred soldiers, and eighty sailors. The latter of
course claimed the victory, but the Londoners made bonfires as if they
were the conquerors.[185]
[Sidenote: and of July 24, 1666.]
The two fleets soon put to sea again, and met on the 24th July, when
another formidable struggle took place between the contending parties.
The English had a hundred sail, the Dutch had eighty ships of the
line and nineteen fireships, the battle being fiercely disputed on
each side with unequal and varying success; but, through an error of
Van Tromp, the English beat De Ruyter, driving him into port; and
afterwards made a descent upon the Dutch coasts, burning a hundred
of their merchant ships and two men-of-war destined for convoys. The
French fleet appeared in the Channel _after_ the campaign was over, but
whether it was in intelligence with the English court, while Louis XIV.
only amused the Dutch with a hollow alliance, secretly rejoicing in
the destruction of both the English and Dutch navies, and hoping that
France might then step in and reap the benefit, certain it is that the
Dutch received no real assistance from France.
[Sidenote: Renewed negotiations for peace, 1667.]
[Sidenote: The Dutch fleet burn ships at Chatham, threaten London, and
proceed to Portsmouth.]
Renewed efforts were then made to procure peace. Charles, however,
procrastinated until he had obtained a fresh and liberal vote of money
from Parliament; and when, at length, negotiations were opened at
Breda, claimed satisfaction for losses sustained before the treaty of
1662. The Dutch, believing the King to be trifling, and finding that
he had not taken precaution to maintain his fleet upon a war footing,
despatched De Ruyter to the Thames to force the English to come to
terms. The Londoners were greatly alarmed. A strong chain was thrown
across the Medway, but the Dutch, with an easterly wind and a strong
tide, broke through it, destroyed the fortifications of Sheerness,
burnt three large merchant ships, the _Matthias_, the _Unity_, and the
_Charles V._, which had been taken from them during the present war,
and carried away with them the hull of the _Royal Charles_, besides
burning and damaging several others. After this they pushed up the
Medway as far as Upnor Castle, near Chatham, and burnt the _Royal Oak_,
the _Royal London_, and the _Great James_ before the eyes of the Dukes
of York and Albemarle, who had just arrived with some troops. Fearing
that the Dutch fleet would sail up to London Bridge, the English sunk
thirteen ships at Woolwich, and four at Blackwall, and raised various
platforms furnished with artillery to defend the approaches to the
city. After committing all the damage he could in the Thames, De Ruyter
sailed for Portsmouth with a design to burn the ships in the harbour,
but, finding them secured, passed on down Channel and captured several
vessels in Torbay. Thence proceeding eastwards, he routed the English
off Harwich, and chased a squadron of nineteen men-of-war under Sir
Edward Spragge, who was forced to retire into the Thames, thus keeping
the English coasts in continual alarm until the Treaty of Peace was
signed in the following July.[186]
[Sidenote: Peace concluded.]
By the Treaty of Breda each nation retained the goods and moveables
they had respectively captured; and, by the nineteenth article, all
ships of war as well as merchant vessels belonging to the United
Provinces, meeting on British waters any of her ships of war, were
required “to strike the flag and lower the sail as had been formerly
practised.” Thus terminated this bitter and bloody struggle. If England
suffered much, Holland, with a larger capital but fewer permanent
resources, suffered still more severely.
[Sidenote: Its effects.]
Turning to events more within our province, it may be mentioned that,
on the authority of Sir Josiah Child, the opponents of the Navigation
Laws point out with exultation that, thirty years after these stringent
Acts came into operation, “the Dutch were beating us in every quarter.”
Such may have been the case in some special branches of commerce, but
it is undeniable that, from the date of these laws, the merchant navy
of England steadily increased; and that soon afterwards the power over
the seas previously claimed by the Dutch was permanently transferred
to the English. Whatever may have been the cause of these changes,
whether the Navigation Acts, or “the stoppage of trade, insecurity of
capital, inherited debts, and taxes on ships” sustained by the Dutch
during the war, England’s maritime resources increased, while those of
Holland declined; and London became what Amsterdam once was, the chief
emporium of the commercial world. Perhaps the resolution of England
to depend upon her own people instead of courting foreign aid by
legislative measures, combined with the exclusion of foreign shipping
from her rapidly-increasing colonial trade, had more to do with these
changes than the other combined reasons which the political economists
of various ages have assigned.
[Sidenote: The colonial system.]
[Sidenote: Partial anomalies.]
[Sidenote: Capital created,]
[Sidenote: Economical theories the prelude to final free trade.]
By what was known as the “Colonial System,” Great Britain secured not
merely the exclusive carrying trade of all produce derived from her
own plantations, but she exercised the monopoly of supplying them from
this side of the Atlantic with such articles as they required or could
afford to consume, while sharing in the carrying trade and commerce
of those parts of the world to which she had access in common with
other maritime states. Many anomalies and some positive self-injuries,
however, sprang out of this exclusive system, which of late years have
been exposed in all their deformities. But it cannot be disputed,
that whatever flagrant evils the exclusive colonial system engendered
it was upon the whole one which tended materially to develop the
maritime energies of British shipowners; and the rapidity with which
the colonies in the West Indian Archipelago and on the continent of
America rose to importance both in wealth and population, demonstrates
that though not so advantageous as it otherwise might have been, it
was certainly not as disastrous to the colonists as partial American
historians would have us believe. There may at first have existed a
paucity of sufficient capital and a deficiency of English ships to
carry on with the fullest advantage the trade thus created; but this
want was speedily supplied, and the foundation laid for an exclusive
but highly flourishing trade and navigation, which continued in
full vigour for more than a century, when the revolt of the North
American Colonies formed a new epoch in history, and, by raising up
an independent maritime people as direct rivals in the carrying trade
of the world, gave a deathblow to a system no longer fitted for the
new state of things. During this long interval the theory of trade and
navigation became better understood. The French economists,[187] made
intelligible and even popular by Adam Smith’s great work, threw a flood
of light on the faults prevailing in the most economical distribution
of wealth in relation with colonies. But the arguments of theorists
would have remained disregarded had the increasing number and influence
of the American colonists and the attitude assumed by the Northern
maritime powers not rendered it impossible to maintain a system now
become obsolete, and the wisdom of the governments of both England and
the United States effected a change which has proved not only to be
safe, but salutary for all parties interested in this great commercial
revolution.
[Sidenote: Eventual separation from the mother country considered.]
In the middle of the seventeenth century it was indeed unreasonable
to expect that England, after her heavy expenditure on settlements
all over the globe, would relinquish advantages from which the first
adventurers, and ultimately the entire nation, anticipated some
return for the amount invested in the plantations and in the ships
fitted out for the carrying trade. Even those writers who expatiate
on the general unremunerative character of her colonial possessions,
with especial reference to Canada, do not consider the foundation of
colonies inexpedient, but, on the contrary, admit unreservedly “that
colonies have been in their consequences highly advantageous to this,
as they have been to most old settled countries in all ages.”[188]
Therefore, whatever differences of opinion may prevail respecting the
relinquishment of the governmental powers of the mother country over
a powerful colony as soon as it is capable of defending itself and
of directing its own affairs, every person concurs in the expediency
of forming new colonies, their eventual severance from the parent
state being only a question of the more or less satisfactory progress
they may make towards a position of independence. At the period when
the English Navigation Laws were inaugurated in imitation of the
successful policy of pre-existing maritime states, there is no doubt
that the Dutch[189] naval predominance on the seas rendered the distant
possessions of Great Britain not only extremely insecure, but enabled
her acute neighbours to carry away part of the prey which had been
really acquired by her “bow and spear.”
[Sidenote: Views of Sir Josiah Child on the Navigation Laws.]
[Sidenote: Relative value of British and foreign ships, 1666.]
When these Acts were passed, and for some years afterwards, they
created quite as much excitement and discussion as their repeal has
caused in our own time. Even Sir Josiah Child,[190] who took the lead
among the few merchants of the period who questioned their policy,
appears to have had strong protectionist views, one of which may be
noticed, as it throws some light upon the cost of shipbuilding at that
period. He proposes to impose a customs duty of no less than fifty per
cent. on all Eastland commodities, timber, boards, pipe-staves, and
salt imported into England and Ireland in any other than English-built
ships, or at least in such as were not sailed by English masters and a
crew whereof three-fourths were English. His reasons for this highly
protectionist proceeding are that “the Danes, Swedes, and Easterlings
will certainly, in a few years, carry off the whole trade, by reason
of the difference of the cost of building the requisite ships, there
and in this country.” Similar statements, we may remark, were the
protectionist arguments used in our own day against the repeal of these
same laws. “The cost,” he goes on to state, “of building a fly-boat of
three hundred tons in those countries would be 1300_l._ or 1400_l._,
whereas in England she could not be constructed for less than from
2200_l._ to 2400_l._, which is so vast a disproportion,” he adds,
“that it is impossible for an Englishman to cope with a Dane in that
navigation under such discouragement.” The stranger’s duty of five
or six pounds per ship each voyage was the only set-off against this
alleged disadvantage, and in his opinion the prizes taken in the Dutch
war alone enabled us to withstand that competition, Sir Josiah averring
that “during the seventeen years the Act of Navigation had been in
force, not one single English ship had been built for this, which we
may call the Lower Baltic trade.”
Sir Josiah, it will be seen, estimates the cost of constructing an
English ship at that time at somewhat under eight pounds per ton, while
a vessel could be built by the Danes and Swedes at very little more
than one half that price. We must, however, remember that in stating
these prices he was arguing in favour of a certain line of policy, and,
in doing so, may have made the cost of construction in the Northern
ports of Europe considerably less than it actually was. Besides, so
much depends upon quality and outfit that a price per ton, unless all
the particulars are stated, gives only a vague idea of the actual value.
Another well-known writer of that period, Sir Henry Petty,[191]
estimates the value of the whole of the shipping of Europe, old
and new, at eight pounds per ton. He also furnishes some valuable
information with regard to the extent of the shipping of Europe at
the time he wrote. Estimating the whole at 2,000,000 of tons, he
apportions to the English 500,000, the Dutch 900,000, the French
100,000, the Hamburgers, with the subjects of Denmark and Sweden, and
the town of Dantzic 250,000 tons, and he gives, which seems small, the
remaining 250,000 tons as belonging to Spain, Portugal, and Italy. He
further states that the Dutch East India Company had then a capital of
3,000,000_l._, and that goods to the value of that sum were annually
exported from Holland into England. The shipping belonging to France
was then, it would appear, only one-ninth of that belonging to the
Dutch, or one-fifth of that of Great Britain, which, on the authority
of Dr. Charles Devonport, had doubled between 1666 and 1688, while
her royal navy had in the same time increased from 62,594 to 101,032
tons.[192]
[Sidenote: British clearances, 1688, and value of exports.]
[Sidenote: 1692.]
From another return[193] we for the first time ascertain the annual
clearances outwards from Great Britain, and the value of the cargoes
of the ships. These in 1688 amounted to 190,533 tons of English, and
95,267 tons of foreign vessels, the gross value of these exports being
4,486,087_l._, showing an annual increase not merely steady but rapid
during the previous ten years. War, however, again harassed the people.
France, the old enemy of England, now sought to pluck from her the
laurels she had won from the Dutch, and to claim a maritime supremacy
over both nations. Her naval force had now become so formidable, being
augmented by numerous privateers, that it played havoc among the
merchant vessels of Great Britain, destroying or capturing nearly the
whole Smyrna fleet, consisting of many richly laden vessels, as also
two of the English men-of-war which accompanied them.[194]
[Sidenote: War with France.]
Such a disaster upon the element where England claimed supremacy
was keenly felt, not merely by those persons who were interested in
maritime affairs, but by the entire nation, while the direct loss
sustained by the English was estimated by the French at one million
sterling.[195] The Turkey Company complained that, the Admiralty
had neglected its duty; that spies in the pay of the French monarch
were allowed facilities for ascertaining the strength and movements
of the English fleets, and the destination of any ships worthy of
capture. Numerous complaints were also made in Parliament, but, in
the sequel, nothing was done to satisfy the nation or to compensate
the parties directly interested for the losses they had sustained.
The attitude, however, taken soon afterwards by the English fleet in
the Mediterranean under the command of Admiral Russell,[196] and the
raising of the siege of Barcelona, with the undisputed command which
she recovered over the Narrow Seas, restored the prestige of England,
and forced the French to keep themselves cooped up in their harbours.
But the war had proved disastrous to her commerce and her shipping;
the clearances at its close, in 1696, having fallen to 91,767 tons,
showing a decrease of no less than 98,766 tons in eight years, while
the value of her exports during that period had declined to the extent
of 1,356,567_l._[197]
[Sidenote: Peace of Ryswick, 1697.]
The Treaty of Peace of Ryswick, concluded in 1697, brought with it
great prosperity, the clearances outwards of British ships averaging in
the following three years 393,703 tons annually, while the gross value
of produce exported on the average in each of the same years reached
6,709,881, or three times more than it had been in 1696.
At this period the government paid for the hire of transports from the
merchant service 716,220_l._ per annum, on an average of ten years.[198]
[Sidenote: Trade of the colonies.]
[Sidenote: African trade.]
From the period of the Revolution in 1688 to the death of Queen Anne,
the trade of the plantations had steadily and rapidly increased,
employing five hundred sail of vessels, a large proportion of them
being engaged in the transport of negroes from the coast of Africa.
Though originally a monopoly in the hands of the African Company,[199]
private speculation had entered so largely into it that, in 1698,
an Act of Parliament gave permission to all the King’s subjects,
whether of England or of America, to trade to Africa on payment of a
certain per centage to the Company on all goods exported or imported,
negro slaves being nevertheless exempted from this contribution.
The advocates of free trade considered the exemption a great boon
to the colonies, as the competition of the private merchant vessels
had greatly reduced the prices of slaves, whereby the British negro
colonies had been enabled to undersell their rivals in the general
market of the world. This process seems, however, to have had a
twofold effect, or to have cut both ways. The keenest partisans for
the unbounded liberty of commerce felt no scruple of conscience in
depriving the poor Africans, who were only guilty of having black
skins and woolly hair, of their liberty, in whatever part of the world
they could be found; and on the east coast of Africa, where negroes
were cheaper than elsewhere, the competition of the traders of various
nations raised the price of human flesh.[200] Although the most
hideous cruelties were practised to procure these slaves, the traffic
continued to increase and, half a century afterwards, one hundred and
fifty vessels were fitted out in one year for the east coast of Africa
from the ports of France alone, transporting in the course of that year
twenty thousand slaves to the island of St. Domingo.
[Sidenote: Newfoundland.]
[Sidenote: Usages at the fishery.]
The French, indeed, during the reign of Louis XIV. had encroached
at all points on the English trade, especially on her fisheries at
Newfoundland; hence William III. in his declaration of war against
that country in 1689, intimated “that whereas not long since the
French had been accustomed to take licences from the British governor
of Newfoundland for fishing in the seas upon that coast, and to pay
tribute for such licences as an acknowledgment of the sole right of the
Crown of England to that island, yet of late their encroachments upon
his subjects’ trade and fishery there had been more like the invasions
of an enemy than of becoming friends who enjoyed the advantages of the
said trade only by permission.” But the capture of Nova Scotia at the
commencement of this war restored English supremacy in that quarter.
The preamble of an Act passed in 1698 for the encouragement of the
trade with Newfoundland, declared it to be a beneficial trade to Great
Britain, not only in so far as it employed great numbers of ships and
seamen in those fisheries, but also in that it procured returns of
valuable commodities direct from other countries in exchange for the
produce of those fisheries. The prevailing customs at the fisheries
were sanctioned expressly in this Act, one of the most important being
that the master of any vessel from England who happened first to enter
any harbour or creek in the island after the 25th of March should be
admiral of the said harbour or creek during the ensuing fishing season,
and should see the rules and orders laid down in the Act duly put into
execution within the limits of the jurisdiction thus assigned to him.
It was also expressly enacted that no subject of any foreign power
“shall at any time hereafter take any bait, or use any sort of trade
or fishing in Newfoundland, or in any of the adjacent islands;” though
this complete exclusion of other rivals was not persevered in.
[Sidenote: Greenland fishery.]
A few years after the Revolution measures were taken to revive the
Greenland fishery; and in 1692 a company, incorporated for carrying it
on with a capital of 40,000_l._, was granted by charter the exclusive
possession of the trade for fourteen years. The preamble of their Act
describes the previous trade to Greenland as “quite decayed and lost,”
the merchants, who had been encouraged to enter into this business,
in virtue of the previous Act of 1673, having only imported a small
quantity of oil, blubber, and whale fins. They had found other nations
enter into the trade with so large a number of ships, that the English
fishermen were not enabled to compete with them on their separate
interests; indeed the whole trade was then or soon after engrossed by
foreigners. At length it was represented to the government that for
several years no ships had been despatched from England to Greenland,
and that the produce of those fisheries had been wholly bought from
foreigners, the prices paid being six times the rates they formerly
were; and the memorial added that there were few, if any, English
harpooners or English seamen skilled and exercised in whale-catching,
so that “the said trade could not be regained nor carried on without
foreign harpinierers, or upon individual risks without a joint-stock
fund.” As, however, the Greenland fishery did not rally under the
protective charter conferred upon the parties subscribing, an
additional capital of 42,000_l._ was raised in 1696, and a new Act
obtained, exempting the Company from all duties upon oil, blubber,
and whale fins imported during the term of their charter, but before
it expired the entire capital was lost, and the Company relinquished
the business. Under these circumstances the trade in 1702 was thrown
open by Parliament, the Act pronouncing that it had been neglected by
the Company, and thus lost to the nation. Twenty years afterwards, in
1721, the number of foreign ships engaged in the Greenland and Davis’s
Straits fishery were three hundred and fifty-five, of which Holland
sent two hundred and fifty-one ships, Hamburg fifty-five, Bremen
twenty-four, Biscay twenty, and Bergen, in Norway, five.
[Sidenote: Russian trade.]
[Sidenote: Peter the Great.]
In 1699 the trade with Russia, now daily becoming of greater
importance, in consequence of the impulse given to the Russian
mercantile navy by Peter the Great, was also practically thrown open
by an Act entitling any person to admission to the Russia Company upon
payment of an entrance fee of five pounds. It was about this time
that the Czar abdicated temporarily his high functions as a powerful
barbarian prince, and, assuming a pilot’s dress, repaired to the Dutch
city of Saardam, then celebrated for its extensive ship-building, where
he purchased a small vessel, at the finishing of which he worked with
his own hands. He afterwards worked at every branch of ship-building,
associating freely with his fellow artisans. Inscribed on the roll of
ships’ carpenters as Peter Michaeloff, he passed among the workmen
by the name of Master Peter. After having visited Amsterdam and
other towns of Holland, this extraordinary man proceeded to England,
where he worked in the dockyard at Deptford in the same industrious,
unostentatious manner as he had done in Holland. The Dutch had taught
him the mere routine of their method of ship-building; in England he
was instructed in the higher branches of the art, and was soon rendered
capable of giving instructions to others. It is said that he assisted
in building one of the best sailing vessels that had yet been launched.
Soon after his return home Russia became a naval power, possessing for
the first time a considerable fleet.[201]
[Sidenote: Effect of legislative union with Scotland, 1707.]
[Sidenote: The maritime commerce of Scotland.]
Although by the accession of James VI. of Scotland and I. of England
these two countries were brought under the same sovereign, they, until
the reign of Queen Anne, were for all purposes of trade and legislation
foreign and antagonistic states. There was little or no commercial,
much less social, intercourse between them; and the advantages enjoyed
by either one, and acquired by foreign treaties, were rigorously
withheld from the other. The whole amount of trade between the two
countries rarely exceeding in value 150,000_l._ per annum, the amount
of shipping employed in it was consequently altogether insignificant;
but the Legislative Union in time gave an immense impulse to the
commerce of Scotland, and opened to that country the rich fields of
the English colonial possessions as well as her home markets. The
merchants of Glasgow and Greenock were the first to reap the advantages
of the Union, but their commercial operations were confined in a great
measure, throughout the whole of the last century, to the West Indies,
and to the plantations of British North America, more especially to
Virginia, while the insurrection in favour of the son of James II.,
known as the “Pretender,” very materially retarded the incipient
maritime prosperity of that portion of the now thoroughly united
kingdom, obliging as it did the English to maintain a considerable
fleet cruising off the coasts of Scotland. But when this insurrection
was suppressed the trade of Scotland again steadily increased, and
may be said to have gone hand-in-hand with England ever since, though
interrupted for a time by the more serious rebellion of 1745-6.
Various circumstances tended to strengthen this commercial intercourse,
and, not the least among the number, may be mentioned the establishment
of the Board of Trade, which, though originally formed under Charles
II. in 1668, only became a permanent establishment in 1696, consisting
of a royal commission under the style of the “Commissioners for
promoting the trade of the Kingdom, and for inspecting and improving
the Plantations in America and elsewhere.” This Board afforded
resources for enlarging and materially benefiting the trade of the
United Kingdom by the publication of its statistical returns, and in
numerous other ways, and had the exclusive superintendence of the
commerce of the plantations, and indeed of their government until 1786,
when a Secretary of State was appointed for the colonies, and a new
council for the affairs of trade organised on its present plan.
[Sidenote: Buccaneers in the West Indies.]
No sooner had England become distracted at home by the civil war of the
first Pretender and by the rupture with Charles XII. of Sweden, than
the pirates of Barbary issued from their secret haunts, and greatly
interrupted every branch of her maritime commerce. In the West Indies,
too, the losses sustained by the ravages of the piratical buccaneers
became so extensive that the most serious complaints were preferred
against the Admiralty for tolerating the grievance, the result being a
proclamation offering a reward of 100_l._ head-money for every captain,
40_l._ for a lieutenant down to a gunner, 30_l._ for an inferior
officer, and 20_l._ for every private captured: more than this, any
pirate who delivered up his captain or commander was entitled upon his
conviction to a reward of 200_l._[202]
[Sidenote: State of British merchant shipping, temp. George I.]
War, as we have too frequently seen, is a terrible obstacle to all
industrial pursuits, and to no branch of commerce—however much a
certain class of shipowners may have realised by having their vessels
employed as government transports—is it a greater source of lasting
injury than to the mercantile marine. This branch of industry, indeed,
suffered not merely by the war itself, but by the hordes of privateers,
buccaneers, and pirates which, up to the close of the last century,
infested the seas whenever war was declared, thus interrupting
legitimate commerce, and plundering wherever they had an opportunity,
either by land or sea, too often with little regard whether the
property they plundered was that of a friend or a foe. In the early
part of the reign of George I. these marauders were almost as daring
and as lawless as the pirates had been during the reign of Elizabeth
and of the Henrys, and none more so than an Englishman named Roberts,
who, in three vessels armed as frigates, the largest mounting forty
guns, and commanded by himself, desolated the coasts of Africa and the
West India Islands, plundering the ships of his own country with as
little remorse as he did those of any other nation.
[Sidenote: South Sea Company, 1710.]
But while the buccaneers at this period scoured the seas, there were
knavish speculators on land who, under the pretence of fostering
and developing the commercial and maritime resources of England,
were really its greatest enemies. Among the numerous concerns then
floated as joint stock companies, no one was more conspicuous or more
disastrous than the “South Sea Bubble.” Having for its professed object
the trade of the South Seas, yet with no basis for its operations
beyond the dishonourable privilege of supplying Spanish America for
thirty years with slaves torn from Africa, a very questionable favour
granted to Great Britain by the Treaty of Utrecht, this company, in
competition with the Bank of England, sought and obtained a monopoly
of the South Sea trade on condition that the national floating debt,
then about ten millions, should be paid out of its surplus profits!!
Though perhaps no wilder scheme was ever propounded, it readily
received the sanction of Parliament, and consequently a thousand and
one other bubbles were speedily projected. The disastrous results are
well known: thousands of families once well to do were irretrievably
ruined, and the frenzy with which the people were seized, together with
the impulse given to every form of gambling instead of to the steady
pursuits of industry, materially aided the convulsion caused by the
bursting of these bubbles, thus for many years paralysing commerce in
all its branches, and laying prostrate the energies of the country.
Seized for a time with the spirit of insane speculation, the people
thought of nothing else, and though in our own day we have witnessed
many wild schemes submitted for public support, none have really proved
so thoroughly disastrous in their results as those which were then
launched. South Sea stock of 100_l._ sold for 1000_l._; the Orkney
Fishery stock rose from 25_l._ to 250_l._; the York Buildings stock,
whose shares were 10_l._, reached 260_l._ The latter, a company erected
to cut timber for ship-building and other purposes in Scotland, in
spite of a protectionist bounty, proved a ruinous failure. There were
besides eleven fishing projects; ten insurance companies; two companies
for the remittance of money; four salt companies; two sugar companies;
eleven companies for settlements in, or trading to, America; two
building companies; thirteen land companies; six oil companies; four
harbour and river companies; four companies for supplying London with
coal, cattle, and hay, and for paving the streets; six hemp, flax, and
linen companies; five companies for carrying on the manufacture of
silks and cottons; one for planting mulberry-trees in Chelsea Park,
and breeding silkworms;[203] fifteen mining companies; and some sixty
more miscellaneous bubbles of the most preposterous character. One
undertaking actually obtained subscriptions for an object “which in due
time should be revealed!”
[Sidenote: The bubble bursts, 1720.]
But the South Sea Company, the greatest bubble of the lot, having
prosecuted some of the rival bubble companies, and obtained a writ of
_scire facias_ from the Queen’s Bench, all stocks fell suddenly; and
the South Sea scheme itself collapsed in the general ruin which ensued.
The price of its stock fell from 1000_l._ to 175_l._ in a few weeks.
The delusion was at an end, and the English nation awaking from its
dreams of boundless wealth to a sense of its degradation, a terrible
commercial distress ensued. Parliament stepped in at last with a bill
to remedy the mischief which had been done, and which it had itself
encouraged. Proofs were given of the deep and fraudulent complicity of
the then Chancellor of the Exchequer (Aislabie), as well as of several
South Sea directors and other persons of the highest rank at court and
in the city. In the sequel, four members of the House of Commons who
were South Sea directors were expelled the House; Aislabie was sent
to the Tower; Knight, the cashier of the Company, absconded, and the
estates of the chief criminals were confiscated.
But amid the numerous wildly speculative concerns then projected and
launched, there were others which were sound and legitimate; among
these may be mentioned the Royal Exchange Assurance Company, with
a capital of 500,000_l._, and the London Assurance Company, with
a subscription list of four times that amount. Each of these have
maintained their position to this day, ranking high as marine and fire
insurance associations. By their original charters they were empowered
to insure ships and merchandise from the dangers and accidents of
the sea, and were also authorised to lend money on bottomry bonds.
Subsequently they obtained charters for insuring from loss by fire.
From the first they have had no exclusive privileges, although they
might well have demanded them, for, just before their formation, the
losses of private underwriters had been so great that no fewer than one
hundred and fifty of them had become insolvent in the previous five
years.[204]
FOOTNOTES:
[175] There is a passage in Mr. Burke’s famous speech on Conciliation
with America, March 22, 1775, where he states her growth in the life of
one man, Lord Bathurst, which reads now almost like a prophecy.
[176] The Ordinance is quoted in Macpherson, ii. p. 430.
[177] Details of the Navigation Act of 1651 (confirmed in 1660) will be
found in Macpherson, ii. pp. 442-444.
[178] Martin Tromp, who fought this action, is often confounded with
his even more famous son, Cornelis Van Tromp. In Dutch history he is
always called Tromp. There would seem to have been five actions in the
years 1652 and 1653. The first between Blake and Tromp, off Dover,
May 29, 1652, when Blake was successful; the second in December, in
which Blake was thoroughly beaten. After this occasion, Tromp placed
the broom at his mainmast-head. The third on February 28, 1653,
off Portland, when the Dutch were beaten, and lost three hundred
merchantmen they had previously captured. The fourth on June 2, when
the Dutch were again beaten. The fifth on August 10, an indecisive
action, wherein Monk commanded the English instead of Blake, and Tromp
was killed, leaving De Witt in command. The action between Ayscough and
De Ruyter was fought on August 26, 1652.—See Sir E. Cust’s ‘Lives of
the Admirals,’ etc., i. p. 370.
[179] Art. xiii. of this treaty requires the striking of the flag
(Macpherson, ii. p. 453).
[180] _Vide_ Macpherson, ii. pp. 442-444.
[181] Ricardo’s ‘Anatomy of Navigation Laws.’
[182] As all Cromwell’s Acts were ignored, the new laws were dated from
the death of Charles I.; hence the Navigation Act of Charles II. is
dated as passed in the _twelfth_ of his regnal years, although really
in the _first_ of his actual reign.
[183] The principal enacting clauses of this Act are given in
Macpherson, ii. pp. 484-486. Roger Coke, in his ‘Discourse on Trade,’
states that owing to the Acts of 1651 and 1660, the building of ships
in England had become one-third dearer.
[184] A full account is given by Gérard Brandt of this celebrated
action, quoted in Sir E. Cust’s ‘Lives of the Admirals,’ vol. ii. pp.
452-454.
[185] All the accounts of the respective losses of the two fleets vary;
but it is clear, from the life of Sir W. Penn, that the English had
quite enough of the battle (Cust, vol. ii. p. 384).
[186] There is no doubt that in this raid on the English coast the
Dutch were successful in doing a great amount of damage to the English
marine; but at the same time more credit is due than has been usually
given to Sir Edward Spragge, who, on two successive days, with only a
small force of five frigates and seventeen fire-ships, repulsed the
Dutch fleet under Van Nes, though on the first he was compelled to fall
back for a few hours under the guns of Tilbury Fort. Van Nes had been
sent by De Ruyter to force his way up the Thames, and Spragge deserves
to be recorded as the English admiral who stopped his further advance
(Cust, vol. ii. p. 391). There is at Hampton Court an original painting
by Vandevelde of the later action of August 1673, in which Spragge was
drowned.
[187] It is remarkable that the free trade theories, which had their
origin in France, should have been so long altogether neglected in the
legislation of that great country; but the most republican governments
there, as elsewhere, seem to have been the most jealous champions of
the protectionist system.
[188] _Vide_ notes on Smith’s ‘Wealth of Nations’ by J. R. McCulloch,
4th edition, p. 607; and E. Gibbon Wakefield’s ‘View of the Art of
Colonisation,’ Lond. 1849.
[189] See remarks on what the Dutch had done to the apparent injury of
the English colonies previous to the passing of the Navigation Acts
(Macpherson, ii. p. 487).
[190] ‘New Discourse on Trade,’ by Josiah Child, 1665, Glasgow, ed.
1751.
[191] _Vide_ ‘Political Arithmetick,’ 4th ed. p. 103.
[192] ‘Discourse on the Trade of England,’ vol. i. pp. 129, 363.
[193] Chambers’s ‘Estimate of the Strength of Great Britain,’ p. 68.
[194] A list of these vessels will be found in the _Gazette_, No. 2888.
[195] The French navy was, however, nearly destroyed in the great
battle of La Hogue, fought by Admiral Russell on May 12, 1692.
[196] See ‘Life of Admiral Russell, Earl of Oxford,’ by Sir E. Cust,
ii. p. 556.
[197] In 1701-1702 there were 3281 vessels measuring, or rather
estimated at 261,222 tons, carrying 27,196 men, and 5660 guns,
belonging respectively to the following ports:—
Ships. Tons. Men.
London 560 84,882 10,065
Bristol 165 17,338 2,357
Yarmouth 143 9,914 668
Exeter 121 7,107 978
Hull 115 7,564 187
Whitby 110 8,292 571
Liverpool 102 8,619 1,101
Scarborough 102 6,860 506
No other ports of the kingdom possessed, at the time the return was
made, one hundred vessels; but though Newcastle-on-Tyne owned then only
thirty-nine vessels, they measured 11,170 tons, giving an average of
two hundred and seventy-one tons to each. In reply to the circular from
the Commissioners of Customs calling for this return, Hull accounted
for her small number of seamen by stating that as it was winter (most
of her vessels, no doubt, being employed in the Baltic and north of
Europe trade, or in whaling) eighty vessels were laid up, and had
consequently no crews on board. It is curious to note that no farther
back than the commencement of the last century, such places as Yarmouth
and Exeter owned more ships than Liverpool, which now owns a larger
amount of tonnage than London; while there are now numerous ports in
the kingdom of infinitely greater maritime importance than either
Scarborough or Whitby, of which no mention whatever is made (Chambers’s
Estimates, p. 68; ibid. pp. 89, 90).
[198] ‘History of the Debt’ (Appendix), London 1753.
[199] The African Company arose out of the slave dealing along the
coasts of Africa, but was at first occupied in a legitimate trade in
gold and ivory from Guinea (Macph. ii. pp. 72, 115, S.A. 1531-1553),
Captain John Hawkins being the first Englishman to trade in negroes,
1562. In 1571 a treaty was made between the Portuguese (who claimed
the coast of Guinea as their own), which allowed equal rights of trade
to the English (Macph. ii. 153). The French would seem to have had a
considerable trade with Senegal at a much earlier period (Macph. ii.
390). In 1637 the Dutch secured a direct commerce in negroes by taking
from the Portuguese the castle of St. George del Mina, on the coast
of Guinea; and, in 1642, by a special treaty, the Portuguese were
permitted to hire English ships wherein to carry their negroes (Macph.
ii. 420). At the peace, the result of Lord Rodney’s action, England
restored to France, in 1783, what she had taken from her along the
coast of Africa. The Royal African Company was first incorporated in
1631. It was constantly in trouble, chiefly with the Dutch, and was
repeatedly renewed with fresh privileges. As late as 1800 it received
from government an annual grant of 20,000_l._ (Macph. iv. 501).
[200] _Vide_ Macpherson, ii. pp. 277-278.
[201] One of the last acts of the life of Peter the Great was to plan
the survey, entrusted to Behring, a Dane, to determine whether Russia
was or was not joined to America. The expedition started, July 1728,
from Kamsachkatka, and Behring discovered the straits named after him,
but did not himself see America (‘Mar. and Inl. Disc.’ ii. p. 345).
[202] A full account of the daring adventures of the buccaneers may
be read in ‘Mar. and Inl. Discovery,’ vol. ii. pp. 298-315; and in
Archenholtz, ‘Hist. des Filibustiers,’ 8vo. 1806.
[203] The attempt to grow mulberry-trees in England with the view of
providing food for silkworms was not new. It had been suggested by
James I. in 1608, indeed a patent had been granted for the same purpose
to Walter Lord Aston in 1629 (see Macpherson, ii. pp. 250 and 358).
But this scheme had failed, probably owing to the coldness or damp of
the English climate; even in France, as is well known, mulberries are
not found to grow sufficiently well north of the Loire. The ground
secured for the mulberry plantation, in 1721, was Lord Wharton’s park,
of about forty acres, at Chelsea. In Reed’s ‘Weekly Journal,’ Aug.
21, 1721, it is stated that “there is a great concourse of foreigners
and others daily in Chelsea Park to see the Raw Silk undertaking, for
which a patent was granted by his present Majesty.” One very ancient
mulberry-tree still survives in the garden of Tudor House, No. 16
Cheyne Walk, and is perhaps the only survivor of the two thousand said
to have been planted in the neighbourhood.
[204] See Reports to the Attorney-General, 1718-1720, and full details
on this subject in Macpherson, vol. iii. pp. 77-114.
CHAPTER VI.
English voyages of discovery, 1690-1779—Dampier—Anson—Byron—Wallis
and Carteret—Captain Cook—His first voyage, in the
_Endeavour_—Second voyage, in the _Resolution_—Third
voyage—Friendly, Fiji, Sandwich, and other islands—His
murder—Progress of the North American colonies—Commercial
jealousy in the West Indies—Seven Years’ War, 1756-1763—Its
effect on the colonies—Unwise legislative measures—Effect
of the new restrictions—Passing of the Stamp Act—Trade
interrupted—Non-intercourse resolutions—Recourse to
hostilities—Position of the colonists—Fisheries—Shipping of North
American colonies, A.D. 1769—Early registry of ships not always
to be depended on—Independence of United States acknowledged, May
24, 1784—Ireland secures various commercial concessions—Scotch
shipping—Rate of seamen’s wages—British Registry Act, Aug. 1,
1786—American Registry Act—Treaty between France and England,
1786—Slave trade and its profits—Trade between England and
America and the West Indies re-opened—Changes produced by the
Navigation Laws consequent on the separation—New disputes—English
Orders in council—Negotiations opened between Mr. Jay and Lord
Grenville—Tonnage duties levied by them.
[Sidenote: English voyages of discovery, 1690-1779.]
In a former portion of this work[205] attention has been directed
to the remarkable discoveries of Columbus, Vasco da Gama, Cabot,
Drake, Chancellor, and others. It is now proposed to furnish a
very brief sketch of a few of the voyages of discovery of a later
period—expeditions of which England has an especial reason for being
proud, in that they greatly extended the geographical knowledge
of mankind, and widely promoted the peaceful arts of commerce and
navigation.[206]
[Sidenote: Dampier.]
Among the earliest of these was the one, under government auspices,
made by William Dampier, who had already become famous, towards the
close of the seventeenth century as one of the most daring of the
buccaneers, in various marauding and piratical expeditions, but who,
on a speculative voyage of his own to the Pacific, had obtained so
much valuable information respecting the Eastern archipelago, Celebes,
Timor, the north coast of New Holland, and the Nicobar Islands, that
when he reached England in 1691, the fame he had acquired induced the
government to send him in 1699 to explore more particularly New Holland
and New Zealand.
It appears from Dampier’s able and amusing account of this voyage
that though the government, with an unaccountable parsimony, had only
placed at his disposal the _Roebuck_, an old and worn-out vessel, he
successfully completed the object they had in view, but was obliged
to abandon his ship at Ascension on his way home, it being no longer
possible to keep her afloat. Having made the coast of New Holland in
latitude 26° south, he shaped his course to the north, where he fell
in with an archipelago of islands stretching over 20° of latitude,
from which he had some difficulty in extricating himself. Thence he
proceeded to Timor, sailing round the coasts of New Guinea, giving
names to its principal bays and harbours, which he surveyed with much
accuracy.
[Sidenote: Anson.]
The expedition of Commodore Anson was fitted out, not so much for
the purpose of discovering new lands, as to make reprisals on the
Spanish for their behaviour in searching English ships found near
any of their settlements in the West Indies and on the coasts of
America. But this expedition also was wretchedly equipped and manned,
and though the ships were placed under Anson’s command in November
1739, they were not ready to sail till September 1740, while so much
difficulty appears to have been experienced in getting men, that 500
out-pensioners from Chelsea Hospital were sent on board, many of whom
were sixty years of age, and some threescore and ten. As might have
been expected, two hundred and forty of them deserted before the ships
sailed, and not one returned to England. In the place of the deserters,
two hundred and ten raw marines were supplied, many of whom were so
untrained that Anson would not permit them to fire their muskets! Of
the squadron, originally composed of six ships of war, mounting two
hundred and twenty-six guns, one alone, the _Centurion_, commanded by
Anson himself, returned home after a cruise round the world of three
years and nine months. The story of this memorable voyage, written by
Mr. Walter, the chaplain of the _Centurion_, is one continued tale of
misery and disaster, the greater part of which might, and probably
would, have been avoided had the government at home listened to the
repeated protests of the Commodore before he left St. Helen’s Roads.
Of the courage and humanity of Anson himself throughout the whole
adventure it is impossible to speak too highly.
[Sidenote: Byron.]
[Sidenote: Wallis and Carteret.]
The voyage of Commodore Byron, who sailed from England in 1764,
was altogether one of discovery, his special instructions being to
ascertain whether there was reason to believe “that lands and islands
of great extent, hitherto unvisited by any European power, were to
be found in the Atlantic Ocean between the Cape of Good Hope and the
Magellanic Strait, within the latitudes convenient for navigation,
and in the climates adapted for the produce of commodities useful to
commerce.” He was further ordered to seek for “His Majesty’s islands
called Pepys’s Island and Falkland’s Island,” about the position, or
even the existence, of which there had previously been considerable
doubt. Byron having already had some experience of the southern
latitudes under Anson, gives an account of his voyage and adventures
homewards after the wreck of the _Wager_ on the coast of Chili, a
narrative which is one of the most romantic stories in naval history.
He shows that there was no ground for believing in the existence of
Pepys’s Island; but, during a passage through the Falkland Islands
and a considerable part of the Straits of Magellan, he furnishes much
interesting information regarding the native Patagonians and the
intricate navigation of these then scarcely known straits. Thence he
made his way across the Pacific, passing and naming various small
groups of islands, till he at length anchored in the harbour of
Tinian, where Anson had been twenty years before, reaching England
early in May 1766 after an absence of twenty months. The careful survey
of the Straits of Magellan, which (contrary to the later judgment of
Captain Cook) he prefers to rounding the Horn Islands, may be deemed
the chief geographical result of Byron’s expedition, that being the
course almost universally adopted at the present day, especially by
steamers. On the coasts of Patagonia, in the Straits, and in the
Falkland Islands, Byron met with enormous quantities of penguins,
quaintly described by Sir John Narborough (an earlier navigator in
these parts) as “like little children standing up with white aprons
on.” Commodore Anson was followed in the same year by Captains Wallis
and Carteret, the former of whom was the first to give any account of
Otaheite (sometimes called King George’s Island), and the latter to
discover Pitcairn’s Island, the home, till recently, of the descendants
of several of the mutineers of the _Bounty_.
[Sidenote: Captain Cook.]
[Sidenote: His first voyage in the _Endeavour_.]
Captain James Cook, the greatest of our more modern discoverers, had
in his early years undergone much hard service in the coal trade on
the east coast of England. After entering the English naval service in
1755, he had greatly distinguished himself by the soundings he made
of the St. Lawrence, so as to allow the English fleet to co-operate
with General Wolfe against Quebec; and subsequently by his surveys of
the coast of Newfoundland, during the government of Sir Hugh Palliser.
In 1768 he was appointed to the command of the _Endeavour_, the main
object in view being an observation of the transit of Venus over the
sun’s disk, at the best place that could be selected for this purpose
south of the line; and, on the advice of Captain Wallis, who had just
returned from his voyage to the Pacific, the island of Otaheite was
chosen, and Cook started for that place August 26th, 1768, accompanied
by Mr. (afterwards Sir Joseph) Banks, and Dr. Solander, then the keeper
of the Natural History in the British Museum. Having rounded the Horn
Islands in thirty-four days, Cook held resolutely on his course, and in
due time, reaching Otaheite, had the satisfaction of making with the
utmost success the astronomical observations which were the main object
of his expedition. During the three months’ stay of the expedition
at Otaheite he surveyed the group of islands of which it is the most
important, and gave to them the collective title of the “Society
Islands.”
Proceeding onwards to the west, he at length reached the north end of
that _Terra Australis Incognita_, now known as New Zealand, which had
been first touched at by Tasman in 1642. Here Cook met with a class
of natives in every way superior to those whom he had seen anywhere
else; with some knowledge of cultivation, and habits of cleanliness
uncommon even among far more civilised people. Their language, too,
as was shown by their freely conversing with a native Otaheitan who
accompanied him, proved the common ancestry of the natives of the
Pacific islands. Tasman did not land on New Zealand, but coasted the
eastern side from 34° to 43° S. Lat. Cook showed further that there
were really two principal islands, separated by a narrow channel, since
justly named after him Cook’s Straits. Having circumnavigated New
Zealand, he went on to Australia, striking its coasts very nearly at
the same place where Tasman had been before him. But during a run of
two thousand miles to the north, the natives were noticed to be very
much below even those of the Society Islands, nor was their language
intelligible. After a voyage of great danger between the coral-reefs
to the north-east of the island, Cook reached the straits separating
New Holland from New Guinea; and, formally taking possession of the
enormous tract of land he had discovered, gave to it the name it still
bears, of New South Wales. Thence he returned to England, by way of
Batavia and the Cape of Good Hope, where he arrived, after an absence
of two years and eleven months. Throughout the whole narrative of this
celebrated expedition the reader will be struck with the singular good
sense and remarkable humanity characteristic of this great voyager, and
which were equally conspicuous in his two subsequent voyages. In this
respect he stands in marked contrast with all those who had preceded
him, Columbus, Magellan, and Anson alone excepted. In every case we
find him using his best influence to make friends with the natives,
drawing up regulations of intercourse with them, to prevent his men
taking unfair advantages, and, above all, restraining, as far as he
could, their evil propensities. “Neither did I think,” says he on one
memorable occasion, “that the thefts these people committed against
us were, in them, crimes worthy of death. That thieves were hanged in
England I thought no reason why they should be shot in Otaheite.”
[Sidenote: Second voyage in the _Resolution_.]
Not many months were allowed to elapse ere Cook was afloat again;
this time to investigate the then unsolved problem of a great southern
continent, which had been only in part set at rest by the discoveries
of Byron, and by the circumnavigation of New Zealand. In this voyage
he took the command of the _Resolution_, of four hundred and sixty-two
tons, while Captain Furneaux took charge of the _Adventure_, of three
hundred and thirty-six tons. Both, like the old _Endeavour_, were
Whitby vessels; and Cook has himself recorded that every possible
attention was paid to their proper equipment, and to the due supply
of anti-scorbutics, and of other necessaries, under the especial eye
of Lord Sandwich, then at the head of the Admiralty. The ships left
Plymouth on July 13th, 1772, and, after calling at the Cape, pushed at
once to the south, till on January 17th, 1773, they reached 67° 15´
S., where farther progress in that direction was barred by fields of
solid ice. Thence Cook made his way to New Zealand, where he arrived,
in Dusky Bay, March 25th, after having been one hundred and seventeen
days at sea, and having traversed three thousand six hundred and sixty
leagues. His companion, Captain Furneaux, who had been for some time
separated from him, by asserting that the sea at the south end of New
South Wales was only a deep bay, missed the opportunity of tracing the
Straits of Van Diemen’s Land, while he at the same time misled Captain
Cook.
At New Zealand Cook landed several domestic animals, and the seeds
of various vegetables, both of which have prospered remarkably. From
that island he paid a second visit to his former friends in Otaheite,
and, having surveyed several islands, among others New Amsterdam,
the people of which were far more civilised than any natives he had
as yet met with, returned to Queen Charlotte’s Sound, New Zealand, to
revictual and refit his ships. On the return of summer he determined
to examine more minutely the question of a southern continent,
proceeding as far as 71° south latitude, the highest latitude which
has been as yet attained. Returning to the north, he examined Easter
Island,[207] one of the group now known as the Marquesas, and describes
the remarkable native statues existing there, of which two have been
recently brought to the British Museum. Thence, passing by Otaheite,
he sailed for the archipelago to which he had given the name of the
Friendly Islands; thence to a still farther group, which he christened
the New Hebrides; and thence to New Caledonia (the largest island in
the Pacific after New Zealand), and to Norfolk Island, then wholly
uninhabited. Resting for a short time in his old quarters at New
Zealand, Cook again started, and made a clean run to Cape Horn,
examining in detail Terra del Fuego and Staaten Island. After touching
at the Cape, he sailed for England, and arrived at Portsmouth July
13th, 1775, having been absent on his second expedition three years and
eighteen days. During this remarkable and perilous voyage he lost but
four men, and only one of these by disease.
[Sidenote: Third voyage.]
On the 12th of July, 1776, Captain Cook undertook his third and last
voyage; the object, on this occasion, being to explore the northern
portions of the Pacific Ocean, and to ascertain, if possible, whether
there was any water communication between the North Pacific and the
North Atlantic. In this voyage he himself sailed in his old ship the
_Resolution_, and had associated with him the _Discovery_, under
Captain Clerke, an engraving of which we are enabled to give on the
following page, from a drawing by E. W. Cooke, R.A., F.R.S.
[Illustration: THE “DISCOVERY,” CAPTAIN COOK’S SHIP.—E. W. COOKE, R.A.]
[Sidenote: Friendly, Fiji, Sandwich, and other islands.]
[Sidenote: His murder.]
After calling at the Cape of Good Hope, he proceeded east, and passing
the islands first seen by Marion and Kerguelen, finally reached
Adventure Bay, at the south end of Van Diemen’s Land, on January
26th, 1777. Thence he proceeded to New Zealand, and thence again for
the winter to the Friendly Islands, taking advantage of the nearly
three months he spent in that part of the Pacific to examine more
closely Amsterdam Island (or Tongataboo), and the Fiji Islands.
Thence he went on to Otaheite, where he left a horse and mare and
other live stock he had brought from England on purpose. Turning from
Otaheite to the north, Cook discovered, in latitude 21°, north, five
islands, to which he gave the name of the Sandwich Islands; and thence
pressing onward he fell in with New Albion in 44° 33´ north, and King
George’s or Nootka Sound in the island now known as that of Vancouver.
Pursuing his northern course, he surveyed a considerable portion of
the American coast, doubled the projecting headland of Alaska, and
passing through Behring’s Straits, anchored on the inhospitable coast
of the Tchshudkis: the most northern point he was able to reach,
being in 70° 44´, where his farther progress was completely barred by
a wall of solid ice. Returning thence again to the south, with the
view of wintering in the Sandwich Islands, he proceeded thither,
and discovered Owhyhee, the largest of this group, which he had not
seen when passing by these islands a few months before. At a southern
bay of this island he remained for some time, his visit being highly
appreciated by the great mass of the natives. Disputes, however,
occasionally arose from the punishments necessarily inflicted on them
to check their love of appropriating whatever articles they could
carry away; and in one of these, for an offence which could not be
overlooked, as they had stolen the _Discovery’s_ cutter, Captain Cook,
on landing with a party of marines to carry into effect his orders,
unfortunately perished in the scuffle, on December 26th, 1779.
[Sidenote: Progress of the North American colonies.]
Previous to most of these important discoveries, and during the earlier
portion of the eighteenth century, while England was distracted by
war, and the nations of Europe were rivalling, by force of arms, to
obtain an ascendency over each other, her American colonies[208]
were, by peaceful and undisturbed pursuits, laying the foundation of
that prosperity which enabled them, before the close of the century,
to demand and obtain their severance from the mother-country, and
their social and political independence. So early as 1729 the city of
Philadelphia in the province of Pennsylvania owned vessels amounting
to six thousand tons, employed in a lucrative trade with the West
Indies, and had also in that year received no less than six thousand
two hundred and eight emigrants from Great Britain. New York, as well
as Pennsylvania, carried on a large trade in grain and provisions with
Spain and Portugal, besides sending considerable quantities of furs and
peltry, obtained from the native Indians, to England. Massachusetts
had already one hundred and twenty thousand inhabitants, employing
forty thousand tons of shipping in their foreign and coasting trades,
or close upon six hundred vessels of one sort and another, one-half of
which traded to Europe; while the American fisheries were already so
valuable and extensive that two hundred and fifty thousand quintals
of dried fish were annually exported to Spain, Portugal, and the
Mediterranean.[209]
New England then supplied the largest and finest masts in the world.
The exportation of rice from Carolina, which in 1733 amounted to
thirty-six thousand five hundred and eighty-four barrels, besides
considerable quantities of pitch, turpentine, lumber, provisions,
and Indian corn, had in 1740 increased to ninety-one thousand one
hundred and ten barrels. Georgia, established in 1732 by a society of
gentlemen, headed by General Oglethorpe, with the view of producing
silk, the worm having been brought from Piedmont, was paving the way
for the growth of rice, indigo, and other products suited to her soil
and warm climate.[210]
[Sidenote: Commercial jealousy in the West Indies.]
But commercial jealousy had already seized the English colonists in the
West Indies, and had led them to claim an exclusive monopoly of the
trade with the colonies on the continent; while, at the same time, the
contraband traffic carried on by the French and the Dutch was pressed
on the consideration of parliament. Hence it was that a Bill received
the sanction of the House of Commons prohibiting, under forfeiture of
ship and cargo, the importation into any part of English America of
sugar, rum, or molasses grown in plantations not of English origin.
Although this bill failed in the House of Lords, an Act was passed in
1733[211] for encouraging the sugar trade, the effect of which was to
grant drawbacks on re-exportations from Great Britain of West India
sugar, and to impose duties on the importation into America of the
produce of foreign plantations. From the preamble of this Act foreign
rivals appear to have surpassed the English colonists in the quality
of their sugar, and to have supplanted their shipping in the carrying
trade: so that the English professed they were unable to carry it on
without relief from the parliament of Great Britain.
Following this example, all classes, as a matter of course, appealed
for protection, and an artificial system grew up which, even if
justifiable at the beginning, proved, when the separation of the
colonies took place, to be altogether impracticable. The shipowners at
home were equally ready to find pretexts for parliamentary interference
in their favour. Thus, in 1749-50, they held a meeting in the city
of London, “to promote British shipping and British navigation,” at
which sixty gentlemen were present, and “the Case” then drawn up was
signed by fifty-nine of them.[212] Their object seems to have been to
prevent foreign ships taking away, as back-freight, goods entitled to
drawback or bounty; the system of bounties practised by other nations
operating against English shipping, though the policy of retaliation
then adopted did not always remedy the evil complained of. Hence it
is that we find incessant remonstrances by shipowners that foreigners
came to English ports with freights and cargoes of small value, and
loaded tin, lead, and other goods only to be obtained in England, and
their assertion that, by the help of drawbacks and of bounties freely
conceded abroad, the foreigners gained, on the whole, a larger freight
than English vessels could do in the same time. English shipowners
sought, therefore, to obtain fresh limitations on the foreigner, so as
to raise their freights to an equality with those earned in the general
market of the world. In the statements thus set forth, the shipowners,
however, were compelled to admit that “at all foreign ports which had
no shipping of their own, ours (English) are always chosen preferable
to the ships of any other nation.”
[Sidenote: Seven Years’ War, 1756-1763.]
[Sidenote: Its effect on the colonies.]
Of the “Seven Years’ War” it is not our province to write, but of its
results as affecting the English colonial arrangements, we may remark
that the expenses of that war mainly induced the Legislature to pass
in 1764 the Act of 4 George III., chap. 15, which ultimately led to
the separation of the North American colonies from Great Britain.
This Act, combined with various conditions taken from the Navigation
Laws, requiring heavy duties on numerous articles imported into the
colonies from the countries that produced them, or from anywhere else
except from Great Britain, and prohibiting the importation of sugar
from the colonies, except in British bottoms, necessarily aroused the
indignation of the American colonists, and sowed the seeds of future
rebellion.
[Sidenote: Unwise legislative measures.]
But unfortunately these impolitic stipulations were only the
commencement of a series of unwise, if not unjust measures, carried
out with extreme rigour, with the object of preserving for the British
shipowner and manufacturer the exclusive monopoly of the trade with
the colonies. No doubt an extensive illicit trade had already been
established between the continental North American colonies and the
foreign West India settlements, carried on in American ships and in
defiance of British law. Indeed, the people of the New England States,
of New York, Carolina, and Pennsylvania built numerous small vessels,
expressly for the purpose of supplying these islands with various
articles of their own production, especially lumber, provisions,
horses, live stock, tobacco, corn, flour, and vegetables; and even made
voyages to Europe, selling both ships and cargo in European ports in
spite of the fiscal laws of the mother-country. But though this trade
was ruined by the regulations for the suppression of smuggling, and by
the collection of the King’s duties in hard silver, which drained the
colonies of the bullion they received in exchange for the sale of their
ships and cargoes, these measures, which were carried into effect with
great vigour, operated with an equally injurious severity on the West
Indian colonies, especially on Jamaica, in spite of a very lucrative
traffic still carried on between that island and the Spanish Main.
Unfortunately, the English government had viewed without compunction
the infraction of the Spanish laws, so long as their shipowners and
merchants reaped an immense advantage by their clandestine trade.
Nor did the dread of perpetual imprisonment and slavery deter their
mariners from engaging in this trade. Indeed, when these were wanting,
Spanish-Americans supplied the deficiency by vessels of their own;
while the governors of the islands connived at the illicit traffic.
But a different spirit of morality was now to prevail. Directions were
sent out from England to enforce the Navigation Acts in all their
strictness: custom-house commissions were issued to the men-of-war, who
were ordered to seize, without distinction, all foreign vessels found
in any of the ports of the West India Islands; the British government
becoming from one extreme of laxity the most strict and energetic
repressors of Spanish as well as American smuggling. The result was
that their own shipping suffered, and their exports to Jamaica declined
168,000_l._ in one year. In 1766 the ports of Jamaica and Dominica were
opened to all foreign vessels whatsoever; but if credit can be given
to one of the historians[213] of the West Indies, the Spanish masters
of vessels who resorted to Jamaica, having their names reported in the
customs’ lists, were thus betrayed to the Spanish authorities, who
visited their offences with the most severe punishment.
[Sidenote: Effect of the new restrictions.]
On the continent of British North America the new duties and the
rigorous measures adopted to restrict or put down the trade so long
carried on with the French and Spanish settlements speedily produced
consequences which the narrow-minded politicians at home did not
anticipate. The extinction of the French and Spanish shipping trade
caused, as its natural result, a serious diminution of the direct
carrying trade between England and the North American colonies, and
this, again, depriving them of their accustomed market, prevented
their being any longer able to consume British manufactures to the
same extent as formerly, or even to discharge debts due to creditors
in England. Hence an effect not anticipated: in that the Americans,
forming associations to dispense with English manufactures, were led
to resort to native industry, and thus to lay the foundation of a
permanent rivalry, the end of which cannot even now be conjectured. In
short, a national American spirit was evoked, highly antagonistic to
British interests.
[Sidenote: Passing of the Stamp Act.]
[Sidenote: Trade interrupted.]
Public opinion was in this excited state when the Stamp Act of the
Grenville Administration received the Royal assent on the 22nd of
March, 1765, and was to come into operation on the 1st November
following. A distinction was instantly drawn in the colonies between
that and the preceding measure. The language of the Act was severely
criticised, but the real grievances were, that Great Britain, by
this Act, indiscreetly interfered with the trade and shipping of the
colonies, cut off one chief source of their prosperity, and sought
by a Stamp Act to collect internal duties in the colonies under the
authority of the Commissioners of Stamps at home. When the stamps
arrived in New York, they were, with universal consent, committed
to the flames by the people, excepting one small parcel which the
magistrates secured, with the reservation that they should not be made
use of. From that day the transaction of business between the two
countries became impracticable. The rivers and wharfs were deserted;
vessels lay in the harbours with their colours hoisted half-mast high;
the courts of justice were closed; and instead of a thriving maritime
population in the sea-ports, all was neglect and stagnation. A general
agreement was entered into by the merchants not to import any more
goods from Great Britain, nor to receive any goods on commission
consigned from that country after the 1st January, 1766, and as Ireland
was exempted from this ban, the seeds of discord were sown among all
parties. The Americans even meditated the prohibition of the export of
tobacco to Great Britain, but this step would have proved even more
fatal to the planters of Virginia and Maryland than to those persons
against whom it had been imposed. The resistance to the authority of
the mother-country was universal in New England, New York, New Jersey,
Pennsylvania, Maryland, and the two Carolinas. But the provinces at the
northern and southern extremities of the continent submitted to the
authority of the British Crown, as did also the West India Islands,
excepting those of St. Christopher and Nevis.
The effects of the Stamp Act in America recoiled with redoubled force
upon Great Britain. Most of the merchants connected with the colonial
trade suspended payment; while her shipowners felt severely the
interruption of commerce between the two countries; the manufacturers
and workmen throughout the kingdom were to a large extent thrown out
of employment—misfortunes greatly aggravated by the high price of
provisions, the vessels laden with them having been embargoed in all
the ports. In the end, the shipowners of London, Liverpool, Bristol,
Hull, and Glasgow, with the manufacturing towns in Lancashire,
petitioned the Legislature for relief; and, in 1766, the obnoxious
Stamp Act was repealed. This repeal, though received with great
joy in all parts of England, and re-echoed by the Americans, was
materially modified on the other side the Atlantic by the preamble of
the Declaratory Act[214] which censured the American legislatures for
assuming the right of taxation in the colonies, declaring the American
colonies subordinate to the English crown and parliament, whose
legislative authority, it was asserted, extended to American subjects
in all cases whatsoever. The resumption, however, of navigation and
commerce produced the most salutary effects, and harmony was for a
season restored between the two countries.
But in the interval between the repeal of the Stamp Act and the
following year a new state of things had arisen. The notion of
self-government had taken hold of the American agitators. In their
provincial assemblies they set the Declaratory Act and the authority of
the mother-country at defiance, while in England, on the other hand, it
was deemed essential to assert the supremacy of the Legislature by even
more effectual proceedings.
[Sidenote: Non-intercourse resolutions.]
Accordingly a fresh American Taxation Act was passed in 1767,
imposing import duties on tea, glass, and other articles, the object
being to assert the right of taxing the colonies. It was, however,
found impossible to collect the new duties. The people of Boston,
Massachusetts, were conspicuous for their violence in resisting this
new and vexatious impost, at the same time proposing a strict union
of all the local assemblies in British America to oppose the law and
to insist on its repeal. Troops were sent to enforce allegiance to
the authorities. The Boston merchants and shipowners, however, were
resolute in their action, and the seizure of a sloop belonging to
one of their citizens causing much excitement, they passed a further
resolution of non-intercourse, at one of their numerous meetings,
unless the last obnoxious Act was repealed. The inhabitants of New
York carried similar resolutions. In this unsatisfactory way matters
continued till 1770, when the Act was repealed in all articles except
tea. The people of America had, however, begun to feel still more
their strength, and declared any such reservation to be inadmissible.
In 1774, when vessels having this article on board reached Boston,
the people seized the tea, threw some portion of it overboard, and
destroyed the remainder, suspending all business of landing and
shipping goods in Boston harbour after the 1st June, 1774, and
declaring all charter-parties, bills of lading, and contracts executed
in England for shipping goods from that port null and void.
[Sidenote: Recourse to hostilities.]
But commercial intercourse was soon afterwards opened by the British
American colonies with France and Holland, which was connived
at by both countries in spite of authoritative prohibitions and
representations by the court of Great Britain. While the American
colonists refused to have any trading intercourse with England,
the Parliament of this country, in spite of the petitions of its
shipowners and parties interested, and actuated by the same unwise and
unaccountable policy, passed an Act to prevent the New Englanders from
fishing on the coasts of Newfoundland, Labrador, or Nova Scotia, and
declaring all vessels thus employed liable to seizure after the 20th
of July, 1775. But before that time the fatal blow had been struck
which led to a total severance of peaceful relations between the two
countries. The inhabitants of the northern and southern provinces
joined in a confederation against the British with all the vigour
and well-known energy of their race; casting cannon, and employing
themselves in learning military exercises with such a menacing attitude
that Governor Gage seized the ammunition and stores lodged near Boston,
thus causing an open rupture. The skirmish at Lexington followed, where
sixty men were killed on each side; and the king’s forces were besieged
in Boston. The military ardour of the Americans augmented as the crisis
approached, their rulers at once assuming, after the oppression to
which they had been subjected, the justifiable powers of an independent
executive under the title, at first, of the UNITED COLONIES, with all
the functions of a government _de facto_. The war with the Colonies
then broke out. To trace the details of the struggle, which terminated
in the separation of these vast regions from the British Empire, is
not within the scope of this work, but it will be necessary to give as
comprehensive a view of the state of our shipping business with America
at that important epoch as our space will admit of: the documents
published by both countries are very numerous.
[Sidenote: Position of the colonists.]
[Sidenote: Fisheries.]
While the territories subject to the Spanish Crown in America abounded
with the precious metals, and the mines of gold and silver of
Mexico and Peru poured a flood of mineral wealth over Europe,[215]
the provinces colonised by Great Britain were destitute of these
riches. The soil was, however, capable of affording the still more
precious products of rice, corn, sugar, tobacco, indigo, and above
all, of cotton. But the New Englanders could not boast of a fertile
territory, their soil scarcely growing sufficient to feed its
inhabitants. Accordingly they directed their attention to the sea as
a source of subsistence, and the business of fishing and navigation
afforded a boundless field for their unwearied industry. Thus they
constructed vessels not only for their own convenience, but also for
sale. These, though inferior to English-built vessels in quality of
timber and workmanship, were low-priced and quickly put together.
The New Englanders were, moreover, acute merchants, and carried on a
considerable trade with Africa; so much so that from their general
aptitude for commerce they were known as the “Dutchmen of America.”
The provinces of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware, with
a better soil than that of New England, produced in abundance corn and
cattle of all kinds, together with hemp, flax, and lumber, iron, pot
and pearl ashes. Their exports of corn and flour brought down from the
interior were even then very considerable; they exported, also, live
stock, boards, scantling, staves, shingles, and wooden houses framed
and ready to set up. These and a multitude of other exports afforded
large means of employment to the shipping of New England, while the
harbour of New York, one of the finest in the world, presented great
maritime facilities to their rising merchant navy. Though Virginia
and Maryland had directed their chief attention to the cultivation
of tobacco, large quantities of grain were raised in those provinces
prior to the revolution. By law their tobacco hitherto could only
be exported to Great Britain; but they were now allowed to ship it
and their corn, flour, timber, and other produce to the West Indies
and elsewhere. North Carolina also grew tobacco, though to a limited
extent; but her annual export of pitch, tar, and turpentine, was not
less than one hundred and thirty thousand barrels, the larger portion
of which was shipped to England. In South Carolina and Georgia (the
growth of silk proving unprofitable) rice and indigo became the staple
products; but it was not until a later period that these two regions,
especially Georgia,[216] became the seat of the vast produce of cotton
now employing so large a portion of the merchant shipping of both the
European and American States.
[Sidenote: Shipping of the North American colonies, A.D. 1769.]
That an idea may be formed of the actual state of the navigation and
commerce of the North American Colonies when they declared their
independence we furnish in the accompanying note an outline of the
leading figures bearing on this subject from a report, issued shortly
after the Declaration of Independence, by the Inspector General of the
Customs, London, and presented to Parliament.[217]
[Sidenote: Early registry of ships not always to be depended on.]
Prior to the Registry Act of the 24th of George III. vessels were
measured in a very loose manner, and in order to evade the payment
of lighthouse dues, and various port charges collected on tonnage,
they were usually registered far below their real burthen; indeed the
difference between the measurements under the old Act of William and
that of George III., being on the aggregate no less than one third,
accounts in some measure for the apparently very small tonnage of the
vessels given in the returns to which we have just referred. But the
return, as a whole, furnishes pretty accurately the position of the
merchant navy and of the oversea commerce of the United States when
they separated from the mother-country. That important event in the
history of the world produced a complete revolution in the relative
positions of the great maritime nations; a merchant navy having
arisen on the other side of the Atlantic which in three quarters of a
century afterwards rivalled, and at one time surpassed in number, and
especially in symmetry and speed, the finest merchantmen of any of the
countries of the Old World.
In noting the progress of British merchant shipping during the earlier
portion of the reign of George III., the dates at which the war with
the colonies broke out, and when peace was finally concluded, must
be remembered, as open hostilities did not actually commence until
1774, though for some years previously a state of non-intercourse had
existed. The revolted colonies might possibly then have been retained
as reluctant subjects for some years longer, had not the French, in
1778, espoused their cause with the object of striking a blow at the
increasing maritime power of England. In the following year Spain also
threw her weight into the scale against her, and finally the Dutch, in
1781, contributed to swell the number of her maritime foes. With three
such nations in arms against her British shipping, clearing outwards
and inwards from her ports, had fallen, in 1782, to 615,150 tons, while
there were in that year 225,456 tons of foreign clearances; but, in
1785, such has ever been the elasticity of her commerce, the entries
inwards and outwards reached 1,182,346 tons, of which only 107,484 tons
were foreign vessels.[218]
[Sidenote: Independence of the United States acknowledged, May 24,
1784.]
When peace was restored, the loss of the North American colonies,
instead of diminishing the commercial shipping of England, tended
rather to augment it,[219] while the value of her exports and imports
resumed that position of steady increase which characterised the
earlier part of the reign of George III., at the same time making a
considerable stride in advance when the war had completely ceased.
Preliminaries of peace were adjusted with the now separated colonies
at Paris on the 30th of November, 1782,[220] although the definitive
treaty was not signed till the 3rd of September, 1783, and ratified
by Congress the 4th of January, 1784. With France and Spain similar
treaties were signed about the same period, the Dutch alone keeping
aloof from a final peace till the 24th of May, 1784. In India peace had
been secured in March of that year by a treaty concluded with Tippoo
Sahib,[221] who, by the peace in Europe, found himself deprived of his
French auxiliaries. By keeping these dates in view, and glancing at the
table at the foot of the page, originally taken from Chalmers’ tables,
and now from McCulloch’s commercial dictionary,[222] the reader will
be enabled to form a clear idea of the state of progress of British
maritime commerce during one of the most critical periods of her
history.
[Sidenote: Ireland secures various commercial concessions.]
While England was incurring a vast debt in unavailing endeavours
to subjugate the revolted colonies, Ireland seized the opportunity
to secure her commercial freedom. Hitherto she had been treated as
a conquered country, a vassal island, the people of which were
looked upon as aliens in race as well as religion. As the Irish were
successful in their demand for freedom of trade and industry, England
now passed successive Acts by which certain goods were allowed to be
shipped directly from Ireland to the British plantations in America and
to the British settlements in Africa; Irish-built ships were declared
to be entitled to the same privileges as British; and, by the 20th
George III. chap. 10, free trade with these countries was guaranteed.
No practical results, however, followed from these concessions, the
Irish having, from some cause or other, it may have been from want of
capital or continuous industry, rarely given any real attention to
mercantile, and especially maritime pursuits. For a brief period they
possessed the dangerous gift of an independent legislature,[223] which,
however, happily ceased its functions some twenty years afterwards,
when a hopeless rebellion had been extinguished; nor indeed, even now,
though possessing so many natural advantages, has Ireland progressed
beyond a thriving coasting trade; while her efforts to encourage
extensive fisheries even along her own coasts have proved unsuccessful.
Indeed, it was only at a later period that her manufactures and her
agriculture became the objects of national attention. Yet, with her
fine harbours, rich soil, generous people, and admirable geographical
position, it might have been hoped that Ireland would have taken a
leading position as a naval power, or rather, as a commercial and
maritime country.
[Sidenote: Scotch shipping.]
While Ireland continued to be a clog on the industry of the people of
England, Scotland, restored to the blessings of domestic peace, was
making rapid progress. The value of her exports, which during the war
had in 1782 fallen to 653,709_l._, reached 1,007,635_l._ in 1785. Her
shipping also represented a satisfactory result.[224] Scotland, like
England, had now commenced a successful career of shipping business,
and, however the colonial war may, for a few years, have retarded the
onward progress of the now united nation, its subsequent advance was
steady and prosperous, and is now astounding.
[Sidenote: Rate of seamen’s wages.]
With regard to the rate of wages paid to sailors in England and
Scotland in 1784, no better authority can be quoted than Dr. Adam
Smith,[225] who says in his great work that, “the lottery of the sea
is not altogether so disadvantageous to the sailor, as compared with
the soldier. Common sailors more frequently obtain some fortune and
preferment than common soldiers; and the hope of those prizes is what
principally recommends the trade.... Their wages are not greater than
those of common labourers at the port which regulates the rate of
seamen’s wages. As they are continually going from port to port, from
all the different ports of Great Britain, their monthly pay is more
nearly upon a level, and the rate of the port to and from which the
greatest number sail, that is the port of London, regulates that of all
the rest.”
“In the time of peace, and in the merchant service, the London price
is from one guinea to about seven and twenty shillings the calendar
month.” It must, however, be remembered that this estimate was made
when the common labourer in London received nine or ten shillings
per week, making in the month forty to forty-five shillings. The
difference, of course, is accounted for by the sailor being supplied
with provisions and shelter, such as it is, in addition to his pay.
Taking the difference of the value of money and of the ordinary rate of
wages paid three quarters of a century ago, we may presume that at the
present rate of fifty to sixty shillings per month, the pay of a common
sailor is considerably higher than it was at the period in question,
and certainly he is much better fed. Indeed the position and condition
of the common sailor have undoubtedly kept pace with the general
improvement and progress of the nation.[226]
[Sidenote: British Registry Act, Aug. 1, 1786.]
About this period the new Registry Act came into operation, requiring
the owner of every decked vessel of fifteen tons and upwards to have
her measurement accurately ascertained according to a prescribed scale,
and providing that every vessel registered in the customs, and thus
securing the advantages of a British ship, must have been built in the
British dominions, or captured as a prize and, subsequently, owned by
British subjects. The Act also ordered that her name and the port to
which she belonged should be painted conspicuously on her stern, and
that her certificate of registration should contain full particulars
of her dimensions, age, and owners, together with the name of her
commander and other details.[227]
Some eminent writers on commerce, among whom the late J. R.
McCulloch[228] stands conspicuous, have doubted the utility of
compulsory registration; but this system, in after years materially
improved, has been of great service to the State, as well as to
individual shipowners. Indeed the exigencies of trade alone required
that English merchant vessels should be provided in time of war
with legally authorised certificates, so that they might be at once
distinguished from those of other nations. Besides, the incalculable
amount of property entrusted to owners of vessels obviously requires
that their ships should be identifiable by a proper system of
registration; for there would be little or no security for the safe
transport of merchandise unless the title to the ship as well as to the
cargo were indisputably established by the certificates of register,
and by the customs’ and clearance papers, which the ship was then by
law required to carry.
[Sidenote: American Registry Act.]
From the earliest period of American independence, Congress[229] passed
a registration measure corresponding almost exactly with that of Great
Britain. The national privileges of trade were by it confined to
ships built in America and belonging to and commanded by citizens of
that country on the 16th of May, 1789, and continually thereafter,
or which had been taken and condemned as prizes in war, or forfeited
for a breach of the United States laws. Few nations have asserted
the rights of neutral ships[230] with greater energy than the people
of the United States; and these rights could not have been enforced
except by a system of registration. But it is superfluous to waste
time in asserting the advantages of registration, which, in all cases
where it is honestly performed, may be deemed one of the most salutary
regulations introduced by civilisation and law, and one, too, of
material value for the repression of crime and piracy.
[Sidenote: Treaty between France and England, 1786.]
On 26th of September, 1786, a treaty of commerce and navigation between
Great Britain and France[231] was concluded, whereby perfect freedom of
navigation was mutually conceded; but before the expiration of twelve
years, the stipulated period of its existence, one of the greatest
political convulsions of modern times had overthrown the dynasty of the
Bourbons, and France and England were again plunged into a more deadly
war than had ever before been waged by these ancient and inveterate
foes. England also formed treaties with Spain, Prussia, and Holland,
and the treaty with Russia, which had been allowed to expire in 1786,
was also then renewed.
[Sidenote: Slave trade, and its profits.]
Among numerous other matters, the slave-trade occupied a very
considerable portion of the attention of Parliament and of the country
during this period. By a return laid before Parliament in 1789, the
number of slaves annually carried from the coast of Africa in British
vessels was thirty-eight thousand; the number taken to the British West
Indies, upon an average of four years, being estimated at twenty-two
thousand five hundred.[232] Prior to the year 1760 no complete returns
have been preserved of the number of ships thus employed; subsequently,
however, it ranged from twenty-eight, measuring three thousand four
hundred and seventy-five tons in the year 1761, to one hundred and
ninety-two, measuring twenty thousand two hundred and ninety-six tons
in 1776; but, during the war, from 1776 to 1783, this inhuman trade
either languished, or the vessels formerly engaged in it were otherwise
more profitably employed.[233] The majority of the slave-vessels were
built expressly for the trade; and at the date of the report, 1786,
from which we derive our information, six vessels were in course of
construction, and about a dozen fitting out or ready for sea. A slave
then cost from 8_l._ to 22_l._ in Africa, and realised in the West
Indies from 28_l._ to 35_l._, the prices having about doubled during
the previous century. In addition to the British import of slaves, the
French carried away from Africa every year about twenty thousand; the
Portuguese ten thousand; the Dutch four thousand; and the Danes two
thousand; making a total of seventy-four thousand annually exported
from Africa, including the thirty-eight thousand despatched in British
vessels. A considerable portion of these found their way to the Spanish
possessions. When after the restoration of peace with the colonies the
London streets were filled with emancipated negroes, many of them,
collected by an order of the 9th of December, 1786, were forwarded in
British transports to Sierra Leone, where a settlement was formed.[234]
[Sidenote: Trade between England and America and the West Indies
re-opened.]
Although the political connection of Great Britain with the United
States of America had been violently rent asunder, there happily
remained between the two countries the bonds of one common origin,
language, religion, and mutual interest. No sooner had American
independence been acknowledged than all prohibitory regulations made
during the war were abolished. Indeed, for a time, no manifest or any
other shipping document was required from any vessel of the United
States arriving at or clearing out from a British port; and the Crown
being meanwhile authorised to regulate the manner in which trade should
be carried on, a royal proclamation was immediately issued on the 14th
of March, 1783, for the admission, till further orders, into the ports
of Great Britain, of any unmanufactured commodities, the produce of
the United States, either in British or American ships, without the
usual certificates, and on payment of the same duties as were payable
on similar articles imported from British America. The same drawbacks
and bounties were also allowed on goods coming from the United States
as on those from the British possessions; and the benefit of the order
was extended to all American vessels that had arrived since the 20th of
January.
These concessions, however, neither gave satisfaction to the American
shipowners, nor to the English sticklers for the Navigation Act in all
its force. A controversy arose respecting the extent of commercial
rights to be conceded permanently to the United States, the practical
point in dispute at the time being whether the Navigation Act should be
held to apply to American shipping as fully as it did to other foreign
vessels, and should thus exclude them from the English West India
Islands. But their claim to be treated upon a more favoured footing
than other nations was deemed untenable, though an exemption in their
favour was urged in this particular case upon the general grounds
of expediency. The shipowners, however, of Great Britain upheld the
Navigation Act as the palladium of their naval power, and urged that a
people who had renounced their allegiance to the mother-country could
have no right to any special favour. Much agitation was also raised
by the West India planters, who asserted that the prosperity of those
islands depended on an unrestricted intercourse with America; and as
their influence was powerful in parliament, ministers were on the point
of yielding to the clamour; at least they connived with the governors
of some of the West India Islands in permitting the free access of
American vessels to their ports.
A pamphlet by Lord Sheffield,[235] and another by Mr. Chalmers,[236]
urged that the remaining loyal continental colonies sufficed to supply
the British West India Islands with lumber and provisions, which
the advocates on the opposite side of the question denied. Great
discussions arose, in which all the controverted points of free trade
and exclusion were again urged in innumerable publications; and, as
usual, glaring exaggerations were resorted to on both sides. In the
sequel, the English government adopted a middle course. A proclamation
of the 2nd of July, 1783, by the King in council, permitted British
subjects to carry in _British vessels_ all kinds of naval stores,
lumber, live-stock, corn, &c., from the United States of America to the
West India Islands, and also to export rum, sugar, molasses, coffee,
cocoa, &c., from the Islands to the States under the same regulations
and duties as if these commodities had been cleared out for a British
possession. This concession naturally satisfied neither parties; Great
Britain and the United States alike regarding it with either alarm or
disdain. The West India planters apprehended instant ruin if there were
any check on the free and unrestricted intercourse with the continent;
while the Americans carried their resentment to an extent sufficient to
induce three of the States to make a requisition to Congress that all
commercial intercourse with England should be prohibited. The British
government, however, vigorously supported by the shipping interest,
remained inexorable in its restrictive policy.
In this matter the American people, moved, as it would seem, entirely
by an instinctive sense of self-interest, became the champions of
a free-trade policy in shipping, while their shipowners, relying
on the provisions of the Navigation Act, assumed the character of
exclusionists. Thus the antagonistic interests of the shipowners of the
two countries disturbed the friendly feelings which might otherwise
have prevailed. Three temporary Orders in Council were issued,
relating to the importation of tobacco, and payment of duties: a
matter of no little difficulty before the organisation of the English
warehousing system. The third of these “Orders” renewed that of the 2nd
of July, regulating the intercourse between the United States and the
West Indies, but relaxed the previous regulations for the British trade
so far as to permit the importation of any unmanufactured goods not
prohibited by law, except oil, pitch, tar, turpentine, indigo, masts,
yards, and bowsprits, being the produce of the United States, either
by British or American subjects, and either in British or American
vessels. This arrangement, having received parliamentary sanction, was
continued annually with little alteration throughout the next five
years; but the Americans during this period persisted in urging their
claims to have both trades placed on a more liberal system.
In 1784 Congress recommended to the legislature of the different
States the adoption of a resolution prohibiting, for fifteen years,
the importation and exportation of every species of merchandise, in
vessels belonging to any foreign powers not provided with a commercial
treaty with the United States. The people of Boston had been highly
exasperated by the exclusion of their vessels from the ports of the
West Indies, and by the high duties on rice, oil, and tobacco, while
their shipping had also suffered by the British regulations of her
fisheries along the American coasts.
[Sidenote: Changes produced by the Navigation Laws consequent on the
separation.]
They overlooked the great fact that the independence of the North
American colonies necessarily placed them in the same relative position
to Great Britain as other countries affected by the English navigation
laws, and thereby excluded them from the ports of the British
Colonies, a result deeply prejudicial to the shipping interests of
Boston, as their cheap ships could no longer trade with the West India
Islands.[237] The high differential duties on rice, oil, and tobacco
which had been enforced against them, regulations combined with the
fishery, led to retaliatory measures being resorted to by the people of
Massachussetts; hence, after the 1st of August, 1785, the exportation
of American produce and manufactures was altogether prohibited, and
vessels owned by British subjects prohibited from entering the ports
of that State. A proviso was indeed added to meet the case when the
governor of any British settlement might be willing to rescind the
proclamations against American vessels. In fact a new warfare of
prohibitions and restrictions, with retaliatory and conciliatory
measures to counteract or aid the contending parties as the case might
be, was commenced by various States, the end of which was not foreseen
upon either side the water. Unfortunately the States of the North of
the Union had commercial interests antagonistic to those of the South,
and hence arose a complex system which on all sides greatly increased
the difficulties of the navigation laws, and became the parent of
endless strife and animosity, which in after years assisted in some
measure to bring about the terrible civil war that raged from 1860 to
1865 between the Northern and Southern States.
Concessions were however soon made, and afterwards, in 1788, an Act was
passed, permanently permitting the importation into the West Indies, in
British vessels, of tobacco, pitch, tar, turpentine, horses, cattle,
&c., the produce of the United States, and the exportation from the
West Indies to the States of all goods or produce lawfully exportable
to European countries. The commercial jealousies and animosities
between the two countries now gradually subsided, though British
shipowners still adhered to the principle of their Navigation Laws, and
excluded American vessels from the colonial and inter-colonial trade,
all such goods imported and exported being required to be carried in
British bottoms.
[Sidenote: New disputes.]
[Sidenote: English Orders in Council.]
[Sidenote: Negotiations opened between Mr. Jay and Lord Grenville.]
Thus matters went on until the war broke out with France in 1792,
when new disputes arose with the United States. In order to obtain
the produce of their West India Islands, the French despatched their
sugars and other produce to the continent of America, whence it was
conveyed in American neutral vessels to France. Here is a striking
illustration of a friendly power professing neutrality, yet enriching
itself by a carrying trade for the benefit of one of the belligerents.
Accordingly an English Order in Council was issued for seizing all
vessels conveying to France the produce of the French colonies, or
supplies from France for the use of those colonies. No wonder that
under such circumstances the Americans set up the demand that “free
ships should make free goods,” which was echoed through the whole
world at a later period. No fewer than six hundred American vessels
were seized, or detained in English ports, under this order between
the 6th of November, 1793, and the 28th of March, 1794, a proceeding
which naturally excited much alarm among merchants connected with the
United States, lest there should be an immediate rupture between the
two countries. The American government took up the matter, and after
having, on the 26th of March, 1794, laid an embargo for thirty days
on all British merchant vessels in their ports, sent Mr. Jay as Envoy
Extraordinary to London, in order to obtain redress. Upon this the
English Order in Council was revoked, and friendly negotiations were
entered into with the view of placing the maritime relations of the
two countries upon a more satisfactory footing; the result being the
conclusion, in 1794, of a treaty of amity, commerce, and navigation, to
which we shall hereafter more fully refer.
[Sidenote: Tonnage duties levied by them.]
Although Mr. Jay, after the conclusion of this treaty, held out
the flag of free trade, the Americans never acknowledged, for any
lengthened period, his enlightened principles, but preferred following,
in this respect, the example of the mother-country whose allegiance
they had renounced; and, although admitting the vessels of all foreign
nations to their ports, levied a tonnage duty on them higher than was
paid by their own ships, with an additional ten per cent. on the duties
payable on their cargoes.
FOOTNOTES:
[205] Vol. I. chaps. xvi., xvii., and vol. II. chaps. i., ii.
[206] This very condensed account of the voyages of Dampier, Anson, and
Cook has been mainly taken from the collection of voyages published
by J. Hawkesworth, London, 4to., 1773; and from Captain Cook’s own
narrative, London, 4to., 1779-1784; that of Dampier has been taken from
his own account, and from ‘Inland and Maritime Discovery,’ vol. ii.
[207] Discovered by Davis, in 1686.
[208] Edmund Burke’s brilliant sketch, entitled ‘An Account of the
European Settlements in America,’ gives a clear and succinct history of
their progress up to 1760.
[209] For the various details on this subject see Macpherson, vol.
iii., and the annual register for each year of that period.
[210] It is estimated that since the Peace of 1783, and down to the end
of 1873, there have been 8,779,174 aliens landed in the United States;
emigrants arrived from various parts of the world. Various estimates
have been made of the amount of money brought into the country by
immigrants. The late John A. Kennedy, for many years Superintendent at
Castle Garden, found it about $68 per head for a given period. Placing
it at only $50, we have $444,000,000 as the result up to this time. But
the far greater value consists in the labour brought into the country,
a very large proportion of which goes to build up new Territories and
States in the West.—London ‘Times’ newspaper, January 20th, 1874.
[211] Statute of George II. chap. xiii.
[212] This “Case,” with all the statements on both sides, will be found
in the Accounts and Papers of the House of Commons, 1749-1777, vol. i.
Miscellaneous, comprising No. 1 to No. 9.
[213] _Vide_ Edwards’ ‘History of the West Indies,’ vol. i. p. 239.
[214] 6 Geo. III. chap. ii.
[215] One especial cause of this was that Spain has at no modern period
had a large internal commerce. Hence Spanish gold was largely spent in
Europe in the purchase of many goods which she did not, or would not,
produce herself.
[216] Cotton was first planted in Georgia in 1786, but made little
progress for several years.
[217] In 1769 the colonies built and launched 389 vessels, 113 square
rigged, and 276 sloops and schooners, of an aggregate burthen of 20,001
tons. Of these, Massachusetts (including Boston and Salem) provided
nearly one-half, New Hampshire and Rhode supplied the next largest
numbers, while New York had only 5 square-rigged vessels and 14 sloops
and schooners, measuring in all 955 tons. Pennsylvania owned 1344 tons;
Virginia, 1249; North and South Carolina, 1396; and Connecticut, 1542;
while Georgia had 1 sloop and 1 schooner, whose combined measure was
only 50 tons! In 1769 the entrances to all the ports of the present
United States amounted to 332,146 tons, and the clearances to 339,362
tons; of which 99,121 tons cleared for Great Britain; 42,601 for
Southern Europe and Africa; 96,382 for British and Foreign West Indies;
and 101,198 for the continent of America and the Bahama Islands.
The aggregate value of the whole imports amounted to 2,623,412_l._,
and of the exports to 2,852,441_l._; of which Great Britain sent
1,604,975_l._, receiving in return produce to the value of 1,531,516_l_.
(‘Journals of the House of Commons,’ 1792, p. 357).
[218] The famous defence of Gibraltar, July 17, 1779, to Nov. 27,
1781, by General Elliott (Lord Heathfield), and Rodney’s two actions,
in which he defeated the Spanish and French fleets respectively, did
more than anything to restore the prestige of England. In the first
of these battles, fought off Cape St. Vincent, Jan. 1780, Rodney took
the Spanish Admiral, Don Langara, and six of his ships; in the second,
fought in the West Indies, on April 12, 1782, he took five ships and
the French Admiral, the Count de Grasse, prisoners of war.
[219] Macpherson, vol. iv., _passim_.
[220] Sir Guy Carleton went to America to treat for peace May 5, 1782.
[221] This Treaty was signed in Tippoo’s camp by Sir George Staunton as
the English Ambassador, on the 11th of March, 1784.
[222] Trade of Great Britain with foreign countries, 1760-1797.
------+---------------+------------------
| |Exports of British
| Imports. | and Foreign and
Years.| | Colonial Produce.
+---------------+------------------
|Official Value.| Official Value.
------+---------------+------------------
| £ | £
1760 | 10,683,596 | 15,781,176
1761 | 10,292,541 | 16,038,913
1762 | 9,579,160 | 14,543,336
1763 | 12,568,927 | 15,578,943
1764 | 11,250,660 | 17,446,306
1765 | 11,812,144 | 15,763,868
1766 | 12,456,765 | 15,188,669
1767 | 13,097,153 | 15,090,001
1768 | 13,116,281 | 16,620,132
1769 | 13,134,091 | 15,001,282
1770 | 13,430,298 | 15,994,572
1771 | 14,208,325 | 19,018,481
1772 | 14,508,716 | 17,720,169
1773 | 12,522,643 | 16,375,431
1774 | 14,477,876 | 17,288,486
1775 | 14,815,856 | 16,326,364
1776 | 12,443,435 | 14,755,704
1777 | 12,643,831 | 13,491,006
1778 | 11,033,898 | 12,253,890
1779 | 11,435,265 | 13,530,703
1780 | 11,714,966 | 13,698,178
1781 | 12,722,862 | 11,332,296
1782 | 10,341,629 | 13,009,459
1783 | 13,122,235 | 14,681,495
------+---------------+------------------
+------+---------------+-----------------+-----------------+--------------|
| | Imports. | Exports.—Official Value. |
|Years.+---------------+-----------------+-----------------+--------------|
| |Official Value.| British Produce | Foreign and |Total Exports.|
| | |and Manufactures.|Colonial Produce.| |
+------+---------------+-----------------+-----------------+--------------|
| | £ | £ | £ | £ |
| 1784 | 15,272,877 | 11,255,057 | 3,846,434 | 15,101,491 |
| 1785 | 16,279,419 | 11,081,811 | 5,035,358 | 16,117,169 |
| 1786 | 15,786,072 | 11,830,195 | 4,470,536 | 16,300,731 |
| 1787 | 17,804,025 | 12,053,900 | 4,815,889 | 16,869,789 |
| 1788 | 18,027,170 | 12,724,720 | 4,747,519 | 17,472,239 |
| 1789 | 17,821,103 | 13,779,506 | 5,561,043 | 19,340,549 |
| 1790 | 19,130,886 | 14,921,084 | 5,199,037 | 20,120,121 |
| 1791 | 19,669,783 | 16,810,019 | 5,921,977 | 22,731,996 |
| 1792 | 19,659,358 | 18,336,851 | 6,568,349 | 24,905,200 |
| 1793 | 19,255,117 | 13,892,269 | 6,496,560 | 20,388,829 |
| 1794 | 22,276,916 | 16,725,403 | 10,021,681 | 26,748,084 |
| 1795 | 22,736,889 | 16,338,213 | 10,785,126 | 27,123,339 |
| 1796 | 23,187,320 | 19,102,220 | 11,416,694 | 30,518,914 |
| 1797 | 21,013,957 | 16,903,103 | 12,013,907 | 28,917,010 |
+------+---------------+-----------------+-----------------+--------------+
[223] For interesting details of this period of Irish history, see
‘Life of Grattan,’ by his son, and Phillipps’s ‘Memoirs of J. Philpot
Curran.’
[224] The ships which entered the ports of Scotland, during the
following years are thus reported by Chalmers:—
Foreign trade. Coast trade. Fisheries, &c.
Tons. Tons. Tons.
In 1769 48,271 21,615 10,275
In 1774 52,225 26,214 14,903
In 1784 50,386 31,542 10,421
In 1785 60,356 36,371 11,252
The Custom House accounts, from which the above is derived, state the
ships to belong to Scotland, reckoning each vessel only one voyage in
each year.
[225] _Vide_ Adam Smith’s ‘Wealth of Nations,’ by McCulloch, pp. 47, 48.
[226] Fleetwood gives the wages of a ship’s carpenter, in 1514, at
3_d._ per day from Candlemas to Michaelmas, and 6_d._ from Michaelmas
to Candlemas; a master caulker had 6_d._ and 5_d._, and inferior
caulkers 5_d._ and 4½_d._ per day respectively, 2_d._ per day being
deducted for diet. A great service has been done, especially in the
navy, by the diminishing the quantity of grog, and by the substitution
for it of cocoa, &c.
[227] 26 George III. chap. 60.
[228] McCulloch’s ‘Commercial Dictionary,’ article Registry; see also
Macpherson, iv. pp. 107-111, who gives the rules for measuring the
capacity of ships.
[229] Act of Congress, December 31, 1792, chap. i.
[230] For full details of the law with reference to neutral ships, see
Wheaton’s ‘International Law,’ vol. ii. c. iii.
[231] Macpherson, iv. pp. 112-116. It may create a smile when we state
that one clause in this treaty stipulated “that the merchants are at
liberty to keep their books as they please, and to write their letters
in any language they think proper.” Another clause provided that
British subjects were “not compelled to keep their accounts on stamped
paper with the exception of the Journal.”
[232] Of one hundred and thirty-seven vessels thus engaged in the year
1787, eighty were owned in Liverpool, and thirty in Bristol.
[233] Macpherson (iv. 145) gives the following dimensions of a
“slaver,” from a return presented to Parliament in 1786. Taking the
first on the list, a ship belonging to J. Brooks and Co., it appears
that the length of the lower deck, with the thickness of the grating
and the bulkhead, was 100 feet; her breadth of beam, from inside to
inside, 25 ft. 4 in.; the depth of the hold, from ceiling to lower
deck, 10 ft.; height between decks, 5 ft. 8 in.; length of the men’s
room on lower deck, 96 ft. 4 in.; breadth of the men’s room on lower
deck, 25 ft. 4 in.; length of the platform in men’s room on the lower
deck, 46 ft.; breadth of the same platform, 6 ft.; length of the
boys’ room, 13 ft. 9 in.; breadth of the boys’ room, 25 ft.; length
of platform in boys’ room, 6 ft.; length of the women’s room, 28 ft.
6 in.; breadth of women’s room, 23 ft. 6 in.; length of platform in
women’s room, 28 ft. 6 in.; breadth of platform in women’s room on
each side, 6 ft. The number of air-ports going-through the side of
the deck was 14; the length of the quarter-deck, 33 ft. 6 in., by a
breadth of 19 ft. 6 in.; the length of the cabin was 14 ft., by 19 ft.
in diameter, and 6 ft. 2 in. in height. The vessel, named after the
owners, the _Brooks_, is described as frigate-built without forecastle,
and pierced for 20 guns. When leaving the coast of Africa she carried,
besides her crew, 351 men, 121 women, 90 boys, and 41 girls, a total of
609! She lost by death, on her passage, 10 men, 5 women, 3 boys, and
1 girl. Her provisions for the negroes were:—20 tons of split beans,
peas, rice, shelled barley, and Indian corn; 2 tons of bread; 12 cwt.
of flour; 2070 yams, averaging 7 lbs. each; 34,002 gallons of water;
330 gallons of brandy, rum, &c.; 70 gallons of wine; 60 gallons of
vinegar; 60 gallons of molasses; 200 gallons of palm oil; 10 barrels of
beef; 20 cwt. of stock fish; with 100 lbs. of pepper. She was 49 days
on the passage from the Gold Coast to the West Indies, the shortest
passage of nine vessels reported being 42 days, and the longest 50 days.
[234] Sierra Leone was discovered in 1460. The number of slaves sent
out is said to have been four hundred males and sixty women. As a
settlement, Sierra Leone has met with indifferent success, and it
has been attacked more than once by the French and the neighbouring
Ashantees. The climate is peculiarly deadly to European constitutions
(Macpherson, iv. pp. 128 and 223).
[235] ‘Observations on the Commerce of the American States,’ by Lord
Sheffield.
[236] ‘Opinions on interesting subjects of Public Law and Commercial
Policy, arising from American Independence,’ by George Chalmers.
[237] The story of the early life of Lord Nelson well illustrates the
difficulties between the colonists, the Americans, and the English
government. In 1784 Captain Nelson found himself, as commanding the
_Boreas_ frigate, the senior captain on the West India Station, under a
general who hesitated about his duties, and was more than half inclined
to support the enemies of England, and an admiral who candidly admitted
he had not read the instructions from home under which he was bound to
act. How Nelson solved the difficulty by simply enforcing the Acts of
Parliament, and how Collingwood, in the _Mediator_, stood firmly by
him, is well told by Southey in his ‘Life of Lord Nelson,’ pp. 54-60
(Bohn’s ed.).
CHAPTER VII.
Great Britain, A.D. 1792—War with France, Feb. 1, 1793—Commercial
panic—Government lends assistance—High price of corn—Bounties
granted on its importation—Declaration of Russia, 1780—Confederacy
renewed when Bonaparte had risen to power—Capture of merchant
vessels—Do “free ships make free goods?”—Neutral nations repudiate
the English views—Their views respecting blockades—Right of
search—Chief doctrines of the neutrals—Mr. Pitt stands firm, and
is supported by Mr. Fox—Defence of the English principles—Nelson
sent to the Sound, 1801—Bombardment of Copenhagen—Peace of Amiens,
and its terms—Bonaparte’s opinion of free trade—Sequestration
of English property in France not raised—All claims remain
unanswered—Restraint on commerce—French spies sent to England to
examine her ports, &c.—Aggrandisement of Bonaparte—Irritation
in England—Bonaparte’s interview with Lord Whitworth—The
English ministers try to gain time—Excitement in England—The
King’s message—The invasion of England determined on—War
declared, May 18, 1803—Joy of the shipowners—Preparations in
England for defence—Captures of French merchantmen—Effect of
the war on shipping—Complaints of English shipowners—Hardships
of the pressing system—Apprentices—Suggestions to secure the
Mediterranean trade, and to encourage emigration to Canada—Value
of the Canadian trade.
[Sidenote: Great Britain, A.D. 1792.]
[Sidenote: War with France, Feb. 1, 1793.]
Notwithstanding numerous predictions that the merchant shipping of
Great Britain would be, to a great extent, supplanted by her now
formidable rivals on the other side of the Atlantic, England possessed,
in 1792, six hundred thousand tons of shipping, more than she had
at the commencement of the American war, while at the same time
her exports had risen to 5,457,733_l._; and when the great war with
France broke out, early in 1793, she owned 16,079 merchant vessels of
1,540,145 tons, under the management of 118,286 seamen.[238]
[Sidenote: Commercial panic.]
[Sidenote: Government lends assistance.]
Yet though comparatively ready for war, its actual declaration
caused a serious monetary convulsion, nor have we any record of so
many commercial failures on the declaration of any previous war. The
struggle for the retention of the American colonies had produced, as
war invariably does, numerous evils; and the South Sea Bubble, many
years earlier, had spread general ruin among those of her trading
community who had rushed wildly into the field of speculation; but now
commercial houses of the highest standing gave way under the shock.
Indeed the sufferings of the people became so intense that Parliament,
after much discussion, resolved to issue 5,000,000_l._ of exchequer
bills as a temporary loan to such of the merchants of London, Bristol,
Hull, Liverpool, Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Leith as could furnish
property equal to double the extent of the loan they requested.
The announcement of the intention of the government to support the
mercantile interests went so far towards dispelling the wide-prevailing
alarm, that the entire amount applied for did not, after all, exceed
3,855,624_l._; and in spite of this panic and of the calamities of war,
English merchant shipping continued to prosper. Indeed war generally
offers a large remunerative employment to her shipowners; moreover, in
this instance, the dread of famine served to increase the demand for
ships, and thereby enhanced their prosperity.
[Sidenote: High price of corn.]
As the winter of 1794-95 set in remarkably early, and proved to be of
extraordinary length and severity, many apprehensions were entertained
that the growing crops might suffer also. Nor were these fears
groundless; the price of wheat, which was 55_s._ 7_d._ on the 1st of
January, 1795, rose to 77_s._ 2_d._ on the 1st of July, and to no less
than 108_s._ 4_d._ per quarter in August of the same year. Government
had, early in 1795,[239] noticed with considerable anxiety the
indications of impending dearth. To check or modify these extraordinary
prices all neutral corn vessels bound to France were brought into
English ports, their cargoes being, however, paid for with a very ample
margin of profit to the owners.
[Sidenote: Bounties granted on its importation.]
Various remedies were proposed to counteract the evils of such high
prices, and Parliament ultimately enacted that a bounty of from 16_s._
to 20_s._ per quarter (according to the quality of the corn), and of
6_s._ per barrel on flour from the south of Europe, should be paid
till the quantity in store amounted to four hundred thousand quarters.
This law was to be in force till the 30th of September, 1796. Indeed
such was the state of alarm at the probable scarcity of food that
the members of both Houses of Parliament bound themselves[240] to
reduce the consumption of bread in their houses by one third, and to
recommend, as far as possible, a similar reduction in the daily food of
their friends and neighbours. By great exertions eight hundred thousand
quarters of foreign wheat were brought into the kingdom during 1796;
but even this extra quantity would have been insufficient to meet the
wants of the people had not an abundant harvest at home during that
year happily restored the balance of supply and demand, so that prices
once more declined to their ordinary range.
[Sidenote: Declaration of Russia, A.D. 1780.]
But though saved from the calamities of famine at home, England had
still to contend against the leading European powers. In 1780 Russia,
roused from the lethargy of ages by an unusually energetic monarch,
made great efforts to extend her power and commerce, not without a
manifest desire to grasp as much as she could of that more justly
belonging to other nations. With this view the Empress Catherine issued
her famous “Declaration to the Courts of St. James, Versailles, and
Madrid,” which is well worthy of consideration. In this celebrated
document, which however remained for some years in abeyance, the
Empress asserted that she had “fully manifested her sentiments of
moderation, and, further, that she had supported against the Ottoman
Empire the rights of neutrality and the liberty of universal commerce.”
She also expressed her surprise that her subjects were not permitted
“peaceably to enjoy the fruits of their industry, and the rights
belonging to a neutral nation;” and as she considered these principles
to be coincident with the primitive law of nations which every people
may claim, and even the belligerent powers cannot invalidate without
violating the laws of neutrality, she had declared:—
1. That all neutral ships may freely navigate from port to port and
along the coasts of nations at war.
2. That effects belonging to the subjects of the said warring powers
shall be free in all neutral vessels, not carrying goods contraband of
war.
3. That all such merchandise be included as is mentioned in the 10th
and 11th articles of her treaty of commerce with Great Britain, and
similar obligations extended to all the powers at war.
4. That a blockaded port means one so well watched by the ships of the
attacking power, that it is dangerous either to enter or leave it.[241]
[Sidenote: Confederacy renewed when Bonaparte had risen to power.]
Such were the principles then hurled at England by Catherine of Russia,
who placed herself at the head of an armed neutrality, consisting
of Denmark, Sweden, and Russia. Lord North, for a while, evaded any
direct reply to them; but the northern powers naturally found zealous
supporters in the nations now at war with Great Britain. Thus the
contemporary declarations of France, Spain, and the United States
lauded the moderation and public spirit which Catherine had displayed,
while England maintained her principles inviolate. But it was only
at the close of the century that the northern confederacy attempted
to enforce their principles. Bonaparte had then concluded peace with
Germany and Naples, had compelled Spain to coerce the Portuguese so
as to destroy all English trade on the coast of Portugal, and had
stimulated the action of the northern powers, by inspiring the Emperor
Paul with an infatuation which could only succeed in men of weak minds
like himself. The avowed aim of Bonaparte was to close every port in
Europe against the merchant shipping of England, to combine the naval
forces of Spain, Holland and France so as to make them act in concert,
and, thus, if possible, to rescue the army he had left in Egypt.
[Sidenote: Capture of merchant vessels.]
England’s position had already become sufficiently perilous, owing to
the order of the National Convention of France, issued in May 1793, to
their ships of war and privateers not to respect British property in
neutral vessels—an exception, however, being promptly made in favour
of American vessels: a resolution which continued in force till the
seizure by the English of the fleet of United States vessels, laden
with provisions for France, forced the Convention to rescind their
order.
American vessels thus became liable to capture on both sides, and
continued so till the French government, hearing that Mr. Jay had been
sent to London to remonstrate against the capture by English cruisers
of American vessels, renewed the order in favour of the United States’
ships. When, however, the National Convention found that Mr. Jay’s
remonstrances, so far from producing the effect anticipated, had led
to the conclusion of a treaty of amity and commerce between the two
countries adverse to France, they again decreed that their conduct to
neutral flags would be regulated by that of their enemies. The French
did not conceal their displeasure against the Americans, whom they
accused of base ingratitude; although it was evident to the whole world
that the assistance France had previously rendered to the revolted
colonists was simply prompted by a desire to check the power of
England, and not from any real sympathy with the American cause.
[Sidenote: Do “free ships make free goods?”]
In this instance the enforcement of the paper treaties pre-existing
between France and America threatened a rupture between the two
countries. The French ambassador to the United States presented a
remonstrance in September 1795 wherein he insisted upon the mutual
duties of neutrality. Not having received any answer, he made further
applications in the ensuing year, which were equally disregarded. In
his last note (27th of October, 1796) he observed, “that neutrality
no longer exists when, in the course of war, the neutral nation
grants to one of the belligerent powers advantages not stipulated by
treaties anterior to the war, or suffers that power to seize upon
them.” Mr. Pickering, the United States Secretary of State, replied
(3rd of November, 1796), that by the treaty of 1778 with France it was
expressly stipulated _that free ships should make free goods_;[242]
that the Americans, being now at peace, have the right of carrying
the property of the enemies of France; and that the French could
not expect them to renounce that privilege because it happened to
operate to the disadvantage of one of the parties engaged in the war.
He maintained _that the captures made by the British of American
vessels having French property on board were warranted by the law of
nations_; that the operation of this law was contemplated by France
and the United States when they formed their treaty of commerce, and
that their special stipulation on this point was meant as an exception
to an universal rule.[243] The Americans, moreover, saw the advantage
of preserving amicable commercial relations with Great Britain, and
this “_perfidious condescension_,” as the French stigmatised it, “to
the tyrannical and homicidal rage of the English government concurred
to plunge the people of France into the horrors of famine.”[244] This
violent correspondence thus threatened to embroil France and the
United States, and in about three weeks afterwards (15th of November,
1796) M. Adet, the French Minister at Philadelphia, gave notice that
his diplomatic functions were suspended, and, at the same time, the
Directory of France refused to receive Mr. Pinckney, the accredited
ambassador from the United States.
It was at this period, while French armies, under the generals of the
Republic, were pursuing their victorious career by land, that England,
on her natural element, the sea, sought to secure a compensating
balance by the monopoly of the carrying trade of the world. Desperate
measures were considered necessary to counteract the sweeping conquests
of the French and to save herself from what then appeared to be
impending annihilation. In 1794 and 1795 the conquest of Belgium and
Holland had been achieved by the arms of France; and in the following
year Napoleon began his victorious campaign in Italy, his first battle
having been gained at Montenotte on the 11th of April, 1796.[245]
But while the French were triumphant by land, the English soon became
equally predominant on the ocean. Their fleets swept the seas of all
their enemies. Through their vigilance, and the indomitable courage of
their crews, the merchant vessels of England had never in any former
war been so thoroughly protected. The premium of insurance which
had, in 1782, been fifteen guineas per cent. on those of her ships
engaged in the trade with India and China, did not exceed half that
rate at any period between the spring of 1793 and the close of this
terrible struggle. Nelson and his brave fellow-commanders were the
only, but they were a complete, barrier to Napoleon’s conquests. The
fleets of France were either destroyed or shut up in her ports, and,
to use Napoleon’s own expression, he could not send a cockle boat to
sea without the risk of its being captured. The loyalty and courage
of the English nation had, amid all their sufferings, risen with the
emergency. In Mr. Pitt the merchants, shipowners, and agriculturists
had found a most able and truly loyal, though a cold, proud, disdainful
champion; his extraordinary administrative talents and unswerving love
of his country rendering him the idol of the mercantile and shipping
classes. But though he had weathered the storm during seventeen years,
he now felt it prudent to withdraw for a while from office; his
retirement being, no doubt, greatly induced by the differences between
him and the King respecting Catholic Emancipation. His influence,
however, and the policy he had unflinchingly pursued, continued to
guide the councils of the Addington administration which succeeded him.
[Sidenote: Neutral nations repudiate the English views.]
It was then that the question of neutral rights, originally promulgated
by Catherine of Russia in 1780, first seriously attracted the attention
of those nations of Europe who were not directly involved in the war,
and especially of the United States of America, now fast becoming a
power of no mean importance, and one, even then, prepared to assert her
rights. These powers indignantly repudiated the claims which England,
under Pitt, had enforced. They alleged that the accidents of war ought
not to interfere with the trade of those not engaged in it; and that
they were justified in possessing themselves of such carrying trade
as the belligerents had been obliged to relinquish. Holding these
views, they claimed the right of frequenting freely all the ports of
the world, and of passing to and fro between those of the belligerent
nations; thus traversing from France and Spain to England, from England
to Spain and France, and (what was still more disputable) of going from
the colonies to the mother-countries, as for instance, from Mexico to
Spain. They resolutely maintained the principle that “the flag covers
the merchandise;” that the flag of neutrals sheltered from search
the merchandise transported in their vessels; that in such vessels
French merchandise could not be seized by the English, nor English
merchandise by the French; in short, that the ships of neutrals were as
sacred as the soil of the country to which they belonged. On the other
hand, they admitted that they ought not to carry goods unquestionably
contraband of war, it being incompatible with any notion of neutrality
that the neutral should supply one of the belligerent nations with
arms against the other. They, however, sought to limit their admission
solely to articles fabricated for war, such as muskets, cannon, powder,
projectiles, and materials for accoutrements of every kind; nor did
they consider provisions interdicted, except such as were prepared for
military and naval armaments, as, for example, biscuits.
[Sidenote: Their views respecting blockades.]
They made a second admission as to the ports which might be entered,
but only on the express condition that these should be accurately
defined; and, further, that it could be shown that such ports were
_bonâ fide_ blockaded by a naval force capable of laying siege to them,
or of reducing them to famine. In such cases they allowed that running
the blockade was an attempt to thwart one of the belligerents in the
exercise of its legitimate right, while at the same time it afforded
succour to one of the powers against the other. They insisted further,
that the blockade should be preceded by formal declarations, that it
should not be a mere paper blockade, and that it should be carried out
by a force that it would be impossible to pass through without great
danger.
[Sidenote: Right of search.]
[Sidenote: Chief doctrines of the neutrals.]
Lastly, as it was necessary to ascertain whether a vessel really
belonged to the nation whose flag she hoisted, and whether she had,
or had not, on board goods contraband of war, the neutrals admitted
the right of search if carried out with certain courtesies to be
agreed upon, and if rigorously observed. Above all, they insisted that
merchant vessels, regularly convoyed by a ship of war, should not be
exposed to search, the naval, or royal flag, in their opinion, enjoying
the privilege of being at once believed when it was affirmed, upon the
honour of its nation, that the vessels so convoyed were of its own
nation, and were not carrying interdicted articles.[246]
The doctrines asserted by the neutrals being similar in most
respects to the declaration issued by Catherine of Russia, are
therefore reducible to four principal points: (1) The flag covers
the merchandise, that is to say, no neutral ship is to be searched
for an enemy’s goods. (2) No merchandise is to be interdicted except
contraband of war. This contraband to be confined solely to articles
made for the use of armies or navies, corn and naval stores not being
included under this head. (3) Access not to be interdicted to any
port unless it is _bonâ fide_ blockaded. (4) No ships under regular
convoy to be subjected to search. Such were the principles maintained
by France, Prussia, Denmark, Sweden, Russia, and the United States
of America: they were, however, but loosely observed when their own
interests were involved.
[Sidenote: Mr. Pitt stands firm, and is supported by Mr. Fox.]
Notwithstanding this mighty confederacy, leagued together to overthrow
the maritime supremacy of Great Britain, Mr. Pitt stood forward as the
undaunted champion of her shipping interests, and asked the House of
Commons whether they would tamely suffer the country to be borne down
by the hostility of the northern powers, or “would submissively allow
those powers to abuse and kick it out of its rights?” He declared that
the four northern nations had leagued together to produce a code of
maritime laws in defiance of the established law of nations, at the
same time strenuously denying that “free bottoms make free goods,” an
opinion in which he was supported by Mr. Fox.
[Sidenote: Defence of the English principles.]
England accordingly insisted upon seizing enemy’s merchandise wherever
it could be found, maintaining the principle that contraband of war
included naval and military stores, indeed everything which could give
succour to an enemy; and, though she admitted that ports ought to be
considered in a state of blockade only when it was unsafe to enter
them, she repudiated utterly the pretended right claimed by the neutral
powers, that no vessel under convoy could be searched. “If,” exclaimed
Mr. Pitt, “we subscribe to the doctrines laid down by the neutral
powers, a small armed sloop would suffice to convoy the trade of the
whole world. England would lose her own trade, and could not take any
steps against the trade of her enemies. She could no longer prevent
Spain from receiving the precious metals of the New World, nor preclude
France from obtaining the naval munitions of war supplied by the North.
Rather than thus sacrifice our naval greatness at the shrine of Russia,
it were better to envelop ourselves in our own flag, and proudly find
our grave in the deep, than admit the validity of such principles in
the maritime code of civilised nations.”[247]
[Sidenote: Nelson sent to the Sound, 1801.]
[Sidenote: Bombardment of Copenhagen.]
Although Mr. Pitt had retired about ten days from office when he
delivered those opinions, his successors made prodigious efforts to
maintain the policy he had so long pursued. Nelson, who had already
gained immortal fame by the battle of the Nile (August 1st, 1798), was
despatched, second in command to Admiral Sir Hyde Parker, to the Sound,
with the double object of overawing Denmark and of preventing the
junction of the fleets of the coalitionists. The details of Nelson’s
extraordinary exploit are too well known to be here recapitulated.
Practically assuming the chief command, he, amid the difficult
navigation of the shoals which protect Copenhagen, bombarded the three
Crown batteries of the Danes (April 2nd, 1801), attacked their fleet
with signal success, and, when their determined resistance placed his
squadron in the extremity of danger, and Admiral Sir Hyde Parker made
the signal to discontinue the action, placing the glass to his blind
eye, he exclaimed, “I really do not see Parker’s signal for leaving off
action.”
After a terrible bombardment the Danes, who had suffered most severely,
allowed their fire to slacken, and at length to cease. The captured
vessels would not, however, yield up possession, so that an irregular
firing was still partially kept up; and, in spite of their heavy
losses, the Danes declined to withdraw from the confederacy of the
neutral powers, or to open their ports to English merchant shipping,
until that great confederacy[248] was broken up by the death of Paul
I. of Russia. When his successor, Alexander I., ascended the throne,
the 24th of March, 1801, his first step was to remove the embargo on
merchant shipping, which had been so unjustifiably imposed by his
predecessor; he had, indeed, no desire to wage a war of principles
against France, and still less against England. The effects of this
wise policy were soon apparent throughout Europe. England at once made
peace with Russia[249] and the northern powers, and secretly entered
into negotiations for the settlement of preliminaries of peace with
France.
[Sidenote: Peace of Amiens, and its terms.]
Both nations were indeed by this time anxious for peace, Napoleon
having in view the consolidation of his own personal power, while the
English ministry sought repose for the country after a ten years’ war;
and the people themselves were equally anxious with their rulers that
war should cease. By the treaty it was agreed that England should
restore to France, and to the other powers of Europe, all the maritime
conquests she had made, with the exception of those parts of India
which she had definitively acquired, embracing Ceylon, captured from
the Dutch, and Trinidad, wrested from the Spaniards. She proposed,
however, to restore the Cape of Good Hope, Demerara, Berbice, Essequibo
and Surinam to the Dutch; Martinique to the French; Minorca to the
Spaniards; and to assign Malta to the still surviving members of the
order of St. John of Jerusalem. England also evacuated Porto Ferrajo,
which, with the island of Elba, was to be given back to the French. As
an equivalent, the French were to evacuate the territory of Naples,
that is, the gulf of Otranto, and Egypt, which France has ever been
anxious to obtain, was restored to the Porte.
The preliminaries of this important treaty were signed on the night of
the 1st of October, and a courier was despatched to Paris, with a view
to make the public announcement simultaneously to the people on both
sides of the Channel. The public joy both in France and England was
of the most exciting character, as the negotiations, which had been
carried on during nine months, had been kept profoundly secret up to
the last moment. Napoleon and his colleagues, the other two consuls,
Cambacérès and Lebrun, received the news at a cabinet council, and
they embraced each other with undisguised delight. In this moment of
satisfaction Cambacérès remarked, “Now that we have made peace with
England, we have only to conclude a treaty of commerce, and all cause
for future dissension between the two countries will be removed.”
[Sidenote: Bonaparte’s opinion of free-trade.]
“Not quite so fast,” rejoined the First Consul, with some energy. “A
political peace is concluded; so much the better, let us enjoy it. As
regards a commercial peace, we will make one if we can. But I will not
on any consideration whatever sacrifice French industry. I remember the
distress of 1786.”[250]
Treaties of peace were now formed between all the nations of the
continent, and peace caused deeper public emotion in all ranks of
people throughout Europe than perhaps any event which had happened for
many centuries.
But this peace, in which so many millions of people rejoiced, was of
short duration. Having by the treaties of Luneville and Amiens[251]
raised himself and France to the highest power and influence in
Europe, Napoleon had now constituted himself consul for life; had
restored the national religion to France, established tranquillity and
good government in all the departments of the state, reorganised the
finances, previously in a deplorable confusion; and had finally, with
Prussia, secularised the ecclesiastical states of Germany, mediatised
a number of smaller German princes, and parcelled out a large portion
of Europe in the most arbitrary, though in some respects judicious
manner. In a word, he had raised himself and France to the highest
pitch of political influence, and only wanted the name of emperor,
which in a year or two afterwards he assumed to be, in every sense the
most powerful potentate in Europe. The world was dazzled with a success
which, until that period, had been combined with many acts of profound
wisdom. But this remarkable man, who could so well govern the unquiet
spirit of France, could not govern himself—
“Oh! happy he who wisely can
Govern that little empire, man.”
Ere long his rage for power and distinction again involved all
Europe in one of the most sanguinary wars recorded in the history of
the world, a war which only terminated after the final struggle at
Waterloo, and in the exile for ever of the Emperor from the scene of
his glory.
[Sidenote: Sequestrations of English property in France not raised.]
[Sidenote: All claims remain unanswered.]
By the fourteenth article of the treaty of Amiens it was provided that
all sequestrations[252] imposed in France and England on the property
of their respective subjects during the war should be abolished, on the
ratification of the peace; and, acting in the spirit of good faith,
the English government, to prove their desire of living on terms of
amicable intercourse with France, at once and punctually performed
their part of this agreement. Indeed as early as the 25th of May,
1802, Mr. Merry, the English diplomatic agent at Paris, notified to
the French minister that His Majesty had, in conformity with this
article, taken off the sequestration on the property of all French
citizens in his dominions, at the same time adding his belief that the
French government would perform the same act of justice towards such
Englishmen as might have property in France. The reasonable request
contained in the latter part of this notification was urged more than
once by Mr. Merry, but Lord Whitworth’s despatch from Paris to Lord
Hawkesbury, dated the 10th of May, 1803, explains with how little
success these applications were entertained by the French government.
“With regard,” said his lordship, “to the numerous memorials and
representations which I have had to make to this government in behalf
of those of His Majesty’s subjects who have suffered by the detention
and confiscation of their vessels and property in French ports, I have
only to observe that they have, with one or two exceptions, remained
unanswered.” Under circumstances so studiously insulting, the British
government, to the surprise of its own people, persisted in a pacific,
if not submissive, demeanour. Instead of resenting such conduct, the
English ministers were content with making new efforts at conciliation.
They removed all the prohibitions on French trade imposed during the
war, placing her shipping in all respects on the same footing as the
vessels of other states in amity with Great Britain, a course involving
much injustice to many British subjects whose interests were thus
postponed to the paramount exigencies of state necessity.
[Sidenote: Restraint on commerce.]
[Sidenote: French spies sent to England to examine her ports, etc.]
As every step of the First Consul indicated a desire to embarrass
English commerce, it was impossible that friendly relations could
be long maintained between France and England. Under the pretext
of a renewal of arrangements formerly subsisting between the two
countries, Napoleon despatched to England a number of agents whose
ostensible occupation was to watch over the interests of French trade
and navigation, their real business and most important commission being
to make inquiries into the commercial value of each port; the course
of exchange; the state of the neighbouring manufactures and fairs;
together with every detail necessary for establishing a rivalry in
trade. These in themselves were legitimate and perhaps not unfriendly
objects, but each agent was further required “to furnish a plan of the
ports of his district,” with “a specification of the soundings for
mooring vessels.” If no plan could be procured, then he was enjoined to
point out, “with what wind vessels could come in and go out, and what
was the greatest draught of water with which they could enter therein
deeply laden.”
From the earliest moment of his assumption of power Napoleon had
conceived the idea that England, “a mere nation of shopkeepers,” could
be most effectually injured by directing his hostility against her
trade, and certain it is that, with unintermitting pertinacity, he
tried to carry out this design. It happened, however, that military
men and engineers were selected to act as “commercial agents,” the two
most able and active of whom having actually commenced their duties in
Guernsey and Dublin, while others arrived in London to receive final
instructions from leaders who had been recognised by Lord Hawkesbury,
the English Commissary-general of the commercial relations with the
French republic in London. The English government could hardly fail to
notice these suspicious circumstances, revealing as they did but too
plainly the object of these pseudo-commercial agents. Lord Hawkesbury
consequently made a verbal representation to the French ambassador of
the facts; but his reply was so flimsy and unsatisfactory, that the
French agents were detained in London, with a further intimation that
if they left it they would at once receive orders to quit the country.
[Sidenote: Aggrandisement of Bonaparte.]
[Sidenote: Irritation in England.]
It is unnecessary to recapitulate at length the various acts by which
Bonaparte, during a presumed period of peace, endeavoured to aggrandise
his power. Suffice it to say that he despatched an enormous military
force to the island of San Domingo with a view of placing the colonial
power of France in the West Indies on a level with that of Great
Britain: an expedition which, however, proved most disastrous, many
thousands of his soldiers finding their graves in a climate singularly
dangerous to European constitutions.[253] But when Bonaparte sent Ney
with thirty thousand men “to give,” in the phraseology of the day,
“a constitution” to Switzerland, the war party in England roused the
entire nation to energetic action, and, though the public language
of ministers still breathed a spirit of peace, it was resolved that
effectual steps should be taken to curb Napoleon’s further progress.
Italy, Holland, and Liguria (as the Genoese republic was called at that
time) had fallen under his iron rule. Spain he had likewise overawed,
while exercising a predominating influence over Austria, whose power
he had humbled; and, in the opinion of the French people, the insular
position of England alone “prevented her from being absorbed into a
French province,” thus sinking beneath the domineering power of the
French Dictator. The very thought of such humiliating conditions was
totally incompatible with the independent spirit of Englishmen. The
newspaper press, though at that time swayed by a spirit of party, yet
still free, sounded the alarm, and attacked the ruler of France with
an undaunted spirit, which Bonaparte could not endure. He lost all
temper when complaining of the unmistakable opinions expressed of his
conduct and intentions by the English press; though the too complaisant
English ministers prosecuted the offending parties.[254] In the midst
of this excitement the question of the surrender of Malta arose, only
to intensify the suspicions of the English people, the more so as
Bonaparte was making prodigious preparations of a military and naval
character in Holland.
[Sidenote: Bonaparte’s interview with Lord Whitworth.]
Although Talleyrand on the 18th of February, 1803, in a conference,
told Lord Whitworth that Sebastiani’s mission was “purely commercial,”
his lordship on the same day received a message from the First Consul,
appointing a personal interview to be held at the Tuileries three days
afterwards, which revealed a very different state of things. This
celebrated interview, which lasted two hours, had been previously
carefully rehearsed by Bonaparte, with the idea of either deceiving or
intimidating England. “Every wind which blows from England,” exclaimed
the petulant ruler of France, as he stood at one end of his table with
Lord Whitworth at the other, “is charged with hatred and outrage;”
and in this strain he harangued the ambassador throughout, inveighing
with bitterness against England, though drawing the veil carefully to
conceal his own acts of territorial ambition; and, in the midst of
his tirades, throwing out broad hints that if England and France were
but united they might share the whole world between them.[255] “As
for Malta,” he exclaimed, after he had worked himself into a frenzy,
“my mind is made up; I would rather see the English in possession of
the heights of Montmartre[256] than that they should continue to hold
Malta.” Lord Whitworth stared in calm, imperturbable silence at this
outbreak of well-feigned passion; but, on that same evening, made his
government acquainted with the extraordinary conversation to which he
had listened, the most startling matter of which was the First Consul’s
declaration “that Egypt must _sooner or later_ belong to France;” and
that in the dismemberment of the Turkish Empire France would take care
to have her share. A few days later, conscious of the folly of his
previous speech, he caused it to be notified to Lord Whitworth that “a
project was in contemplation, by which the integrity of the Turkish
Empire would be effectually secured,” Napoleon having evidently
perceived that he had overshot his mark, and, therefore, that he must
endeavour to obliterate the impression he had made on the mind of the
English ambassador.
[Sidenote: The English ministers try to gain time.]
The bolt was however shot, and to retrieve his indiscretion was beyond
his power. The English ministry, although they saw that war was
inevitable, were desirous of protracting the issue; they, therefore,
desired Lord Whitworth to state that His Majesty could not evacuate
Malta till substantial security was provided for those objects which
might be materially endangered by the removal of his troops. While
England was firm, Bonaparte, on the other hand, as was often his habit
whenever his schemes were thwarted, rashly published an extravagant
paper in the _Moniteur_, as an exposition of the powerful state of
France, and of his own glory. The whole of the past policy of France,
together with his intentions, were disclosed in this ostentatious
instrument. The other powers on the continent were plainly told how
impossible it would be for any of them to obstruct or interfere with
the prosecution of French designs; while they were reminded of the
advantages to be derived from the protection of France, and of the
destructive consequences of her enmity.
[Sidenote: Excitement in England.]
The public mind in England was wound up to the highest pitch of
excitement by the publication, in the official _Moniteur_, of the
“Acts of the Republic.” Nor did the love of peace, the desire of a
commercial people to preserve an uninterrupted intercourse with the
continent, or the dread of fresh burthens, allay their indignation. All
the independent portion of the English press poured forth a ceaseless
torrent of abuse of the French despot, thereby accelerating the crisis;
nay, even the government journals, which had previously observed
a guarded silence, now joined the chorus of national indignation.
The English ministers had sent orders to the Cape of Good Hope to
surrender that colony; and some of its forts had been actually given
up to the Dutch government. The commander-in-chief, however, learning
from England the critical state of affairs, repossessed himself with
adroitness of the places given up, relanded his troops, and held
possession of the settlement until counter-orders arrived.
In the meantime Bonaparte was with the utmost secresy preparing the
most formidable preparations in Holland, and had already conceived and
partly matured his grand design for the invasion of England. Yet even
then, so completely were ministers unprepared or unconscious of his
proceedings, that one of the Lords of the Admiralty said, in the course
of a debate in Parliament, that only a few miserable fishing-boats
existed in the Dutch ports; while, so late as the 23rd of February, the
Prime Minister declared the country to be in a state of profound peace.
[Sidenote: The King’s message.]
[Sidenote: The invasion of England determined upon.]
[Sidenote: War declared, 18 May, 1803.]
However, on the 8th of March, 1803, the King sent a message to the
House of Commons, acquainting them that he had judged it expedient
to adopt additional measures of precaution for the security of his
dominions, and, only two days later, the whole of the militia of the
United Kingdom were called out and embodied. The energy and spirit of
the monarch obtained an enthusiastic support from all ranks of his
people; and Bonaparte, not yet quite prepared, launched forth one of
his manifestoes in the form of a despatch to his ambassador at the
English court, in which he disclaimed having any prepared armament
except one at Helvoetsluys; adding, further, that this, though destined
solely for purposes of colonisation, and ready to sail, should, in
consequence of the king’s message, at once be countermanded. Very
soon afterwards, however, he despatched staff-officers to Holland,
Cherbourg, St. Malo, Granville, and Brest, with orders to repair all
the gun-boats of his former Boulogne flotilla, and to collect in every
port all craft available for the transportation of troops. He further
ordered the construction of a vast number of flat-bottomed boats to
carry heavy guns, and made the most formidable preparations for his
cherished scheme of invading England. He also made arrangements for the
occupation of Hanover, Portugal, and the gulf of Otranto (Tarentum),
so as to control the Mediterranean, with the view of having thus
under his command the whole continent of Europe from Denmark to the
Adriatic.[257] With a similar object he collected a vast force at
Bayonne to march into the Peninsula, and a second army at Faenza of ten
thousand men and eighty guns to fall upon Naples; while he, at the same
time, relanded the troops at Helvoetsluys, which, he had declared, were
destined for Louisiana, and despatched them to Flushing. All the ports
of the north of France were fortified in the strongest manner, and
when, a few weeks later, he formed the celebrated camp at Boulogne,
war was declared on the 18th of May, 1803, after a peace of only a year
and a half.[258]
[Sidenote: Joy of the shipowners.]
[Sidenote: Preparations in England for defence.]
[Sidenote: Captures of French merchantmen.]
The shipowners and merchants of London, after what had taken place,
heard the news of the formal declaration of war with tumultuous
exultation; indeed war seemed then more acceptable than peace had
been eighteen months before. Nelson was appointed to take charge of
the Channel fleet, and a force of volunteers was speedily embodied,
sufficient to convince Bonaparte that the invasion of England was
not so easy as he had anticipated, even “although all France rallied
around the hero which it admired.”[259] The English government, not
waiting for the formal declaration of war, seized upon all the French
merchant vessels they could meet with. Indeed, the news reached
Paris, just after Lord Whitworth left that capital, that two English
frigates had captured in the bay of Audierne some French merchantmen
which were endeavouring to get into Brest. The intelligence of other
captures soon followed. There had been an agreement between France and
the United States on the subject of such captures (30th of September,
1800); but, strangely enough, the treaty of Amiens was silent upon
this subject; hence the English government, viewing the prodigious
military preparations of Bonaparte on land, retaliated in the only way
they could retaliate effectively, by claiming the supremacy of the
ocean. In seizing the French merchantmen before war had been formally
declared, England adhered to her invariable practice when war, though
unproclaimed, existed de facto. But the ruler of France was unprepared
for this blow, and, in the first impulse of his resentment, he issued
a decree arresting as prisoners of war all Englishmen then travelling
in France. Nor was he induced till after long solicitation to limit the
action of this decree to persons holding the king’s commission.[260]
[Sidenote: Effect of the war on shipping.]
The first effect of hostilities on England’s maritime commerce and
shipping seems to have been to reduce the nominal value of the cargoes
exported from 41,411,966_l._ in 1802 to 31,438,985_l._ in 1803. The
next effect was to introduce into the carrying trade of Great Britain
an extra supply of one hundred and twelve thousand eight hundred and
nineteen tons of foreign vessels, whilst the third was to lessen,
by one hundred and seventy-three thousand nine hundred tons, her
own mercantile shipping; so that the success which had attended
the business of the shipowner during the previous war no longer
accompanied him, especially during the earlier period of the renewal
of hostilities, the majority of this class suffering heavy losses. The
owners of neutral vessels, while enjoying many other privileges, had
likewise the advantage of obtaining from the Baltic and elsewhere the
materials necessary for the construction of their vessels, at less cost
than the British shipowners. The English government also levied a heavy
tax on timber, hemp, canvas, and other articles requisite for the
conduct of their business, and insisted on licenses being taken out,
and bonds given to the commissioners of customs for the construction
and navigation of their ships.
[Sidenote: Complaints of English shipowners.]
Against these and other special burdens British shipowners now loudly,
and not without cause, complained. They remarked, with much force,
that it was of the last importance that their vessels should trade on
equal terms with those of other nations, but that “so long as they
continued to be burthened with tonnage, convoy, port-duties, extra
insurance, heavy taxes for docks, canals, tunnels, and _a thousand
other water-brain schemes_, they will continue to drag on a miserable
existence, till even the profitable concerns of _ship-breaking_ shall
be seen no more.”[261] Had their complaints been confined to the
special burdens with which they were afflicted, the sympathy of the
country would have gone with them; but when they formed an association,
which had for its object the maintenance of the old navigation laws in
their original integrity, they received no support even from Mr. Pitt,
a leading member of whose Administration declared “that however wise
and salutary the navigation laws might have been in the infancy of our
commerce, he did not perceive the efficacy of them at present, and the
necessity of strictly adhering to their original provisions.” This
truth was, indeed, at last beginning to break forth upon the world; but
it still required many years to convert the shipowners to what they not
unnaturally regarded as a heretical doctrine.
Thus they contended, with redoubled force, that if, in the infancy
of commerce, the navigation laws had been wise and salutary, their
rigorous enforcement now was more than ever imperative, not only from
the amazing increase of foreign shipping, but from the heavy duties
to which British shipping was liable. British ships, they said, stood
charged with duties not merely on every article necessary for their
equipment, amounting to upwards of seven per cent. on their whole
value, but double duty was levied on their gross tonnage, denominated a
_war tax_, though really the offspring of what was termed “a profound
peace.”[262] The ships of Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Prussia, they
went on to state, could be built and navigated at much lower rates than
those of Britain, while many naval stores were the original produce
of countries whose ships were not burthened with heavy duties, and
where, too, provisions were cheap and wages low. Hence foreigners, it
was alleged, “were able to take freight at a lower rate; and, as the
smallest difference in that respect determined the preference of the
merchant, the carrying-trade of Europe was almost entirely wrested from
us.”
Whatever may have been the cause that led to this result, it was
stated publicly at the end of March 1804, that there was then scarcely
a single offer of trade for a British bottom, except such as were
employed in the coasting or colonial trades, which were held secure by
the strict enforcement of the Navigation Act. The shipowners pointed
with dismay to the mooring places in the river Thames, which were
crowded with foreign ships in full employ; while British vessels
covered the banks or filled the wet docks in a state of inactivity and
decay.
[Sidenote: Hardships of the pressing-system.]
[Sidenote: Apprentices.]
Nor did their complaint stop here. The arbitrary system of impressing
sea-apprentices, a system which acted with especial injury in the case
of those of the watermen on the river who, being liable to be impressed
in the fourth year of their apprenticeship, were lost to their masters
when their services were becoming remunerative, was severely and
justly criticised; indeed it is on record that, before this period,
there had been no fewer than thirty thousand watermen, etc., at
work on the river Thames, between Westminster-bridge and Gravesend,
exclusive of the British and foreign seamen on board the shipping;
but that in 1804 there was not a sixth part of that number. The new
dock regulations and the employment of carts instead of lighters to
carry goods to the merchants’ inland warehouses swelled the general
catalogue of grievances, while the erection of the East India Docks,
then in progress, was looked on as the crowning act of mischief, and
was therefore viewed by the forlorn shipowners with unmitigated horror.
[Sidenote: Suggestions to secure the Mediterranean trade,]
Amid this numerous body of complainers, some of whose grievances were
real, some insignificant, and others imaginary, there were happily
men who had more enlarged views, and who were able to urge on the
government[263] to take effectual steps to extend the foreign trade,
and to devote more attention than heretofore to the colonial and
especially to the West India business, in which large commercial
fortunes were soon afterwards realised. The trade of the Mediterranean
was proposed by them to be cultivated and re-established, as a course
of business likely to give vast employment to her shipping, and to
secure for England a predominating power and influence over other
nations. With this view the establishment of well-qualified agents,
versed in commercial affairs, in various ports of that sea was strongly
advocated.
[Sidenote: and to encourage emigration to Canada.]
[Sidenote: Value of the Canadian trade.]
But perhaps the most important point of policy pressed upon the
attention of the government in connection with shipping was the
expediency of encouraging emigration to Canada, with a view to the
cultivation of hemp, timber, and other naval stores, so as thus to
render England independent of Russia and of the other Northern powers.
Far-seeing politicians, and especially Mr. Pitt, had already perceived
that the ultimate objects of Russia were to unite the Baltic and the
Mediterranean, to secure the trade of the south by the naval stores
of the north, and eventually to dispossess England of the trade of
the Levant; and this judgment was confirmed by the fact that at this
juncture Russia held back and allowed Napoleon to prosecute his
schemes of conquest unchecked. It was, therefore, deemed sound policy
on the part of England to take every means in her power to enlarge
her shipping business with her own colonies. The timber trade alone
sufficed to tempt many enterprising Englishmen to strain every effort
to open out the vast regions comprised under the names of Upper and
Lower Canada. They soon discovered that in those colonies there were
nine or ten different indigenous species of oak; that among these the
live oak, a very superior description of timber, was of most use for
ship-building; that firs and pines abounded in great variety; that the
uncultivated parts of the country contained the most extensive forests
in the world; and that the white Canadian pine was better adapted than
any wood to be found in the Baltic for masts of the largest and best
description.
They were also aware that when Canada was under the dominion of the
French a sixty-gun ship had been constructed of the red pine of that
country, which was found very suitable for the purpose. Besides various
descriptions of timber well adapted for ship-building purposes,
Canada produced the pitch-pine tree, which yields abundance of pitch,
tar, resin, and turpentine, so that English shipowners had resources
within their own colonies which would render them in a great measure
independent of Russia if they were only developed. The great importance
of these and other articles of naval stores, and their prodigious
abundance in Canada, caused much more attention to be directed to the
trade of that country than had hitherto been the case; but it was only
after the perseverance of many years in these judicious efforts to
develop the agricultural riches of her North American colonies, that
English shipowners reaped the benefits of the extensive trade now
carried on between them and the mother-country.
FOOTNOTES:
[238] Abundant evidence on the elasticity of the commerce of England
in spite of all the odds against her may be seen in Macpherson, vol.
iv. _passim_; in Lord Sheffield’s ‘Observations on the Treaty with
America;’ and Chalmers’ ‘Comparative Estimate of the Strength of Great
Britain,’ 1794.
[239] The sufferings of the French, especially in Paris, in March,
1795, from famine and the severity of the weather, was even greater
than any experienced in England (Alison, ii. p. 604).
[240] ‘Parliamentary History,’ Dec. 11, 1795.
[241] _Vide_ ‘Annual Register,’ 1780, p. 348, where the declarations of
Great Britain and the other Powers will be found. Denmark and Sweden
replied in July 1780, assenting to Catherine’s doctrines.
[242] See further details on this subject, and on the duties of
neutrals, together with an examination of the Orders of Council,
_infra_ ch. viii.
[243] _Vide_ ‘Annual Register,’ 1796, p. 308.
[244] _Vide_ the American despatch quoting the French minister’s
despatch of the 29th of Sept., 1795. This famine was subsequently
noticed by Bonaparte in his speech to Cambacérès on receiving the news
of the Peace of Amiens.
[245] Alison, iii. p. 28.
[246] See various details on these matters in the correspondence
between Lord Hawkesbury and Mr. Rufus King, quoted in Mr. Alex.
Baring’s pamphlet, pp. 39, 41, 53; and ‘Rights of War as to Neutrals,’
in Wheaton’s ‘Elements of International Law,’ vol. II. ch. iii. pp.
132-260; and in Furneaux, ‘Treaties of Peace since that of Westphalia,’
8vo, Lond., 1817.
[247] On the 18th January, 1798, the French Directory issued a decree
declaring: “that all ships having for their cargoes, in whole or in
part, any English merchandise shall be held good prize, whoever is
the proprietor of such merchandise, which should be held contraband
from the single circumstance of its coming from England, or any of its
foreign settlements; that the harbours of France shall be shut against
all ships having touched at England except in cases of distress; and
that neutral sailors found on board English vessels should be put to
death”!—Ann. Reg. 1800, 54, 55.
[248] The fleets of the Confederacy were as follows: Spain and Holland
united possessed eighty ships fully equipped. Sweden had twenty-eight,
Russia thirty-five, Denmark twenty-three, making a total of one
hundred and sixty-six ships of the line: a force that would have been
infinitely superior to the British navy, but that the efficiency of her
vessels and armaments far surpassed those of the Confederacy. Austria
alone was then in amity with Great Britain.
[249] Alison, iv. p. 529.
[250] M. Thiers, in his ‘Consulate and the Empire,’ book xi. vol. iii.,
relates this remarkable anecdote, and adds that “Cambacérès, with his
usual sagacity, had touched upon the difficulty which at a subsequent
period was again to embroil the two nations.” And see _ante_, p. 294.
[251] The preliminaries of peace were signed at Amiens October 1, 1801,
and the definite Treaty March 27, 1802. See also Alison, iv., pp.
604-624.
[252] See excellent remarks on the ‘Rights of war as against Enemies’
in Wheaton, vol. ii. ch. ii. pp. 75-131.
[253] It is said that of thirty-five thousand men (including
reinforcements) scarcely seven thousand reached France again (Alison,
v. p. 43).
[254] The most striking instance was the prosecution of M. Peltier for
an alleged libel on the First Consul. In this Peltier was condemned,
though defended with extraordinary power and eloquence by Sir James
Mackintosh (see ‘Trial of Peltier,’ etc., Lond. 1801).
[255] Perhaps the most graphic description of this remarkable scene is
that by M. Thiers, in his ‘History of the Consulate and the Empire.’
[256] “_Effroyable parole!_” (“Frightful expression!”) ejaculates M.
Thiers, “which was afterwards but too truly realised for the misfortune
of our country” (France).
[257] M. Thiers dwells on all these aggressive schemes with a certain
national pride. The lives of millions were to be sacrificed to carry
out these mad freaks of ambition!
[258] The English Legislature was nearly unanimous in supporting the
Declaration of War; the numbers in the House of Commons being three
hundred and ninety-eight for, sixty-seven against; and in the House of
Lords, one hundred and forty-two to ten (Alison, v. p. 126).
[259] Speech of M. de Fontanes in his reply to the _Corps d’ l’Etat_,
when war was announced by Bonaparte.
[260] Others who had not held the King’s commission were occasionally
thus detained. Thus the Rev. Mr. Lee, then a Fellow of New College
Oxford, was kept a prisoner at Verdun till 1814. The number altogether
arrested is said to have been ten thousand (Alison, v. 114).
[261] Extracted from two letters which appeared in the _Morning
Chronicle_ in the early part of 1804, and which attracted considerable
attention at the time.
[262] Tonnage Duties Acts, 42 Geo. IV. c. 43; 43 Geo. IV. c. 70, United
Kingdom.
[263] See sensible remarks in Mr. Baring’s pamphlet (p. 7) on Mr.
Pitt’s firmness in not giving way to the popular clamour on this
occasion.
CHAPTER VIII.
Mr. Fox tries to make peace with France, 1806—Napoleon’s
Proclamation—English Order in Council, April 8, 1806—Berlin
Decree, Nov. 10, 1806—Its terms, and the stringency of its
articles—Napoleon’s skill and duplicity—Russian campaign
conceived—Berlin decree enforced—Increased rates of
insurance—English Orders in Council, 1807—Preamble of third
Order in Council—Terms of this Order—Neutrals—The Orders
discussed—Embargo on British ships in Russia—Milan Decree,
Dec. 17, 1807—Preamble and articles—Bayonne Decree, April
17, 1808—Effect of the Decrees and Orders in Council in
England—Interests of the shipowners maintained—Napoleon infringes
his own decrees—_Moniteur_, Nov. 18, 1810—Rise in the price of
produce and freights, partly accounted for by the Orders in
Council—Ingenuity of merchants in shipping goods—Smuggling—Licence
system in England—Cost of English licences—Their marketable
value—Working of the licensing system in England—Simulated
papers—Agencies for the purpose of fabricating them.
[Sidenote: Mr. Fox tries to make peace with France, 1806.]
[Sidenote: Napoleon’s proclamation.]
On the death of Mr. Pitt, January the 23rd, 1806, his great political
and rival successor, Mr. Fox, endeavoured to make peace with France,
but in vain. Indeed before his own death, which took place the 13th of
September the same year, he had become satisfied that any lasting peace
with Napoleon was impossible. Having vanquished and humbled two of the
greatest powers of Europe, the ambition of the ruler of France grew
in proportion to his conquests; his arrogance being only qualified by
the reflection that he could not reach England by land, and could not
therefore crush her, as he had done so many other European states;
in fact, she had proved to be the one stumbling-block between him and
universal empire. Unable to reach her with his armies, and frustrated
in every attempt to overcome her fleets at sea, he attempted her
ruin by means which appeared at the moment more within the reach of
one who had overrun Europe with his armies. Thus, he declared to the
European Powers that he would not restore any of their territories till
England had restored the colonies she had taken during the previous
war from France and other countries. Allowing only a brief armistice
to the Prussians, and having arranged everything in his own mind,
he proclaimed the whole of their ports to be blockaded, and closed
those of Hanover against the ships of England and her manufacturers.
Defeated by this country in every action at sea, he resolved, if an
alliance with all the leading European powers could be secured, to
destroy her commerce by a gigantic but impracticable scheme, known as
his “continental system,” the one object of which was the exclusion of
British ships from every port in Europe.
[Sidenote: English Order in Council, April 8, 1806.]
Conduct so outrageous was not to be endured by even the mild government
of Mr. Fox, which, on receipt of the intelligence of the exclusion of
the English flag from the harbours of the Elbe, recalled the British
ambassador from Berlin, declared the rivers Ems, Weser, Elbe, and
Trave, and all Prussian harbours to be in a state of blockade; laid an
embargo on every ship of that nation then in British ports, and issued
an Order in Council [April 8, 1806] authorizing the seizure of all
vessels navigating under Prussian colours, so that before many weeks
had elapsed four hundred of its merchant vessels were laid up in the
harbours of Great Britain.
[Sidenote: Berlin Decree, Nov. 10;]
These stringent measures were the forerunners of Napoleon’s famous
decrees.[264] The redoubtable Berlin decree issued at that city on
the 10th of November, 1806, was meant, we must presume, to be only
applicable to the countries actually occupied by his armies, including
France, Holland, Spain, Italy, and the whole of Germany, although it
declared the British Islands to be in a state of blockade.
[Sidenote: Its terms.]
This extraordinary document set forth that England did not admit the
right of nations as universally acknowledged by all civilised peoples;
that she declared as an enemy every individual belonging to an enemy’s
state, and in consequence made prisoners of war, not only of the crews
of armed but also of merchant vessels, and of even their supercargoes;
that she applied to merchant vessels and to articles of commerce,
the property of private individuals, the right of capture; that she
declared ports unfortified, and harbours and mouths of rivers to which
she had not sent a single vessel of war, to be blockaded, although
a place ought not to be considered blockaded excepting when it is so
closely invested that no approach can be made to it without imminent
hazard, and that she even declared places blockaded which her united
forces would be incapable of blockading, such as entire coasts and a
whole empire. It further stated that this unequalled abuse of the right
of blockade had no other object than to interrupt the communication
of different nations, and to extend the commerce and industry of
England upon the ruin of those of the continent; that, this being
evidently the design of England, “whoever deals on the continent in
English merchandise favours that design and becomes an accomplice; that
this conduct of England (worthy of the first ages of barbarism) has
benefited her to the detriment of other nations; that it being right
to oppose to an enemy the same arms she makes use of, when all ideas
of justice, and every liberal sentiment (the result of civilisation
among men) are disregarded, we have resolved to enforce against England
the usages which she has adopted in her maritime code.”[265] Of course
every reader of history knows that many of these charges have no
foundation in fact. Nevertheless, Napoleon, then in the plenitude of
his power, decreed:—
[Sidenote: and the stringency of its articles.]
1. That the British Islands are in a state of blockade.
2. That all commerce and correspondence with them is prohibited,
consequently no letters or packets, written in England, or to an
Englishman, if written in the English language, shall be despatched
from the post-offices, but shall be seized.
3. That every individual, a subject of Great Britain, of whatever rank
or condition, who is found in countries occupied by French troops, or
those of her allies, shall be made prisoner of war.
4. That every warehouse, and all merchandise or property whatever,
belonging to an Englishman, are declared good prize.
5. That one half of the proceeds of merchandise declared to be good
prize, and forfeited as in the preceding articles, shall go to
indemnify merchants who have suffered losses by the English cruisers.
6. That no vessel coming directly from England, or her colonies, or
having been there since the publication of this decree, shall be
admitted into any port.
7. That every vessel which, by a false declaration, contravenes the
foregoing dispositions, shall be seized, and the ship and cargo
confiscated as English property; and that the councils of prizes at
Paris and at Milan are authorized to take cognisance of whatever cases
might arise in the empire and in Italy, under this article; the whole
instrument winding up with orders to communicate its provisions to the
kings of Spain, Naples, Holland, Etruria, and to all others the allies
of the French, whose subjects, as well as the subjects of France, “were
victims of the injuries and barbarity of the English maritime code.”
[Sidenote: Napoleon’s skill and duplicity.]
These extraordinary measures having been long conceived by Napoleon,
were now, in the full tide of his continental victories, launched
against the commerce of England. It will be seen by the calm perusal
of this famous but outrageous document, how well Napoleon knew how
to frame his edicts in a form to captivate the multitude, to mask
his ulterior objects under the appearance of liberty, and to assume
the character of a redresser of the wrongs of nations oppressed by
the alleged malignity of England. But his staunchest encomiasts have
scarcely dared to justify this atrocious decree, or to support his
pretence that it was merely issued to compel the English to renounce
the supremacy over the ocean, or to intimidate the agents connected
with English shipping, and principally the merchants of the Hanseatic
towns, whom he stigmatised as “smugglers by profession,” as they had
contrived, in spite of the raging of hostilities, as all merchants
will contrive, to pour into the continent every description of
merchandise.[266]
M. Thiers states[267] that Talleyrand knew nothing of this decree until
it was made public, although Napoleon had despatched extraordinary
couriers to the governments of Holland, Spain, and Italy with orders to
some, and a peremptory summons to others, to carry it into immediate
execution. Indeed Marshal Mortier, who had already invaded Hesse, was
ordered to proceed with all speed to the Hanseatic towns, Bremen,
Hamburg, and Lubeck, and to seize not only those towns but the ports of
Mecklenberg and of Swedish Pomerania, as far as the mouths of the Oder.
He was further instructed, by occupying the rich entrepôts of these
towns, to seize all goods of English origin, to arrest the English
merchants, to transport to Germany a certain number of seamen taken
from the flotilla of Boulogne, in order that they might cruise in boats
at the mouths of the Elbe and Weser, and to sink at once every merchant
vessel suspected of attempting to run the blockade.
[Sidenote: Russian campaign conceived.]
While carrying into effect all over Europe “the continental system,”
shadowed forth in this decree, in retaliation, as Napoleon alleged, of
the English “paper blockade,” and fulminating his memorable manifesto
against England, its author, as is now confessed, was meditating a
march to the Vistula, to compel Russia, the only remaining friend
and ally of England, to turn against her, while he at the same time
attempted to turn the Poles against Russia, by amusing them with the
silly notion of the restoration of the kingdom of Poland under the
benign protection of France, and to work upon the Sultan of Turkey,
with a view to excluding England from the whole of Europe, and thus “to
achieve the command of the ocean by land.”
[Sidenote: Berlin decree enforced.]
The news of the Berlin decree did not, however, create at first so
much alarm as might have been anticipated. Its extreme rigour led the
majority of shipowners to believe it could not be enforced; though
more prudent parties waited to see the upshot of the affair before
they hazarded their cargoes on distant voyages. Matters, consequently,
remained in a very uncertain state until March 1807, when enterprising
shipowners resumed their shipments. These were carried on to a moderate
extent, till August 1807, when it was found to a certainty that the
Berlin decree had been put in force, and that, wherever the French
could send their custom and excise officers, a number of vessels and
cargoes had been seized, so that a virtual suspension of all shipping
to the continent took place from that date.
[Sidenote: Increased rates of insurance.]
The seizure of various vessels at Antwerp raised the rates of insurance
from England to Holland to fifteen, twenty, and thirty guineas per
cent., and, at even these exorbitant rates, the greatest difficulty was
experienced in effecting an insurance. It was then when her maritime
commerce had suffered severely, that the English government resolved to
put in force retaliatory measures of an equally stringent character.
[Sidenote: English Orders in Council, 1807.]
The first Order in Council[268] only contained certain regulations
under which the trade to and from the enemy’s country should thereafter
be carried on. The _second_ order,[269] 17th of January, 1807, set
forth that “whereas the sale of ships by a belligerent to a neutral
is considered by France to be illegal; and whereas a great part of the
shipping of France and of her allies has been protected from capture
during the present hostilities by transfers or pretended transfers to
neutrals; and whereas it is fully justifiable to adopt the same rule,
in this respect, towards the enemy which is applied by the enemy to
this country,” his Majesty in Council consequently orders “that in
future the sale to a neutral of any vessel belonging to the enemy
shall not be deemed to be legal, nor in any manner to transfer the
property, nor to alter the character of such vessel; and all vessels
now belonging, or which shall hereafter belong, to any enemies of his
Majesty, notwithstanding any sale or pretended sale to a neutral, after
a reasonable time shall have elapsed for receiving information of this
order, at the place where such sale or pretended sale was effected,
shall be captured and brought in, and shall be adjudged as lawful prize
to the captors.”
[Sidenote: Preamble of third Order in Council.]
[Sidenote: Terms of this Order.]
The _third_, and far the most important order, issued on the 11th
November, 1807, declared the absolute blockade of his Majesty’s
dominions, and of all countries under their control, with certain
exceptions which were specified. The much criticised preamble recited
that “whereas certain orders establishing an unprecedented system of
warfare against this kingdom, and aimed especially at the destruction
of its commerce and resources, were some time since issued by the
government of France, by which the British Islands were declared to be
in a state of blockade, thereby subjecting to capture and condemnation
all vessels, with their cargoes, which should continue to trade
with his Majesty’s dominions: and whereas by the same orders, all
trading in English merchandise is prohibited; and every article of
merchandise belonging to England, or coming from her colonies, or of
her manufacture, is declared lawful prize:” and whereas “the nations
in alliance with France, and under her control, were required to give,
and have given, and do give, effect to those orders: and whereas his
Majesty’s order of the _9th of January_ last,[270] has not answered
the desired purpose, either of compelling the enemy to recall those
orders, or of inducing neutral nations to interpose with effect to
obtain their revocation; but, on the contrary, the same have been
recently enforced with increased rigour: and whereas his Majesty, under
these circumstances, finds himself compelled to take further measures
for asserting and vindicating his just rights, and for supporting that
maritime power which the exertions and valour of his people have, under
the blessing of Providence, enabled him to establish and maintain;
and the maintenance of which is not more essential to the safety and
prosperity of his Majesty’s dominions, than it is to the protection
of such States as still retain their independence, and to the general
intercourse and happiness of mankind: his Majesty is therefore pleased”
to order “that all ports and places of France, their allies, or of
any other country at war with his Majesty, and all other ports and
places in Europe, from which, although not at war with his Majesty,
the British flag is excluded, and all ports and places in the colonies
belonging to the enemy, shall from henceforth be subject to the same
restrictions, in point of trade and navigation, with the exceptions
hereinafter mentioned, as if the same were actually blockaded by his
Majesty’s naval forces in the most strict and vigorous manner.”
[Sidenote: Neutrals.]
All trade in articles or manufactures of such countries was declared
unlawful; and “every vessel trading from or to the said countries or
colonies, together with all goods and manufactures and merchandise on
board, shall be captured and condemned as prize to the captors.[271]
His Majesty being desirous, nevertheless, not to subject neutrals to
any greater inconvenience than is absolutely inseparable from carrying
into effect a just determination to counteract the designs of his
enemies, and to retort upon them the consequences of their own violence
and injustice, and being yet willing to hope that it may be possible
(consistently with that object) still to allow neutrals the opportunity
of furnishing themselves with colonial produce for their _own_
consumption and supply; and even to leave open for the present such
trade with the enemy as shall be carried on directly with the ports of
his Majesty’s dominions, or of his allies,” makes exceptional certain
places and points which are there recited.
In this order the falsification of certificates of origin was specially
dealt with, and vessels carrying such simulated papers were declared
lawful prizes. On the 18th of November another Order in Council was
issued approving the draft of instructions to the commanders of H.M.
ships of war and privateers to carry out the previous order. On the
25th of November additional orders and instructions were issued,
containing supplemental provisions, and specifying the periods at
which the Orders in Council of the 11th of November should come into
operation at distant ports of the world; and, on the 18th of December,
1807, further supplemental orders were promulgated, all directed to
carry out the views of government in the West Indian colonies and in
the Mediterranean.[272]
The Order in Council[273] of the 11th of November is referred to
even in the present day as a justification of the Berlin Decree. It
ought, however, to be remembered, by those who desire to question the
character of England for uprightness, that the Prussian government had
previously in a forcible and hostile manner taken possession of the
electorate of Hanover, and had notified “that all British ships should
be excluded from the ports of the Prussian dominions, and from certain
other ports in the north of Europe, and not suffered to enter or trade
therein;” and had further declared (5th of April, 1806) “that no ship
or vessel belonging to any of his Majesty’s subjects be permitted to
enter or clear from any ports of Prussia, and that a general embargo or
stop be made of all ships and vessels, at that time, or which should
hereafter come into any of the ports, harbours, or roads of the United
Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, together with all persons and
effects on board the said ships and vessels.” Surely, considering the
circumstances of the King of Prussia’s perfidy,[274] this Order in
Council must be deemed justifiable.
The Order in Council of _the 16th May, 1806_, whereby all the ports
from the Elbe to Brest were declared to be strictly blockaded,
contained a proviso “that this blockade _shall not extend_ to _neutral
vessels_ having on board merchandise _not belonging to the enemies of
his Majesty_, and not contraband of war; except, however, the coast
from Ostend to the mouth of the river Seine, which is hereby declared
subject to a blockade of the strictest kind.” This Order in Council,
which the French pronounced “barbarous,” and “a paper blockade,” etc.,
was actually signed by Charles James Fox himself, nor can there be
any doubt that the coasts thus declared in a state of blockade were
in the strictest sense subject to such declaration, since the perils
of leaving the harbours embraced in it were such that hardly any one
of even the enemy’s armed vessels ventured to incur them. Considering
the circumstances of the times, and that Napoleon was then organising
a European confederacy in order to fall upon England with his whole
concentrated power, it must be admitted that the Whig Order in Council
was not only justifiable by the law of nations, but imperatively called
for by expediency. Orders providing for the blockade of harbours and
coasts which it was at the moment in the highest degree perilous to
enter, and for the interim detention of the Prussian cargoes, in
retaliation for the unprovoked invasion of Hanover by the Prussian
troops, and the exclusion of British commerce, all brought about by the
direct intrigues of Napoleon, were clearly within the law of nations,
and, moreover, seem now to have been, at the time and under the
circumstances, a very moderate exercise of the rights of a belligerent.
To attempt to palliate the Berlin Decrees on the grounds of the
“barbarous” character of the previous Orders in Council, was obviously
“a weak invention” of the enemy.[275]
[Sidenote: Embargo on British ships in Russia.]
[Sidenote: Milan Decree, Dec. 17, 1807.]
Russia having been bribed by the acquisition of Finland, Moldavia,
and Wallachia, followed the example of Prussia, and lost no time in
breaking off all intercourse with England. On the 28th of August the
Emperor Alexander laid an embargo on every English ship then in the
Russian ports. Napoleon returned for a short time to Paris, proceeding
thence to Italy, and, on the 17th of December, 1807, issued from Milan
the second celebrated Decree, a fitting supplement to the Berlin Decree
of the year previous: this Decree was couched in the following terms:—
[Sidenote: Preamble and articles.]
“Napoleon, Emperor of the French, King of Italy, and Protector of
the Rhenish Confederation(!): observing the measures adopted by
the British government, on the 11th of November last, by which
vessels belonging to neutral, friendly, or even Powers, the allies
of England, are made liable not only to be searched by English
cruisers, but to be compulsorily detained in England, and to have a
tax laid on them of so much per cent. on the cargo, to be regulated
by the English Legislature: observing further that by these acts
the British government denationalises the ships of every nation in
Europe; that it is not competent for any government to detract from
its own independence and rights, all the sovereigns in Europe having
in trust the sovereignties and independence of their flag; that if
by unpardonable weakness, which in the eyes of posterity would be an
indelible stain, such a tyranny was allowed to be established into
principles and consecrated by usage, the English would avail themselves
of it to assert it as a right, as they have availed themselves of the
tolerance of governments to establish the infamous principle that the
flag of a nation does not cover goods, and to give to their right of
blockade an arbitrary extension which infringes the sovereignty of
every State: we have decreed, and do decree as follows:
“1. Every ship, to whatever nation it may belong, which shall
have submitted to be searched by an English ship, or made a
voyage to England, or shall have paid any tax whatsoever to the
English government, is thereby, and for that alone, declared to be
denationalised, to have forfeited the protection of its own king, and
to have become English property.
“2. Whether the ships thus denationalised by the arbitrary measures of
the English government enter into our ports or those of our allies,
or whether they fall into the hands of our ships of war or of our
privateers, they are declared to be good and lawful prizes.
“3. The British Islands are declared to be in a state of blockade, both
by land and sea. Every ship, of whatever nation, or whatsoever the
nature of its cargo may be, that sails from the ports of England, or
those of the English colonies, and of the countries occupied by English
troops, is good and lawful prize as contrary to this decree, and may be
captured by our ships of war, or our privateers, and adjudged to the
captor.
“4. These measures, which are resorted to only in just retaliation
of the barbarous system adopted by England, which _assimilates its
legislation to that of Algiers_, shall cease to have any effect with
respect to all nations who shall have the firmness to compel the
English government to respect their flag. They shall continue to be
vigorously in force as long as that government does not return to
the principle of the law of nations, which regulates the relations
of civilised states in a state of war. The provisions of the present
decree shall be abrogated and null in fact as soon as the English abide
again by the principles of the law of nations, which are also the
principles of justice and honour.”
[Sidenote: Bayonne Decree, April 17, 1808.]
It may here be conveniently added, that by a further decree of the
17th of April, 1808,[276] dated at Bayonne, all American vessels, then
in the ports of France, and such as should come in thereafter, were
ordered to be seized.
Such was the tenor of these extraordinary manifestoes; and the history
of the world furnishes no example of similar violations of the ordinary
rules which influence the conduct of civilised nations, even in the
fury of the most internecine hostilities.
[Sidenote: Effects of the Decrees and Orders in Council in England.]
The policy of these decrees became the battle-ground of party in
England during several successive years. In fact they affected so many
powerful classes in so many different ways, that it was natural that
in a parliamentary government, not then always acting from the most
disinterested motives, a great party clamour should be created. Nor,
indeed, can it be doubted that the Berlin Decrees, and still more
the Milan and Bayonne Decrees, struck a heavy blow at the American
neutral trade; while, on the other hand, it cannot be denied that the
merchants of England carried on a profitable clandestine trade with
the continent through the intermediation of neutral ships, chiefly
American. This commerce Napoleon resolved to destroy at the hazard of
risking a war with the United States; and by the policy he pursued in
coercing the Americans to resist the English Orders in Council, he
achieved two objects: first, he discountenanced and did all he could to
suppress a trade which enriched his enemies, and secondly, he fomented
a feeling of hostility against England, whereby, as was proved in the
sequel, England found a new enemy ranged against her. The merchants
connected with America, who had employed their shipping in carrying on
a contraband trade with the continent, inveighed loudly against the
impolicy and “barbarous tyranny” of the English Orders in Council, and
asserted that these were the cause, _the original cause_, of all the
evils which ensued. Yet, in point of fact, those merchants who were
not shipowners cared little in what vessels their goods reached the
continent so long as the insurance effected secured them from loss, and
they could carry on the trade to a profit.
[Sidenote: Interests of the shipowners maintained.]
If such a system could have been allowed to prevail, it is obvious that
the shipowners of England would have been altogether shut out from
carrying on the ordinary trade of the country, and the whole business
of the transportation of commodities must have been monopolised by
neutral powers, who would reap incalculable benefit from the calamities
of the war. Napoleon, discerning clearly the usual practice of the
ports of Europe, and the enormous quantity of English goods shipped
from England and her colonies in American bottoms, at once struck
a blow at this commerce by seizing every vessel belonging to that
country then at Antwerp, Bordeaux, and Bayonne, and by burning those
in the port of St. Sebastian; nevertheless, the Americans, instead
of asserting openly and boldly the independence of their flag, as
they did in later years, secretly intrigued with Napoleon to obtain a
special immunity from his decrees for their shipping trade with England.
[Sidenote: Napoleon infringes his own decrees.]
But while Napoleon was vainly fulminating his decrees against England,
and putting into motion his whole power in Europe to carry them out,
he himself first set the example of their evasion, and for a temporary
profit established a system which tended to neutralise the very object
he was making so many efforts to accomplish. Scarcely had a few months
elapsed after the publication of the Berlin Decree, before it was
discovered that a large source of revenue might be opened by granting,
at exorbitant prices, licences to import British colonial produce and
manufactures.[277]
[Sidenote: _Moniteur_, Nov. 18, 1810.]
[Sidenote: Rise in the price of produce and freights,]
These licences were granted ostensibly to benefit French manufacture,
under the obligation of exporting French or continental produce to an
equal amount, a condition, however, which was easily and frequently
evaded. In this manner a most lucrative trade was carried on,
notwithstanding the exorbitant rates of the licences, and the great
additional charges to which the whole transaction was subjected.
British manufactures and colonial produce rose to an extravagant price
in France, while foreign produce realised almost as greatly enhanced
prices in England; so that, although the mass of the people on both
sides the Channel suffered deeply from the interruptions caused by
the Decrees on the one hand and the numerous Orders in Council on the
other, producing great obstructions to the ordinary course of commerce,
numerous classes amassed fortunes by these disturbing elements.
To add to the many sufferings the war created and to the confusion
these sweeping proclamations had entailed, the price of wheat rapidly
advanced in the spring of 1808. The scantiness of the crop of the
previous year was beginning to be seriously felt, while apprehension
daily increased that the exclusion of the British flag from the trade
of the Baltic would cut off from England her supplies of food from that
quarter of the world.[278]
[Sidenote: partly accounted for by the Orders in Council.]
But though British ships were to a great extent excluded from the trade
of the Baltic, the Orders in Council enabled them in the long run to
obtain almost a complete monopoly of the other portions of the carrying
trade of the world. England at this time had practically exclusive
possession of the East and West Indies; and the colonial produce
brought in her vessels was, in spite of the efforts of Bonaparte,
distributed at a great profit over the whole of the continent of
Europe. It is unnecessary here to enter into a dissertation as to
the general effect of a monopoly produced by war on prices or on
the interests of the consumer; nor is it necessary to lay down the
principle that, in the long run, a state of peace must, in these days
at least, prove far more profitable to the shipowner than a state of
war. But during the latter period of the great French war, whatever
diminution may have taken place in the building of ships, it is certain
that at no period was British shipping more prosperous, or employed
at higher freights. Scarcely a ship belonging to any other nation
could sail without a licence, which, following the example of France,
the British government had rendered imperative.[279] The whole of the
exportable produce of the East and West Indies, and a large portion
of that from South America, now came to the ports of Great Britain,
either for consumption or re-exportation; and any effort of Bonaparte
to exclude these necessary articles from the continent proved nearly,
if not altogether abortive. England now, to all intents and purposes,
obtained a monopoly, costly it is true, but she can never again hope to
carry on hostilities with any of the great powers of Europe and bring,
as it were, under her dominion at the same time all the material riches
of the world.[280]
But while the cost of articles imported from the continent of Europe
was enhanced by the difficulty of communication, and the circuitous
routes it often became necessary to adopt, similar causes raised
the price of colonial produce, and of some descriptions of British
manufactures, to a still greater proportionate height on the continent,
so that the severity with which the decrees of the enemy were enforced
operated more directly against imports from England than against
exports to that country, and many curious instances besides those we
have just mentioned are given of the extraordinary rates paid for
freight.[281]
[Sidenote: Ingenuity of merchants in shipping goods.]
Among the various means devised by the ingenuity and enterprise of
adventurers to elude and overcome the obstacles presented by the
decrees of the enemy, one in particular, which was resorted to on an
extensive scale, deserves mention. Several vessels laden with sugar,
coffee, tobacco, cotton-twist, and other valuable commodities were
despatched from England at very high rates of freight and insurance
to Saloniki, in European Turkey. Refined sugar and other goods were
packed in boxes made at a considerable additional expense, so that
each package should not exceed about two hundredweight. These, when
landed, were conveyed on mules and pack-horses through Servia and
Hungary to Vienna, for the purpose of being distributed over Germany,
and sometimes even into France. The articles sold at enormously high
prices. Sugar fetched 5_s._ to 6_s._ per lb.; coffee 7_s._ per lb.;
indigo 18_s._; and cotton 7_s._ and 8_s._ per lb.[282]
[Sidenote: Smuggling.]
On the 5th September, 1807, the English made themselves masters of the
small island of Heligoland (which was confirmed to them by the Treaty
of Kiel, January 14th, 1814), and thence enormous quantities of British
goods were smuggled into Holstein, and thence again were conveyed at
a charge of 33 to 40 per cent. within the French custom-house line.
This regular traffic, being well known to the imperial authorities, and
sometimes connived at on account of its enormous profits, was alleged
as a justification for the sale of licences, especially as Bourrienne,
who at that time was resident at Hamburg, had represented to Napoleon
that he had much better at once authorize the trade on these terms,
and realise for himself this contraband profit. Napoleon adopted the
proposal, and in consequence sixty millions of francs (2,400,000_l._)
worth of English produce was in one year openly imported into that
town alone. The same system was adopted in Prussia; while legions
of custom-house officers and coastguards were employed to put down
contraband trade with the English.
[Sidenote: Licence system in England.]
The English government having been unable to resist the importunities
of the manufacturing and mercantile interests, could not therefore
forbear from following the pernicious example thus set by Napoleon.
When the system, though different in many respects, had been fully
established in Great Britain, the number of licences issued rose
from four thousand nine hundred and ten in 1808, to no fewer than
fifteen thousand two hundred and twenty-six in 1809, and eighteen
thousand three hundred and fifty-six in the year 1810. Though these
licences were professedly regulated upon fixed principles, they were
nevertheless a source of jobbery and fraud, and great peculation and
corruption prevailed, “a fruitful source,” as Lord Stowell observed,
“of simulation and dissimulation from beginning to end.”
[Sidenote: Cost of English licences.]
Such licences were payable on a graduated scale on imports and exports
not transferable, as well as upon transferable exports and imports. The
fees received at the Admiralty were for licences to merchant vessels to
carry guns; on granting Mediterranean papers; on ships’ fines for loss
of papers; on ships’ protection for three months; on protection granted
to barges and boats for a similar period; on commissions, warrants,
and appointments; on granting letters of marque; and on licences to
join convoy; the Privy Council Office charging for licences to trade
4_l._ 16_s._ each, besides gratuities, which were divided amongst the
clerks.[283] The amount of the fees during the height of the licence
system was calculated to yield annually about 100,000_l._[284] beyond
the public stamp of 1_l._ 10_s._ which was added before delivery of the
licence.
But the whole system of licences proved utterly indefensible, and,
being granted to foreign vessels to the prejudice of English shipping,
it grew at last to be altogether intolerable. Beyond the mere amount of
fees claimed by the Council Office, the Secretary of State’s fees for
the sign-manual were as much again, and even this aggregate amount was
frequently exceeded. For instance, it is reported in the ‘Parliamentary
Proceedings’ that there was paid by a certain John Lubock for the
certificate of one cargo, imported or exported, 15_l._ 0_s._ 6_d._,
and for each duplicate, if required, 3_l._ 12_s._; part of this was,
however, admitted to be for agency. The charge for a ship going out
in ballast to import a cargo of timber from Wilmington, in the United
States, was 17_l._ 2_s._ 6_d._ A licence for St. Domingo (special) to
trade to and from that island, cost 25_l._ 1_s._ 6_d._ For an order
allowing small vessels to trade to and from Holland for six months, the
charge for one licence amounted to 15_l._ 0_s._ 6_d._; but an order
for six ships could be obtained for 44_l._ 5_s._ 6_d._ One agent is
reported to have paid no less than 3,952_l._ 7_s._ 6_d._ in the course
of a year for licences alone.[285]
[Sidenote: Their marketable value.]
Sometimes, however, they were estimated at an even extravagant value.
Mr. A. Baring said, in the course of a debate in Parliament on the
subject, that he would have given 15,000_l._ for one of the licences
issued, which, owing to a clerical error in the substitution of one
word for another, became of that marketable value. No wonder that the
merchants importuned the government for these licences, when they not
only served as a protection to their property, but might, by a lucky
error, become the means of making a man’s fortune. In this point of
view the licences were wholly and entirely unjustifiable. It seems
further that where applications were made, a considerable amount
of control and interference were exercised in framing them before
they were granted. Mr. Brougham drew a picture of the President and
Vice-President of the Board of Trade laying their heads together, and
passing a whole morning in determining with the utmost gravity “whether
one cargo should consist of cotton or of wool, whether scissors should
be added, whether nails should be added to the scissors; whether the
nails or the scissors should be left out, or whether the commerce of
the country might or might not be ruined by throwing in a little hemp
with the nails and the scissors to make up the cargo.”[286] But this
was not all.
[Sidenote: Working of the licensing system in England.]
[Sidenote: Simulated papers.]
The licence to sail from port to port, for example, contained
the following clause: “_The vessel shall be allowed to proceed,
notwithstanding all the documents which accompany the ship and cargo
may represent the same to be destined to any neutral or hostile port,
or to whomsoever such property may belong._” With this licence, the
ship which carried it, foreign or British, was enabled to pass through
the British fleet; every vessel thus authorized being permitted to
take on board another set of papers, which were, in point of fact,
a forgery from beginning to end. Should the vessel be overhauled by
English cruisers, she nevertheless continued her voyage unmolested. If,
for example, she had actually cleared out from London, it was stated in
the simulated papers that she had cleared out from Rotterdam. With this
view, the proper description was made out as nearly as possible in the
handwriting of the Custom-house officer at Rotterdam; and, if it were
necessary that the signature of the French minister of state should
be affixed, as in the case of Holland, this was skilfully forged,
and even the fantastic signature of Napoleon himself was sometimes
attached to these forged documents![287] These forgeries were not done
perfunctorily or by halves, for not only were the names forged, but the
seal was admirably engraved, and the wax closely imitated. Indeed a
regular set of letters were frequently also forged, containing a good
deal of fictitious private anecdote, with a mixture of such news from
Rotterdam as might be supposed to be interesting to mercantile people,
together with an imaginary letter from a merchant in Rotterdam to the
shipowner.
[Sidenote: Agencies for the purpose of fabricating them.]
Thus provided, the vessel set forth from London to encounter the
manifold perils of the sea. The most respectable houses in London
made application for similar licences, and every merchant who, with
the privity of his clerks, sailed a vessel under such circumstances
was compelled to become conversant with the humiliating mysteries of
this fraudulent trade. But to make matters still worse, the forgeries
were confirmed by the solemn oaths of the captain and the crew when
they arrived at their destined port. Indeed it had become so common
a practice that perjury under such circumstances was not dealt with
as a crime, nor was it considered a crime on their part, as their
owners compelled them to swear that all their letters and documents
were genuine. Every sort of interrogatory was put to the captain and
the crew calculated to discover the real port whence the vessel had
sailed, and these questions the captain and crew were obliged to evade
by numerous false oaths. The feeling that they were doing no wrong
could alone have induced them thus to act. They were even obliged
to declare from what quarter the wind blew when they left Rotterdam
and took a pilot on board, although they were never near the place,
together with many other particulars, all confirmed by oath, perjuring
themselves at every stage. To such an extent did these frauds prevail
that at last they were reduced to a regular system. Individuals formed
themselves into established mercantile agencies, in order to facilitate
the simulation of these papers. Indeed they openly issued circulars
avowing their object. One of these extraordinary productions has been
enshrined in a parliamentary debate, Mr. Brougham having published to
the world the following “atrocious circular.”[288]
“Liverpool, ——
“GENTLEMEN,
“We take the liberty herewith to inform you that we have
established ourselves in this town for the sole purpose of making
simulated papers, which we are enabled to do in a way which will
give ample satisfaction to our employers, not only being in
possession of the original documents of the ships’ papers and
clearances to various ports, a list of which we annex, but our Mr.
G. B. having worked with his brother, Mr. I. B., in the same line
for the last two years, understands all the necessary languages,
and knows what is required.
“Of any changes that may occur in the different places on the
continent in the various custom-houses and other offices, which
may render a change of signatures necessary, we are careful to
have the earliest information, not only from our own connections,
but from Mr. I. B., who has proffered his assistance in every way,
and who has for some time past made simulated papers for Messrs.
B. and P. of this town, to whom we beg leave to refer you for
further information.
“We remain,” etc.
This singular document was accompanied by a list of about a score of
places, for which these agents had clearances all ready at the instant
for disposal to those merchants who, from the exigencies of the times,
found themselves compelled to resort to such practices. Indeed these
knaves knew perfectly well that if the merchants of England refused to
participate in this “filthy commerce,” the traders in Boston would not
have any such scruples, still less those of Pappenburg, or some of the
ports of Danish Holstein.
FOOTNOTES:
[264] France asserted, and America seems to have admitted that the
first departure from the Law of Nations was this Act of Mr. Fox’s
Administration, and that this Act led to the Berlin Decree; but this is
a pretence (see ‘Key to Orders in Council,’ p. 1). It is worth while
to give briefly here the dates and order of these different decrees,
etc. (1.) Mr. Fox’s Order for blockade of French coast, April 8, 1806.
(2.) Berlin Decree, Nov. 10, 1806 (recapitulated, Nov. 24, 1806). (3.)
Lord Grey’s Order in Council, Jan. 7, 1807. (4.) Orders in Council of
Nov. 11, 1807, by the Portland administration. (5.) Milan Decree, Dec.
17, 1807. (6.) Bayonne Decree, April 17, 1808. (7.) Rambouillet Decree,
March 23, 1810. (8.) Fontainebleau Decree, March 23, 1810. The Bayonne
and Rambouillet Decrees were those most directly issued against the
Americans.
[265] We cannot read with patience such denouncements of barbarism,
and such professions of liberty and justice from one who about this
period ordered a poor bookseller of Nuremburg, by name of Palm, to be
arbitrarily arrested, and brought before a military tribunal at Bremen,
where he was condemned to be unceremoniously shot, because he had
published and distributed a pamphlet, which questioned the “justice”
of Napoleon’s acts, as the conqueror of Germany. If ever there was
a martyr in the cause of “liberty” it was this poor man, whose most
unjustifiable execution in August 1806, was regarded with horror
throughout Europe.
[266] Alison, vol. xi., p. 105, in a note, mentions a striking instance
of how the Berlin decree was opposed even to Napoleon’s own interests.
Shortly after its issue there arrived at Hamburg an urgent order for
the immediate delivery of a very large amount of clothing for his army;
but the resources of the Hanse Towns were so totally unable to provide
within the specified time the requisite supply, that Bourrienne, the
French diplomatic agent, after trying in vain every other expedient,
was obliged to contract for it with English houses. Thus while the
Emperor was boasting that by the continental system he had excluded
British goods from the continent, 50,000 to 60,000 of his half-naked
soldiers were, in the depth of winter, clothed by the manufacturers of
Halifax, Leeds, and other English towns.
[267] M. Thiers’ ‘Consulat et l’Empire,’ vii. 222.
[268] This is Mr. Fox’s Order of April 8, 1806.
[269] This is Lord Grey’s Order. The _Morning Chronicle_ of Jan.
4, 1808, in commenting on the above order, remarks that Lord Grey
“distinctly stated to the United States of America that their
acquiescence in a code which violated the rights of independent States
would compel this country to take steps for its own protection.... The
Decree is certainly directed against the Americans—it is a menace to
her; ... she must choose her party.”
[270] By the Portland Administration, of which Canning and Perceval
were members: two orders would seem to have been issued on the same
day. Key to ‘Orders,’ p. 5.
[271] These Orders in Council are dispersed through a multitude of
works. In 1808 they were laid before Parliament, and will be found _in
extenso_ in vol. x. ‘Parl. Papers’ of that year.
[272] Such was the effect in England of these proclamations, that in
the months of September and October 1807, when these or similar orders
were anticipated, no fewer than sixty-five applications were made to
the Commissioners of Customs at the port of London for permission to
re-land cargoes, already shipped in the Thames for exportation to the
continent of Europe, the impression being that goods arriving there in
English vessels would be confiscated (‘Parl. Papers,’ vol. x., 1808, p.
11).
[273] The Orders in Council were fully examined by Mr. Alex. Baring
in his pamphlet. Mr. Baring’s sympathies were strongly American, but,
on the whole, fair to this country (see ‘Enquiry into Causes and
Consequences of the Orders in Council,’ Lond. 8, 1808).
[274] Alison, ch. xlii. (1806).
[275] _Vide_ Martin’s ‘Law of Nations,’ Sup. 5, 437, 435, and ‘Annual
Register,’ 1806, p. 677, for the Order in Council detaining Prussian
ships. In discussing “the rights of war as to neutrals,” Wheaton
remarks that “during the wars of the French Revolution the United
States, being neutral, admitted that the immunity of their flag did
not extend to cover enemy’s property, as a principle founded on the
customary law and established usage of nations, though they sought
every opportunity of substituting for it the opposite maxim of _free
ships_, _free goods_, by conventional arrangements with such nations as
were disposed to adopt that modification of the universal law” (vol.
ii. pp. 176, 177).
[276] There is a further Decree of March 23, 1810, known as the
‘Rambouillet Decree’ on this subject (see ‘Key to Orders in Council,’
No. 13).
[277] _Moniteur_, 18th Nov., 1810. At Hamburg, in 1811, under the
bloody government of Davoust, an unhappy father was shot for having
introduced into his house a small sugar-loaf, of which his family
stood in need: yet at that very moment Napoleon was probably signing a
licence for the importation of a million of such loaves. Smuggling on a
small scale was punished with death; but the government carried it on
upon the greatest scale. The same regulations filled the prisons with
victims and the imperial coffers with revenue. Note by Alison, vol. xi.
p. 173, from Bourrienne, vol. vii. p. 233.
[278] The freight on wheat from the Baltic rose to 50_s._ per quarter.
The price of linseed advanced from 43_s._ to 150_s._ Hemp rose in price
from 58_l._ to 108_l._ per ton; flax from 58_l._ per ton in 1807, to
118_l._ per ton in the following year. Memel timber, which, during 1806
and 1807, had varied from the extremes of 73_s._ to 170_s._ per load,
advanced to 340_s._ per load; while deals rose in a similar proportion.
Russian tallow rose from 53_s._ to 112_s._ per cwt. Freights on all
these articles ranged exceedingly high. For instance, timber was
charged at 10_l._ per load; tallow at 20_l._ and hemp at 30_l._ per
ton; in fact, at ten to twenty times greater than the current rates of
the present period (Tooke’s ‘History of Prices,’ vol. i. pp. 309-343).
[279] A copy of these warrants will be found in ‘Parl. Papers,’ 1808,
vol. xi. p. 117. They were signed by the Lords of the Treasury.
[280] Many remarkable cases occurred of goods being sent by a
circuitous route. On one occasion two parcels of silk were despatched
from Bergamo, in Italy, to England at the same time. One was sent by
the way of Smyrna, and the other by the way of Archangel. The former
was a twelvemonth, and the latter two years on its passage. The
expenses attending the importation of silk which was brought by these
and similar routes through the north of Europe were enormous. Some silk
likewise came through France, and the charges of conveyance from Italy
to Havre, and duty of transit, amounted to nearly 100_l._ per bale of
240 lbs. net weight, exclusive of freight and insurance from Havre
hither.
[281] For instance, the charge of freight and French licence on a
vessel of very little more than fifty tons burthen have been known to
amount to 50,000_l._ for the voyage, merely from London to Calais and
back. In another instance a vessel, the whole cost of which, including
the outfit, did not exceed 4,000_l._, earned a gross freight of
80,000_l._ on a voyage from Bordeaux to London and back (see Tooke’s
‘History of Prices,’ vol. i. p. 310).
[282] As an instance in our own experience of the effect of blockades
in more recent times, it may be mentioned that England obtained, during
the whole of the late war with Russia, her supplies of hemp, tallow,
and other Russian produce in almost as great abundance from that
country as she did during peace, _but_ at greatly enhanced prices to
the British consumer. These articles, instead of being shipped in the
ordinary course of commerce direct from the Baltic ports, were carried
across the frontiers into Germany, or Belgium, or France, and by
railway rapidly found their way to the ports of neutral countries, and
thence were exported to England, so that the modern means of transit
would seem not only to render in a great measure nugatory the effect
of blockades, but to greatly enhance the price of all articles to the
nation which establishes them. Thus, while England was very heavily
taxed to maintain an effective blockade of the Russian ports, her
people paid at least one hundred per cent. more for numerous articles
produced in that country, articles, too, be it remembered, necessary
for their existence. Would it not be advisable for English statesmen to
consider if, in the interests of this country, the right of blockade,
as well as the capture of private property at sea, could not now be
erased from the ancient laws of nations?
[283] The amount received in 1807 was 12,609_l._ 12_s._
[284] ‘Parl. Papers,’ 27, 1808, vol. x. p. 359.
[285] _Vide_ ‘Proceedings in the Privy Council on Licences to Trade and
Navigate,’ vol. x. p. 1808.
[286] _Vide_ Speeches of Mr. Brougham and Mr. Canning (‘Parl. Debates,’
vol. xxi. p. 1108, et seq.).
[287] Mr. Brougham said in the House of Commons that he had himself
seen the forged signature of Napoleon (_Nap_).
[288] Mr. Brougham’s speech on the Licence Trade (‘Parl. Debates,’
vol. xxi. p. 1114).
CHAPTER IX.
Effect of the Orders in Council on American trade, A.D.
1810—Complaints of the Americans against England—Policy of
Napoleon towards neutrals—Non-intercourse Act—Secret terms with
America—Partiality of the United States towards France—Contentions
at home respecting the Orders in Council—Declaration of
war with America—Motives of the Americans—England revokes
her Orders in Council—Condemnation of the conduct of the
United States—Impressment of American seamen—Fraudulent
certificates—Incidents of the system—War with America—Necessity
of relaxing the Navigation Laws during war—High duties on
cotton—Great European Alliance—Napoleon returns to Paris—Germans
advance to the Rhine—Treaty of Chaumont—The Allies enter Paris—End
of the war by the Treaty of Paris, 1814—Napoleon’s escape from
Elba—His landing in France and advance on Paris—British troops
despatched to Belgium—Subsidies to European powers—Fouché—Last
campaign of Napoleon and defeat at Waterloo—Reflections.
[Sidenote: Effect of the Orders in Council on American trade, A.D.
1810.]
[Sidenote: Complaints of the Americans against England.]
Although the Orders in Council asserted the purpose which England had
in view at the time they were issued, these commercial retaliatory
measures can only be justified on the ground of extreme necessity.
Desperate measures on the part of the enemy were then met by measures
as desperate on the part of Great Britain. She would, if she had dared,
been glad to have dispensed with them, for though they thwarted the
designs of Napoleon and impoverished his people, they injured her
own commercial pursuits; while their effect on her relations with the
United States of America was of the most irritating and unpleasant
character. When they came into full force, the English export trade
with that country, previously valued at twelve millions sterling per
annum, ostensibly fell to five and a quarter millions, although the
total aggregate exports experienced no such corresponding diminution,
thereby proving that the Americans had absorbed, as the greatest
maritime neutrals, the largest share of the carrying trade. But when
the English Orders in Council, issued in consequence of Napoleon’s
decrees, struck a blow at this trade, the Americans, seeing so
lucrative a branch of their commerce withdrawn from their hands, set up
an indignant appeal, and, though tamely acquiescing in Napoleon’s still
harsher measures, declaimed furiously against the English government,
when it exhibited a resolute determination to prevent the carrying
trade of the world being taken from English shipowners.
The most important of the British Orders in Council, as we have seen,
bore date 11th November, 1807, the Milan Decree following on the 17th
of December of the same year; but the Americans, having been apprised
of the intentions of the English government, adopted precautionary
measures by imposing a general embargo from and after the 22nd of
December, 1807.[289] Nothing can prove more conclusively how unpopular
this step was among the shipowners of the United States than the fact
that every vessel in the foreign trade which heard the intelligence
kept out of their ports, preferring to run the risk of capture rather
than lose their share of the enormous profits they were making in their
neutral bottoms, by a clandestine trade with France and England. The
American government clearly foresaw that the extreme measures adopted
by both belligerents would annihilate their foreign carrying trade,
and restore to England that power and its accompanying commercial
advantages, which her maritime superiority had already conferred on her
in the great contest in which she was engaged.
[Sidenote: Policy of Napoleon towards neutrals.]
[Sidenote: Non-intercourse Act.]
One of the objects of Napoleon by his decrees was evidently to prey
upon the known susceptibility of the Americans, and to urge them,
on the pretence of the independence of their flag, to resist the
executive authority exercised by England, whether with regard to the
right of neutrals, the right of search, or the impressment of American
seamen, all fruitful sources of complaint on the part of the American
government. Nor had he, indeed, unwilling listeners, for the Americans,
in their diplomatic proceedings, exhibited an unequivocal tendency
to favour Napoleon. Although statements were made in Parliament that
the Americans would have joined England in the war against France if
she would have consented to rescind the Orders in Council as regarded
their shipping, all these allegations were unfortunately at variance
with the truth, and were, in fact, only put forward by interested
English merchants who could no longer avail themselves of American
bottoms to carry on their trade. Finding their embargo inoperative, as
American vessels preferred an adventurous commerce and large profits
to a ruinous inaction, the United States government removed it; but
as the European governments were inflexible in their policy, they
immediately afterwards passed the Act of Non-Intercourse,[290] by which
all commercial interchanges with France and England were prohibited;
the result being the Rambouillet Decree, issued by Napoleon on the 23rd
of March, 1810, which ordered that all American vessels and cargoes
arriving in any of the ports of France or of countries occupied by
French troops, should be seized and condemned.
[Sidenote: Secret terms with America.]
On the 1st of May, 1810, Congress passed a further Act, excluding
British and French armed vessels from the waters of the United States,
but providing that if either of these nations should modify its edicts
by the 3rd of March, 1811, of which fact the President was to give
notice by proclamation, and the other did not, within three months
after, pursue a similar course, commercial intercourse with the first
might be renewed, but not with the second. It, however, appears that
while Napoleon was intriguing with the American minister in Paris to
concert hostile anti-commercial measures against England, he had issued
on the 5th of August, 1810, the Trianon Decree,[291] ordering the sale
of all American vessels seized, and the proceeds to be paid into the
treasury. In spite, however, of this perfidy, the United States came
to an understanding with Napoleon, that they would, as he desired,
“cause their flag to be respected,” that is, break with England,
provided their vessels were released, and provision made for their
enjoying the monopoly of the continental carrying trade.
[Sidenote: Partiality of the United States towards France.]
[Sidenote: Contentions at home respecting the Orders in Council.]
Accordingly, on the 2nd of November, 1810, the President issued his
proclamation declaring the French decrees revoked, thus renewing
intercourse between the United States and France; and on the 10th of
the same month another proclamation appeared, interdicting commercial
intercourse with England.[292] These antagonistic demonstrations were
accompanied with a vast amount of popular declamation against England,
and as Napoleon was then rising to the height of his ambitious career,
the people of the United States were, it is to be feared, ready to
be his acquiescing instruments in assisting to rivet the chains of
the nations of Europe, provided they were secured the monopoly of the
carrying trade, to the displacement of English shipping. But whatever
motives may have governed their conduct, whether mere commercial
interest, or a more broad national policy, it is beyond controversy
that in the negotiations and language held throughout there was a
marked partiality towards France and her ruler, and a corresponding
coldness and animosity against England. This disposition of the United
States to display subserviency to the French emperor, and their hostile
temper towards Great Britain, daily increased, but it was not until
1812 that the long smouldering ashes of suppressed enmity broke out
into open hostilities.[293] In England the contentions which arose
respecting the Orders in Council shook the commercial peace of the
country. Every man espoused the side with which his own peculiar
interests were interwoven, claiming, however, to be the infallible
guide upon the subject to all his countrymen. Mr. Alexander Baring,
the second son of Sir Francis Baring, who had passed many years in the
United States, where he and his brother Henry had formed matrimonial
alliances, published a pamphlet[294] which greatly favoured the
American view of the subject, and exhibited a feeling of the greatest
alarm lest “as past errors had brought us to the brink of a precipice,
the next might throw us over it.”[295]
[Sidenote: Declaration of war with America.]
Although these Orders in Council were loudly condemned by the Whigs,
who made them their leading stalking-horse, whereby to assail the
ministry, the Tories and the government were inflexible, and chose
rather to risk a rupture with the United States than to relax their
policy. They were still of opinion that the infallible consequences
of repealing these orders and of giving up the licence trade would be
to open the ports of France, and to transfer to the United States the
commerce of the world. This determination at last brought about the
long pending rupture, but other reasons were not wanting to hasten this
lamentable event.
[Sidenote: Motives of the Americans.]
The Americans, seeing the vast preparations made by Napoleon for the
subjugation of Russia, had evidently calculated that he would succeed,
and that, the continental system being established, they, holding a
monopoly of the carrying trade, could, in league with France, humble
England, their great maritime and commercial rival. Consequently their
government declared war on the 18th of May, 1812, and General Hall
immediately invaded Canada. But the English declaration of war was not
issued until the 11th of October, 1812,[296] about the very moment
when Napoleon commenced his fatal retreat from Moscow, which, however,
was not then known. Mr. Barlow, the American minister at Paris, had
been invited to proceed to Wilna in the rear of the Imperial army; and
there can be no doubt that Napoleon, in the event of success, would
have dictated the terms of the treaty with the United States which
Mr. Barlow had hitherto in vain endeavoured to secure. Napoleon, as
everybody knows, failed utterly in his Russian campaign, Barlow died
in Poland, and the Americans found themselves at war with England on
grounds which not one of their historians ever ventures to defend, and
which their statesmen of to-day would heartily repudiate, if war on
such shallow and selfish pretences was again attempted.
As it was not until the _11th of May, 1812_, that Mr. Barlow received
“FOR THE FIRST TIME”[297] a copy of the decree of the _28th of April,
1811_, by which the Berlin and Milan Decrees were revoked, it is clear
that this fact affords a complete justification for the course pursued
by the English government; the United States choosing to rely and to
insist upon the verbal assurances of Napoleon that the decrees were
revoked, when at the very moment new seizures and confiscations were
being made by his orders.[298] It was not until the 21st of May that
the American minister in London produced a copy, or what purported to
be a copy, of an instrument which professed to bear date the 28th of
April, 1811. This decree, by which the American vessels were protected,
recites “that whereas Congress has established a non-intercourse with
England, and excluded her vessels, merchandise, and those of her
colonies from entering the ports of the United States, therefore we
decree,” etc. It is self-evident that the moment relations were renewed
between the United States and England, Napoleon reserved to himself the
right to take ulterior measures. But his object was now effected, war
had been declared, and, as the French said triumphantly, “England had a
new enemy.”
[Sidenote: England revokes her Orders in Council.]
The English ministers, although they considered the document produced
most unsatisfactory, decided on revoking the Orders in Council,
conditional upon the Non-intercourse Act being also rescinded; but, the
Americans having pre-determined on war, frustrated the pacific measures
which had previously been taken by England. To crown the unwarrantable
conduct of the American government, it afterwards was shown that when
they proclaimed the declaration of war, and the extreme measure of
issuing “letters of marque,” they were actually in possession of the
report of the French Minister for Foreign Affairs of the 12th of March,
1812, promulgating anew the Berlin and Milan Decrees, as fundamental
laws of the French empire, under the false pretext that their monstrous
principles were found in the treaty of Utrecht, and were therefore
binding upon all nations.[299] Indeed the whole intrigue seems to
have been a masterpiece of perfidy, and their reasons for war were so
untenable that the Americans, in their speeches and diatribes, were
compelled to make the most of the English impressment system and the
original blockade of 1806, which they denounced as a paper blockade,
perhaps conscious that if they had made a treaty with Napoleon, the
blockade of the French coasts might have proved a fresh obstacle to
their monopolizing the whole trade of the continent, under the colour
of a neutral flag.
[Sidenote: Condemnation of the conduct of the United States.]
An impartial perusal of all the documents relating to this rupture
makes the inimical disposition of the government of the United States,
their complete subserviency to the ruler of France, and their hostile
temper against Great Britain conspicuous in every page of their
official correspondence with the French government. England might well
say that she looked for a different result. From their common origin,
from their common interest, from their professed principles of freedom
and independence, the United States was the last power in which Great
Britain could have expected to find a willing instrument and abettor of
French tyranny and despotism. The Americans, however, seem to have been
blinded by a short-sighted view of European affairs, not anticipating
that a few months would produce a complete revolution in the whole
aspect of continental affairs, and that the power of Napoleon would in
so short a period have passed away.
[Sidenote: Impressment of American seamen.]
When the English Parliament re-assembled in February 1813, the House
of Commons unanimously carried the address approving the war with the
United States, on the ground of maintaining the maritime rights of
Great Britain. The Americans had industriously circulated a report
that the British had impressed fifteen thousand to twenty thousand
American seamen. The absurdity of such a statement must be apparent to
every reflecting person; the report, however, was not addressed to such
parties, but to the demagogues of both countries, who alone desired
war. By the Admiralty records it was plainly proved that out of one
hundred and forty-five thousand seamen then employed in the British
navy, the whole number who claimed to be American subjects, a claim,
too, the justice of which rested upon their simple declaration, was but
three thousand five hundred, and that out of every four individuals
who claimed their discharge in right of being citizens of the United
States, only one established his claim on any tolerable ground
whatever. Supposing, however, one-half of the claimants to have had a
rational ground for demanding their liberation, the whole number of
Americans in the British navy could not have exceeded from sixteen to
seventeen hundred, and it cannot be supposed that England should have
involved herself in a new war with a view to retain the services of
such an inconsiderable number of reluctant hands.
[Sidenote: Fraudulent certificates.]
Indeed the fact cannot be questioned that the English government
had invariably given directions to the officers of her navy not to
press seamen, professing to be American born, who were found on
board American vessels with certificates signed by the collector of
customs of an American port, even though it was well known that these
certificates were easily obtained in the United States, the American
government making no effort to check their fraudulent emission. In
the port of New York the system of obtaining false certificates had
become so disgracefully open, that in one day, ludicrous as it may
appear, an old woman was allowed by the collector to qualify a whole
host of seamen by swearing she knew them to be American citizens; and
when the clerk remonstrated against its impropriety, and appealed to
the collector with regard to the credibility of the witness, he was
told by his superior that it was no business of his, for that he only
acted ministerially in the affair; so that this old woman continued
during the entire day to receive her two dollars for every seaman who,
through the oath administered to her, obtained his certificate.[300]
The same system prevailed at Philadelphia; certificates were also
frequently transferred from one individual to another, and became as
much a matter of bargain and sale as any other description of chattel
property; the most ridiculous part of the system being, that after a
transfer of this description it was no unusual thing to see produced by
a sailor of colour a certificate for his protection, in which he was
described to be of “_a fair complexion, light hair and blue eyes_!”
In all these indefensible proceedings the Americans held that a British
subject, who by a false oath converted himself into an American
citizen, or who naturalised himself in the United States, in conformity
with their laws, ceased to owe allegiance to the king of his native
country, and was entitled to their protection; and, in support of
this strange doctrine, whenever this view was impeached, the American
envoy merely replied that he had no instructions on that point. In
the parliamentary discussions which took place upon the subject,
Mr. A. Baring, with all his Whig tendencies and strong American
predilections, while affecting to believe that the Russian campaign and
Napoleon’s intrigues had nothing to do with the declaration of war by
the Americans, strongly maintained the English right of impressment,
adding “that if there were sixteen hundred American seamen in our navy,
there were more than sixteen thousand British seamen in the American
navy;”[301] and he condemned ministers for not carrying on the war
against the United States with greater vigour: at that moment, however,
every effort was concentrated to strike down Napoleon.
The truth of Mr. Baring’s recommendations soon became too apparent.
Although the Americans when they declared war had only four frigates
fit for service, the _Constitution_ not being then finished, they
launched such a fleet of privateers that English merchant vessels were
captured in large numbers; but it was only when two of their frigates
were taken that the English were aroused to the necessity of meeting
with greater force their new rivals on the ocean. It ought, however,
to be remembered that in the well-known cases of the capture of the
_Guerriere_, the _Macedonian_, and the _Java_, by the _Constitution_
and the _United States_ respectively, the odds were largely on the
side of the Americans, especially in the weight of their armaments
and size of their vessels. Moreover the American crews were generally
one-third English, and, however much we may regret to have to admit
the fact, certain it is that, on board the _United States_, there
were men who had actually served under Lord Nelson on board the
_Victory_ at Trafalgar[302]. But it was not until the _Shannon_ took
the _Chesapeake_, in the presence, as is related, of a crowd of yachts
which had come out from Boston to see the English frigate captured,
that the British regained the supremacy they had so long held upon the
ocean.[303]
During this unfortunate war many difficulties arose with respect
of the importation of American cotton, as that necessary article of
commerce, in spite of the English navigation laws, still in some mode
found its way to her ports in neutral bottoms. Consequently there arose
a complication, in which the cotton-spinners stood in direct antagonism
with the interests of the shipowners. By the laws of war trade could
not be carried on with America except by royal licence; the Act of the
43 George III., c. 153, only giving power to legalise importations. The
general navigation laws of England prohibited importation except in
their own ships, or in the ships of the places where the commodities
imported grew. The Act of George III., therefore, conflicted with
that of Charles II., and the shipowners viewed any relaxation of the
provisions of the old navigation laws with the deepest alarm.
[Sidenote: Necessity of relaxing the Navigation Laws during war.]
Thus, whenever a war with a maritime power supervened, the navigation
laws were relaxed in favour of some paramount interests, such as, in
the present case, that of the cotton-spinners, whose demands for raw
cotton required to be supplied. Even in a state of war every nation
must of necessity provide as far as possible for the supply and sale of
those raw materials of produce, the manipulation of which tends in a
great degree to employ the industry and promote the general prosperity
of large classes of the community. England had been thus compelled to
sacrifice, or evade by licences or otherwise, her Orders in Council,
although every statesman who could exercise a disinterested judgment
had a full conviction of their expediency under the circumstances in
which she was then placed. In like manner the United States, a few
years previously, had been compelled to sacrifice their system of
embargoes, which was a favourite policy of the actual dominant party
in America; and the Czar, in his incipient efforts, had been incited
to resist Napoleon’s dictation as to what merchant vessels he should
or should not admit into his ports, although this decision raised the
question of the existence of national independence.
[Sidenote: High duties on cotton.]
But with all these obvious principles patent to every legislator in
both Houses of Parliament, it is the fact that a duty of TWOPENCE per
_pound_ was levied on the importation of COTTON WOOL if imported in
British ships, and THREEPENCE per _pound_ if imported in _ships not
British built_. Such were the strange anomalies of protection and such
the difficulties which all similar legislative measures must ever
create in the necessary commercial intercourse between nations. England
has, however, now happily corrected all this fallacious legislation,
and consequently a population of wealth and national power has been
created in the very centre of the kingdom unsurpassed for intelligence
in any previously existing manufacturing community. The shipowners
of the kingdom, instead of stopping up and checking the fountain
of prosperity at its source, now suffer it to flow in its natural
channels, and they find that their own interests, instead of being
impaired by the change, have kept pace with the general prosperity
enjoyed by other classes.
[Sidenote: Great European Alliance.]
Turning now to the great wars which still raged in Europe, we may, by
way of continuity, remind our readers that the consent of the King
of Prussia having been reluctantly obtained, for he still inclined
to Napoleon, the treaty of Kalitsch was signed on the 1st of March,
1813.[304] This treaty constituted the foundation of that grand
Alliance which soon after accomplished the overthrow of Napoleon, and
the deliverance of the European continent. The people of Prussia, to
a man, had risen to arms to deliver their fatherland from the grasp
of their French oppressor, and the king, though dreading the ire of
Napoleon, who could easily have purchased his neutrality at the time,
felt conscious that it was now a question of life and death for him,
and no longer hesitated. The treaty, therefore, was signed, and Russia
agreed never to lay down her arms until Prussia was reconstituted as
she stood anterior to 1806. A proclamation was issued to all the German
princes, announcing that the allies had no other object in view but to
rescue Germany from the domination of France. Four days afterwards the
Russian general proclaimed the dissolution of the Confederation of the
Rhine, and the Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin gave the first example of
an adhesion to the new Alliance.
[Sidenote: Napoleon returns to Paris.]
Napoleon, with Caulaincourt in the same vehicle, had reached Paris
before the intelligence of his retreat from Moscow had become
known. With his accustomed vigour he soon restored tranquillity and
confidence in the capital, raised three hundred and fifty thousand men
by a conscription voted by the obsequious Senate, and contrived to
wring from the Pope a Concordat, wherein his Holiness yielded up the
point for which he had lost the papal throne and suffered so long an
exile. Confident in the moral and religious powers thus acquired by
a reconciliation with the Church, Napoleon’s joy was intense. He put
forth the whole strength of his varied resources to place his army upon
the best footing. In the meantime, however, the forces under the Duke
of Wellington were advancing; and while the storm gathered fast in
Spain, outraged Germany was marshalling her forces to expel the invader
from her confines. The decisive battle of Vittoria was fought on the
21st of June, 1813, and Pampeluña besieged in the latter end of July.
The British army under Wellington entered France on the 8th of October,
and Pampeluña surrendered on the 31st of the same month. England had
also secretly opened negotiations with Austria, which, favoured by
Wellington’s victories, were brought to a satisfactory conclusion; and,
with the view of crushing her formidable enemy, she poured out her
treasure like water. Portugal received from her a loan of two millions
sterling; Sicily four hundred thousand; Spain, in money and stores,
two millions; Sweden a million; Russia and Prussia three millions;
Austria one million; besides warlike stores sent to Germany to the
amount of two millions more. The war on the continent cost England
this year, in subsidies or other contributions to foreign powers, ten
million four hundred thousand pounds; and the total expenditure of
England for 1813-14 amounted to the enormous sum of one hundred and
eighteen millions; the sum paid for transports alone being 565,790_l._
[Sidenote: Germans advance to the Rhine.]
Napoleon quitted Paris to take the command of his army in April.
The details of the battles of Lützen, Bautzen, and Hochkirche,
which followed, are too well known to be here recounted. Austria,
instigated by England, on the 15th of August declared war against
France; but Napoleon seemed still favoured by fortune, as he repulsed
the attack of the main army at Dresden on the 27th of that month;
and it was only at the great battle of Leipsic, where Napoleon had
concentrated his forces, when the Saxon and Würtemburg troops passed
over from the French ranks and joined the Allies, that his army was
completely routed. Then the conqueror of a hundred battles fell back
upon the Rhine, breaking through the Bavarian army, which obstructed
his passage, and soon afterwards returned to Paris once more utterly
defeated.[305] The Germans now raised the thrilling and invigorating
cry “To the Rhine!” and the Allies issued, on the 4th of December,
their declaration from Frankfort, still offering peace, which Napoleon
answered by raising another three hundred thousand men by conscription.
The Allied armies crossed that far-famed river, while Schwartzenburg
entered France through Switzerland.
[Sidenote: Treaty of Chaumont.]
The struggles and guerilla warfare which followed are too familiar
to every reader of history to require recapitulation. Even after the
battle of La Rothière Napoleon might have concluded terms of peace if
he had chosen to make concessions. Before the final blow he haughtily
said that he was nearer Munich than the Allies were to Paris; and
to renounce even the frontier of the Rhine after so much bloodshed
was worse than death to him. To the last he struggled against Lord
Castlereagh’s influence, whose presence in the Allied camp was worth a
host of generals in circumventing his intrigues. England had already
concluded a treaty with Joachim Murat of Naples, and Soult had been
once more defeated by Wellington at Orthes (Feb. 27, 1814), on French
ground, when on the 1st of March the treaty of Chaumont was agreed on
by the Allied powers. By this celebrated diplomatic instrument it was
stipulated that in the event of Napoleon refusing the terms which had
been offered to him—viz., the reduction of France to the limits of the
old monarchy, as they stood prior to the Revolution, the four Allied
powers, Austria, Prussia, Russia, and England should each maintain one
hundred and fifty thousand men in the field; and that England should
pay an annual subsidy of five millions sterling, to be equally divided
between the three continental powers, besides maintaining her own
contingent complete from her own resources. Such were the prodigious
efforts made to put the crowning act to all her previous efforts to
accomplish the utter destruction of the common enemy.
[Sidenote: The Allies enter Paris.]
The Allies now made rapid advances upon Paris; on the 1st of April
their victorious armies entered the capital of France; and on the 10th
of April the dynasty of the Bourbons was restored by a decree of the
Senate. The battle of Toulouse, fought after the events in Paris,[306]
terminated the brilliant campaign carried on by the Duke of Wellington;
and, after one of the most sanguinary wars ever waged in history, the
pacification of Europe was for a time restored, Napoleon being assigned
to the island of Elba, where he was allowed to retire with a liberal
and independent revenue.
[Sidenote: End of the war by the Treaty of Paris, 1814.]
These acts were confirmed by the treaty of Paris, 30th of May, 1814;
and in a short time after Denmark made peace, having been compelled
to cede the kingdom of Norway to Sweden. It may be added, though the
facts must be familiar to most of our readers, that by the treaty of
Paris France was reduced to the limits of 1792; Belgium was united
to Holland, and constituted the kingdom of the Netherlands; Savoy and
Piedmont were restored to the King of Sardinia; Tuscany to its former
grand-duke, Ferdinand III.; and Lombardy was given to Austria.
But no sooner had the powers assembled at Vienna to settle the
delineations of territory which had been so grievously disturbed by
Napoleon, than difficulties met them at every stage. The Bourbons
at Paris were beset with claims quite impossible to be conceded.
Insolvency, consequent upon Napoleon’s wars, stared them in the
face. Russia demanded the whole grand-duchy of Warsaw as the reward
of her sacrifices, and adduced abundant arguments to support her
claims. Prussia wished to be reinstated in all respects, statistical,
financial, and geographical, as she stood at the commencement of the
war in 1806, with such additions as might be practicable according to
the treaty of Kalitsch. Accordingly, besides various provinces on the
left bank of the Rhine, she claimed the whole of Saxony, while Prussia
and Russia, by friendly concessions, were united in their demands.
[Sidenote: Napoleon’s escape from Elba.]
France, Austria, and England opposed these sweeping annexations of
the northern nations; and Alexander, annoyed that England and Austria
should resist his pretensions, was even more fiercely indignant that
Talleyrand, representing France, should “with black ingratitude”
hesitate to grant what he asked. To support these pretensions Alexander
kept up an army of two hundred and eighty thousand men in Lithuania
and Poland, and published an address announcing his intention to
restore to the Poles their lost nationality; Prussia had reorganised
her army ready for action; Austria maintained her forces on a war
footing; and British troops in great number were sent over to Belgium;
till a million of armed men, in the midst of a congress assembled
for the general pacification of the world, were retained under their
banners ready for mutual slaughter. When, however, the political
reasons which prompted France, Austria, and England to form a secret
arrangement to carry out the treaty of Paris somehow transpired, the
views of the northern powers were materially modified; but while their
rulers were still discussing the fresh territorial arrangements to
be determined upon, the news suddenly reached Vienna that Napoleon
had quitted the island of Elba, and had again entered France. This
thunderbolt dispelled at once the numerous jealousies which had been
fast gathering during the winter. All minor differences were forgotten,
and, at the first meeting of the plenipotentiaries, a declaration was
drawn up and signed in the name of all the Powers, which in the most
rigid terms proscribed Napoleon as a public enemy, and expressed their
determination to employ their whole forces to prevent Europe from being
again plunged into revolutionary confusion.
[Sidenote: His landing in France and advance on Paris.]
The escape of Napoleon from Elba, his landing, his addresses to
the soldiers and to the people, the defection of Labedoyère, his
triumphant advance by Lyons to Paris, the treason of Ney and flight
of the Bourbons to Ghent as the imperial adventurer approached the
capital, are all well-remembered events. They succeeded each other with
astonishing and bewildering rapidity. On the 21st of March Napoleon
found himself once more in the palace of the Tuileries, with the
whole army of France enthusiastic in his favour. The efforts made at a
counter-revolution by the Bourbons in the provinces signally failed,
and Napoleon, with fortune at his back, seemed to have seized once more
permanently the imperial sceptre.
[Sidenote: British troops despatched to Belgium.]
[Sidenote: Subsidies to European Powers.]
[Sidenote: Fouché.]
But England again stood like a lion in his path. On the 6th of April
the Prince Regent announced formally to the House of Commons the events
which had occurred. War was approved unanimously by the Lords, and only
thirty-seven members could be found to vote against it in the Commons.
The nation to a man put forth its concentrated strength. An enormous
sudden demand took place for transports to carry over troops and
munitions of war to Flanders, which it was intuitively seen must be the
battle-ground whereon the future peace of Europe was to be decided. The
House of Commons provided the sinews of war with unbounded liberality.
The property-tax, producing 15,000,000_l._, was renewed. Subsidies were
voted to the extent of 11,000,000_l._ to Austria, Russia, Prussia,
Hanover, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Italy, and the Netherlands; and
all Europe in a few weeks bristled with bayonets. Napoleon sought to
obtain popularity by conceding a constitution; but no reflecting man
had much confidence in these paper declarations. Caulaincourt tried
in vain to open negotiations for peace; but his couriers were stopped
on the frontiers. It was intimated to him that the Allied Sovereigns
would not swerve from their resolutions: “all Europe had declared war
against Bonaparte.” The Emperor Alexander was especially moved, and
said that “Europe requires an example.” Murat, at the head of an army
of fifty thousand Neapolitans, made a diversion in favour of Napoleon
by marching to the Po; but they fled like a flock of sheep before the
Austrians. Treason now lurked in the councils of Napoleon. Fouché was
detected in a correspondence with Metternich. Napoleon threatened to
hang him, but did not dare. As Carnot wisely said, the Republicans only
permitted Napoleon to reign because they thought him more favourable
to their views than the Bourbons; so Napoleon dissembled, under
the necessity of keeping both in power. Each predominant power in
succession had been fully conscious of the innate treachery of Fouché,
but each was compelled to employ him.
[Sidenote: Last campaign of Napoleon, and defeat at Waterloo.]
Leaving a council to direct affairs in Paris, Napoleon left that city
to commence his last campaign, which ended in his final overthrow at
Waterloo on the 18th of June, 1815.
[Sidenote: Reflections.]
Every impartial reader of history can hardly fail to see that though
the maritime decrees of Napoleon on the one hand, and the English
Orders in Council on the other, had nothing to do with the origin
of the lamentable wars which so long shook Europe to its base, they
were the means, in a great measure, of their prolongation, and were
the origin, in an essential manner, of the war between England and
the United States of America. Attempts on the part of governments to
deprive nations of what is necessary for their existence must ever
produce the most serious consequences. Besides, it is alike vain
and presumptuous for weak man to interpose obstacles in the way of
securing to large masses of the people articles absolutely requisite
for them, and which, so far as we can divine the inscrutable ways of
Providence, are produced for the general use and welfare of mankind.
Indeed, the mind is impressed with a singular sensation on beholding a
great conqueror, just reposing after one of his most signal victories,
issuing decrees that would render almost every sea desolate, and
prevent an interchange of commodities as necessary for the daily wants
of his own people as for those of other nations.
In gaining his great victories, in adding state after state to his
dominions, and in placing brother after brother on the throne of
ancient kingdoms whose dynasties he had overthrown, Napoleon may for
some mysterious purpose have been performing the part assigned to him
by a Higher Power, and accomplishing the destinies of which, under
Heaven, he was to be the instrument. But when he extended his ambition
to the ocean, when he undertook to overwhelm the innocent peoples
of many nations by his maritime decrees, he left the orbit in which
evidently it had been his destiny to move for one on which his fleets
had been invariably defeated, and where he himself was never seen
except as a fugitive, and at last as a prisoner of war in the hands of
the ancient rival of his country.
FOOTNOTES:
[289] This Act, in its fullest stringency, meant no commercial
intercourse with any European state (see ‘Key to Orders in Council,’
No. 10).
[290] This Act passed Congress on the 1st of March, 1809; generally
it provided that the “commerce of America was opened to all the world
except France and England.” The ships of war of both countries were
excluded from American ports (‘Key to Orders in Council,’ No. 11).
[291] ‘Report of the Chamber of Deputies,’ 1835.
[292] Holmes’ ‘American Annals,’ vol. ii. pp. 441, 442.
[293] The case of the English will be found treated at great length in
Mr. Stephen’s speech, March 1809, a full verbatim report of which will
be found at the end of vol. xiii. ‘Parl. Debates’ for that year.
[294] See _ante_ for notice of the celebrated pamphlet.
[295] Concluding sentence of Mr. Baring’s ‘Inquiry into the Causes
and Consequences of the Orders in Council, and an Examination of the
Conduct of Great Britain towards the Neutral Commerce of America.’
[296] Though the Bill for declaring war was passed by the House of
Representatives by seventy-nine to forty-nine, the votes in the Senate
in favour of war were only nineteen to seventeen (see Holmes’ ‘American
Annals,’ vol. i. p. 448; and ‘American Diplomacy,’ p. 235.)
[297] _Vide_ his letters of that date; we use his own words, as quite
conclusive.
[298] _Vide_ Monroe’s letter, Jan. 14, 1812, to Mr. Foster,
Consul-General of Great Britain.
[299] This document is in the ‘United States State Papers, Foreign
Relations,’ vol. iii. p. 457, and is further referred to in the
‘Declaration of the Prince Regent,’ Jan. 9, 1813. The obnoxious Decrees
are renewed in full vigour, while the Duke of Bassano was affecting to
wonder that the Americans had never had a copy of the Decree revoking
them.
[300] Statement of Lord Castlereagh, Feb. 18, 1813.
[301] Mr. A. Baring, afterwards Lord Ashburton, said that, in an
American ship in which he arrived at Portsmouth harbour from the
United States, a person came on board to search for British seamen.
All the crew produced certificates but one, who was carried off in
the boat, amidst the jeers of the American captain, who said, “There,
they have taken a man who was never out of Pennsylvania in his life,
and who, thinking no one could doubt it, did not provide himself with
a certificate; and have left three fellows who have been only six
months out of a British man-of-war, but who have been wiser in securing
certificates.”
[302] See James’ ‘Naval History,’ vol. vi.
[303] Though numerous British merchant vessels were at the commencement
of the war captured by privateers, the Americans suffered the most
deeply before its close from the effects it produced in their
commercial relations. Their foreign trade, which anterior to the
rupture with Great Britain amounted to 22,000,000_l._ of imports and
28,000,000_l._ of exports, carried on in 1,300,000 tons of shipping,
was almost annihilated. So disastrous were the effects of the war, that
in the two short years of its existence two-thirds of the mercantile
and trading classes in all the States of the Union became insolvent,
and such were the suffering and public discontent in the States of
Massachusetts and Connecticut that the feeling of nationality was
nearly extinguished. Indeed a large portion of the people, when peace
was restored, were preparing to take steps to break off from the Union,
to assert their national independence, and to make terms with Great
Britain (see ‘De Tocqueville’ and ‘Annual Register’ for 1814, p. 193).
[304] Alison, v. x. p. 121.
[305] The order of events was as follows: at first on the advance
of the French they were victorious everywhere, especially on the
historical fields of Lützen, Bautzen, and Hochkirche, and also at
Würtschen; but the tide of victory turned after a brief armistice,
and Dresden was Napoleon’s last success in a pitched battle. Culm,
Katzbach, Gross-beeren, and Dennewitz had proved that the French were
no longer invincible, and prepared for the final and crushing crisis,
rendered all the more severe by the defection of two brigades of Saxon
foot, twenty-two guns, and the Würtemburg cavalry, in the middle of the
great battle of Leipsic, Oct. 18, 1813.—Alison, ch. xxxi.
[306] It is now certain that Soult, feeling sure of beating Wellington
at Toulouse, had received the news of the entrance of the Allies into
Paris four days before he fought the final battle of the great war, on
April 10, 1814.—Alison, xi. p. 309.
CHAPTER X.
United States of America—Her independence recognised,
1783—Commercial rights—Retaliatory measures—Threatening attitude
of Massachusetts—Constitution of the United States—Good effects
of a united Government—Maritime laws and laws respecting
Neutrals—Feeling on both sides the water—Treaty between Great
Britain and United States—The right to impose a countervailing
tonnage duty reserved—Difficulty of the negotiation—Remarkable
omission respecting cotton—Indignation in France at the Treaty—The
French protest against its principles—Interest of England to
have private property free from capture at sea—Condemnation
of ships in the West Indies and great depredations—Outrages
on the Americans—Torture practised by French cruisers—The
advantages of the war to the Americans—Impulse given to
shipping—Progress of American civilisation—Advances of maritime
enterprise—Views of American statesmen—The shipwrights of
Baltimore seek protection—Great Britain imposes countervailing
duties—Effect of legislative measures on both sides—Freight and
duty compared—Conclusions drawn by the American shipowners—Alarm
in the United States at the idea of reciprocity—Objections to
the British Navigation Act—Threatened destruction to American
shipping—Popular clamour—Opinions in Congress—Great influence of
the shipowners—Early statesmen of the United States—Their efforts
to develop maritime commerce—First trade with the East—European
War of 1803—Its effect on their maritime pursuits.
[Sidenote: United States of America.]
A brief exposition has already been given of the trade and navigation
of the British colonies of North America, which in 1776 declared their
independence, and after an unwise and ineffectual resistance on the
part of Great Britain, achieved their object, and became, in 1783, the
now great transatlantic republic, known as the United States of America.
[Sidenote: Her independence recognised, 1783.]
For some time after their independence had been acknowledged, the
people of the infant republic were slow in recovering from the
extraordinary efforts they had made to secure their position as a
nation. There were domestic as well as foreign obstacles to overcome.
Each of the thirteen States at first contended for its own immediate
interests. Some of them declared for a system of free-trade; others
were in favour of protection. When a five per cent. _ad valorem_ duty
on foreign produce was proposed by Congress, with a view to pay off
the debt of the federation, the opposition of one State alone, that of
Rhode Island, was sufficient to defeat the project. And when the State
of Pennsylvania levied a duty on foreign produce, New Jersey, equally
washed by the waters of the Delaware river, admitted the same articles
brought by foreign merchant vessels free of duty, the result being that
goods could be easily smuggled into one State from the other. Nor did
the troubles of the new States end here.
[Sidenote: Commercial rights.]
[Sidenote: Retaliatory measures.]
No sooner had their independence been acknowledged than there arose,
as we have seen, in Great Britain a controversy respecting the extent
of the commercial rights which it would be advisable to concede to the
republic; the main point in contention being whether the vessels of the
United States should be excluded from her West Indian settlements, as
the vessels of all other nations were by the Navigation Act, and from
a commerce at that time constituting the most valuable branch of the
whole British trade. As this view of the question prevailed, Congress,
in 1784, recommended to the legislatures of the different States the
adoption of a law prohibiting for fifteen years the importation and
exportation of every species of merchandise in any vessels belonging to
foreign powers which had not connected themselves with the government
of the United States by commercial treaties. The recommendation of
retaliatory measures, as has too frequently been the case in all ages
and with all nations, found ready favour with the New England States,
whose people were almost exclusively engaged in maritime pursuits. The
merchants and shipowners of Boston, who had played so determined and
conspicuous a part in the great revolution, were highly exasperated
by their exclusion from the ports of the West Indies, and by the
regulations adopted with regard to British fisheries in the American
seas. They viewed also with alarm the establishment of British factors
in their country.
[Sidenote: Threatening attitude of Massachusetts.]
Massachusetts consequently passed an Act for the regulation of
navigation and commerce, whereby they prohibited the exportation of
any American produce or manufacture from their ports in vessels owned
by British subjects after the 1st of August, 1785; with a provisional
exception in favour of those British settlements whose governors should
reverse their proclamations against the admission of American vessels
into their ports. They also levied several extra duties to be paid by
vessels belonging to foreigners, and especially by British subjects.
There was, however, a proviso, containing a permission for newly-built
vessels constructed in Massachusetts, though partly or wholly owned
by British subjects, to take in cargoes upon equal terms with the
citizens of the United States, but only for their first departures.
Several States, following the example of Massachusetts, levied duties
of various kinds on foreign tonnage. In some of the States 1_s._ per
ton was imposed, while in others foreign vessels were subjected to
a tax of from 3_s._ to no less than 5_s._ per ton, counterparts, in
many respects, to the ancient navigation laws of England. However
prejudicial to other nations, these high and conflicting rates led to a
general misunderstanding among the States themselves, which contributed
about as much as any foreign competition would then have done to check
the progress of American navigation. But a common interest soon made it
manifest to the people of the United States that these differential, or
rather protective duties could not be maintained, and that some general
regulations were essential to the safety and welfare of the Union, and
to the development of its trade and navigation. In short, the different
States found it absolutely necessary to part with a portion of their
individual liberty in order to secure the combined and wholesome
action of the entire Union. Indeed they soon perceived the necessity
of confiding to Congress alone the power of regulating and controlling
their intercourse with foreign nations; and, with this object in view,
a convention was called to revise the articles of the confederation.
[Sidenote: Constitution of the United States.]
By the constitution of the United States (Art. 1, Sec. 8, 9, 10),
Congress was vested with the power of regulating commerce with foreign
nations. It was therefore stipulated, on the recommendation of the
convention, that no tax or duty shall be laid on articles exported from
any State; that “no preference shall be given by any regulation of
commerce or revenue to the ports of one State over that of another;”
and that no vessels bound to or from one State should be obliged to
enter, clear, or pay duties in another. Further, that “no State shall,
without the consent of Congress, lay any impost or duty on imports
or exports except what may be absolutely necessary for executing its
respective laws; that the net produce of all duties or imposts laid by
any State on imports or exports shall be for the use of the treasury
of the United States, and that all such laws shall be subject to the
revision and control of Congress.”
[Sidenote: The good effects of a united government.]
The adoption of this paper constitution, as yet not quite in force
to its legitimate extent in some of the Southern States, conferred
upon the United States the sovereign attributes of a great nation.
It secured the domestic tranquillity then so much required, and laid
the foundation for amicable treaties of commerce and navigation with
foreign powers. Placed as the people of the United States were, without
any relations of amity with other nations, but happily unshackled with
any trading monopolies to limit their free action, it was obviously to
their interest to invite other countries to their shores, and to form
with them friendly alliances of commerce and navigation. Accordingly
their then Secretary of State, seeing that some of the States were
opposed to protection, proclaimed with great wisdom the principles of
free-trade; and in his manifesto on this subject[307] remarked that
“instead of embarrassing commerce under piles of regulating laws,
duties, and prohibitions, it should be relieved from all its shackles
in all parts of the world. Would even a single nation,” he continued,
“begin with the United States this system of free commerce, it would be
advisable to begin with that nation.”
Unfortunately other nations, and more especially Great Britain, as
well as the Northern States of America, were not then prepared to
adopt, pure and simple, the principles he propounded; and although
American vessels were then admitted to the British possessions in the
East Indies upon the most favoured footing, the great majority of the
English people had no inclination to yield one iota of their ancient
navigation laws without an equivalent, as they considered these laws
to be the chief, if not the sole cause of their maritime success and
supremacy. Nor would the English government make any concessions with
regard to Light dues and Local charges, of which the shipowners of
the United States justly complained, and have still, though to a much
less extent, some cause for complaint. The Board of Trade contended
that these charges were of ancient establishment and the property of
private persons or of corporate bodies, and that the funds arising from
them were in many instances applicable to public works or charitable
purposes.
[Sidenote: Maritime laws and laws respecting neutrals.]
[Sidenote: Feeling on both sides the water.]
With regard to maritime regulations an intimation was given by the
Lords of the Council that Great Britain might consent to insert in a
commercial treaty with the United States all the articles of maritime
law which had of late years been inserted in her commercial treaties
with other foreign powers; expressly excepting, however, any article
allowing the ships of the United States to protect the property of the
enemies of Great Britain in time of war, _which should on no account
be admitted_. On the other hand, the more violent partisans in America
for unrestricted trade with the West Indies threatened to break off all
commercial intercourse with Great Britain unless their demands were
complied with. In this controversy it is amusing to observe that grave
members of the English Council actually gave an authoritative opinion:
“That the articles which the people of the United States now send to
European markets are but few, and can be obtained in equal perfection
from other countries; and,” they added, “IT IS MORE LIKELY _that the
demand for them from thence should in future_ DIMINISH RATHER THAN
INCREASE.” If these short-sighted mortals could but have opened the
book of the future, and could have contemplated the prodigious supply
of cotton, and corn, and other raw produce which have been derived from
the United States since the resources of its fertile and varied soil
have been developed, they would have paused before they hazarded such
crude and altogether erroneous vaticinations. They, moreover, decried
the trade in grain as precarious, and asserted that no system of
foreign commerce permanently profitable could be founded upon it.
[Sidenote: Treaty between Great Britain and the United States.]
Happily, however, a treaty of amity and commerce and navigation was at
last concluded between the two nations; but we need only here refer to
those portions of it which more especially affected their navigation.
By this treaty it was arranged that during the continuance of the
French war, and for two years after its termination, the citizens of
the United States might carry in vessels of their own, not exceeding
the burthen of seventy tons, to the British West Indies, all such
produce or manufactures of the United States as could be lawfully
carried from the States to the islands by British vessels; and also
that American vessels might carry back from the islands to the States
all such West Indian produce as British vessels might carry to the same
quarter; the same duties being levied by each government on the ships
of the one country as on those of the other engaged in this trade. The
United States were, however, expressly debarred from carrying molasses,
sugar, coffee, cotton, etc., the produce of the West Indies, to any
other part of the world.
[Sidenote: The right to impose a countervailing tonnage duty reserved.]
The liberty of continuing to trade to the ports of the territories of
Great Britain in the East Indies was confirmed to American vessels;
the government of the United States engaging that such vessels should
carry the goods brought away by them from India to no part of the world
except their own ports in America. By the 15th article it was agreed
that no higher duties should be charged in the ports of either country
upon vessels belonging to the other than were paid by the like vessels
on merchandise of all other nations; nor should any prohibition be
imposed upon the exportation or importation of any articles to and from
the territories of the two contracting parties respectively, which
should not equally extend to all other nations.[308] But the British
government reserved to itself the right of imposing on American vessels
entering into the British ports in Europe a tonnage duty equal to that
which was payable by British vessels in the ports of America; and also
such duty as might be adequate to countervail the difference of duty
payable on the importation of European and Asiatic goods, when imported
into the United States in British or in American vessels. Both parties
further agreed to treat with regard to a more exact equalisation of
duties. If a vessel should be taken or detained on suspicion of having
enemy’s property on board, or of carrying contraband articles, it
was stipulated that only the illegal portion of the cargo should be
condemned and made prize.
By the 21st article the two governments bound themselves not to permit
their subjects or citizens to accept commissions from the enemies of
the other, nor to permit such enemies to enlist any of their subjects
or citizens into the military service; any subject or citizen acting
contrary to this article being made punishable as a pirate. By
subsequent articles the contracting parties agreed that neither would
permit privateers, commissioned by the enemies of the other, to arm or
to trade in their ports, still less allow a vessel belonging to the
other to be taken within any of its bays, or within cannon-shot of its
coasts. In case of a rupture between the two countries, the subjects
or citizens of the one residing in the dominions of the other were
secured the privilege of remaining and continuing their trade, so
long as they committed no offence against the laws; and even if their
conduct should induce the government to order them to depart from the
country, they were allowed twelve months to remove their families and
effects.
[Sidenote: Difficulty of the negotiation.]
These were the chief articles of this treaty. The disaffected on both
sides the water found, however, as has almost invariably been the case
in commercial treaties, great fault with it. The shipowners of the
United States complained of the restrictions put upon their shipping
intercourse with the West Indies; while the cavillers in Great Britain
looked upon the permission to use vessels of seventy tons in the trade
between the United States and these islands as equivalent to the
creating a nursery of seamen for the use of America. But the treaty,
in spite of these cavillings, was signed by Lord Grenville and Mr. Jay
on the 19th of November, 1794. It was not, however, until the 25th of
October, 1795, that the ratifications between the two governments were
exchanged. The House of Representatives in the United States did not
sanction this treaty till the 30th of April, 1796, nor was the Act for
carrying its provisions into effect passed in the British Parliament
till the 4th of July, 1797.[309] Throughout the whole negotiation
Mr. Jay admits that he was apprehensive of giving umbrage to France;
but while he is eloquent about the British spoliations on American
commerce, he was forced to admit that British vessels had been captured
by French privateers, illegally armed in American ports, and that some
of them had actually been taken in the waters of the United States. The
obligation of the United States to make compensation for these captures
was also admitted by Washington. But the great difficulty of bringing
the negotiation to a satisfactory issue cannot be better described than
in the words of Mr. Wm. Jay.[310]
“On his arrival in England, the revolutionary frenzy in France was
at its height. Robespierre was revelling in all the wantonness of
unbridled power, and the French people, the unconscious vassals of a
bloody tyrant, were perpetrating acts of cruelty and impiety which
excited the astonishment and abhorrence of all who duly estimated the
claims of humanity and the obligations of religion. With this people
the British monarch was waging a war, in which he was supported by
the enthusiastic co-operation of his own subjects,[311] and by the
alliance of Russia, Austria, Spain, and Sardinia. Although in this war
the United States were _professedly neutral_, yet it was well known
that the sympathies of a large portion of their citizens were enlisted
_on the side of France_, and that they were with difficulty restrained
by their government from violating the duties of neutrality. The late
proceedings of Congress, also, had tended but little to conciliate the
goodwill of England. The American war, and the consequent independence
of her colonies, had moreover wounded the pride of Britain, and
engendered feelings towards the United States unpropitious to the
negotiation. The extent of her resources, the number of her allies, the
nature of the war in which she was engaged, and her resentments towards
the United States, all combined to indispose Great Britain either to
acknowledge the wrongs she had committed or to make reparation for
them.”
It was in this treaty that Mr. Jay proposed to insert a clause “that if
it should unfortunately happen that Great Britain and the United States
should be at war, there shall be no privateers commissioned by them
against each other.” Unhappily the clause was considered inadmissible
by Lord Grenville, and in fact, although the proposition is embraced in
Mr. Jay’s original instructions, the American government have receded
from the views they then propounded unless other nations exempt private
property from capture at sea.[312]
[Sidenote: Remarkable omission respecting cotton.]
It may seem singular that the American minister should have consented
to prohibit the exportation of cotton, one of the articles enumerated
in the clause relating to the West Indian trade. The explanation
is curious. In the original draft of the treaty, the United States
minister stipulated to prohibit during the continuance of the article
in force, all “West Indian productions and manufactures.” The
expression was, on reflection, deemed to be too general, and it was
agreed to specify the prohibited articles, and accordingly “cotton”
was inserted as a West Indian production; the cotton then used in the
United States being almost wholly brought from the West Indies.[313]
A few months prior to Mr. Jay’s departure for England, Mr. Jefferson,
the Secretary of State, in a report to Congress on the commerce of
the United States, enumerated the exports of the country, but made no
mention of cotton. It was not, in fact, then known as a production of
the United States, although it now requires for its transport a greater
amount of shipping than almost any other article in the whole range of
commerce.
[Sidenote: Indignation in France at the treaty.]
The treaty so satisfactorily concluded between Great Britain and
the United States, having been undoubtedly a successful effort of
diplomacy in bringing together two nations which had been torn asunder
by revolution, was viewed in France with the most profound alarm and
indignation. The resentment of the French scarcely knew any bounds.
They were full of the idea that the Americans owed their national
independence to the aid rendered by them to the revolted colonies, a
support which, as already explained, was furnished with a view less to
promote the cause of freedom in the United States than to aim a blow at
the maritime power of England.
[Sidenote: The French protest against its principles.]
So loud and clamorous were the complaints against the treaty, that
if the voice of the French had been listened to, an open rupture
must then have ensued. They publicly declared that it violated in a
positive and hostile manner the treaty they had concluded “in favour
of the Americans in the year 1778, by which the United States agreed
to guarantee the possessions of France in the West Indies; whereas, by
this treaty, the very furnishing of provisions to the French islands
was pronounced illegal.”[314] They alleged that it “deprived France of
all the advantages stipulated in a former treaty;” and they charged
the Americans with “the abandonment of their neutral rights, to the
injury of France,” in not maintaining the pretended principle of the
modern law of nations, that free ships make free goods, and that timber
and naval stores for the equipment and armament of vessels are not
contraband of war.
[Sidenote: Interest of England to have private property free from
capture at sea.]
On this question, of such paramount importance to England, considering
the vast amount of her maritime commerce, much has been said and
written, and every view of the subject has been argued with great care
and consummate ability. No doubt the feeling of nations is becoming
more in favour of the principle of making all goods not contraband
of war exempt from capture at sea, and the views of the more modern
English statesmen are inclining in that direction; but it is only by
taking a retrospective view of the measures unscrupulously adopted by
both France and England during their mighty struggle that a conjecture
can be formed of what will be the future effect of such or similar
compacts. While waging internecine war against each other, the people
of England and France were famishing alike for want of food. Should
such circumstances again arise, it is not easy to suppose, much less
to hope, that nations so powerful at sea as Great Britain, with their
people thus suffering, would be bound by any compact that stopped the
supply from America or elsewhere; and it is almost as futile to hope
that they would relinquish their power of hampering their enemies’
commerce at sea unless it were stipulated that neutral nations are
bound to enforce the compact. Though England still stands first as a
maritime power, and has consequently at her disposal the most extensive
means of destroying an enemy’s maritime commerce, she has, on the
other hand, by far the largest amount of property of any nation at all
times afloat, and must therefore be the largest sufferer in the event
of hostilities with any power which can equip a fleet of privateers.
Consequently, it was hoped by a large portion of the English people,
when the American government in 1856 declined to become parties to the
declaration of the European Powers assembled in conference at Paris,
unless all private property was made free from capture at sea, that
Great Britain would have readily acquiesced in the proposal.
[Sidenote: Condemnations of ships in the West Indies,]
This policy did not, however, suit France in 1797; and to show in
a practical manner their displeasure at the treaty into which the
United States had entered with England, the French republic issued in
the same year the circular, already incidentally noticed, in which
they announced that the conduct of France towards neutrals would
be regulated by the manner in which they should suffer the English
to treat them, thus opening a wide door to spoliation, in defiance
of subsisting treaty obligations. At Malaga and Cadiz the French
consuls interpreted this unprincipled notification or decree as an
authorization to capture and condemn all American merchantmen for the
single circumstance of their being destined to a British port. But
the most disastrous effect was produced in the West Indies, whose
seas swarmed with privateers and gun-boats; which were stimulated
into active operation by the latitude allowed to their depredations
by the indefinite terms of that decree, and the explanatory orders
of the agents of the French directory at Guadaloupe and St. Domingo.
These agents captured and confiscated American vessels under the most
shameless and contradictory pretexts. All neutral vessels bound to
certain enumerated ports, which it was pretended in the decree had
been given up to the English, were unceremoniously condemned. The fact
of an American vessel being bound to an English port sufficed for her
sweeping condemnation, and not unfrequently for that of her cargo. Any
informality in a bill of lading; any irregularity in the certified list
of the passengers and crew, the supercargo being, for instance, by
birth a foreigner, although a naturalised citizen of the United States;
the destruction of a paper of any kind soever, and the want of a sea
letter, were deemed sufficient to warrant the condemnation of American
property, even when the proofs of the property were indubitable.
[Sidenote: and great depredations.]
[Sidenote: Outrages on the Americans.]
In the West Indies the most audacious scenes of depredation were
exhibited; so much so that the conduct of the public agents and of the
commissioned cruisers surpassed all former examples. American vessels
were not only captured under the French decrees, but when brought to
trial in the French tribunals, they with their cargoes were condemned,
without admitting the owners or their agents to make any defence.
Indeed a system of spoliation seems to have been brought into practice
for the obvious purpose of insuring condemnations. By a monstrous abuse
in judicial proceedings, frauds and falsehoods, as well as flimsy and
shameless pretexts, passed unexamined and uncontradicted, and were made
the foundation of sentences of condemnation. American citizens were
beaten, insulted, and imprisoned; and even their prisoners of war were
exchanged with the British for Frenchmen. American property going to or
coming from neutral ports was seized, and in many cases forcibly taken
when destined for France, or actually in _French ports_, without any
pretence whatever, except that the French required it for their own
purposes.
[Sidenote: Torture practised by French cruisers.]
Nor did their wanton and outrageous conduct against the Americans stop
here. Many accounts are extant of attempts to effect condemnations
by bribing the officers and seamen of the American vessels to swear
falsely; and it was further reserved for those days, when offered
bribes were refused, and threats despised, to endeavour to accomplish
the object by _torture_. In a protest set forth by Captain Martin,
master of the _Cincinnatus_, a vessel of about two hundred and
twenty-nine tons, belonging to Baltimore, the fact of torture having
been resorted to by the French cruisers appears to be placed beyond
all doubt.[315] In this protest he states that while on his voyage from
Baltimore to London he was boarded by a French armed brig under English
colours, when he with five of his crew were taken on board, and though
the vessel’s papers when examined left no doubt of the nationality
of his ship and cargo, being American, the officer in command of the
French brig insisted that the cargo was English property, and assured
Martin that if he would admit the fact, and formally acknowledge it,
his full freight should be paid, and he should have a present of one
thousand pounds. But the overture was spurned, the master declaring
the whole to belong solely to Aquilla Brown of Baltimore, merchant.
“Whereupon the French officers thumb-screwed the said master in
the cabin of their said brig, and kept him in torture to extort a
declaration that the said cargo was English property, for nearly four
hours, but without the desired effect.” A vessel heaving in sight,
Martin was liberated, but it was not until the _Cincinnatus_ reached
the English Channel that she was relieved by H.M.S. _Galatea_, and
finally reached Dover. Mr. Rufus King, minister of the United States
in London, personally examined Captain Martin’s thumbs, and said “they
still bear the marks of the torturing screws, and the scars will go
with him to the grave.”[316]
[Sidenote: The advantages of the war to the Americans.]
But with all these drawbacks to the progress and success of American
shipping, and the great disadvantages to which neutrals are exposed
during a state of war, which often counterbalance the advantages they
enjoy of seizing upon the carrying trade of the world, it cannot
be denied that the memorable revolution of France in 1789, and the
wars consequent upon the events, created a vast demand for American
exports, and secured for the Americans a very considerable portion
of the carrying trade of Europe. They not only carried the colonial
productions to the several parent states, but they also became the
purchasers of them in the French, Spanish, and Dutch colonies. A new
era was indeed established in their commercial history, and their
merchants and shipowners increased in numbers to an extent out of all
proportion to the general state of the population.
[Sidenote: Impulse given to shipping.]
Many persons who had realised moderate capitals from mercantile and
other pursuits now become daring adventurers as carriers by sea [there
being no trading companies, whose monopolies have a withering effect
upon individual enterprise], the practice became common for Americans
to frequently change their pursuits, a practice springing out of a
native energy of the people still prevailing. Foreigners were admitted
without reservation to all the privileges of the citizens of the United
States, although the government carefully excluded them from any
participation ostensibly in the benefits arising from the possession
of ships. No aliens were permitted to be either sole or part owners
of American vessels. The predominant spirit of that period had a
powerful effect in determining the character of the rising generation,
and the brilliant prospects held out by maritime enterprise led them
to neglect for a time the mechanical and manufacturing branches of
industry.
[Sidenote: Progress of American civilisation.]
By this greatly extended intercourse with other nations the Americans
not only augmented their material wealth, but became acquainted with
the habits, manners, science, arts, resources, wealth, and power of
those countries with which they carried on a profitable trade. They
were thus enabled to avail themselves of all the stock of accumulated
experience and wisdom which the elder nations of Europe had slowly,
and, at the cost of so much labour, bloodshed, and incessant struggles,
secured. With some modification of the English constitution, the
Americans, having as yet no ancient aristocracy, chose an elective
republican form of government; but the well-framed body of English laws
formed the basis on which the whole framework of society rested. In
almost everything relating to the conduct of commercial and maritime
affairs the English code was adopted, and became transplanted and
firmly rooted in the hearts of the American people. In a natural desire
to appear free and original, they affected some changes, but these were
merely partial; and, both in theory and practice, English laws relating
to shipping, with such prudent modifications as the change of position
and circumstances required, were adopted, and formed the model of
American practice and legislation.
[Sidenote: Advances of maritime enterprise.]
With these incalculable advantages, a rich soil, an enterprising and
free people, a country indented with harbours and bathed by magnificent
navigable rivers, it is scarcely a matter for wonder that their
maritime enterprise made rapid advances. The capital of the shipowners
being thus suddenly augmented, they were enabled to explore new sources
of wealth. The entire globe was circumnavigated with a view to open new
markets. Merchants who had been long engaged in trade were confounded
by the changes so rapidly effected. The less experienced considered
the newly acquired advantages as matters of right which would remain
to them. They did not contemplate a period of general peace, when
each nation would carry its own productions in its own vessels; when
the jealousy of rivals would suggest the imposition of differential
or practically prohibitive duties; when foreign commerce would be
again fettered and limited by “enumerated articles,” and when, with
reduced profits on shipping transactions, a much greater amount of
circumspection would be necessary.
[Sidenote: Views of American statesmen.]
It was in the midst of this career of prosperity in the United States
that many far-seeing American statesmen urged on the then reluctant
attention of those of their countrymen who dwelt along the sea-board
the paramount necessity of dedicating their surplus capital to the
extension of agricultural industry. These men urged that the food
heretofore exported by America to foreign countries might not be
required for European consumption, and that many of the hands then
engaged in active hostilities, either for defence or conquest, would be
required for agriculture. Instead of there being always a deficiency of
food in Europe, it was quite possible that there might be a surplus of
provisions, the many thousands in their armies and fleets being added
to the productive classes, and thus diminishing the chief branch of
freight enjoyed by the United States shipping.
The experience of the interval from 1783 to 1791, when American trade
was so much depressed, had not been lost upon keen and calm observers,
and many able American writers incessantly pointed to the vast, rich,
fertile uncultivated lands in the south and west of the Union, as
the inexhaustible mine of wealth from which the future greatness and
power of the States must be derived, and urged their countrymen to
encourage and direct their efforts to that branch of domestic industry.
This salutary advice was not altogether lost at that time upon the
Americans; but it has since been ardently pursued, with what success
the exports of the articles of corn and cotton alone will fully
establish.
[Sidenote: The shipwrights of Baltimore seek protection.]
Nevertheless, the shipowners of the United States were at the earliest
period of their existence as a nation infected with the principles of
self-protection on which the English Navigation Act had been founded;
for in the very first session of Congress, 1789, the shipwrights of
Baltimore and South Carolina, in rehearsing their grievances to the
House of Representatives, copied identically the numerous complaints
urged on this side the water. They pointed out the diminished state of
ship-building in America, and the ruinous restrictions to which their
vessels were subject in foreign ports; and, among the advantages looked
for from the national government, was the increase of the shipping and
maritime strength of the United States of America by laws similar in
their nature and operation to that Act. Whichever way they looked,
they perceived that the United States ought soon to become as powerful
in shipping as any nation in the world. They insisted that, upon the
closest examination of the subject, they were better prepared for a
Navigation Act than England had been when the British Navigation Act
was passed in 1660. They argued that though the registered tonnage
of that kingdom did not then exceed ninety-six thousand tons, it had
reached close upon eight hundred thousand tons in 1774, an increase, in
little more than a century, of about seven hundred and four thousand
tons. Why, therefore, exclaimed the Baltimore shipwrights, why should
not we adopt a similar wise policy?
Arguments such as these, reiterated over and over during a course of
years, produced in time their effect upon Congress, many of whose
members had been strongly opposed to the treaty with England. French
influence was also brought to bear in every conceivable way against
it, and at last the protectionists of the United States were enabled
to carry a measure through the Legislature sanctioning certain
differential duties in favour of their own vessels as against those of
England trading with their ports. From this time commenced that war of
retaliation which, in one shape or other, continued between the two
nations for nearly half a century.
[Sidenote: Great Britain imposes countervailing duties.]
In the fifteenth article of the treaty of commerce and navigation the
British government had reserved the right of countervailing these
discriminating duties, and the United States had bound themselves not
to impose any new or additional duty on the tonnage of British ships
or vessels, or to increase the then subsisting difference between the
duties payable on the importation of any article in British American
ships; so that when Congress imposed increased duties, the English
Parliament exercised the reserved right stipulated in the treaty,
and thus by the Act of Geo. III., c. 97, countervailing duties were
imposed, payable on the importation of American goods in American
vessels, in addition to the duties payable on their importation in
British ships.[317] Additional duties were also imposed upon certain
specified articles, and three per cent. _ad valorem_ upon enumerated
articles.
[Sidenote: Effect of legislative measures on both sides.]
Such, then, was the legislation on both sides, as it most materially
affected merchant shipping. The American shipowners and merchants
looked upon every proceeding on the part of the British Legislature
as levelled especially against themselves; and, jealous of everything
which militated against their own interest, they contended that the
Parliament of Great Britain had exceeded the fair intent and meaning
of the treaty of 1794, and had secured for the British shipowners
the exclusive carriage to Great Britain, in time of peace, of some
of the most important objects of American exportation. They pointed
out that the English had selected fish, oil, and tobacco, articles of
great bulk, as objects on which the highest countervailing duties had
been imposed. They alleged that in consequence of this countervailing
duty upon oil, a British ship of two hundred and fifty tons register,
carrying two hundred and fifty tuns of oil to great Britain from the
United States, would pay 453_l._ 15_s._ sterling less duty thereon than
the same oil would pay if imported into Great Britain in an American
ship. By a similar operation, a British ship of two hundred and fifty
tons, carrying four hundred hogsheads of tobacco, of one thousand two
hundred pounds each, to Great Britain from the United States, would pay
360_l._ sterling less duty than would be payable on the same quantity
of tobacco imported in an American ship; the whole freight, at 35_s._
sterling per hogshead, would only amount to 700_l._ sterling, which,
after deducting the countervailing duty of 360_l._, would leave to the
American a net freight of only 344_l._ 1_s._ sterling.
It was further pointed out that rice, when imported into Great Britain
in an American ship, was charged with a duty of 8_d._ per hundredweight
more than when imported in a British ship; and that an extra duty
amounting on a tierce of rice to 3_s._ 9_d._ sterling, the freight of a
tierce of rice being then about 12_s._ sterling, was also demanded. It
was said that no person would give 15_s._ 9_d._ freight in an American
when he could have the same carried for 12_s._ in a British ship. Pot
and pearl ashes were made to pay a countervailing duty of 9_d._ per
barrel; and as the freight of such a barrel was presumed to be 5_s._ to
5_s._ 6_d._ sterling in times of peace, a difference of 9_d._ sterling
would effectually give the carrying trade to British ships of all the
ashes exported from the United States to Great Britain.
[Sidenote: Conclusions drawn by the American shipowners.]
From such arguments as these the shipowners of the United States drew
the conclusion that Great Britain, by her countervailing Act, secured
effectually the carrying, for her own wants and foreign commerce, of
the American fish-oil, tobacco, pot and pearl ashes, rice, indigo, and
cotton; and, having obtained the carriage of these bulky articles, all
minor objects, except naval stores, not being sufficiently important to
form entire cargoes, would also, of necessity, be carried in British
ships. The small _export_ duty imposed by the British Parliament, of
_one-half_ per cent. on all goods, wares, and merchandise of the growth
or manufacture of Great Britain on their exportation to any port in
Europe within the Straits of Gibraltar, and of _one_ per cent. on
similar goods when exported to any place not being in Europe or within
the Straits of Gibraltar, subjected the United States to a duty on
exports double that which was paid by the nations of Europe. Of course
this extra duty, small as it was, but utterly wrong in principle,
served to make a new grievance, and the Americans contended that this
_discriminating_, or, more properly, this _differential_, duty was in
contradiction to the spirit of the treaties which subsisted between the
United States and Great Britain.
Two modes were proposed to the American Legislature to obviate the
disadvantages resulting to the carrying trade of the United States
from these countervailing and differential duties. The one was, to
increase the American discriminating[318] (differential?) duties, so
as to counteract the injury they experienced from the operation of the
countervailing duties of other nations. The other was, to relinquish
the American duties (so far as they related to goods, wares, and
merchandise, the growth, produce, or manufacture of the nations to
which the ship in which these were imported belonged) in favour of such
foreign nations as would agree to abolish such of their discriminating
duties as were in their operation injurious to the interests of the
United States.
[Sidenote: Alarm in the United States at the idea of reciprocity.]
The mere intimation of a design to inaugurate something like a policy
of reciprocity, if not of entirely free-trade, struck alarm into the
minds of the shipowners and shipbuilders of the United States. They
held meetings, in which their patriotic feelings of indignation, as
seems to have been the case in other countries as well, were singularly
intermingled with a keen sense of self-interest, not perhaps very
wisely directed. But, carried away by popular clamour, engendered but
too often by parties who had only a very limited view of their own
and of the national interests, the great mercantile bodies of New
York, Boston, and Philadelphia strenuously opposed any remission of
the American differential tonnage duties. They insisted that, taking
anterior years as a guide, the loss to the revenue would not be less
than $450,000 per annum. They viewed the project with alarm, believing
that if carried out it must essentially injure the commerce of the
United States; as its immediate effect, by opening the market for
freight to the lowest bidder, would be to shift the carrying trade from
the hands of their own merchants to those of foreigners. In this way
the American shipowners argued that foreigners would build cheaper,
equip cheaper, and sail their vessels at less cost than they could, at
the same time intimating that Europeans were generally satisfied with a
less profit than the American merchant could afford to receive.
[Sidenote: Objections to the British Navigation Act.]
[Sidenote: Threatened destruction to American shipping.]
Accordingly, they contended that to meet the advances of Great Britain
and to repeal the American countervailing Acts, would not be to place
the two nations on an equal footing, so long as England retained her
Navigation Act. The mutual repeal of differential tonnage duties they
urged would not establish a perfect system of reciprocity; as the
Americans, in that case, would thus permit Great Britain to carry
to the United States, not only goods the growth or manufacture of
that country, but of all others, while by maintaining in force her
Navigation Act, the Americans would be expressly confined in their
trade to the carriage of goods the growth or manufacture of the United
States. British vessels would accordingly bring goods from England to
America, take a freight in one of the ports of the United States to the
British colonies, where American vessels are not admitted, and thence
a third, home, making three freights in one voyage; so that foreigners
would crowd their wharves, underbid their freight, monopolize their
markets, and “leave American vessels idly to rot in their docks.”[319]
Such was the almost universal feeling against the measure entertained
by the shipowners of the United States, who endeavoured to enlist the
agricultural and mechanical classes on their side, and employed for
this purpose arguments which have been repeated over and over again in
our own generation. They asserted that although, generally speaking,
freight is paid by the consumer, and that, therefore, it may be said it
is immaterial to the farmer how high or how low it may be, nevertheless
this is not the case when the demand ceases or slackens; it then falls
back on the husbandman. In this point of view, to transfer the American
trade to foreigners would, it was alleged, lessen very much the
certainty of the demand.
They went farther, and told the agriculturists that the active
enterprise of the American merchants and shipowners was constantly
on the alert in looking abroad to every part of the world for a
market, and if it was anywhere to be found, or if there existed only a
reasonable presumption that it might be found, the farmer was thereby
secured a ready vent for his produce. Perhaps the calculation of the
merchant might be disappointed, perhaps not even a freight would be
earned, and he might be ruined; nevertheless, this misfortune did not
reach the farmer, who had secured the benefit of a good market. But,
in the event of American vessels disappearing, he must then be left at
the mercy of chance adventurers for a market; and when the demand is
not very great, the price of the freight would be deducted from the
article itself. This serious contingency, it was argued, must tend
necessarily to lessen essentially the value of the farmer’s produce. As
nothing less than the total annihilation of the American merchant navy
was anticipated, it was pointed out to the mechanic that those numerous
bodies connected with shipbuilding, the carpenter, the blacksmith, the
sail-maker, the rope-maker, and others would of course all be thrown
out of employment; their labour would be neither wanted nor paid for.
The American ships, being, under these circumstances, banished from
their native shores, would no longer furnish a nursery for seamen,
but that valuable class of citizens would be driven to seek for their
bread in other countries, and finally, in any future European wars
which might supervene, and which were constantly liable to happen, the
American people would find themselves denuded of seamen and ships,
and would not be able to avail themselves of that neutral position
which reflection and experience equally warranted them in calculating
upon, as one of the “blessings” allied to their remote and secure
geographical position.
[Sidenote: Popular clamour.]
The history of these struggles shows that however enlightened the
members of Congress may have been, it was, even at that time,
impossible to run counter to popular clamour, although this may have
been instigated by perhaps an erroneous view of the self-interests of
the parties primarily concerned. The consumer did not feel the same
deep immediate interest in the controversy as the shipowner, whose
voice was loudly heard in Congress through the representatives of the
great ports and maritime towns.
[Sidenote: Opinions in Congress.]
Upon a consideration of all the circumstances, Congress was led
to consider that any retaliatory legislation imposing heavier
discriminating duties on foreign tonnage or goods would in its
consequences materially tend to increase the commercial warfare, and
render more serious the war of tariff between the United States and
foreign nations. The reflecting, far-seeing members perceived that if
the United States were to increase her differential duties, there was
every probability that England and other foreign nations would also
augment theirs in every instance, and that at every time the United
States pursued their plan of increase, foreign nations would repeat the
same process. But they were met at all points, as we have seen, by the
almost universal opposition of the American shipowners, who were as
eager to maintain a protectionist policy in shipping as any of their
rivals in the same business on this side the Atlantic.
[Sidenote: Great influence of the shipowners.]
Though the shipowners of the Northern States exercised for a time
considerable influence over the Legislature, a committee of the
House of Representatives passed a resolution which went no further
than to recommend to the House, “That so much of the several Acts
imposing duties on the tonnage of ships and vessels, and on goods,
wares, and merchandise imported into the United States, as imposes a
discriminating duty of tonnage between foreign vessels and vessels of
the United States, and between goods imported into the United States
in foreign vessels and vessels of the United States, _ought to be
repealed_, so far as the same respects the produce or manufactures of
the nation to which such foreign ships or vessels shall belong, such
repeal to take effect in favour of any foreign nation whenever the
President shall be satisfied that the discriminating or countervailing
duties of such foreign nation, so far as they operate to the
disadvantage of the United States, have been abolished.”
This important resolution, opening the door to reciprocal measures,
was declared to be more consistent with the true interest, as well as
with the peaceful disposition, of the United States than any retrograde
movement. Although no legislative action followed this enunciation of
the principles of reciprocity, it formed at a future period the basis
of both negotiation and legislation with foreign powers. The time,
however, had not then arrived for the avowal and practice of a much
wiser and more enlightened policy than that by which nations were
guided before, and for some years after, the close of the eighteenth
century.
[Sidenote: Early statesmen of the United States.]
[Sidenote: Their efforts to develop maritime commerce.]
Perhaps no nation of modern times has produced more enlightened
statesmen than those who regulated the affairs of the United States
for full half a century after the declaration of its independence.
They had, as we have seen, numerous difficulties to contend with, both
at home and abroad, but these were overcome with a tact and genius
which commands our admiration. Though materially assisted in their
efforts to extend and develop their shipping by the seafaring habits
of the people, by the natural maritime resources of their own country,
and by the advantages they derived as neutrals during the war which
so long raged in Europe, they were ever ready to encourage increased
intercourse with distant nations, in spite of the opposition of the
maritime States to those liberal measures which they had so frequently
propounded, and in which they had been too often thwarted.
[Sidenote: First trade with the East.]
But though the American shipowners, as a body, and as would seem to
be the case with the majority of shipowners of all countries, clung
to protection, they were individually quite as daring, and even more
energetic, than those of Great Britain. So early in their independence
as 1785 a vessel from Baltimore in Maryland displayed, for the first
time, the American flag in the Canton river, where she discharged
a cargo of American produce, and loaded in return a cargo of teas,
China ware, silk, and other produce for her own country. In September
1788, Captain Read, the commander of an American merchantman, arrived
in Philadelphia from a voyage to China, wherein he had performed the
outward passage by stretching from the Cape of Good Hope to the south
of New Holland (Australia), and running northwards along the east side
of that vast island, until he reached his port of destination. As we
have seen, other American merchant vessels had reached the British
possessions in India at a time while as yet prolonged voyages to the
most distant regions of the globe were deemed such arduous efforts of
nautical skill, as only to be performed in safety by a few experienced
commanders in the service of Spain, Portugal, Holland, and England, who
had been accustomed to the navigation of those distant seas, and were
familiar with the routes, and the prevailing periodical winds. So rapid
indeed was their progress, that out of the million tons of sea-going
vessels owned in the United States at the commencement of this century,
no less than seven hundred and twenty thousand were employed in their
trade with foreign nations. Although some historians[320] attribute
this prosperity in great measure to their protective laws, it will be
found mainly due to the facilities which the United States afford for
maritime pursuits, the abundance and cheapness of timber suitable for
shipbuilding purposes, and especially, as we have just mentioned, to
the energy of the people and the advantages they derived as a neutral
nation.
[Sidenote: War of 1803.]
[Sidenote: Its effect on maritime pursuits.]
When in May 1803, the war again broke out between France and England,
the shipowners of the United States, with their characteristic energy,
were prepared to avail themselves, to an even greater extent than they
had hitherto done, of the numerous advantages which a European war
conferred on them as neutrals. Hostilities between two great nations
must ever be a most grievous calamity, but it was greatly aggravated
in the present instance by the depredations of American privateers
hoisting, as might suit their purpose, French or English colours, under
men, too, who were almost as reckless and daring in their acts as
the English and Dutch buccaneers of the early part of the eighteenth
century, some of them frequently making capture of vessels belonging to
their own countrymen.
But though an examination of the State papers collected by the
Americans themselves furnishes abundant proof of too many unblushing
acts of piracy committed by vessels built and equipped in American
ports, and frequently manned almost exclusively by citizens of the
United States, there is no reason to suppose that their lawless acts
were committed by the consent or knowledge of the American government.
When the arm of the law is not sufficiently strong, there are always
abundance of adventurers of all nations ready to take advantage
of its weakness and, in the name of neutrals or under the flag of
belligerents, as may best suit their purpose, to fit out from neutral
ports cruisers with no other object than plunder; and there were
too many of such vessels cruising about the ocean during the last
twelve years of the mighty struggle between France and England. The
government of the Federation was as yet incapable of controlling the
ardour, love of gain, and enterprise which render similar adventures
as fascinating as they are profitable; but it exclaimed incessantly
against both England and France for alleged breaches of the laws of
nations, and did not, or would not, see the violations committed by
their own or by professing citizens sailing under the flag of the
United States in vessels built and equipped in their own harbours, and
especially in the port of Baltimore, at that time, and for some years
afterwards celebrated for the construction of vessels of great beauty
and symmetry, and of extraordinary speed.
FOOTNOTES:
[307] ‘Reports, House of Representatives,’ Feb. 23, 1791.
[308] This “most favoured footing clause” has been a fruitful source of
reclamation between the two countries.
[309] The reader will find an account of the negotiations in Mr. Jay’s
correspondence, ‘Life of John Jay,’ New York, 1833.
[310] Mr. William Jay was the son and historian of his father, John
Jay, the ambassador from the United States (_vide_ vol. i. p. 324).
[311] The most ardent supporters of the war were the shipowners: the
Whigs and the Radicals did all they could to neutralise the power of
the executive.
[312] Privateering was finally abolished by the great Powers of Europe
March, 30, 1856; but the Americans refused to agree to this unless
all private property was made free from capture at sea. The right of
blockade was also proposed to be given up. This the English government
declined assenting to, asserting “that the system of commercial
blockade was essential to its naval supremacy.” During the recent civil
war in America all the great Powers agreed in disallowing privateering,
and it was also forbidden by the Treaty of Washington; hence, when
Jefferson Davis announced his intention of issuing “letters of marque,”
Lincoln replied that the officers and men in any such ships would be
shot as pirates.
[313] Of 404,135 pounds imported into the United States in 1792, no
less than 373,350 came from the West Indian islands.
[314] The whole ground of dispute between France and the United States
is recited in a _most voluminous_ despatch, Jan. 16, 1797, from Mr.
Pickering to Mr. Pinckney, United States Minister at Paris. It will be
found in ‘American State Papers,’ vol. i. p. 559.
[315] Captain Martin’s Protest _in extenso_ will be found in the
‘American State Papers,’ vol. ii. pp. 64-65.
[316] _Vide_ letter of Rufus King, ‘State Papers,’ vol. ii. pp. 29-64.
The case seems undoubtedly well authenticated.
[317] The duties imposed were as follows:—On pig-iron, bar-iron,
and pearl ashes, ten per cent. additional, when imported without
certificate from the British Colonies in America; ten per cent. upon
the customs duties on pitch, tar, resin, turpentine, masts, yards,
bowsprits, and manufactured goods and merchandise (except wood-staves
and tobacco); and a similar percentage upon the customs duties on all
manufactured wood-staves when imported from Europe in British ships.
On oil of fish, blubber, whale-fins, and spermaceti, ten per cent.
on the customs duties payable when imported from countries not under
the dominion of Great Britain. On tobacco, one shilling and sixpence
per one hundred pounds weight; and on all other American goods, ten
per cent. upon the customs duties payable for the same when imported
in British-built vessels from the American States. The countervailing
duties were to be calculated upon the rates of duties as they stood
previously to the Act of 37 Geo. III., c. 15. By the statute above
recited, a tonnage duty of two shillings sterling was imposed on all
American vessels arriving in the ports of Great Britain.
[318] The Americans always employ the word “discriminating” for our
“differential” duty. Our sugar duties were discriminating duties. The
duties on the three categories of tea, before they were made uniform,
were discriminating duties, distinguishing qualities of different
values. The present duty on foreign and Cape wines is a _differential_
duty.
[319] If the word “British” is substituted for “American,” we have the
exact expression constantly used by the opponents in England during
the numerous meetings held in 1849 against the repeal of the British
Navigation Laws.
[320] Tybert’s ‘Statistical Annals of the United States.’
CHAPTER XI.
A special mission sent to England—Concessions made in the
Colonial trade—Blockades in the Colonies, and of the French
ports in the Channel—The dispute concerning the trade
with the French Colonies—What is a direct trade—Reversal
of the law in England—Effect in America—Instructions to
Commissioners—Proceedings of the shipowners of New York—Duties of
neutrals—Views of the New York shipowners—Conditions with respect
to private armed vessels—Authorities on the subject—Negotiations
for another treaty—Circuitous trade—Commercial
stipulations—Violation of treaties—Complaints of the Americans
against the French—Language of the Emperor—Bayonne Decree, April
17, 1808—American Non-intervention Act, March 1, 1809—Intrigues in
Paris against England—Hostile feelings in United States against
England—Diplomatic proceedings in Paris—Convention with Great
Britain—Retaliatory Acts to be enforced conditionally—Hostile
legislation against Great Britain—Bonds required—Treaty
negotiations renewed—Dutch reciprocity—Bremen reciprocity.
Although there is reason to fear that the shipowners of America, having
made the profits of a war in Europe a matter of deliberate calculation,
paid less attention than they might otherwise have done to the
remonstrances of the British government against their piratical acts,
they had, on the other hand, some reason for complaining of the conduct
of British cruisers. The Americans complained that their vessels were
searched on the high seas, not merely for enemies’ goods, but, as
already noticed, for seamen to man the British navy, a practice which
they alleged was derogatory to them, and tended to destroy all cordial
friendship between the two countries. In reply, the English government
held that no State had such jurisdiction over its merchant vessels
upon the high seas as to prevent a belligerent from searching them for
contraband of war, or for the persons and property of enemies; and if,
in the exercise of that right, the belligerents should discover on
board of a neutral vessel any of their subjects who had withdrawn from
their lawful allegiance, they asked upon what grounds could the neutral
refuse to give them up.
But the public mind was so inflamed in the United States by stories of
thousands of Americans forced to serve in the British Navy; of American
ships upon the high seas deprived of their hands by British cruisers,
and compelled to put into the nearest port for want of seamen to
pursue the voyage; and of other outrages still more extraordinary and
unpardonable, that, looking only to the alleged abuses of the right,
their popular leaders went to the extreme of denying its existence
altogether. A Bill upon this principle was consequently brought into
Congress, but it was rejected by the Senate.[321]
[Sidenote: A special mission sent to England.]
When, however, the American government determined to send a special
mission to England for the adjustment of differences between the two
nations, the British habit of impressing on the high seas was stated as
the foremost of the American grievances, and their plenipotentiaries
were instructed to urge the abandonment of a practice “so disgraceful
and injurious to their country, as the point most essential to its
peace, honour, and tranquillity.”
[Sidenote: Concessions made in the colonial trade.]
[Sidenote: Blockades in the colonies, and of the French ports in the
Channel.]
As the second ground of complaint, the alleged violation of neutral
rights by seizing and condemning their merchantmen though engaged in
lawful commerce, involves a variety of important considerations, which
were incessantly the subjects of dispute, it may be desirable to state
the substance of the views of the American government and of English
jurisconsults on so important a question. England had conceded to the
Americans, in the previous war, permission to trade with the colonies
of the enemy for articles intended for their own domestic consumption;
and in case no market was found in the United States for articles
imported with that intention, she had permitted them to re-export
those articles to any part of the world not invested by her blockading
squadrons. In 1804 certain ports of Martinique and Guadaloupe, French
colonies, were declared to be in a state of blockade, and the siege of
Curaçoa was also converted into a blockade. In August of the same year
a rigorous blockade was declared to be established at the entrances
of the ports of Fécamp, St. Valery, Caux, Dieppe, Treport, the Somme,
Etaples, Boulogne, Calais, Gravelines, Dunkirk, Nieuport, and Ostend.
Bonaparte at that moment was threatening England with invasion, and
England was putting forth all her strength to repel the attempt and
to circumvent his designs. America looked calmly on, and profited,
as we have seen, by the struggle, pushing forward her pretensions
and alleged grievances with the view of annoying as much as she
could both belligerents, and especially Great Britain. England, as is
well known, had constantly refused the Americans permission to trade
directly between the colonies of the enemy and the mother-country,
but had tolerated the indirect communication above mentioned, on the
supposition that the goods so transmitted had been intended originally
for American consumption, and would not have been re-exported, but for
want of a market in the United States.
[Sidenote: The dispute concerning the trade with the French colonies.]
“It is now distinctly understood,” said his Majesty’s Advocate-General,
in a report officially communicated by Lord Hawkesbury to the
American government, and transmitted to all the Vice-Admiralty Courts
aboard,[322] “and so decided by our highest tribunals, that the produce
of the colonies of the enemy may be imported by a neutral into his own
country, and may be re-exported from thence, even to the mother-country
of such colony; and in like manner the produce and manufactures of the
mother-country may, in this circuitous mode, legally find their way to
the colonies. The _direct_ trades, however, between the mother-country
and its colonies have not, I apprehend, been recognised as legal,
either by his Majesty’s government, or by his tribunals. What is a
_direct_ trade, or what amounts to an intermediate importation into
a neutral country, may sometimes be a question of some difficulty: a
general definition of either, applicable to all cases, cannot well be
laid down. The question must depend upon the particular circumstances
of each case. Perhaps the mere touching at a neutral country to
take fresh clearances may properly be considered as a fraudulent
evasion, and as, in effect, the _direct_ trade; but the High Court of
Admiralty[323] has expressly decided that landing the goods and paying
the duties in the neutral country breaks the continuity of the voyage,
and is such an importation as legalises the trade, although the goods
be re-shipped in the same vessel, and on account of the same neutral
proprietor, and be forwarded for sale to the mother-country or the
colony.”
But his Lordship admitted that the decision of Sir William Scott by
no means went so far; that distinguished judge remarking in the most
guarded manner that it was not his business to determine “what was a
_bonâ fide_ importation.” However, from Lord Hawkesbury’s commentary
upon the judgment, presuming that he indorsed the Judge-Advocate’s
opinion, by sending it to America as an extract, it came to be
universally understood in the United States that the mere landing
of the goods, and paying the duties in the neutral country, were
sufficient to break the continuity of the voyage and to legalise
the trade; whereas the landing and the payment of the duties were
only deemed the best criteria or the best evidence obtainable of a
_bonâ fide_ importation. This distinction became afterwards of great
importance, although the peace of Amiens put an end for a time to all
controversies on the subject. But when hostilities recommenced between
France and England, the American merchants, recollecting the footing
on which the trade had been placed at the conclusion of the previous
war, embarked in it without apprehension, as a commerce perfectly
lawful. An immense amount of tonnage was employed in this trade, which
was carried on without interruption till the summer of 1805, when a
decision on new grounds was adopted by the English Admiralty Courts,
which suddenly, and without the smallest warning, exposed the whole of
the American merchant vessels to seizure and condemnation.
[Sidenote: Reversal of the law in England.]
It was now decided that the proof of payment of duties in America
was no evidence of a _bonâ fide_ importation into that country,[324]
because payment of duties did not mean that the duties had been
actually paid in money, but that they had been secured by bonds; and
from the peculiar system of revenue laws established in the United
States, the merchant who re-exported goods previously imported,
gained a profit by his transactions with the custom-house, instead of
suffering any loss or deduction from his gains. The importer, when the
duties were ascertained, gave bonds for the amount; but if the next day
he should enter the goods for exportation again, he became entitled
to debentures from the custom-house, payable on the same day with the
bonds, and made out for the same sums, with a deduction of only three
and a half per cent., which was retained for the government. The bonds
given originally by the merchant remained unissued in the custody
of the revenue officers; while the debentures became an assignable
and transferable security for money, capable of being recovered by a
summary process; and if the importer failed, enjoyed a priority before
all private demands. The result of the whole operation, therefore, was
that the government lent to the private credit of the merchant the
character of a public security, in lieu of his bonds deposited at the
custom-house, and received three and a half per cent. on the amount of
these bonds in return for the accommodation it afforded. Now, however
admirable this system may be in reference to the trade of the United
States, it utterly broke down when adduced as evidence of a _bonâ fide_
importation, or as a proof that the duties had been paid or secured in
the United States according to law; as, in point of fact, the merchant
gained by repeating the transaction.
[Sidenote: Effect in America.]
[Sidenote: Instructions to commissioners.]
The English courts, therefore, acting in perfect consistency with the
principle of their former decisions, when these facts were made known
to them, refused any longer to admit the payment of duties in America
as a proof of a _bonâ fide_ operation. On the other hand, the merchants
of America, without looking at the legal grounds of former decisions,
had trusted to Lord Hawkesbury’s communication made during the previous
war, which led the American government to believe that “landing the
goods and paying the duties legalised the trade,” and had consequently
embarked their capital and ships in a commerce they felt assured was
a legal and permitted trade. When, therefore, they saw their vessels
captured by the British cruisers, without any previous warning, and
brought into the Vice-Admiralty Courts for adjudication, they naturally
complained of the violent and inconsistent conduct of England, and
loudly accused her of robbery and injustice. Indignation meetings,
as they have since been termed, were convened in all the principal
commercial cities of America; declarations and resolutions were voted;
and petitions and remonstrances were addressed to the President and
Legislature. Congress, as was natural, caught the flame with which it
was surrounded, and after a multitude of injudicious and inflammatory
resolutions, passed a non-importation Act[325] against the manufactures
of Great Britain, to take effect in the ensuing month of November. In
the meantime the commissioners sent to negotiate with Great Britain
were instructed to obtain from the government a clear and precise rule
for regulating their trade with the colonies of the enemy, which should
not be liable to be changed by Orders in Council or instructions to
cruisers.
[Sidenote: Proceedings of the shipowners of New York.]
[Sidenote: Duties of Neutrals.]
Before examining the third point of the complaints urged by the
Americans, it will conduce to the general comprehension of the whole
scope of the quarrel if reference is made to the proceedings of the
merchants and shipowners at New York shortly before this period.
It requires very little penetration to perceive that the arming of
vessels in the ports of the United States, under pretence of being
bound to the East Indies, was a mere cloak for privateering. There
were then plenty of freebooters under the American flag, who cared
but little which side they espoused, so as they could succeed in a
very profitable maritime adventure. In fact their depredations on the
seas rose to such a height that Congress was at last compelled to
take cognisance of their proceedings, and a Bill was brought forward
to restrain merchant vessels of the United States from sailing in an
armed condition. The shipowners of New York upon that occasion put upon
record their sentiments, and some of the principles they expounded
are well deserving reflection and attention. They[326] acknowledged
with satisfaction that since the commencement of the existing war the
commerce of the United States had not, to their knowledge, suffered any
injuries which could justly be attributed to the governments of Europe.
They disclaimed explicitly any intention to derive unfair advantages
from the misfortunes of the belligerent nations; and they solemnly
engaged to support with all their influence any regulations enjoined by
treaties or by the established usages of civilised States. They only
desired to foster their native genius for enterprise. The duties of
neutral merchants, as understood by them, consisted in the observance
of the following rules:—
1st. Not to protect under false appearances the ships or property of
the subjects of belligerent nations.
2nd. Not to resist reasonable visitation and search by the ships of war
of belligerent nations.
3rd. Not to supply either party with articles contraband of war; and,
4th. Not to enter ports in a state of blockade.
[Sidenote: Views of the New York shipowners.]
They did not consider it a duty or usage of neutral nations to enforce
by legal sanction the observance of these rules, but merely to
apprise their citizens of the nature of their obligations, arising
under treaties or under the general law of nations, by which they
would be subjected to such penalties as custom had established. These
penalties, the New York merchants asserted, could only be rightfully
inflicted by regular tribunals, established by the belligerent nations
in such fashion that they should not exceed the right of condemning
the property attempted to be illegally concealed or transported:
they would, accordingly, cheerfully submit to a law for restraining
the armament of private merchantmen, except in conformity with the
following principles:
[Sidenote: Conditions with respect to private armed vessels.]
1st. That the vessels should wholly belong to citizens of the United
States.
2nd. That the cargoes laden on board such vessels shall wholly belong
to citizens of the United States, and except necessary munitions and
merchandise to and from ports eastward of the Cape of Good Hope, and
westward of Cape Horn, shall in no degree consist of articles declared
contraband of war, either by the general law of nations, or by treaties
with the United States.
3rd. That the owners of armed vessels be required to give bonds for a
reasonable amount that they shall not sell or charter such vessels in
the dominions of any foreign state or nation, in America or elsewhere,
to the subjects of the belligerent parties.
4th. That the masters and chief officers of all armed vessels be
required to give bonds that they will not enter a blockaded port, and
that they will not resist lawful visitation and search by a national
ship of any European belligerent power; while, if deemed expedient,
the masters and chief officers may be further rendered liable to such
personal penalties as the wisdom of Congress may prescribe.
It will be seen that the New York merchants, who might then be presumed
to represent the most influential body of the shipowners and merchants
of the Union, never attempted to impeach any of the principles which
had been held by all civilised nations, as establishing the law of
nations, especially as regards the right of search. Indeed the highest
authorities in the United States have laid down, “that the right of
visitation and search of neutral vessels at sea is a belligerent right
essential to the exercise of the right of capturing enemy’s property,
contraband of war, and vessels committing a breach of blockade.”[327]
Text writers generally concur in recognising the existence of this
right. Sir W. Scott remarks, “All writers upon the law of nations
_unanimously_ acknowledge it, without the exception of even _Hubner_
himself, the great champion of neutral privileges.” In fact the many
European treaties which have reference to this right deal with it as
pre-existing, and merely regulate the exercise of it.
[Sidenote: Authorities on the subject.]
These authoritative expositions of the law, as drawn from American as
well as European text writers, notwithstanding the long period which
has elapsed since the eventful struggle at the commencement of the
present century, are the more necessary to be here quoted as there
are unfortunately still recurrences of these disputes respecting the
exercise of the right of search, and it must be conducive to a good
understanding between England and all other nations, that an accurate
interpretation of the law of nations should be generally established
and observed.
[Sidenote: Negotiations for another treaty.]
The scope of this work will not admit of entering into all the
details of the conferences in respect of the treaty which was shortly
afterwards entered into between Great Britain and the United States,
and which had become the more necessary after the unfortunate
encounter[328] between the _Chesapeake_ and H.M.S. _Leopard_ in
Hampton Roads, where England was held by various authorities to be
in the wrong. It is now generally admitted that the commissioners
on both sides were animated by a sincere desire to establish a firm
and lasting friendship between the two countries, on terms mutually
advantageous, though it is deeply to be lamented that their efforts
at negotiation were at times much thwarted by popular clamour on both
sides the water.[329] Considering the state of public opinion in
America, and the instructions which they appear to have received from
their government, the American commissioners, in particular, evinced
in the strongest manner their disposition to conciliation, when, after
many fruitless conferences held in the hope of devising some adequate
substitute for the practice of impressing on the high seas, they
consented, contrary to their instructions, to proceed with the other
articles of the treaty, pledging the government of Great Britain “to
issue instructions for the observance of the greatest caution in the
impressment of seamen, and of the greatest care to preserve citizens
of the United States from any molestation or injury, and to afford
immediate redress upon any representation of injury sustained by them;”
engaging besides at any future period “to entertain the discussion of
any plan that should be devised to secure the interests of both States,
without any injury to rights to which they are respectively attached.”
[Sidenote: Circuitous route.]
In the other questions between the two countries, the negotiators were
more fortunate in bringing their labours to a successful issue. On
the subject of the circuitous trade permitted to the United States,
between the colonies of the enemy and other parts of the world, an
article was framed which satisfied the American commissioners. A
clear rule for the regulation of that commerce was substituted in
place of the uncertain and variable system under which it had been
previously conducted. The principle was taken from Lord Hawkesbury’s
communication, to which reference has just been made, which defined
the difference between a continuous and an interrupted voyage; but,
besides requiring that the goods should be landed and the duties paid
in the neutral country, this article expressly stipulated that, on
re-exportation, there should remain, after the drawback, a duty to
be paid of one per cent. _ad valorem_ on all articles of the growth,
produce, and manufacture of Europe; and on all articles of colonial
produce a duty of not less than two per cent. The maritime jurisdiction
of the United States was guaranteed by the 12th article, against the
alleged encroachments and violations of his Majesty’s cruisers; and
on account of the peculiar circumstances of the American coast, an
extension of maritime jurisdiction, to the distance of five miles from
shore in American waters, was mutually conceded by both parties, with
certain limitations, having reference to other powers, expressed in the
treaty.[330]
[Sidenote: Commercial stipulations.]
The commercial stipulations contained in this treaty seem to have
been framed on the fairest and most liberal principles of reciprocal
advantages to both countries; but before the treaty reached the United
States for the requisite ratification, and indeed before it was signed
in London, the celebrated Berlin Decree[331] had been issued, and the
position of England was thereby very greatly altered in respect to
neutrals.
[Sidenote: Violation of treaties.]
But treaties, in those days of national convulsions, were of little
avail; they were too frequently made only to be broken; and from
the experience of the past, and the wholesale destruction of the
private property alike of neutrals and belligerents during periods of
hostility, we may learn that it is unsafe to rely, in similar cases,
on the validity and security of any paper pledges without the general
guarantee of nations. Although France, as well as England, had entered
into treaties of amity with the United States, which were in force
between 1803 and 1809 inclusive, no less than thirteen hundred and
three American merchant vessels were captured between those dates by
the cruisers of both nations.
Although nominally captured under the operations of the French Decrees
and English Orders in Council, many of these captures were made in
direct violation of existing treaties, and not a few in obedience
simply to the will of the Emperor on the one hand, and that of the
English Council on the other. Of the five hundred and thirteen
American merchantmen taken by the French, and the forty-seven by the
Neapolitans, antecedent to the Berlin and Milan Decrees, one hundred
and seventy-four were condemned and burnt, four were compromised, and
twenty-one acquitted; while two hundred and nine captured during the
operation of these decrees were condemned and burnt, thirty-three
released or compromised, and eighty-eight altogether acquitted. Of the
vessels captured by the Neapolitans, forty-one were confiscated or
condemned, two restored, and four not accounted for. In the category
of the vessels burnt at sea no fewer than thirty-seven were destroyed
in order to keep secret the movements of the French squadron; and a
large number because they had touched at ports in England on their way
to continental ports, some of them having done so only through stress
of weather. To recompense the losses thus sustained, the Americans
claimed from the French government eighty millions of francs, a demand
which proved so serious a cause of dispute as almost to embroil the two
countries in war.
But the captures by the English of American merchant vessels in the
same period amounted to seven hundred and forty-five, and of those
taken before the issue of the Orders in Council two hundred and
forty-three were condemned, one hundred and fifty acquitted, and
eighty-eight released; while out of the number subsequently taken two
hundred were condemned, one hundred and ninety-one acquitted, and
ninety-three restored to their owners.
[Sidenote: Complaints of the Americans against the French.]
America, had she had the power, would undoubtedly have resented by
force of arms many of these captures; but between two such belligerents
she was helpless, and had to submit, though not altogether in silence,
to proceedings against her shipowners, too frequently as unjust as
they were unjustifiable. While the rigorous enforcement of the right
of search on the part of the English, and the decrees of the French
excluding from their ports every neutral vessel which had English
goods on board, or had touched at any of the ports of that country,
remained in force, it was impossible for the shipowners of the United
States of America to carry on an oversea trade with any prospect of
success. French cruisers, scattered over the seas, with orders to sink
or burn any ship which might reveal their route to the English (who,
with all their naval force, could not control the immensity of the
seas), captured American vessels for contraventions committed a few
days after, and sometimes before, the publication of the decrees. As
the news of each seizure reached the American minister in Paris, he
complained with increasing energy. He invoked the principles alike of
international and civil law, appealing to the convention by which the
rights of neutrals were guaranteed, forbidding the application of laws
until they could have become known, and, in the name of his outraged
government, declared that “such proceedings, and the continuation of
such acts, could not fail to interrupt the good understanding, which
had so long subsisted between the two Powers, and had been mutually
advantageous, which it would be unwise to destroy for the sake of
pillaging a few merchant vessels.”[332]
[Sidenote: Language of the Emperor.]
But Napoleon understood perfectly well his own policy. Casting aside
all those rules which restrain constitutional governments, his aim
was to excite the Americans to open war against England; and whilst
thus trampling upon the rights of America, the French minister
was instructed _to proclaim those of neutrals_ in the name of the
Emperor! In a letter from M. Champigny to Mr. Armstrong, 12th Feb.,
1808, it is stated that “A merchant vessel is a floating colony; any
act of violence committed against such a vessel is an attack on the
independence of its government. The seas belong to no nation; they
are the common property, the domain of all.” In spite, however, of
the enunciation of these just and liberal principles, and while
admitting that the Berlin and Milan Decrees were flagrant violations
of them, Napoleon incessantly threw the entire blame upon England,
who, he alleged, had provoked these orders, and by setting up the
indisputable dogma that the independence of the flag was a right common
to all powers, he attempted to coerce the Americans into resisting by
force the retaliatory measures to which England, in defence of her
own commerce, was compelled to resort. Indeed M. de Champigny[333]
explicitly says, “the Emperor has no doubt that the United States,
considering the position in which _England has placed the continent_,
particularly since its decree of the 11th of November, _will declare
war against her_:” adding, “War does exist, _de facto_, between England
and the United States, and the Emperor considers it as having been
declared on the day on which England issued its orders. With this view,
the Emperor, willing to consider the United States as engaged in the
same cause with all the Powers who have to defend themselves against
England, has adopted no definite measure with regard to the American
vessels which may have been brought into the French ports. He has
ordered them to be retained under sequestration until a determination
could be taken with regard to them, which determination would depend
upon the disposition manifested by the American government.”
[Sidenote: Bayonne Decree, April 17, 1808.]
Such language could only be interpreted in one way: “Make war against
the mistress of the seas without delay, and then I will consider
whether I will release the American vessels which in violation of the
laws of nations I have seized.” Language such as this, supported by the
tempting promise to restore the American ships he had captured, could
only be the result of a deliberately planned policy on the part of
Napoleon. By his Bayonne Decree, 17th April, 1808, he had given orders
to seize all American vessels then in the ports of France, and such as
should come in thereafter; and in an explanatory note of the 25th of
April, 1808, addressed to the American minister at Paris, had stated
that the decree of the 17th instant directed the seizure of vessels
coming into the ports of France after that date, because no vessel of
the United States could then navigate the seas without infringing their
own laws, thus furnishing a presumption that they did so on British
account or in British connection.
Finding that the French seizures were incessant, the American minister
at Paris in the beginning of 1808 declared that the conduct of France
towards the United States, instead of advancing the views of the
Emperor, had an entirely contrary effect, and was calculated to defeat
them. Whilst admitting[334] that the United States were ready to go
to war with Great Britain for the purpose of avenging certain alleged
outrages committed on American rights as a neutral nation, he reminded
M. de Champigny that the French had also most grievously invaded
those rights, showing at the same time that the reparation of those
injuries, by relieving the American property from sequestration, and by
renouncing for the future the right of seizure in such cases, would be
the most efficient means of forming new and more intimate connections
between the United States and France.
[Sidenote: American Non-intervention Act, March 1, 1809.]
[Sidenote: Intrigues in Paris against England.]
As the American shipowners had set at defiance the embargo imposed
on the ports of the United States, their government on the 1st of
March, 1809, replaced it by the Act of Non-intervention, whereby all
intercourse between America, France, and England was interdicted under
severe penalties, and the ports of America closed against the armed
vessels of both belligerents. In communicating this act to the French
government, General Armstrong took care to call special attention
to its conditional character, and to disavow all hostile views and
intentions, declaring it to be a measure of precaution in order to
preserve the vessels of the United States from the numerous dangers
to which they were exposed by the continuance of their intercourse
with France. He subsequently added that “the Non-intercourse Act was a
fresh appeal _to the wisdom and justice_ of the Emperor, as a simple
modification of the imperial decrees relating to the right of neutrals
would instantly restore the commerce between the United States and
France. The United States,” he continued, “did not in fact require a
repeal of these decrees, having the greatest deference for the dignity
of the chief of a great empire; and declared they would be satisfied
if an interpretation were given to them which would thenceforward free
American vessels from harassments and capture; finally, entering into
the views which the Emperor had so often manifested”—that is to say,
a league to humble the power and destroy the commercial navy of Great
Britain. Indeed General Armstrong declared “that he was authorized, in
case France should give the required explanation, and England should
refuse a sufficient explanation, to state that the President of the
United States _would recommend an instant declaration of war against
the latter Power_.” These insidious propositions were not accepted
by France. The Emperor persisted in requiring a repeal of the orders
of the British Council before he would revoke the imperial decree,
and left it with the United States to obtain such repeal by their own
efforts. This attempt at reconciliation with France was then abandoned
by the Americans, and the Non-intercourse Act remained in full vigour.
[Sidenote: Hostile feelings in United States against England.]
[Sidenote: Diplomatic proceedings in Paris.]
But while the feelings of the people of the United States were
becoming daily more hostile to Great Britain, the American government,
under some strange delusion, insisted upon the sincerity of France
in the early repeal of her decrees. Quiescent under the outrages
committed by the French upon their merchantmen, they were furious
against the English. Every little incident was seized upon to inflame
the public mind against Great Britain. Indeed the President sent a
message to Congress stating “that the continued evidence afforded of
the hostile policy of the British government against our national
rights strengthens the considerations recommending and urging the
preparation of adequate means for maintaining them.” The resolutions
for this object were carried by such large majorities in the House of
Representatives, that war became unavoidable. Both parties boasted of
their moderation and forbearance; both alleged the reason and justice
of their cause; nevertheless both were determined by motives of state
policy operating respectively upon the interests of each country. In
the beginning of the year, in order to leave no pretext for England,
the American minister at Paris pressed the French government to issue
an official or authentic Act; and at length, on the 10th of May, 1812,
he received, as we have seen, a copy of _a decree dated 28th April,
1811_, by which the Berlin and Milan Decrees were repealed, so that the
knowledge of this decree was withheld from the United States for more
than a year,[335] and was only brought to light and publicly avowed
when Napoleon had so far wrought upon the Americans as to commit them
to the unfortunate war with Great Britain.
[Sidenote: Convention with Great Britain.]
Peace was happily concluded on the 24th of Dec., 1814, and in 1815
a convention was signed in London between the United States and
Great Britain to regulate the commerce and navigation between their
respective countries.[336] It was framed upon the model of the English
reciprocity treaties, which were the first steps taken by her towards
a future greater freedom of trade. By the terms of the 2nd article,
the equalisation of the duties on tonnage and imports was extended to
the vessels of both nations, as far as related to their intercourse
with the British dominions in Europe and the United States. By that
convention the English confirmed to the United States vessels a free
direct communication with their dominions in the East Indies, with
liberty during peace to trade in any articles not entirely prohibited.
Pursuant to this convention, the vessels of Great Britain, and the
merchandise imported therein, when they entered the ports of the United
States were exempted from the payment of extra duties of tonnage
and import; provided the vessels arrived from, and the merchandise
consisted of the growth, produce, and manufacture of, the British
dominions in Europe. The same reciprocity was conferred upon American
vessels proceeding to Great Britain laden with merchandise of similar
character. But at the end of Article 2 there was a special proviso,
that “the intercourse between the United States and his Britannic
Majesty’s possessions in the West Indies, and on the continent of
North America, shall not be affected by any of the provisions of this
Article, but each party shall remain in the complete possession of its
rights, with respect to such an intercourse.”[337]
[Sidenote: Retaliatory Acts, to be enforced conditionally.]
In retaliation, Congress on the 1st of March, 1817, passed an Act
providing that “on and after the 30th of June of that year a duty of
two dollars per ton” should be paid “on all foreign vessels which
should enter in the United States, from any foreign place to and with
which the vessels of the United States are not ordinarily permitted
to enter and trade.” And it was further enacted, in almost the exact
words of the English Navigation Laws, that after the 30th of September,
1817, no merchandise should be imported into the United States from
any foreign place except in vessels of the United States, or in
“such foreign vessels as wholly belong to the citizens or subjects
of that country of which the merchandise is the growth, production,
or manufacture, or from which it can only be, or most usually is,
first shipped for transportation.” Adding that, “the regulations
aforesaid are only applicable to the vessels of such foreign nations
as have adopted or may adopt similar provisions;” and providing that
“merchandise imported into the United States contrary to the Act
aforesaid,[338] and the vessel in which the same is imported, are
forfeited to the United States.” It was further determined that “the
coasting trade is only allowed in vessels of the United States”; and
that “merchandise imported from one port into another port in the
United States, in a vessel belonging wholly or in part to a subject of
any foreign power, unless such merchandise shall have been imported in
such vessel from a foreign port, and that the same shall not have been
unladen, is forfeited to the United States.”
[Sidenote: Hostile legislation against Great Britain.]
In 1818 Congress made their navigation laws still more stringent by
enacting,[339] “That from and after the 30th of September next, the
ports of the United States shall be and remain closed against every
vessel owned, wholly or in part, by a subject or subjects of his
Britannic Majesty, coming or arriving from any port or place in a
colony or territory of his Britannic Majesty, that is or shall be, by
the ordinary laws of navigation and trade, closed against vessels owned
by citizens of the United States; and such vessel, that in the course
of the voyage shall have touched at, or cleared out from, any port or
place in a colony or territory of Great Britain, which shall or may be,
by the ordinary laws of navigation and trade aforesaid, open to vessels
owned by citizens of the United States, shall nevertheless be deemed to
have come from the port or place in the colony or territory of Great
Britain, closed as aforesaid against vessels owned by citizens of the
United States, from which such vessel cleared out and sailed before
touching at and clearing out from an intermediate and open port or
place as aforesaid; and every such vessel, so excluded from the ports
of the United States, that shall enter or attempt to enter the same in
violation of this Act, shall, with her tackle, apparel, and furniture,
together with the cargo on board such vessel, be forfeited to the
United States.”
[Sidenote: Bonds required.]
“After the date above mentioned, no vessel owned wholly or in part
by subjects of his Britannic Majesty, though the same may have been
duly entered in the United States, and the duties on goods, wares, and
merchandise imported duly paid, can be cleared out laden with articles
the growth, produce, or manufacture of the United States, before the
owner or consignee shall have given bond and sureties, in double the
value of the articles aforesaid, that they shall not be landed in any
port or place in a colony or territory of his Britannic Majesty, which
by the ordinary laws of navigation and trade is closed against vessels
owned by citizens of the United States.”
[Sidenote: Treaty negotiations renewed.]
Such was the mode adopted by the Americans to coerce Great Britain into
the relinquishment of her exclusive colonial trade. But at the very
same time a negotiation was opened in London to carry out the views
of the government of the United States, to settle all the differences
relating to impressments, the fisheries and boundaries, and to secure a
fresh treaty and convention on terms of reciprocity. Prior to entering
upon the negotiations, it was agreed that the subsisting convention
should be continued for a term of not less than eight years.
[Sidenote: Dutch reciprocity.]
In 1818 a reciprocity treaty was concluded between the United States
and the King of the Netherlands on the same basis as the convention
subsisting with Great Britain. The Dutch colonial trade was not,
however, included within the conditions of the treaty.
[Sidenote: Bremen reciprocity.]
The President of the United States, in his proclamation dated the 24th
of July, 1818, announced that he had received satisfactory proof that
the burgomasters and senators of the free Hanseatic city of Bremen
had abolished, after the 12th of May, 1815, all discriminating and
countervailing duties, so far as they operated to the disadvantage
of the United States; and accordingly he declared that the American
Tonnage Duties Acts were repealed in so far as they affected Bremen.
A very considerable trade in tobacco and other American productions
resulted from this first step towards freedom of trade with Germany.
Though England for a time rejected the principles of reciprocity in
the form offered by the government of the United States to the nations
of Europe and accepted by the Netherlands, it was found impossible
to conduct to advantage the rapidly increasing commerce of the world
in the face of these constantly recurring retaliatory measures.
Consequently in 1820 she found it not merely necessary, but to her
interest, to adopt a more liberal maritime policy, and to relax in some
measure her stringent navigation laws.
FOOTNOTES:
[321] _Vide_ ‘Annual Register,’ 1806, p. 246.
[322] _Vide_ ‘Annual Register,’ 1806, and ‘American State Papers,’
Foreign Relations, 1801, vol. ii. p. 491.
[323] This decision is called the “_Polly_” case, for which see
‘Robinson’s Reports,’ vol. ii. p. 368, for the judgment of Sir William
Scott (Lord Howell).
[324] This point was first decided in the case of the _Essex_, May
1805; and after an elaborate argument, the same decision was pronounced
in the case of the _William_, March 1806.
[325] Act of April 18, 1806.
[326] This very interesting document (December 21, 1804) will be found
in United States ‘State Papers,’ Commerce and Navigation, vol. i. p.
582.
[327] Wheaton’s ‘Elements of International Law,’ Rights of war as to
Neutrals, vol. ii. ch. iii., 1836.
[328] Holmes’ ‘Annals of America,’ vol. ii. p. 434.
[329] It may be reasonably doubted whether Captain Humphreys, of the
_Leopard_, was guilty of anything beyond going slightly beyond his
instructions in taking from the _Chesapeake_ three men who had deserted
from the _Melampus_, but who were not actually named in the order sent
to him by the Admiral of the Station, the Hon. G. C. Berkeley. That his
order from Admiral Berkeley completely justified his firing into the
_Chesapeake_ cannot be questioned; but whether it was wise for Admiral
Berkeley to issue such an order is another matter. The surrender of the
_Chesapeake_ took place in March 1807; and on the news reaching London,
together with a Proclamation from Jefferson, the English government at
once disavowed the act of Admiral Berkeley, and recalled him. It is
further clear that if the captain of the _Chesapeake_ had answered the
hail of Captain Humphreys honestly and truly, his ship would not have
been fired into.
[330] This document will be found in ‘Parl. Papers,’ 1808, vol. xiv.
It will be found also in American ‘State Papers,’ together with a most
voluminous correspondence.
[331] November 21, 1806.
[332] Mr. Armstrong’s letter to M. Champigny, at Paris, ‘American
Foreign Relations,’ vol. iii. There is a vast number of letters.
[333] Letter, August 22, 1809, to Mr. Armstrong.
[334] General Armstrong’s letter, February 4, 1808.
[335] ‘Diplomacy of the United States,’ p. 133.
[336] The convention was signed on the 3rd of July, 1815 (_vide_
‘Hertslet’s Treaties,’ vol. ii. p. 386); but so far as regards the
great questions on which differences had arisen it settled nothing. It
professed, indeed, to adjust the question of the north-east boundary;
but this point was not arranged until many years afterwards, the
two countries having been previously on the point of rupture. The
north-west boundary, afterwards known as the Oregon dispute, was
left _in statu quo_. Neither party cared to agitate the impressment
question, although the Americans had at one period made this the chief
ground for going to war. Both parties made a barren declaration, that
they were desirous of continuing their efforts to promote the entire
abolition of the slave-trade. The vapourings about neutral rights, with
which the world had been nauseated for a number of years, were buried
in silence, to be resuscitated whenever a national cry of agitation
might be necessary for electioneering purposes. The question about
blockade was set aside just in the like manner. The American claims
relating to the impressment of seamen fell to the ground; and, with the
exception of the Paris Declaration of 1856, the rights of neutrals, to
a large extent, remain undecided to this day. The boundary question was
deferred, not decided upon; and in 1834, as the award of the empire,
the King of the Netherlands, did not satisfy either party, both refused
to abide by it, and it was only settled by the award of the Emperor of
Germany in 1872.
[337] The United States, in 1816, enacted “that so much of an Act as
imposes a higher duty of tonnage or of import on vessels, and articles
imported in vessels of the United States, contrary to the provisions
of the countries between the United States and his Britannic Majesty,
the ratifications whereof were mutually exchanged the 22nd of December,
1815, be, from and after the date of the ratification of the said
convention, and during the continuance thereof, deemed and taken to be
of force and effect.”
[338] Act, March 1, 1817.
[339] Act, April 1818.
CHAPTER XII.
Earliest formation of wet-docks and bonded warehouses—System
of levying duties—Opposition to any change—Excise Bill
proposed, 1733—but not passed till 1803—Necessity of docks
for London—Depredations from ships in London—The extent of
the plunder—Instances of robberies—Scuffle hunters—“Game”
ships—Ratcatchers—River-pirates—Their audacity—Light
horsemen—Their organisation—“Drum hogsheads”—Long-shore
men—Harbour accommodation—Not adequate for the merchant
shipping—East and West India ships—Docks at length planned—West
India Docks—Regulations—East India Docks—Mode of conducting
business at the Docks—London Docks—St. Katharine’s Docks—Victoria
and Millwall Docks—Charges levied by the Dock Companies—Docks
in provincial ports, and bonded warehouses—Liverpool and
Birkenhead Docks—Port of Liverpool, its commerce, and its
revenue from the Docks—Extent of accommodation—Extension of
Docks to the north—Hydraulic lifts and repairing basins—Cost
of new works—Bye-laws of the Mersey Board—The pilots of the
Mersey—Duties of the superintendent—Conditions of admission to the
service—Pilot-boats and rates of pilotage.
[Sidenote: The earliest formation of wet-docks and bonded warehouses.]
Although the wars in which Great Britain had been so long engaged
tended very materially to retard her maritime and commercial progress,
they gave her, on the other hand, a position among the nations which
at that period of her history could perhaps only have been achieved by
force of arms; nor, though a sad stumbling-block in her path, did they
prevent the development of those inventions which have done so much in
our own time to make her the first of maritime nations. The steamship,
to which we shall have occasion frequently, and at considerable length,
to refer, had its birth, for all practical purposes, in the midst of
war; while the dock, bonding, and warehousing systems, without which
England never could have become the chief market of the world, were
then, for the first time, successfully introduced. The power of steam,
it is true, had been known, and the advantages which docks and bonding
warehouses were likely to confer had been discussed long before the
commencement of the present century, but it was only then that they
were brought into useful and remunerative operation.
So early as 1660 the Commercial wet-dock on the Surrey side of the
River Thames was opened to shipping, and, in 1662, the magistrates of
Glasgow purchased the land on which Port Glasgow is now erected, and
constructed there a harbour and a graving dock; but these were the
only works of the kind in any way worthy of note until an Act, passed
in 1709,[340] authorized the construction of a wet-dock at Liverpool.
Close upon another century, however, elapsed ere the Act was passed
which led to the construction and opening of the West India Docks of
London. Nor had anything been done before that period to carry into
effect the recommendations of Sir Robert Walpole, who, so far back as
1733, had strongly urged the desirability of some sort of warehousing
system, whereby the duties levied upon imported goods might be
collected so as to meet the convenience of their owners or consignees,
and to protect the revenue.
[Sidenote: System of levying duties.]
Previously to 1802, if the duties were not paid on the arrival of
the goods at the port of discharge, their owners or consignees were
required to enter into bonds with the Customs to provide security for
the amount due to the Crown. “It was often,” remarks McCulloch,[341]
“very difficult to find sureties, and the merchant, in order to raise
funds to pay the duty, was frequently reduced to the ruinous necessity
of selling his goods immediately on their arrival, when perhaps the
market was already glutted. Neither was this the only inconvenience
that grew out of this system, for the duties having to be paid all at
once, and not by degrees as the goods were sold for consumption, their
price was raised by the amount of the profit on the capital advanced in
payment of the duties; competition, too, was diminished in consequence
of the greater command of funds required to carry on trade under such
disadvantages, and a few rich individuals were enabled to monopolize
the importation of those commodities on which heavy duties were
payable. The system had besides an obvious tendency to discourage the
carrying trade. It prevented this country from becoming the _entrepôt_
for foreign products by hindering the importation of such as were not
immediately wanted for home consumption, and thus tended to lessen
the resort of foreigners to our markets, inasmuch as it rendered it
difficult, or rather impossible, for them to complete an assorted
cargo. And in addition to all these circumstances, the difficulty
of granting a really equivalent drawback to the exporters of such
commodities as had paid duty opened a door for the commission of every
species of fraud.”
[Sidenote: Opposition to any change.]
[Sidenote: Excise Bill proposed, 1733,]
Nevertheless, when Sir Robert Walpole, in 1733, first introduced his
famous Excise Scheme, requiring all importations of tobacco and wine to
be deposited in public warehouses until the duty had been paid, there
were the loudest clamours against a measure meant, not merely for the
security of the revenue, but for the benefit and convenience of the
merchants, who, however, scouted his proposal. Indeed, those of them
who had availed themselves of the facilities afforded by the existing
system for defrauding the revenue resisted the measure by every means
in their power, exasperating the people to a state of the wildest fury
against it.
[Sidenote: but not passed until 1803.]
[Sidenote: Necessity of docks for London.]
No valid or ostensible reasons were then assigned for their determined
opposition, nor were any arguments worthy of record brought forward
against the proposed Bill. “We shall be ruined,” alike exclaimed the
merchant and the shipowner; while the parliamentary opponents of
the government, taking up the cry, ultimately obliged Sir Robert,
who “narrowly escaped falling a sacrifice to the ungovernable rage
of the mob which beset the avenues to the House of Commons,”[342]
to abandon the Bill. So endurable were the impressions made by the
violent opposition to Walpole’s scheme, and so strong the force of
prejudice, that this most valuable measure lay dormant for more than
sixty years, and even then might not have become law had the necessity
of establishing docks with bonding warehouses attached to them not been
brought prominently under public notice by Mr. Patrick Colquhoun, in
his remarkable treatise on the commerce and police of the River Thames.
Increased accommodation for the number of ships frequenting the river
had now become equally necessary, the trade of London with distant
nations requiring in 1796 no less than three thousand five hundred and
three small craft of different sorts to discharge or load the merchant
vessels which lay in the stream.
[Sidenote: Depredations from ships in London.]
London, therefore, from the extent of its trade, and the
disproportionate space allotted on the surface of the water for
the accommodation of vessels frequenting the port, and on land for
the collection and stowage of their cargoes, at that time afforded
numerous and greatly increased facilities for the secret disposal of
merchandise and property of every kind. A wide and lucrative field
was thus opened for the depredations of a host of plunderers of every
sort, trained in their nefarious arts with all the regularity and
system of a disciplined body. Their numbers and stratagems of course
increased with the augmentation of the commerce of the river; and
especially with the practice of sending cargoes in lighters to wharves
at the distance of several miles from the discharging vessels, or from
the wharves on board the loading vessels, the necessary result of
the overcrowded state of the harbour. The great numbers of lumpers,
watermen, lightermen, coopers, and labourers employed upon the wharves,
as well as the seamen and petty officers of too many vessels, in league
with the lower classes of revenue officers, now formed a large and
dangerous band of conspirators against the property of the merchants
and the revenues of the Crown. Mates of merchantmen then claimed by
custom as their perquisites the sweepings of the hold, consisting of
such parts of the cargo as might from any cause have dropped out of
their packages; and numerous charges were made against the inferior
members of this class, whose duty it was to take care of the cargo
under their charge, that they had been tempted to injure the packages
with a view to increase their perquisites. Mr. Colquhoun’s treatise
furnishes an account of the vessels employed in the trade of London,
and of the value of their cargoes, with an estimate of the number of
packages plundered in each branch of trade during the year ending the
5th of January, 1798.[343]
[Sidenote: The extent of the plunder.]
From this statement it would appear that in that year there were
eighteen hundred and forty-three foreign, and eleven thousand six
hundred and one British vessels, embracing those employed in the coal
and coasting trades, of a tonnage, including their repeated voyages, of
one million seven hundred and seventy-six thousand three hundred and
twenty-six tons, entering and clearing to and from the port of London.
The value of the imports and exports he computed at 60,591,000_l._ (a
very large estimate, but no doubt he includes the repeated transfers
by ship or barge), in, perhaps, three million packages. He estimates
the amount of plunder of the West India packages alone at no less a
sum than of 232,000_l._ The plunder of the East India trade he sets
down at 25,000_l._, and of the cargoes of the vessels in that of the
United States of America at 30,000_l._ The entire aggregate amount of
plunder, including 20,000_l._ in the coal trade, and the like sum in
the coasting trade, he estimates at 461,500_l._ from merchant vessels,
while the loss in tackle, apparel, and stores of thirteen thousand four
hundred and forty-four vessels he computes at 45,000_l._, making the
total depredations during one year in the River Thames, prior to the
construction of docks and the establishment of the warehousing system,
as not less than 506,500_l._ To this amount must be added a large sum
for the depredations on stores belonging to ships of war, which were by
no means exempt from plunder.
As regards the depredations at that time committed upon merchant
shipping and goods, Mr. Colquhoun mentions one remarkable case, of the
enormous quantity of fifty tons of sugar,[344] three whole puncheons
of rum, besides three hundred gallons pumped out of different casks,
and a large quantity of coffee, which were proved to have been
plundered from one vessel.
[Sidenote: Instances of robberies.]
In another case, in August 1794, a small vessel arrived in the river
from Antigua, with seventy hogsheads of sugar, five of which were
actually stolen by three tidesmen in collusion with the mate and a
well-known receiver. In this case the master of the vessel, happening
to be a stranger, had expressed so much apprehension with regard to
the dishonesty of the lumpers, that the revenue officers proposed,
with a view of allaying his fears, to discharge the cargo. The result
being that, while he remained on shore in fancied security, he lost
one-fourteenth part of the whole!
[Sidenote: Scuffle-hunters.]
[Sidenote: “Game” ships.]
One gigantic system of plunder seems to have prevailed throughout.
There were “scuffle-hunters,” who offered their services in long
aprons, well adapted to wrap up and conceal whatever they could pilfer,
and who were “longshore” thieves of the worst class. The lightermen
committed the most nefarious robberies. The bumboatmen who were
licensed to hawk goods among the shipping, and the “Peter-boatmen”
employed in fishing, swelled the number of delinquents. There was also
a numerous class denominated “mudlarks,” who stole whatever, above or
below the water, they could lay hands upon. Whenever a “game-ship,”
that is, a ship whose officers were corrupted for the purposes of
plunder, was discharging her cargo close to the shore, these mudlarks
were accustomed to prowl about, grubbing in the mud under her bow and
quarters, for the purpose of receiving from the lumpers and others
employed in the delivery, bags and handkerchiefs of sugar, coffee,
and other articles, which they conveyed to the houses and shops of
the receivers, according to the plan which had been preconcerted by
the confederates in this general conspiracy. Rum, pillaged in large
quantities, was obtained by means of a regular system applicable to the
nature of the article. Skins and prepared bladders with wooden nozzles
were secretly conveyed on board, a bribe being given, as in the case
of sugar and coffee, to the mate and revenue officers for a licence to
draw off a certain quantity from each cask, for which a pump called a
_jigger_ had been previously provided, and also tin tubes, adapted to
render the booty accessible in every situation. By these and similar
devices the skins and bladders were filled, and handed over to the
mudlarks and other hangers-on who infested the neighbourhood of the
ship.
[Sidenote: Rat-catchers.]
The ingenuity of men devoid of the principles of moral rectitude
is ever fertile in devising the means of subsistence by criminal
expedients. Among the various classes of delinquents who contributed
to the removal of plunder from ships and vessels in the river were a
set of rascals who pretended to follow the occupation of rat-catchers.
These itinerants, who professed to know how to destroy the vermin,
being permitted to go on board in the night to set their traps, and
afterwards to visit them at such hours as they chose to prescribe for
themselves, became dangerous auxiliaries to lumpers and others who
had previously concealed plunder in the hold, until a convenient
opportunity should occur to get it removed without exciting suspicion.
In some instances these ingenious thieves not only committed the
depredations described, but, for the purpose of obtaining access to
different ships, and increasing the demand for their professional
labours, had no scruple in conveying the rats alive from one vessel to
another, as a means of receiving payment for catching the same animals
three or four times over, and of thus extending the field for plunder.
[Sidenote: River-pirates.]
But the “river-pirates” were the most desperate and depraved of the
fraternity of nautical vagabonds, as their exploits were invariably
covered by receivers who kept old iron and junk shops in places
adjacent to the Thames, and who were ever ready to receive and conceal
the nocturnal plunder of these hostile marauders, many of whom were
armed, and all provided with boats, perhaps stolen, for the particular
object in view.
The practice of the “river-pirates” seems to have been to select the
darkest nights for committing their depredations, having previously
reconnoitred the river, during the day, for the purpose of marking the
particular vessels and craft most likely to afford a rich booty, either
from the nature of the merchandise, stores, or other materials which
were accessible, or from the circumstances of their being without the
protection of a nightly watch.
[Sidenote: Their audacity.]
In the port of London, where so many vessels were constantly lading
and discharging valuable merchandise in the stream, and where from two
hundred to five hundred open barges and other small craft in which this
merchandise was deposited in its transit to and from the shore offered
so many temptations for plunder, it is easy to conceive how audacious
these marauders would become, unrestrained by police or any hazard of
apprehension, and emboldened by the strength of their own desperate
and organized gangs. Well-authenticated instances have been adduced of
river-pirates cutting bags of cotton and other merchandise from the
quarters of ships on their first arrival, and even of their weighing
anchors, and getting clear off with these heavy articles, together
with the cables and everything portable upon the deck. One instance
in particular is recorded, where an American and a Guernsey ship
were plundered in this manner by the actual removal both of anchors
and cables, the robbery being, in fact, completed in the view of the
masters of the vessels, who were only alarmed in time to reach the
deck and ascertain the fact from the pirates themselves; who, as they
rowed from the vessels with their cumbrous booty, wished the astonished
masters a very “good morning.”
[Sidenote: Light horsemen.]
The night-plunderers were sometimes denominated “light horsemen;” and
they generally carried on their depredations through the connivance
of the revenue officers. For a licence to commit plunder, by opening
packages of sugar, coffee, and other produce during several hours in
the night, no less than from twenty to thirty guineas were usually paid
to the mate and the revenue officers, who almost invariably went to bed
while the robbery was perpetrated, affecting ignorance of the whole
transaction.
[Sidenote: Their organisation.]
[Sidenote: Drum hogsheads.]
Most of these infamous proceedings were carried on according to a
regular system, and in gangs, frequently composed of one or more
receivers, together with coopers, watermen, and lumpers, who were
all necessary, in their different occupations, to the accomplishment
of the general design of wholesale plunder. They went on board the
merchant vessel completely prepared with iron crows, adzes, and other
implements to open and again head up the casks; with shovels to take
out the sugar, and a number of bags made to contain a hundred pounds
each. These bags went by the name of “black strap,” having been
previously dyed black, to prevent their being conspicuous in the night,
when stowed in the bottom of a river boat or wherry. In the course of
judicial proceedings it has been shown that in the progress of the
delivery of a large ship’s cargo, about ten to fifteen tons of sugar
were on an average removed in these nocturnal expeditions, exclusive
of what had been obtained by the lumpers during the day, which was
frequently excessive and almost uncontrolled, whenever night plunder
had taken place. This indulgence was generally insisted on and granted
to lumpers, to prevent their making discoveries of what they called the
“drum hogsheads” found in the hold on going to work in the morning, by
which were understood hogsheads where from one-sixth to one-fourth of
their contents had been stolen the night preceding. In this manner one
gang of plunderers was compelled to purchase the connivance of another,
to the ruinous loss of the merchant.
[Sidenote: Long-shore men.]
The total number of the mates and crews of vessels, revenue officers,
lumpers, coal-heavers, coopers, watermen, lightermen, night-watchmen,
scuffle-hunters, and labourers employed in warehouses was then
computed at thirty-six thousand three hundred and forty-four, of
whom no fewer than nine thousand six hundred were pronounced by Mr.
Colquhoun as delinquents and participators in the rascality then
prevailing. In addition to these, there were one hundred river-pirates,
two hundred night-plunderers, two hundred “light-horsemen,” five
hundred and fifty receivers of a dozen different classes, besides two
hundred mudlarks, most of whom had no other calling, forming together
a formidable band of ten thousand eight hundred and fifty marauders,
who constituted the component parts of this great machine of organized
crime, to the loss of the revenue and the infinite detriment of the
best interests of commerce and navigation.
[Sidenote: Harbour accommodation.]
Towards the close of the last century the harbour accommodation for
the greatly increasing amount of merchant shipping frequenting London
was, with the exception of that part where small vessels discharged
their cargoes between Blackfriars and London Bridge, limited to that
portion of the river extending from London Bridge to Deptford, being
in length about four miles, with an average width of four hundred and
fifty yards. This harbour comprised—1st. The Upper Pool, from London
Bridge to Union Hole, for ships of two hundred and fifty tons and
under, being in length sixteen hundred yards, and capable of holding
three hundred and twenty-nine vessels, coasters and other small
craft. 2nd. The Middle Pool, from Union Hole to Wapping New Stairs
for ships of three hundred and fifty tons, being seven hundred and
fifty yards, and capable of accommodating one hundred and twenty-six
middle-sized vessels. 3rd. The Lower Pool, from Wapping New Stairs to
Horseferry-tier, near Limehouse, for ships of four hundred tons, being
eighteen hundred yards. 4th. From Horseferry to the mooring chains at
Deptford, for ships of four hundred and fifty to five hundred tons,
drawing seventeen to eighteen feet water, extending two thousand seven
hundred yards in length, capable of holding three hundred and twenty
large ships, and these two bring Limehouse, affording accommodation
besides for fifty-four ships, and Deptford about a similar number.
At that time the large East Indiamen, drawing from twenty-two to
twenty-four feet water, could not discharge higher up the river than
Blackwall.
[Sidenote: Not adequate for the merchant shipping.]
From the foregoing account it would seem that there was not convenient
space for more than eight hundred and eighty vessels in the harbour;
yet it frequently happened, when the fleets arrived together, that from
thirteen to fourteen hundred vessels, including coasters, were in port
at the same time. As many as three hundred colliers have been seen at
one time in the Pool, where there were besides usually from one hundred
and fifty to two hundred sail of other coasting craft.
[Sidenote: East and West India ships.]
The East India Company discharged the cargoes of their ships into their
own decked hoys, and transferred them to warehouses, which were then
deemed “splendid and commodious in the highest degree.” Their goods
were carted to these warehouses from their own quays, where they were
deposited under the care of revenue officers specially appointed, as
the duties were never paid until the goods were delivered after a sale
had been effected.[345] But, with the exception of a few small vessels,
which landed their goods at wharves, and the timber-laden vessels,
which made rafts of their cargoes on the river, the West India and all
other traders discharged their cargoes into lighters, creating a state
of confusion which, combined with the enormous amount of depredations,
at length stimulated the parties most largely interested to devise
means for protecting themselves, and suppressing the existing evils.
[Sidenote: Docks at length planned.]
[Sidenote: West India Docks.]
The West India merchants, being the greatest sufferers, took the lead,
and through their exertions an Act of Parliament, which met with
much opposition,[346] was obtained for the construction of the West
India Docks, on the Isle of Dogs, with powers to the Lord Mayor and
Corporation of the City of London to excavate a canal sufficiently
large and deep to be navigated by ships, extending across the head of
that peninsula between Blackwall and Limehouse Hole. The stock of the
Company at the commencement of this important undertaking amounted to
only 500,000_l._, with power to augment it to 600,000_l._ if necessary.
They were restricted from raising their dividends above ten per cent.
They were required to inclose the docks, wharves, and warehouses
connected therewith with a wall of brick or stone, not less than thirty
feet in height, with strong gates, and to carry round them a ditch
of at least twelve feet in width constantly filled with water to the
depth of six feet. They were expressly forbidden to allow any slips for
building or repairing vessels on their premises; nor were they allowed
to be concerned in the building or repairing of vessels.
[Sidenote: Regulations.]
All vessels engaged in the West Indies were required to load and
deliver their cargoes in the Company’s docks, or in the river below
Blackwall, except in the case of embarking naval stores for the royal
service at Deptford. Schedules of rates and other particulars were
annexed to the Act. The construction of these works constituted the
first great step to the improvement of the river, and led to the
formation of the other spacious and commodious docks which now adorn
the metropolis, affording the incalculable advantages of an almost
entire security to property. The success of the scheme of wet docks
prepared the way for the eventual establishment of the warehousing
system on a more complete and comprehensive scale than that which had
been proposed by Sir Robert Walpole. Though violently opposed when
first introduced, it has perhaps done more than any other measure to
develop the maritime resources and trade of Great Britain with foreign
nations, and has proved of immense advantage in the protection of the
revenue.[347]
[Sidenote: East India Docks.]
The West India Docks originally consisted of about twelve acres of
water space appropriated in two equal parts for the use of vessels
inward and outward bound, known as the Import and Export Docks; these
communicate with each other by means of locks, having a basin of more
than five acres at the lower entrance, and another of about half
that size contiguous to Limehouse. In 1829 the South Dock, formerly
the City Canal, was added, and further important additions were made
to the works in 1869-70. Between the docks are ranges of handsome
and commodious warehouses for the purpose of receiving in bond all
descriptions of produce subject to duty, especially rum, brandy, and
other spirituous liquors. These docks are now amalgamated with the
East India Docks Company, formed some years afterwards, and have a
united capital of upwards of 2,000,000_l._, their management being
vested in a board of thirty-eight directors, who are elected by the
shareholders. Their business is no longer limited to that of the East
and West Indies, and ships to and from all parts of the world receive
and discharge their cargoes there, though they naturally retain a
very considerable proportion of those descriptions of produce for the
reception of which they were originally constructed.
[Sidenote: Mode of conducting business at the Docks.]
Under the conditions of the Acts of Parliament whereby the Docks
were established, the directors have power to levy rates and frame
regulations and bye-laws for the proper conduct of business. For
instance, certain rules require to be observed by vessels entering or
leaving the docks, and by the crews while they remain there. For the
protection of the revenue, no ship is allowed to break bulk until her
cargo is duly entered, nor any baggage to be taken away until it has
been examined by an officer of the Customs. Bills of lading must be
specially endorsed so as to clearly designate the party to whose order
the contents are to be delivered; and no orders for goods are received
until the manifest (particulars) of the cargo, certified by the
captain of the vessel in which they were imported, has been deposited
in the Dock Company’s office. Every description of merchandise is
deliverable by warrant, with the exception of goods imported in bulk,
and a few specially excepted articles which are deliverable by cheques
or sub-orders, unless their owners otherwise desire and are agreeable
to pay the extra expense of sorting them into separate and distinct
parcels. To facilitate passing orders and paying the cheques due upon
goods, the Company open deposit accounts upon a request from their
owner or consignee, with such deposit as he may think proper to make,
provided it is not less than 10_l._ By opening these accounts the
business of the consignee with the Dock Company is greatly facilitated,
especially when goods are subject to the warehouse rent charge. Landing
rates are charged upon the gross weight, and include delivering or
receiving by land, wharfage and housing, piling on the quay or loading
from the landing scale, weighing or gauging, and furnishing landing
weights, and tales or gauge accounts of the strength of spirits as
ascertained by the Customs.
[Sidenote: London Docks.]
Before the West India Docks were opened another company had applied for
and obtained an Act of Parliament for constructing docks on a much more
extensive scale in the parishes of St. George’s in the East, Wapping,
and Shadwell, which were principally intended for the reception of
tobacco, rice, wine, and brandy. These, the London Docks, were opened
for business in 1805, and all vessels laden with the articles we have
just named were bound for a period of twenty-one years to discharge in
them, except such as arrived from the East or West Indies. The premises
of this Company, which are surrounded with high walls, cover an area
of about one hundred acres, and the stock of the Company amounts[348]
to upwards of five millions sterling, a very considerable portion of
it having been appropriated to the purchase of the land and the houses
which occupied the site of the Docks.
The western dock has a water area of more than twenty acres; that of
the eastern covers about seven acres, and the tobacco dock, confined
exclusively to the reception of vessels laden with that article,
occupies one acre of water space, while the warehouse for the reception
and storage of tobacco, perhaps still the largest in the world, is
capable of containing twenty-four thousand hogsheads, and covers no
less than five acres of land. The other warehouses are upon an almost
equally extensive scale, and, though in separate blocks, cover an
area of nearly nineteen acres. Below them and the tobacco warehouses
are vast arched vaults which can contain, exclusive of the gangways,
sixty-six thousand pipes of wine and spirits. Hydraulic machinery is
now in use in all parts of the docks for the purpose of discharging the
cargoes of vessels and landing them on the quays or delivering them
into the warehouses, and it is no uncommon thing to discharge from one
ship a thousand tons of cargo in the course of twelve or fifteen hours.
There are besides large basins for the reception of vessels at the
Wapping and Shadwell entrances, the latter covering six acres of water
space, with an entrance-lock of three hundred and fifty feet in length,
and sixty feet in width, having at spring-tide a depth of twenty-eight
feet of water over the sill of the dock-gates.
[Sidenote: St. Katharine’s Docks.]
[Sidenote: Victoria and Millwall Docks.]
The St. Katharine’s Docks, situated still farther up the river,
incorporated by the Act of 6 George IV., cap. 105, were partially
opened for traffic in October 1828. They lie immediately below the
Tower of London, and though only occupying one-fourth of the space of
the London Docks, cost upwards of two and a half million sterling in
their construction, arising in a great measure from the increased cost
of the land and the houses which had to be removed, and from the more
expensive character of their warehouses. Here vessels of upwards of a
thousand tons register are docked and undocked without difficulty, by
night as well as by day, an advantage peculiar to this establishment.
The more recent docks, such as the Victoria and Millwall, also on the
north side of the Thames, but below the others, occupy a much larger
space, though the amount of business as yet carried on in them is
comparatively limited, especially as regards the value of the goods
imported. The Victoria, situated immediately below the East and West
India Docks, extends from Bow Creek to Galleon Reach, a distance of
nearly three miles, and embraces an area of about six hundred acres of
what was known as the Plaistow Marshes, although only sixteen acres
are as yet occupied as a half-tide basin, seventy-four acres as the
inner or main wet-dock, and about twelve acres of canal, intended to
intersect the eastern lands of the Company. These docks were formed in
1850 at a cost of about 1,600,000_l._, increased by various additions
and improvements, and notably by amalgamation, a few years ago, with
the London and St. Katharine’s Docks, all of which now form one
company. The only entrance to the Victoria Docks from the Thames is at
present from Bow Creek, by means of a lock three hundred and twenty
feet in length, eighty feet in width, and twenty-eight feet in depth.
In the main dock there are six jetties, five of which have warehouses
erected upon them, and on the north side there is an enormous shed
capable of containing no less than one hundred thousand tons of guano,
the entire London trade in that article being now confined to the
Victoria Docks. There is also a warehouse covering an area of four
acres, appropriated to the stowage of tobacco. A branch railway runs
through the whole of the premises, conveying goods from alongside the
ships to all parts of the kingdom.
The Millwall Docks, situated in the Isle of Dogs, and contiguous to
those of the West India Dock Company, were incorporated by Act of
Parliament on the 25th of July, 1864, and opened for traffic about four
years afterwards. The property of this Company comprises an area of
more than two hundred acres, thirty-five and one-third of which have
been converted into a wet-dock capable of receiving merchant vessels
of the largest class, with a quay wall frontage of eight thousand two
hundred feet, and entrance-locks eighty feet in width. Its capital,
comprising ordinary and preference shares and debenture stock, amounts
to about 1,130,000_l._ A graving-dock capable of receiving vessels of
from fifteen hundred to two thousand tons has been formed in connection
with the wet-dock, thus affording to shipowners the advantage of
examining and repairing their vessels without requiring them to be
ballasted and sent out into the river. The gates, bridges, warping
capstans, and other machinery are worked by hydraulic power. The
Millwall Docks, like the Victoria, and all the other docks, except the
London and St. Katharine’s, are in direct railway communication with
the City of London and the various railways of the Northern and Midland
districts. Possessing many natural advantages, and affording increased
facilities for the more rapid conduct of business, these docks will no
doubt soon secure a larger proportion of the trade of London than now
falls to their lot.[349]
[Sidenote: Charges levied by the Dock Companies.]
Although the dues vary in the several establishments, except where
there is combination, the leading rules and regulations by which their
business is conducted are similar. They are all vast stores, where
goods and produce subject to duty can be deposited either for home
consumption or re-exportation, as well as wet-docks where ships can,
at all times, lie afloat, alike free from the risks to which they were
formerly subjected on the river by the dangers of its navigation, and
the plunder of the combined rogues by whom the Thames was so long
infested.
[Sidenote: Docks in provincial ports, and bonded warehouses.]
Besides the old Commercial Dock on the south side of the Thames,
and the Grand Surrey Canal, both devoted almost exclusively to the
reception of ships with cargoes not subject to duty, such as deals
and timber, there are now wet-docks in most of the important ports of
the kingdom, varying in size according to the trade of the place or
district, but, with the exceptions we have named, they are all the
creation of the present century. Bristol, Southampton, Hull, Great
Grimsby, Cardiff, Newport, Newcastle, Glasgow, Leith, Sunderland,
Dundee, Cork, and the Tyne have each their wet-docks, of greater
or less capacity, with warehouses where goods subject to duty can
be bonded. Besides these there are now forty-eight towns or ports
in England, nineteen in Scotland, and eighteen in Ireland, where
the privileges of bonding are allowed, and from which goods can be
obtained for home consumption, or for re-exportation.
[Sidenote: Liverpool and Birkenhead Docks.]
But Liverpool, including Birkenhead, has a far larger amount of dock
accommodation than any other port in Great Britain, or, indeed, in the
world and no works of a similar character, of either ancient or modern
times, can be compared with them. Gibbon has described the port of
Ostia, to which we have already referred,[350] with its docks, as the
boldest and most stupendous works of Roman magnificence; but, so far
as we can now trace, they were in the extent of their accommodation
altogether insignificant when compared with the docks which at present
line the banks of the river Mersey. These extend on its eastern shore
upwards of five miles in length, and the works now contemplated or in
course of construction will add at least another mile in length to
these already gigantic undertakings.
[Sidenote: Port of Liverpool, its commerce, and its revenue from the
docks.]
Though the entrance to the estuary of the Mersey is encumbered by
sand-banks, there is at low-water spring-tides a depth over the bar
of eleven feet, and as the water rises twenty-one feet in neap and
thirty-one feet in spring-tides, there is ample depth for vessels of
the largest size over its shallowest and most dangerous part. The
channel is also well defined by numerous buoys, beacons, lightships,
and lighthouses, and vessels entering the harbour have the advantage
of the services of the most daring and experienced pilots to be found
in this or in any other country, who are constantly cruising about,
in their well-equipped cutters, in search of inward-bound vessels
long before they reach that part of the navigation which is in any
way dangerous. To this noble river and the facilities which its docks
afford for the expedition and safe conduct of maritime commerce may
be attributed, combined with its position as the readiest outlet for
the vast manufactures of the surrounding district, the rapid rise
of Liverpool. As an indication of its extraordinary prosperity, it
is sufficient to state that while in 1812[351] the revenue of the
Trustees, levied upon four hundred and forty-seven thousand tons of
shipping and their cargoes, did not exceed 45,000_l._, it had in 1871
reached 562,953_l._, upon no less than six million one hundred and
thirty-one thousand seven hundred and forty-five tons of shipping; and
in the year ending 1st July, 1872, the shipping frequenting the port
had increased to six million five hundred and thirty thousand three
hundred and eighty-six tons, and the annual revenue to 592,258_l._
[Sidenote: Extent of accommodation.]
But the docks themselves are the marvel of the place. Along the whole
of the eastern bank of the river (the site of Liverpool) there will
shortly be, for upwards of six miles in length, the finest range of
wet-docks in the world, protected by a sea-wall of an average thickness
of eleven feet, and forty feet in height from its foundations,
faced with massive blocks of granite, perhaps in itself one of the
greatest works of the kind of modern times. Through the courtesy of
the Secretary, we ascertain that the existing docks with their basins
cover a water area of two hundred and sixty acres, and have a quayage
of upwards of eighteen lineal miles: and to these must be added the
Birkenhead Docks, on the opposite bank of the Mersey, comprising about
one hundred and sixteen acres of water space, and embracing more than
nine lineal miles of quays. So that out of the whole area of the
Dock Estate, comprising one thousand five hundred and thirty-eight
acres, upwards of one hundred docks[352] of one sort and another, have
already been formed, covering an area of upwards of four hundred and
twenty-four acres of water-space, and having more than twenty-eight
miles of quay walls. These figures furnish an idea of the vast extent
and character of the works under the control of the Mersey Docks and
Harbour Board, and show what unaided private enterprise can accomplish.
The wet, as well as the graving-docks, are capable of receiving the
largest description of vessels. The graving-docks, with two exceptions,
are from forty-five to one hundred feet in width, and from four hundred
and fifty to seven hundred and fifty-eight feet in length, containing
no less than twelve thousand one hundred square feet of flooring.
Nor do the facilities afforded to maritime commerce at this great
sea-port end here. There are wooden landing-stages on both sides of
the river, resembling floating islands, connected with the shore
by bridges which rise and fall with the tide. One of these stages
measures one thousand and forty feet in length, with a width of from
thirty-five to fifty feet, and another is one thousand and two feet
long, and eighty feet wide. There are also wet docks belonging to the
Corporation of Liverpool and other persons, comprising water-space of
upwards of eleven acres. The warehouses, though perhaps affording less
convenience and accommodation than those of London, are likewise upon
a large scale. Only three docks, the Albert, Stanley, and Wapping, are
surrounded with bonding warehouses: the other docks have warehouses
contiguous to them, but as a large portion of the produce, both free
and subject to duty, is conveyed by railway or barge to Manchester and
other inland towns, accommodation storage is not required to the same
extent as in London. The tobacco warehouse, however, is six hundred
and thirty feet in length, with a width throughout of three hundred
and fifty feet; while there are warehouses for the reception of corn
capable of receiving four hundred thousand quarters of wheat or other
descriptions of grain. Nearly all the docks are surrounded with open
sheds on the quays for the reception and temporary stowage of goods
and produce. Many of these are handsome structures, and all of them
substantial and very commodious. There are besides in the Nelson,
Princes, and in one or two other docks, “transit sheds,” one storey
in height and substantially built, where ships can be discharged with
extraordinary rapidity, and their cargoes safely stored until it
suits the convenience of the owners or consignees to remove them to
the warehouses. Steam dredging-machines are ready whenever required
to remove accumulations of mud in the docks, basins, and approaches,
and these at all times maintain the full depth of water, while strict
rules are enforced, and a large and efficient body of police[353] are
permanently employed.
[Sidenote: Extension of docks to the north.]
Notwithstanding the vast accommodation at present afforded to shipping,
the growing wants of Liverpool are so rapid that it has been found
necessary to materially increase the existing accommodation, besides
widening the entrances to some of the existing docks, and increasing
the area of their water-space. Three more large docks are to be
constructed to the north, one to contain an area of twenty acres of
water space, and three thousand and seventy lineal feet of quayage;
another to embrace forty-three and three-quarters acres of water space,
surrounded by ten thousand eight hundred and seventy lineal feet of
quay walls; and the third to contain eighteen acres of water-space,
with a gross quayage of three thousand eight hundred and sixty-five
lineal feet.[354] At least one of these docks is to be capable of
receiving ships of the largest size, with quay walls suited for vessels
“ranging up to six hundred feet in length, should such a type come into
use.” It is proposed to surround them with sheds ninety-five feet wide,
“flanked by roadways ranging from eighty to one hundred feet in width,”
except at the ends of the branch docks, where the erection of stores or
warehouses are contemplated, which are to be fitted with “elevators,”
on the American principle, for the purpose of unloading grain in bulk
from the hold of the ships to the different floors.
[Sidenote: Hydraulic lifts and repairing basins.]
But besides these wet-docks and warehouses, it is proposed to construct
hydraulic lifts, each with a framework five hundred feet in length
and sixty feet in width, capable of receiving and raising the largest
class of vessels, and “admitting ordinary repairs and overhauling to
be effected with safety, economy, and expedition.” On the eastern
side of the basin of these wet-docks there are to be constructed two
graving-docks, with sixty feet width of entrance, each eight hundred
and fifty feet in length, and having adjoining “_lye-bye_” berths of
sufficient capacity to accommodate and facilitate the working and free
entry of the largest description of ships. Between the graving-docks
it is proposed to make another dock eight hundred and twenty feet
long and one hundred and forty feet wide, to be specially adapted for
repairing purposes, with quays one hundred and thirty feet in width,
provided with the largest and most convenient class of cranes. These
various new docks, with separate entrances from the river, are to be in
direct communication with the existing docks, so as to form one almost
unbroken line of the finest dock accommodation in this or any other
country.
On the southern side of the Dock Estate, that is to the south of the
existing docks, there is to be a half-tide basin to the east, in
connection with the Brunswick basin, of one thousand one hundred
and thirty feet in length and seventy feet in width, surrounded by
convenient quays and sheds in direct communication with the railway.
Opening from the existing basin, and extending in a north-eastern
direction, with a passage of sixty feet in width, another wet dock is
contemplated, one thousand three hundred and thirty feet in length,
by three hundred feet in width, comprising a water area of eight and
three-quarter acres, and a total quayage of two thousand eight hundred
and forty lineal feet.
[Sidenote: Cost of new works.]
Eastward, and in connection with the dock now described, by means of
a sixty-feet passage, there is to be an “import dock,” one thousand
four hundred and fifty feet in length, with eleven acres and a half of
water-space, and a quayage of three thousand two hundred and eighty
lineal feet; while at the extremity of the whole, the half-tide basin
at present in use is to be more than doubled in size, and another
graving-dock constructed seven hundred and forty-five feet in length,
with “repairing berths,” which will be applicable for other trade
purposes, and if thus used, furnished with forty and twenty-ton
hydraulic cranes. When these new works are completed the water area
of the Liverpool Docks will be increased by more than one hundred and
thirty-three acres, and upwards of thirty thousand lineal feet added
to the present vast extent of quayage. Their estimated cost[355] is
4,834,051_l._, which will raise the borrowed capital of the Mersey
Docks and Harbour Board to close upon twenty millions sterling.
While the docks are in the nature of a private undertaking, receiving
no aid whatever from government, and happily allowing no government
interference beyond the right to appoint three members of the board,
they are at the same time a public trust; the surplus revenue, after
providing for current expenses and the interest of money borrowed,
being in all cases applied to the reduction of the rates.[356] The
regulations of the Board are very complete, and the dock-charges, as
well as the cost of delivering cargoes, moderate.
[Sidenote: Bye-laws of the Mersey Board.]
The laws framed pursuant to the Acts of Parliament for the government
of these vast undertakings are embraced in one hundred and fifty-nine
clauses. They state who shall be stevedores or porters employed to
discharge or load vessels in the docks, and their duties; they regulate
the conduct of masters and pilots, and the conditions alone on which
ships will be allowed to enter the docks, inflicting penalties for
violation of the rules;[357] they fix the charges for the use of the
graving-docks; stipulate the condition of the railway-trucks, and the
length of the trains to be used within their docks, requiring great
attention on the part of those persons who are in charge of them. No
craft of any kind is allowed to ply for hire on the river without being
registered at the Dock Office unless a steam or a ferry-boat; and these
are, in some respects, under the control of the Board. Certain places
are specially appropriated for the discharge and stowage of timber;
and all cotton and other merchandise (not being wooden goods) must be
removed from the quays of most of the docks within forty-eight hours
from the time of discharge. The bye-laws further embrace the conditions
on which fires, exclusively confined to the consumption of coal or
coke, may be used on board vessels in the docks, and all lights must
consist of “oil lamps or candles contained in glass lanterns or globes.”
The pilots, who still maintain an exclusive monopoly, are under
the control of a Pilotage Committee elected from the members of
the Mersey Board. Subject to the orders of this committee there
is a superintendent of pilots, whose duties are of an arduous and
responsible character. He has to see that full reports of all
occurrences affecting this important service are furnished to him; that
the Acts of Parliament and bye-laws are duly observed at the respective
stations; and it is his especial duty to arrange that the pilot-boats
at these stations are effectively occupied by day and night. He is
required to visit occasionally, as time and circumstances admit, the
whole of the stations, and record the particulars of his inspection.
He is also required to make a strict and careful survey of every
pilot-boat at least once every year, reporting upon her condition and
equipment, as required by the bye-laws. It is further his duty every
five years to visit and survey all the ports and anchorages, lights
and lighthouses, buoys, beacons, and seamarks, a thorough knowledge of
which is required from pilots on passing their examination; and he is
required to carefully note for the good of the service all changes in
the buoys, channel, lights, etc., which may have been made since the
date of his last survey, and report upon any matters which may appear
to him desirable in the interests of navigation. Nor do his duties here
end, for it is required of him “to attend promptly to the complaints
of shipowners, shipmasters, or other interested persons, in reference
to pilots or pilotage, and generally to do all that lies in his power
to maintain and increase the discipline and efficiency of the pilot
service:” this service, therefore, though exclusive, is no doubt on all
occasions most effectively performed.[358]
[Sidenote: Conditions of admission to the service.]
No candidate for the pilotage service is admitted for examination if he
is under fifteen or over eighteen years of age, or unless he is able
to read and write well, and possesses a fair knowledge of arithmetic.
He must also present a medical certificate of sound health, and be
physically competent for the labour he has to undergo. When these
requirements are met to the satisfaction of the Board, he is, after a
month’s probation, apprenticed for seven years, the Board reserving to
itself the power of cancelling his indentures should he fail to give
satisfaction or prove incompetent for his duties. At the expiration of
his third year of apprenticeship he becomes eligible for examination
for a third-class licence; at the end of five years he may be promoted
to the second class; and after a third examination he may be admitted,
at the expiration of his apprenticeship, to a full licence.
[Sidenote: Pilot-boats.]
Every pilot-boat must be of at least forty tons, painted in a
particular manner, and have on board, besides a complete equipment of
spars, sails, and the ordinary stores and provisions, “two punts for
boarding vessels, a good telescope, two lanterns, a swivel or other
small gun, and a supply of rockets and bluelights for making signals;
also a sufficient number of life-buoys and life-belts,” as well as an
approved chart of the Bay of Liverpool, and charts of the latest survey
of the various places under the jurisdiction of the Board, or which its
pilots are required to frequent. Each pilot-boat has a master, second
master, and third master, and ten apprentices, who, with the other
pilots on board, are to take charge of vessels in rotation, according
to their respective grades and qualifications, so that every man has
a fair proportion of labour, the master in command always having a
discretionary power to set the turn aside in peculiar cases, the
circumstances of every such case being duly entered in the log-book,
and reported to the Pilotage Committee when required. The earnings
of each of the pilot-boats, which, by the way, are private property,
licensed by the Board, are divided into shares and distributed in
fixed proportions among the owners, masters, and crew, according to
their class. Seven separate stations are allotted to the boats on the
look-out for inward-bound vessels, which must be strictly kept, so that
it is hardly possible, even in the thickest or most stormy weather, for
any ship approaching the banks to miss a pilot-boat, if the captain
adopts the most ordinary precautions, and the means readily available
to find one. The duty of the seventh and last of these boats is to
take the pilots out of vessels outward bound, and when she has her
complement of pilots and apprentices on board, to return with them to
Liverpool.
[Sidenote: and rates of pilotage.]
The pilotage rates, limited by Act of Parliament, are levied by scale
according to the draught of water. An extra charge, regulated by the
Mersey Docks and Harbour Board, is allowed for piloting ships beyond
the Liverpool pilotage limits, as also for transporting vessels from
certain prescribed places, or transferring them from one dock to
another.
FOOTNOTES:
[340] 8 Anne, chap. xii.
[341] ‘Commercial Dictionary,’ p. 1504.
[342] ‘Commercial Dictionary,’ p. 1505.
[343]
----------------------+-----------------+---------+----------+---------+---------
| VESSELS. | Tonnage,| Value of |Estimate |Estimate
SPECIFICATION |-----------------|including| Imports | of the | of the
OF THE TRADES. |Foreign.|British.| their | and |Amount of|Amount of
| | |repeated | Exports. |Packages |Plunder.
| | |Voyages. | | Out and |
| | | | | Home. |
----------------------+--------+--------+---------+----------+---------+---------
| | | | £ | | £
East Indies | 3 | 50 | 41,466|10,502,000| 300,000 | 25,000
West Indies | 11 | 335 | 101,484|11,013,000| 400,000 | 232,000
British American | | | | | |
Colonies | 0 | 68 | 13,986| 1,638,000| 65,000 | 10,000
Africa and Cape of | | | | | |
Good Hope | 0 | 17 | 4,336| 531,000| 20,000 | 2,500
Whale Fisheries, | | | | | |
North and South | 0 | 45 | 12,230| 314,000| 20,000 | 2,000
United States of | | | | | |
America | 140 | 0 | 32,213| 5,416,000| 260,000 | 30,000
Mediterranean and | | | | | |
Turkey | 29 | 43 | 14,757| 509,000| 70,000 | 7,000
Spain and the | | | | | |
Canaries | 119 | 2 | 16,509| 947,000| 60,000 | 10,000
France and Austrian | | | | | |
Netherlands | 121 | 1 | 10,677| 1,015,000| 20,000 | 10,000
Portugal and | | | | | |
Madeira | 55 | 125 | 27,670| 853,000| 50,000 | 8,000
Holland | 329 | 0 | 19,166| 2,211,000| 60,000 | 10,000
Germany | 172 | 63 | 37,647|10,672,000| 240,000 | 25,000
Prussia | 527 | 81 | 56,955| 432,000| 60,000 | 10,000
Poland | 31 | 38 | 17,210| 242,000| 70,000 | 5,000
Sweden | 100 | 9 | 14,252| 322,000| 50,000 | 3,000
Denmark | 194 | 8 | 48,469| 806,000| 60,000 | 5,000
Russia | 5 | 225 | 56,131| 2,017,000| 150,000 | 20,000
Jersey, Guernsey, | | | | | |
Alderney, and Man | 4 | 42 | 5,344| 302,000| 15,000 | 2,000
Ireland | 3 | 273 | 32,824| 2,539,000| 160,000 | 5,000
Coasting Trade | 0 | 6,500 | 560,000| 6,600,000| 900,000 | 20,000
Coal Trade | 0 | 3,676 | 656,000| 1,710,000| ... | 20,000
|--------+--------+---------+----------+---------+--------
| 1,843 | 11,601 |1,776,326|60,591,000|3,030 000| 461,500
Annual loss in tackle, apparel, and stores, of 13,444 vessels | 45,000
|--------
Total depredations, estimated at | 506,500
[344] _Vide_ Mr. Colquhoun’s work, p. 109. Five revenue officers
received 150_l._ each, independently of the money received by the mate
and agents in this iniquitous business.
[345] Rival traders looked enviously on this privilege, “which could
not fail to give an inconceivable spring to commercial pursuits if
extended to all the other great branches of trade.” And yet the
warehousing system, when proposed, met, as we have seen, with fierce
opposition.
[346] Local Acts, 59 Geo. III., cap. 79.
[347] The opposition to the construction of docks in London was so
great that the watermen and barge-owners frequenting the Thames
not merely claimed, but obtained a large sum of money by way of
compensation, nominally on the ground of being deprived of their
vested rights to the use of the foreshore of the river; but beyond
this pecuniary compensation, a clause was inserted in the Dock Acts,
granting to all watermen for ever the right of entering the docks,
and delivering or receiving whatever amount of cargo they pleased,
_free of any charge_. These privileges, granted no doubt originally to
stifle opposition, they still retain to their own gain and that of the
wharfingers, but to the loss of the companies. Surely when the monopoly
of the companies expired, a monopoly to which they were for the time
fully entitled, considering the service they had rendered to the Crown
in the protection of the revenue, these privileges to the barge-owners
should also have been withdrawn.
[348] The capital of this dock company, since amalgamated with the St.
Katharine’s and Victoria Docks, amounted on the 1st January, 1873, to
8,809,872_l._ The report of the Company states that “the number of
loaded ships from foreign ports which entered the docks during the six
months ending the 31st of December last, was 746, measuring 519,359
tons, and for the corresponding period in 1871, 759 ships, measuring
526,931 tons The quantity of goods landed in the docks during the past
six months was 294,462 tons, and for the corresponding period in 1871,
285,854 tons. The stock of goods in the warehouses of the docks on the
31st of December last was 347,696 tons, and at the same period in 1871,
338,436 tons.”
[349] Papers supplied by the Secretary to the Company.
[350] Gibbon, c. xxxi.; and vol. i. p. 189.
[351] Accounts, Mersey Docks and Harbour Board, for the year ending
July 1, 1872.
[352] This number includes wet and dry, or graving-docks, half-tide
docks, basins, locks, and floats. The number of wet docks, exclusive
of basins and locks, is somewhere between forty and fifty, but in
some instances it is difficult to distinguish one from the other. The
details will be found in Appendix No. 7.
[353] The expense of the dock police force alone amounted in 1872 to
25,636_l._ 4_s._ (see Accounts, Mersey Docks and Harbour Board).
[354] Reports of G. F. Lyster, Esq., Engineer of the Mersey Docks and
Harbour Board, 1872.
[355] Engineer’s Reports, p. 14.
[356] The frontispiece to this volume contains a plan on a reduced
scale of the whole of the existing and contemplated dock-accommodation,
which has been courteously supplied by the Secretary.
[357] Bye-laws of the Mersey Docks and Harbour Board, 1866.
[358] Bye-laws, Mersey Docks and Harbour Board, p. 36.
CHAPTER XIII.
East India Company—Early struggles—Rival company—Private
traders—Coalition effected—Their trade, 1741-1748, and
continued difficulties up to 1773—Their form of charter—Rates
of freight—Gross earnings—Evidence of Sir Richard Hotham before
the Committee of Inquiry—The effect of his evidence—Reduction of
duties, August 1784—Extent of tea trade—Opposition of independent
shipowners—India-built ships admitted to the trade—Board of
Control established, 1784—Value of the trade, 1796—Charter
renewed, with important provisions, from 1796 to 1814—Restrictions
on private traders—East India Company’s shipping, 1808-1815—The
trade partially opened—Jealousy of free-traders—Efforts of
the free-traders at the out-ports—Comparative cost of East
India Company’s ships and of other vessels—Opposition to the
employment of the latter—_Earl of Balcarras_—Her crew—Actions
fought by the ships of the Company—Conditions of entering the
service—Uniforms—Discipline—Promotion—Pay and perquisites—Abuse
of privileges—Direct remuneration of commanders—Provisions and
extra allowances—Illicit trade denounced by the Court, and
means adopted to discover the delinquents—Connivance of the
officers of the Customs—Pensions, and their conditions—Internal
economy of the ships—Watches and duties—Amusements—Gun
exercise—Courts-martial—Change in the policy of the East India
Company—Results of free-trade with India, and of the Company’s
trading operations—China trade thrown open, 1832-1834—Company
abolished, 1858—Retiring allowances to commanders and
officers—Compensations and increased pensions granted—Remuneration
of the directors—Their patronage.
[Sidenote: Early struggles.]
We have already noticed the difficulties English navigators had to
encounter in their earliest endeavours to gain a share of the lucrative
trade which, after the discoveries of Vasco de Gama, the Portuguese
carried on with India, and their long struggles against them and the
Dutch East India Company, who shared it with them for more than a
century, thus maintaining a virtual monopoly of the commerce of the
East. Nor were the English any more successful when the Pope’s Bull
ceasing to have effect induced the government of England to grant
to the few merchants and shipowners we have named the charter of
incorporation,[359] for the purpose of encouraging the systematic
development of that valuable trade. Although the charter gave to the
association an exclusive monopoly of the commercial intercourse between
England and India, besides numerous special privileges, the directors
had considerable difficulty in obtaining the requisite capital to
equip their first expedition.[360] Indeed, their success, as a whole,
for many years afterwards, though occasionally considerable, was
not equivalent to the risk they encountered; and even when they had
secured factories or depôts at Surat and settlements in Bengal, their
prosperity was of so variable and unstable a character that their
charter had to be frequently renewed with increasing privileges.
But it is unnecessary to further trace the varying fortunes of the
East India Company[361] since the Revolution, or the origin of the
clamour against their monopoly. Suffice it to state that the charges of
delinquency and mismanagement which were brought against the directors
and employés induced the House of Commons, re-echoing the feeling out
of doors, to send up, in 1692, an address to the Crown requesting the
immediate dissolution of the Company, and praying for the incorporation
of a new association.
[Sidenote: Private traders.]
However, it was not until 1698 that the government, being in want of
money, resolved to throw the trade of India open to the highest bidder.
The existing Company was outbid by another association, whose tender to
supply two millions sterling was accepted, and an Act passed embodying
it under the name of “The English Company trading to the East Indies,”
with exclusive possession of the commerce of the East for ever;
subject only to the right of the Old Company to continue to trade for
three years longer. But the Old Company, having through its treasurer
subscribed for and obtained 315,000_l._ of the loan, became the largest
shareholders in the new and rival body. The greatest confusion of
conflicting interests consequently ensued. There was the Old Company,
trading with its vessels for three years, and at the expiration of that
period to be left in legal possession of all its forts and factories
in India, besides whatever privileges it had acquired in the East from
the native authorities, while, secondly, there was the New Company in
the field, but without any Indian possessions whatever, and opposed by
a rival body seeking its destruction, and wielding a controling power
over its operations. Thirdly, there were a few subscribers to the late
loan, who had declined to join the New Company, but who, by the terms
of the original contract with the government, were, nevertheless,
entitled to trade each for himself, so long as the two millions
remained unpaid; and, lastly, there were such private traders as had
cleared out from England previously to the 1st of July, 1698, who had a
right, in virtue of a clause in the Act, to carry on their trade till
they should think fit to return to England. No fewer than sixty ships
were employed by these rival traders; a number far in excess of the
requirements of the trade, so that the first effects of the competition
were ruinous to all parties concerned.
The 100_l._ shares of the Old Company fell to 37_l._; and their
rivals being in no better position tended further to exasperate the
two companies, whose animosities divided the whole kingdom into two
parties, the Old Company being supported by the Tories, and the New
by the Whigs. At the dissolution of Parliament in 1700, each party
spent enormous sums to procure the election of their friends, and the
nation was in a ferment about the contention between them. At length,
in July 1702, a tripartite indenture was executed, wherein Queen Anne,
with the Old Company and the New Company jointly concerned, became the
contracting parties.[362]
[Sidenote: Coalition effected.]
Satisfactory estimates were taken of the value of the possessions
in India of both companies, and adjusted accordingly. Various minor
arrangements were made, and after a period of seven years the new
association was inaugurated with the title “The United Company of
Merchants of England trading to the East Indies;” and thus, in 1708,
that powerful body was restored, or rather recreated, which became
ultimately possessors of a considerable portion of the vast continent
of India, and rulers over more than a hundred million people.
[Sidenote: Their trade, 1741-1748, and continued difficulties]
But this united Company was frequently opposed. In 1730 the merchants
of Bristol and Liverpool, with other capitalists resident in London,
made vigorous efforts to prevent the government from granting a renewal
of the Company’s charter, under an impression that its profits were
enormous. Such may have been the case in some branches of their trade,
or in special years; but it afterwards appeared that, on an average
of eight years, ending 1741, the value of British goods and products
of all sorts exported by the Company to India and China amounted to
only 157,944_l._ per annum, while the average annual value of imports
during the seven years ending 1748 was not more than 188,176_l._;[363]
so that their profits as merchants could not have been large, unless
the percentage of gain was excessive upon the amount of business
they transacted. Some of their servants, no doubt, realised immense
fortunes, especially when the Company secured possession of large
tracts of land. But the Company itself, not many years afterwards, was
involved in debt and difficulties; and, so far from being able to pay
government the stipulated sum of 400,000_l._ per annum, the directors
were compelled in 1772 to apply to the Treasury for a loan. Indeed,
had it not been for the greatly increased consumption of tea in Great
Britain, the Company at this period would have ceased to carry on any
branch of trade with the East, so that its commercial monopoly would
then have happily come to an end.
[Sidenote: up to 1773.]
[Sidenote: Their form of charter.]
[Sidenote: Rates of freight.]
A secret committee of Parliament[364] was, however, appointed to
inquire into the mode in which the business of the Company had been
managed, and from its proceedings some valuable information may be
obtained with regard to the trade of the East at this period, and
the mode in which shipping business of the highest class was then
conducted. As the chief object of the inquiry seems to have been
to ascertain if the Company could build and navigate ships at less
cost than they could be chartered, the rates of freight, size of
vessels, the conditions of charter, and other matters came under the
consideration of the committee. The charter-party was exceedingly
voluminous.[365] In it the Company covenanted with the shipowners
that no vessel was to carry less than four hundred and ninety-nine
tons at the rate therein specified, including eighty tons of iron
kentledge[366] for the purpose of ballast. It further provided that
notwithstanding “the ship is let to freight for four hundred and
ninety-nine tons, yet the Company may, if they think fit, lade what
more they please,” at certain rates. The rates of freight varied. For
instance, from China the freights on rough goods were 24_l._ per ton in
1753; 37_l._ in 1760; and 29_l._ in 1772. Fine goods in the same years
paid 27_l._, 40_l._, and 32_l._ respectively. The freights from Bombay
in these years were somewhat higher; and the rate of demurrage[367] per
day was 12_l._ 2_s._ in 1753, 20_l._ 3_s._ 4_d._ in 1760, and 18_l._
3_s._ in 1772.
[Sidenote: Gross earnings.]
Voluminous accounts were produced of the vessels employed, their
capacity and cost. Those engaged for India in 1772 will suffice to
furnish an illustration. In that year thirty-three ships were employed
by the Company, of twenty-three thousand one hundred and fifty-nine
tons, builder’s measurement, which brought home twenty-one thousand
one hundred and fifty-eight tons of merchandise, the cost of freight
amounting to 457,600_l._, besides an allowance for surplus freight
of 95,390_l._ 16_s._ 8_d._, and 57,733_l._ 11_s._ 4_d._ paid for
demurrage. From a return furnished of the China ships engaged during
the five years preceding 1773, the Company appears to have imported
fifty thousand three hundred and forty-three tons of produce, in
vessels registering forty-eight thousand eight hundred and sixty-five
tons, builder’s measurement.
[Sidenote: Evidence of Sir Richard Hotham before the Committee of
Inquiry.]
[Sidenote: The effect of his evidence.]
Among the witnesses who appeared before the committee, there was no
one more intelligent than Sir Richard Hotham, an eminent shipowner,
who declared that the existing mode of freighting ships by the Company
was absurd, and that their charter-party was one of the most useless
for the purpose that could possibly be conceived. Analysing the whole
system, and the clumsy and expensive mode in which they conducted their
business, he gave the following particulars of what they actually paid
for carriage on every ton of produce imported from the East:—
£ _s._ _d._
80 tons of kentledge, at the fixed
rate of 9_l._ 13_s._ 4_d._ per ton 773 6 4
11 tons of China ware, at the chartered
rate of 29_l._ per ton 319 0 0
393 tons of tea and silk, at the chartered
rate of 32_l._ per ton 12,576 0 0
15 tons, private trade, at the chartered
rate of 32_l._ per ton 480 0 0
--- ------ - -
499 14,148 6 4
[Illustration: THE ‘THAMES’ EAST INDIAMAN, 1360 TONS REGISTER, 25 GUNS,
AND 130 MEN.
E. W. COOKE, R.A.]
Or equal to 32_l._ 10_s._ per ton, after the freight on kentledge had
been deducted; and he showed how a saving could be effected in the cost
of freightage on the vessels employed, from China alone, of upwards of
43,000_l._ annually.[368] Sir Richard offered to bring goods from any
part of the East at twenty guineas per ton, and this offer, combined
with other important facts which had been adduced in evidence,
produced at the time various changes in the mode of conducting the
chartering and loading of their vessels. The Company also resolved to
construct vessels of a larger class for their own use, vessels which
became famous in more modern times, of which we furnish an illustration
of one of the latest on the preceding page.
[Sidenote: Reduction of duties, August 1784.]
[Sidenote: Extent of tea trade.]
Though the operations of the Company as traders continued in full force
for ten years after this inquiry, its shipping business underwent
very considerable changes by reason of Mr. Pitt’s judicious reduction
of the duties on various Indian productions,[369] especially on tea;
the duty on which was then reduced from 120 to 12½ per cent. _ad
valorem_. High duties had been found to encourage smuggling,[370] and
divert the trade from England to continental nations. Although in
the nine years preceding 1780 the importation of tea from China to
Europe amounted to 118,783,811 lbs., only 50,759,451 lbs. out of that
quantity had been imported in vessels belonging to or chartered by the
Company. But the change in the duty effected a revolution, and the
sales and importations of tea by the Company were trebled. Their export
trade also increased, and in 1789 they began to ship tin to China for
the first time. Whilst the value of their exports in 1784 was only
418,747_l._, in twenty-seven ships, it rose in 1792 to 1,031,262_l._,
employing forty-three vessels. On the other hand, the quantity of
bullion despatched to the East materially declined. During the same
period the “private trade” carried on by the commanders and officers of
the Company’s ships, and by the merchants holding licences who resided
in India, rose from 144,176_l._ of imports in 1783, to 400,784_l._ in
1794,[371] and increased to no less than double that amount in the
following ten years.
[Sidenote: Opposition of independent shipowners.]
The Liverpool and Bristol shipowners now began to agitate still further
for a participation in the East India trade. The Company, however,
having obtained fresh capital, were thus enabled, combined with other
causes, to secure a renewed lease of exclusive commercial power, which
now virtually extended over Europe, and was not overthrown until many
years afterwards. The Dutch East India Company having incurred enormous
losses, and the other companies having either relinquished the business
or declined to such a point as to render their rivalry no longer
dangerous, left the trade of the East to a large extent in the hands of
the English. In 1789 the Portuguese, who once engrossed the whole of
the oriental trade, had but three ships at Canton, the Dutch five, the
French one, the Danes one, the United States of America fifteen, and
the English East India Company forty, while British subjects residing
in India had a similar number. Moreover, a very considerable portion of
the trade of the East was then conducted in Indian ships, owned by the
natives, by whom as many voyages were undertaken from India to China,
and from the coast of Malabar to the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea, as
in the days before the passage to Europe by the Cape of Good Hope had
been discovered.
[Sidenote: India-built ships admitted to the trade.]
It was not, however, until 1795 that India-built vessels were permitted
to convey goods to London. In the course of that year a great number of
the Company’s ships having been employed in the service of the English
government, instructions were sent to the Presidencies to engage
vessels of India build at 16_l._ per ton for rice and other dead-weight
stowage, and 20_l._ for light goods to the Thames, with liberty to take
back on their own account whatever merchandise they pleased to the
territories of the Company, or to any place within the limits of its
charter.
Many of them having been constructed on speculation, under an
impression that they would be permanently employed, although warned by
Lord Cornwallis to the contrary, their owners were greatly disappointed
when they found that after the immediate wants of the government and
the Company had been satisfied their services were no longer required.
English shipowners in the service of the Company inflexibly maintained
their monopoly, and having secured stipulations for a number of voyages
during successive years, they successfully opposed for a time any
innovation of a permanent character upon their chartered rights. The
contest, however, which arose between the independent merchants of
England, who had combined with the owners of native shipping against
the Company on this point, induced the Directors to make various
concessions, which were the prelude to the opening of the trade at a
future period.
[Sidenote: Board of Control established, 1784.]
But, apart from this combination, the Act of Mr. Pitt, passed in
1784, constituting a Board of Control to superintend the affairs of
the Company, had paved the way for many changes. This board consisted
of six members of the Privy Council, who were to superintend, check,
and control all operations and concerns in any way relating to the
civil and military government or the revenues of the territory and
possessions of the Company; and the Act further provided that all
communications to or from India touching the above matters were to
be submitted to this Board of Control, the Directors reserving to
themselves power to amend their instructions. A secret committee of
three directors was formed, with which the Board of Control might
transact any business it did not choose to submit to the Court of
Directors, and to whom persons returning from India were required,
under severe penalties, to declare the amount of their fortunes; while
a tribunal was constituted which had for its sole object the trial
of any person accused of misconduct in India, consisting of a judge
of each of the three chief law-courts in England, of five peers and
seven members of the House of Commons, the last being chosen by lot at
the commencement of each session. Although the Directors were left to
superintend their shipping and commercial affairs, as they had hitherto
done, the Board of Control exercised an indirect influence over their
proceedings both at home and in India.
[Sidenote: Value of the trade, 1796.]
During the three years ending 1796, the value of the Company’s exports
of British produce and manufactures fluctuated from 928,783_l._ to
1,031,262_l._; but this increase may be attributed mainly, if not
wholly, to the great reductions which the Act of 1784 had effected in
the duties on tea, and the vast increase which consequently took place
in its consumption.
[Sidenote: Charter renewed, with important provisions, from 1796 to
1814.]
When, in 1796, the Company’s charter was again renewed, the important
provision was made that all his Majesty’s subjects, residing in any
part of his European dominions, were to be allowed to export to India
any article of the produce or manufacture of the country where they
resided, except military stores, ammunition, masts, spars, cordage,
pitch, tar, and copper, and the Company’s civil servants in India, as
well as the free merchants resident there, were permitted to ship,
on their own account and risk, all kinds of Indian goods, except
calicoes, dimities, muslins, and other piece goods. But so jealous
were the Directors of competition in their commercial operations, that
they prevailed on the government to insert various clauses in the
new charter whereby neither the merchants of India nor of England
generally, nor any of the Company’s servants, were allowed to export
or import except in ships belonging to or chartered by the Company;
appropriating, however, under various restrictions, three thousand tons
of space in their ships for the use of private traders, at the reduced
rate, in time of peace, of 5_l._ outwards, and 15_l._ homewards, for
every ton occupied by them in the Company’s ships, but stipulating
that this rate of freight might be increased in time of war by the
approbation of the Board of Control.
[Sidenote: Restrictions on private traders.]
“It might have been,” remarks Mr. M’Culloch,[372] “and indeed was most
probably foreseen, that very few British merchants or manufacturers
would be inclined to avail themselves of the privilege of sending out
goods in the Company’s ships, or of engaging in a trade fettered on all
sides by the jealousy of powerful monopolists, and where consequently
their superior judgment and economy would have availed almost nothing.
As far therefore as they (the English merchants) were concerned, the
relaxation was more apparent than real, and did not produce any useful
results.” Indeed Lord Melville quotes, from a letter written by the
Marquess of Hastings to the Company, dated 21st of March, 1812, the
following passage, “It will not be denied that the facilities granted
by that Act (the Act of 1796) have not been satisfactory, at least to
the merchants of this country or of India. They have been the source
of constant dispute, and they have even entailed a heavy expenditure
upon the Company without affording to the public any adequate benefit
for such a sacrifice.”[373] This privilege was, however, made use of
to a considerable extent by private merchants in India, and also by
the Company’s servants returning from India, many of whom invested a
portion or the whole of their fortunes in the produce of India suited
for the English markets.
Notwithstanding the privileges secured by the Act of 1796, and
the superintendence of the Board of Control, the finances of the
Company again fell into the same unprosperous state in which they
had previously been, although accounts of a large surplus revenue
to be immediately derived from India were issued from time to time
to the public, and various Acts of Parliament were passed for the
appropriation of surpluses which never had any existence except in the
imagination of the persons who framed them!
[Sidenote: East India Company’s shipping, 1808-1815.]
The wars in which they had been engaged with the Mahrattas, and other
powers in the East, although they had terminated in a vast accession
of territory, did not add to the pecuniary resources of the Company,
and were consequently disapproved of at home. During 1808 and 1809 they
were particularly unfortunate, having lost in those two years four
outward-bound and ten homeward-bound ships[374], the cargoes of these
vessels, with the advances made to the owners, including 60,729_l._,
the value of one of the ships which belonged to the Company amounting
to no less than 1,048,077_l._ The calamities of the French war had
also reached the Company, which suffered by the deficiency in the
amount of their sales at home, partly in consequence of a reduced
demand for Indian produce and manufactures, but chiefly on account
of the convulsed state of Europe, and the interdiction of commercial
intercourse with almost every country of the Continent to which
previously their goods were exported.
[Sidenote: The trade partially opened.]
Happily in 1814 the trade of the Company, for so many years jealously
guarded as a strict monopoly, was thrown entirely open to private
competition, in so far as respected the Indian continent, although the
exclusive trade to China, deemed by far the most lucrative at the time,
was still preserved, in spite of the efforts of Manchester, Glasgow,
and Bristol to open it to the general competition of all classes.
Several sensible men in the House of Commons urged upon the Company the
policy of throwing open the whole trade to the enterprise of private
shipowners and merchants, arguing that the affairs of the Company
would be benefited, rather than prejudiced, by such an arrangement;
but the interests of private individuals connected with the Company
predominated both with the government and with Parliament.
[Sidenote: Jealousy of free-traders.]
The consideration of this Bill occupied the entire session of 1813, and
in its conditions[375] may be traced the slow effects of the efforts
of the free-traders to procure the total overthrow of the Company’s
privileges in respect of shipping. Such was the jealousy with which
these were viewed, that Mr. Baring moved an amendment to one of the
resolutions confining the return of vessels from India to the port
of London, though holding out the idea that this restriction was to
be limited to five years. The mercantile men in the House of Commons
supported the amendment, upon the ground that such a restriction would
operate to the better security of the revenue, and would offer a more
convenient market for foreigners. One speaker, Mr. Thornton, laughed at
the pretensions of the out-ports to share in the trade, which in the
same breath he pronounced delusive as regarded the profits to be made
in it.[376]
[Sidenote: Efforts of the free-traders at the out-ports.]
But the people of the out-ports did not show any disposition to be
deluded by these inconsistent arguments. They stood up stoutly for
their own interests, and for the cause of free-trade. They considered
themselves quite as well qualified as any of the East India directors
to form a judgment how far a trade with the East could be carried on
with profit by their own vessels.
[Sidenote: Comparative cost of East India Company’s ships and other
vessels.]
Indeed the fact was beyond all dispute that the cost of the ships
fitted out by the East India Company was thirty, forty, and even fifty
per cent. greater than those of private shipowners. It was credibly
stated that the Company paid for their vessels 40_l._ per ton, while
more suitable vessels could be built and equipped for 25_l._ per ton.
The Company’s ships were, it was admitted, fitted up very expensively
for their passengers, but it was denied that this was necessary for the
purpose of carrying goods and produce to or from India. On the other
hand, the supporters of the East India Company’s monopoly inquired, and
with considerable reason, whether any ship could be built and equipped
for 25_l_. per ton which would be as capable of contending against an
enemy as were the ships of the Company, or if such private ships would
be fit for the service of the country during war.[377]
[Sidenote: Opposition to the employment of the latter.]
It is, however, interesting and amusing, if not instructive, to look
back and reflect upon some of the arguments employed by the champions
of monopoly in behalf of their own interests. They pretended that it
was only out of regard to the shipowners of the out-ports, to protect
them from the dangerous speculation into which they were about to
precipitate themselves and their capital, that they desired all East
India trading ships should by law be compelled to come to London. It
was only to slip in between the rashness of adventurers and their
ruin that they supported the measure; it was not to uphold monopoly;
it was not to exclude the rest of the country from participating in
the benefits of the Eastern trade; the opposition to the out-ports
all sprang from pure benevolence, pure kindness and mercy! Such was
the folly and blindness of the great merchants who supported the
ultra claims of the Company. The shrewd men of the out-ports did not,
however, appreciate such unexampled patriotism, and so struggled for
their privileges, such as they were. But the difficulty with which
they obtained these small concessions indicates how deeply rooted the
principles of monopoly had become during a period of two hundred
years; nor was it till many years afterwards that any material progress
was made in the commerce of England with the East.
The number of ships employed by the Company varied now quite as much
as in former years. In the “season” of 1809-10 they despatched to
their different stations in Bengal, Madras, Bombay, China, Ceylon, and
Penang forty-seven ships, measuring thirty-two thousand five hundred
tons; and in the season of 1819-20 twenty-three vessels, measuring
twenty-six thousand two hundred tons, besides twenty-one vessels which
they had chartered, of ten thousand nine hundred and forty-eight
tons; whereas, in 1829-30 they only despatched twenty ships belonging
to or permanently engaged by the Company, and twelve which they had
chartered.[378]
[Sidenote: _Earl of Balcarras._]
[Sidenote: Her crew.]
[Sidenote: Actions fought by the ships of the Company.]
On the following page we furnish an illustration of another of the
largest and finest vessels belonging to the Company. This ship, the
_Earl of Balcarras_, built in 1815, registered one thousand four
hundred and seventeen tons, and was manned by a crew of one hundred
and thirty men, consisting of the commander, six mates, a surgeon and
his assistant, six midshipmen, purser, boatswain, gunner, carpenter,
master-at-arms, armourer, butcher, baker, poulterer, caulker, cooper,
two stewards, two cooks, eight boatswains, gunner’s, carpenter’s,
caulker’s, and cooper’s mates, six quartermasters, one sail-maker,
seven servants appropriated to the commander and leading officers,
and seventy-eight seamen. The crews of ships of from eight hundred
to thirteen hundred tons register varied from one hundred and two to
one hundred and thirty men, or nearly four times the number required
for merchant sailing-vessels of similar size of the present day. But
the vessels of the East India Company combined many of the requisites
of ships of war, and gained numberless laurels in many a gallant and
hard-fought action.[379]
[Illustration: EAST INDIA COMPANY’S SHIP ‘EARL OF BALCARRAS.’]
[Sidenote: Conditions of entering the service.]
[Sidenote: Uniforms.]
Five supernumeraries beyond the crew were allowed to each ship, two of
whom had the privilege of appearing on the quarter-deck. Penalties were
inflicted for taking on board persons without the permission in writing
of the Company’s agents, varying from 20_l._ for a black servant, up
to 500_l._ for a European; and bonds had to be given by all passengers
bringing native servants from India to bear their expense while in
England, and the cost of their return to that country. Every commander
in the Company’s service was required to be at least twenty-five years
of age, and to have performed, before receiving his appointment as
such, one voyage in the regular service of the Company as chief or
second officer, or to have commanded a ship in the extra service. Chief
mates were required to be twenty-three years of age or upwards, and to
have made a voyage as second or third mate in the service to and from
India or China; second mates must also have performed a similar voyage,
and were not eligible unless they were twenty-two years of age. Third
mates were required to be twenty-one, and to have made two voyages as
midshipmen or otherwise in the Company’s service, whilst the fourth
mate must have reached the age of twenty years, and been a voyage to
or from India and China in a Company’s ship, or in that of any other
service, of which he had to produce satisfactory certificates. Their
uniform, in the case of a commander, consisted, when in full dress, of
a blue coat, black velvet lappels, cuffs and collar, with a bright gold
embroidery “as little expensive as may be;” waistcoat and breeches of
deep buff; the buttons were of yellow-gilt metal, with the Company’s
crest; cocked-hats, side-arms, “to be worn under the coat,” and black
stocks or neckcloths; while the undress consisted of blue coat with
lappels, black collar and cuffs, waistcoat and breeches deep-buff, and
buttons similar to the full-dress suit.
[Sidenote: Discipline.]
Somewhat similar uniforms, though of a less ornamental character, and
without swords, were worn by the chief, second, third, and fourth
officers, but with the distinguishing mark of one, two, three or four
small buttons, respectively, on each cuff of their coats. To preserve
the “utmost uniformity” in the dress, so far as regarded the buff coat
and the gilt buttons, patterns of these were kept for view at the
shipping offices, and at the Jerusalem Coffee House, for the guidance
of the masters and mates of the extra ships engaged by the Company. All
officers in both divisions of the service were strictly enjoined[380]
“not, on any account, to appear in boots, or black breeches and
stockings;” and to be in full-dress uniform when attending the Court
of Directors “on any occasion whatever.” Commanders were especially
required[381] “to keep up the worship of Almighty God” on board their
ships every Sunday when circumstances admitted, and to see that the
log-book contained the reasons for any omission, under a penalty of
two guineas for every omission of mentioning the performance of divine
service or of assigning satisfactory reasons for the non-performance
thereof.
[Sidenote: Promotion.]
With regard to promotions, the Company in their own ships adhered
to the strict rule of seniority, always supposing good character,
conduct, and abilities; and their promotions were made from one ship
to another as vacancies occurred.[382] Commanders were appointed to
ships before they were launched, so that they might superintend their
equipment and outfit for sea. The first appointments of midshipmen
to the ships of the Company were made by the members of the Court of
Directors in succession, according to seniority, so that every member
might have one nomination before any other member had a second; and
no youth was eligible as a midshipman under thirteen or over eighteen
years of age, unless he had been one or two years at sea, when the
admission in the latter case might be extended to the age of twenty.
Assistant surgeons were also nominated by the members of the Court, the
chairman having the first nomination, rising by seniority to surgeons,
if their abilities and conduct were in all respects satisfactory.
The appointment of pursers was left to the commander, subject to the
approval of the Committee of Shipping. When vacancies of any kind
amongst the superior grades of officers occurred abroad, they were
filled up temporarily by the Indian government, the Select Committee
at Canton, or by the commander of the ship in which they occurred. But
the command of a ship was not allowed to be given to an officer who was
not competent, by the rules of the service, for the charge, unless the
vacancy could not be otherwise filled, in accordance with these rules,
at the place where the vacancy happened.[383]
[Sidenote: Pay and perquisites.]
In the Appendix, No. 12, will be found the scale of wages paid in
money to the officers and crew of a ship of eight hundred tons in the
service of the Company, towards the close of the last and during the
early part of this century; but 10_l._ per month to the commander, and
5_l._ per month to the chief mate, very imperfectly represent their
remuneration. So many were their privileges, and so numerous their
perquisites, that during five India or China voyages a captain of
one of the Company’s ships ought to have realised sufficient capital
to be independent for the remainder of his life. Under the head of
“Indulgences,” the Court of Directors, “desiring to give all due and
fitting encouragement to the commanders and officers of ships employed
in their service,”[384] allowed them to participate in the Company’s
exclusive trade by granting to them a certain amount of tonnage space
outwards and homewards in their ships, wherein they might embark, on
their own account, free of freight, any goods or manufactures they
pleased, except “woollens, camlets, and warlike stores,” which goods
the Company thought proper to reserve for their exclusive trade. They
had likewise, in proportion to their rank, the privilege of exporting
bullion to a specified extent. Homewards they could import any articles
they pleased, except tea, China-ware, raw silk, or nankeen cloth from
India; nor were they allowed to import from China raw silk, musk,
camphor, arrack, arsenic, or other poisonous drugs. The quantity of tea
allowed to be imported from China and Bencoolen was limited to 9,336
lbs. for the commander, 1,228 lbs. for the first mate, and 4,668 lbs.
for the other mates, and the boatswain, gunner, and carpenter.
[Sidenote: Abuse of privileges.]
In each ship ninety-seven tons of space was also appropriated to
the commander and officers, including those of a subordinate class,
such as the quartermasters, stewards, cooks, carpenter, boatswain,
gunner, caulker, armourer, and sail-maker; but the commander had the
lion’s share, as his proportion of the whole amounted to no less than
fifty-six and a half tons. They had besides the privilege of importing
in similar proportions China-ware on their own account, provided it
was brought as a flooring to the teas, and did not exceed from twenty
to forty tons, according to the size of the ship. The commanders
likewise received the passage-money of all passengers, except troops,
less the cost of their provisions and wine. They, with the officers,
were further allowed to bring home as much surplus tonnage as their
ships could stow with safety and convenience, not exceeding thirty
tons in each vessel, provided such goods were stowed in places not
allotted to the Company’s cargo, or had not been tendered to them
by the Company’s agents in India or China, or in the event of the
ship not bringing home her expected quantity of goods, provided they
produced satisfactory proof to the Committee of Private Trade that such
deficiency was not occasioned by any default or neglect on their part.
The importation of dunnage[385] appears also to have been a perquisite
or privilege allowed to the commanders and officers; but this seems
to have been abused, as no doubt many other privileges were, for we
find that the Court resolved, “that as large quantities of rattans,
shanghees, canes, bamboos, sapan, or other articles have been brought
home in the Company’s ships, under the denomination of dunnage, far
beyond what is necessary for the protection of the cargo and stores,
occupying tonnage to the exclusion of goods, or cumbering the ship, the
Court have resolved that unless what is brought home of those articles
appears absolutely and _bonâ fide_ necessary for and used as dunnage,
any exceedings of such requisite quantity shall be charged against the
tonnage of the commanders and officers.”[386]
[Sidenote: Direct remuneration of commanders.]
When we take these various privileges and perquisites into
consideration, the _direct_ remuneration to the commander of one of
the Company’s ships, inclusive of his monthly pay must have averaged
from 3,000_l._ to 5,000_l._ each voyage;[387] but considering the
various other privileges and “indulgences” granted to him, and the
opportunities he had for trading on his own account in the export and
import of goods and produce at a time when the fabulously valuable
commerce of India was an exclusive monopoly in the hands of the
Company, we need have no hesitation in estimating the value in many
instances on each voyage of a commander’s appointment at from 8,000_l._
to 10,000_l._, or perhaps a great deal more if he was a shrewd man of
business, and had sufficient capital to fill the space allotted to
him as well as the “dunnage” corners, and “places not allotted to the
Company’s cargo,” or not appropriated by their agents, with goods and
produce of their own.
[Sidenote: Provisions and extra allowances.]
Besides an ample supply of provisions to each ship, the commander
had almost every luxury he could desire provided at the expense of
the Company.[388] He was also allowed to import two pipes of Madeira
wine,[389] which were not reckoned as part of his allowance. The
first mate, besides his proportions of freight and provisions, had as
“indulgences” on each voyage twenty-four dozen of wine or beer, two
firkins of butter, one hundredweight of cheese, one hundredweight of
grocery, and four quarter cases of pickles. The second the same as the
chief, except that his allowance of wine or beer was limited to twenty
dozen; and the other officers in somewhat similar proportions. So that
their appointments, if not so lucrative as that of the commanders, must
have been very desirable and comfortable.
If such were the advantages of the officers in the maritime service
of the Company, what must have been the gains of its civil servants
in India, who appear not to have been limited or controlled to the
same extent in their perquisites or trading privileges. No wonder that
the Company, even with its vast monopoly, found itself frequently in
difficulties, and obliged to seek, especially in the earlier portion of
its career, the assistance of government. Indeed instances sometimes
occurred when the commanders and officers, not having filled their
allotted space with produce of their own, received for it from China
not less than 50_l._ per ton as freight to London; and in one instance
within our own knowledge, the commander of one of the ships employed
on the “double voyage”—that is, from London to India, thence to
China,[390] and thence back to London, where he had a large interest
in the freight on cotton or other produce conveyed from India to
China—realised no less than 30,000_l._
[Sidenote: Illicit trade denounced by the Court,]
But notwithstanding these numerous privileges, the Court of Directors
having frequently received information of an illicit trade carried on
by too many of the officers and commanders of their ships, at last
resolved, with the view of putting an end to practices “so detrimental
to the revenue, the Company, and the fair trader,” to invariably
dismiss from their service any one found guilty of such practices.
Indeed, in the hope of detecting the delinquents, they went so far as
to publish advertisements, wherein they state that “having received
information that great quantities of woollens, camblets, and warlike
stores have been illicitly imported; also great quantities of tea,
muslins, China-ware, diamonds, and other merchandise have been imported
in their ships and smuggled on shore,” they “offer a reward to any
person who shall make a discovery of such offence of one-half of what
the Company shall recover and receive over and above all other rewards
the parties are entitled to by law.”[391]
[Sidenote: and measures adopted to discover the delinquents.]
But these illicit practices appear at one time to have been carried on
not merely in London and at the ports to which the ships of the Company
traded in India and China, but at places in England, Scotland, and
Ireland their ships had no business to be; for the Court of Directors
passed a standing order wherein it was declared that within six weeks
of the clearance of the cargoes of the homeward-bound ships, the
commander and officers were required to attend a joint committee of
private trade and shipping, to whom it was referred to make strict
inquiry into the reasons of any deviations made on the passage to
London, or during any portion of the voyage, and the committee were
enjoined with all convenient speed to report their opinion to the
Court. The Directors further “resolved unanimously” that, as these
illicit practices were shown to have occurred, and were “frequently
carried on” at foreign ports, as well as at out-ports in England,
Ireland, and Scotland, to which the ships proceeded “contrary to the
orders and instructions given to the commanders,” or by “means of
vessels which meet the Company’s ships at sea, and there deliver goods
to, and receive goods from them,” stringent measures should be adopted
to detect the delinquents.[392] It was consequently further ordered
that the clerk to the Committee of Private Trade should within four
weeks of the arrival of each ship collect from her journals, and from
letters and other means of information brought before him, an account
of all the ship’s proceedings “to or towards any port or place, both
outward and homeward, without or contrary to the Company’s orders or
instructions, and of all the ship’s deviations from, or loitering in,
the course of her voyage in the English Channel or elsewhere,” and
report the same in writing to the chairman or deputy chairman, and
also to the Committees of Private Trade and Shipping. If satisfactory
accounts were not given for these deviations, the solicitor to the
Court was instructed to file a bill in the Court of Exchequer against
the commander of the ship or other persons implicated.
[Sidenote: Connivance of the officers of Customs.]
But though deviations for any such purposes must have been difficult
to trace, as so many excuses could be brought forward in the shape
of contrary winds, stress of weather, sickness, loss of spars and
sails, or the necessity of a fresh supply of water and provisions for
the crew and passengers, the Court of Directors appear to have done
everything in their power to discover the delinquents by still further
resolving, that on the arrival of the Company’s ships in the River
Thames the clerk of the Committee of Private Trade was forthwith to
give notice thereof to the Master Attendant or his assistant, or if
they were otherwise previously employed, to the Surveyor of Shipping
or his assistant, to proceed at once on board of the ship, and before
any goods were delivered to carefully examine the state and condition
of her hold, and of every part of the lower decks, and report to the
Committee of Private Trade what vacant space, if any, remained therein
which was fit and proper for the stowage of goods, and also whether
any packages appeared to have been removed or displaced during the
homeward-bound passage. When any vacant space was discovered which
could not be satisfactorily accounted for, the commander was fined in
the sum of 100_l._ for every sixty cubical feet of such vacant space.
But these apparently stringent regulations were somehow or other too
frequently of no avail, especially in cases where the illicit practices
were effected by the connivance of the officers of Customs, or in
various other ways, more easily understood than explained, so that
convictions were too often rendered impossible or impracticable. And
whenever these were made and actions were raised, the “compositions
of such suits, very much to the prejudice of the Company,” were so
frequent that the Court had to request the Commissioners of his
Majesty’s Customs “to be pleased to give an account to its solicitor of
all suits which were pending,” and from time to time “of all suits that
shall hereafter be brought against any of the commanders and officers
of the Company’s ships for practices of smuggling.”[393]
Considering the very high remuneration of the Company’s commanders
and officers, and the very liberal manner in which they were treated,
we should have thought that no one among them would have been guilty
of illegal practices, especially when they were found to be highly
prejudicial to the interests of employers at whose hands they were so
handsomely treated. But such, we fear, must have been the case, towards
the close of the last century, and that to a large extent, or the Court
would not have deemed it necessary to issue such stringent regulations
for their suppression. Happily the class of men, and the high character
of the families to which, as a rule, they belonged, who entered the
service in later years, combined with the rigorous enforcement of the
Company’s regulations, brought about a different state of things, and
put an end to a system which ought never to have prevailed in the best
paid maritime service in the world: and did we not feel bound to record
such instances of wrong and ingratitude, as these official documents
too clearly reveal, we would gladly omit altogether the notice of acts
which reflect great discredit on a class of men otherwise deserving our
respect and our gratitude for the invaluable services they, on more
than one occasion, rendered to their country.
[Sidenote: Pensions, and their conditions.]
But the liberality of the Company was not confined to the most ample
remuneration to their commanders and officers while in active service.
It extended to them in their retirement, and provided for those of
their widows and children who required its aid. In 1800 the Court of
Directors[394] resolved that every commander, officer, seaman, or other
person who had served in any of the Company’s ships, or any of its
freighted vessels, for eight years, and who had regularly contributed
to what was known as the “Poplar Fund,”[395] should be entitled to a
pension, subject to the following conditions: that is to say, where a
commander was not worth 3,000_l._, or did not possess a fixed income of
at least 150_l._ per annum, he became entitled to a pension of 100_l._;
and in cases where the chief or second mate had not 2,000_l._, nor a
clear income of 100_l._, he received a pension of 60_l._ per annum. The
other officers, down to the midshipmen, were also allowed pensions of
from 30_l._ to 18_l._ per annum if they did not possess a certain fixed
income, or were not worth 600_l._ Commanders’ widows who stood in need
of aid received 80_l._ per annum, and 16_l._ for each child under five
years of age; and their orphans were each allowed 33_l._ 6_s._ 8_d._
per annum. In these allowances were included the widows, children, and
orphans of all mates, pursers, surgeons, and midshipmen who had served
in the Company’s own or chartered ships, for the period of eight years;
or who had been killed, or maimed, or wounded in the service, so as to
be rendered incapable of further service at sea.
[Sidenote: Internal economy of the ships.]
[Sidenote: Watches and Duties.]
The internal economy and discipline on board of the Company’s ships
were much more perfect than in any other merchant vessels of the
period. The crew or seamen of each were divided into two watches,
starboard and larboard; the officers into three watches. Each watch
of the former had, during the night, four hours’ rest below, and
four hours’ duty on deck. At half-past six A.M. the watch on deck
commenced to wash and clean decks; at half-past seven the hammocks
were piped up, and stowed in the hammock nettings round the waist
by the quartermasters. At eight o’clock all hands breakfasted, after
which they commenced the ordinary duties of the day. These consisted,
when the men were not required to set, shorten, or trim sails, of work
of the most multifarious description, such as setting up rigging,
shifting or repairing sails, splicing ropes, making spun yarn, weaving
mats, painting, tarring, greasing masts, and so forth. Twice every
week, Wednesdays and Saturdays, they cleaned and holy-stoned[396] the
’tween-decks, in the fore part of which they slept and had their food,
the whole crew being divided into messes of eight men each, who had a
space allotted to them between the guns, where their mess utensils were
arranged. When these cleaning and scouring operations were finished,
the ’tween-decks were carefully inspected by the commander and surgeon,
to see that everything was clean and in order, and that all mess
kids, brass pots, and kettles, tin pannikins, and other utensils were
properly scoured and polished.
On Sunday no work was allowed to be performed except what was urgent
and necessary; and on the morning of that day the crew were mustered
and inspected before assembling at prayers, which every person on
board was expected to attend in his best attire. Dinner was served at
noon; after that the men, on week-days, resumed their work until the
“_dog_ watches,” which commenced at four P.M. These, no doubt, derived
their name from the fact that they were (according to Theodore Hook)
_cur-tailed_, that is, lasted for only two, instead of four hours each
watch, viz., from four to six, and from six to eight, when the crew,
instead of going below to rest, usually employed themselves in sorting
the contents of their sea-chests, or in making or repairing their
clothes, and frequently in games or other amusements, which every good
commander encouraged. On Saturdays, during these hours, if the weather
permitted, they had their dance or songs and music, drinking health
and wealth, long life and happiness to their “wives and sweethearts.”
In harbour the crews of the Company’s ships performed, without the
assistance, as now, of the natives, all the work on board, such as
discharging, loading, and stowing cargo, as well as stripping and
refitting the rigging of their ships, and keeping the boats in order.
In China they rowed guard, on Sundays, among the ships in harbour. One
day every week was allotted to washing their clothes; and once every
month they scrubbed their hammocks. These were known as “washing” days.
[Sidenote: Courts-martial.]
Nor did their duties end here. The Company’s ships were ships of war,
as will be seen by the many gallant actions they fought, as well as
merchantmen. Each of them mounted from twelve to twenty-six guns,
chiefly eighteen-pounders, and the men were drilled to gun-exercise
with almost as much care as the gunners of the royal navy. They had
likewise to go through a regular course of musket, cutlass, and
other small-arms drill, in which they were expected to be thoroughly
efficient, as also in the art of handling the boarding-pike, more
especially for the purpose of defence. Courts-martial were held on
board, as in ships of war, the members of which were composed of the
commander and the four senior or sworn officers, the fourth or junior
mate giving his opinion of what the verdict ought to be before any of
the other members. And when punishments were inflicted, which was too
frequently the case for the most trifling offences, the lash from the
brawny arm of a boatswain’s mate over the bare back and shoulders of
the delinquent was much more severely felt than would have been the
lash of a drummer’s mate. Three dozen of such lashes was no uncommon
punishment.
[Sidenote: Change in the policy of the East India Company.]
The renewal of the Company’s charter in 1814, until 1831, though
granted by Parliament, was, as we have seen, so stoutly opposed by
the representatives in Parliament of the out-ports and the great
manufacturing districts, that various concessions were offered to the
growing intelligence of the people and to their increasing wants. But
the granting of licences and the extension of conditional privileges
did not satisfy the demands of a people who were beginning to ask
their rulers the unanswerable question why they should not be allowed
to purchase what they required in the cheapest markets; and who saw
that though the territory of the Company had increased to an enormous
extent, its commerce, considering the extent of the land and the
richness of the soil now in the Company’s possession, was altogether
insignificant; in a word, that territorial aggrandisement had now
become the _Alpha_ and _Omega_ of the Company’s policy.
[Sidenote: Results of free trade with India,]
Events thoroughly demonstrated the force and truth of these
impressions. In the face of many difficulties, private traders,
whenever they obtained a footing in the trade of the East, were certain
immediately afterwards to secure an ascendancy over the Company in
its trading operations, and in a very short time trebled the trade
of England with the East. Such in this case, as in numerous other
instances, are the effects of individual energy, even when curtailed
and contracted as in the present instance, over monopoly, however
influential and powerful. How indelibly marked are now the footprints
of free-trade in the pages of the commercial history of the East
Indies! In 1814, when the close monopoly of the Company was brought
to an end, the value of exports from the United Kingdom to British
India amounted to 1,870,690_l._; in 1820, after the trade had been
partially opened to individual energy, it reached 3,037,911_l._; in
1830, when still somewhat fettered, it was 4,087,311_l._ In 1840 the
exports amounted to 5,212,839_l._; and in 1850 to 7,242,194_l._ In
1854 the value of the exports and imports was 20,293,572_l._; in 1860
it had reached 32,791,195_l._; and in 1870 it amounted to no less than
45,183,912_l._[397]
[Sidenote: and of the Company’s trading operations.]
It is very questionable if the East India Company, even at the period
of its closest monopoly, or, indeed, during any portion of its career,
ever realised much profit by its _commercial_ operations. Many of
their employés were enabled to amass very considerable fortunes, but
the shareholders were paid their dividends from other sources of gain
than commerce: sources it is not our province to explore; and perhaps,
for the credit of England, it would be better if a veil could be drawn
over many of the acts of the Company and its servants. Nor were the
Directors, whatever they may have been as individuals, competent, as a
body, to conduct a lucrative commerce at distances so remote. “It was
not in the nature of things,” remarks Mr. McCulloch,[398] “that the
Company’s purchases could be fairly made; the natives could not deal
with their servants as they would have dealt with private individuals,
and it would be absurd to suppose that agents authorized to buy on
account of government, and to draw on the public treasury for the
means of payment, should generally evince the prudence and discretion
of individuals directly responsible in their own private fortunes for
their transactions. The interference of such persons would, under
any circumstances, have rendered the East Indian trade peculiarly
hazardous. But their influence in this respect was materially
aggravated by the irregularity of their appearances. No individual not
belonging to the Court of Directors could foresee whether the Company’s
agents would be in the market at all, or, if there, to what extent they
would either purchase or sell. So capricious were their proceedings,
that in some years they laid out 700,000_l._ on indigo, while in others
they did not lay out a single shilling, and so with other things. A
fluctuating demand of this sort necessarily occasioned great and sudden
variations of price, and was injurious alike to the producers and the
private merchants.”
[Sidenote: China trade thrown open, 1832-1834.]
Indeed when, in 1832, the renewal of the Company’s charter came to be
again discussed in Parliament, the Directors had no valid reasons to
offer against the entire opening of their trade, and had evidently no
longer any desire, especially in face of the increased power of the
free-traders, to resist the demands which were made to allow private
shipowners to trade to all parts of the East, including China, on
the same conditions, in all respects, as the vessels belonging to or
chartered by the Company: the owners, therefore, finding it impossible
to compete, with any prospect of success, against individual energy,
unless protected, sold their ships, and from that time the Company
ceased to be traders.
[Sidenote: Company abolished, 1858.]
In the Appendix[399] will be found an account of how the vessels
belonging to the Company were disposed of, the names of their
purchasers, and the prices realised, which are small indeed compared
with what they must have cost.[400] From April 1834, when the Company’s
trade with China ceased, its functions have been wholly political,
and the Directors, though retaining their patronage in the civil
and military services, became little more than a council to advise
and assist the president of the Board of Control. In 1858 they were
deprived by Parliament of all their power and privileges, and ceased to
exist as a governing body, the whole of the British dominion in India
being then placed under a Secretary of State in Council for India, and
its military and civil services merged with those of the United Kingdom.
[Sidenote: Retiring allowance to commanders and officers.]
When the Company’s commercial operations were brought to a close the
commanders and officers of their “maritime service”[401] memorialised
the Court for compensation for loss of employment, and requested to
be placed on a footing somewhat equivalent to what the officers and
servants on their own ships would have been entitled to claim by law or
usage, had they been discharged or otherwise deprived of employment.
This memorial, which will be found in the Appendix, contains a good
deal of information connected with the service worthy of perusal.
Though drawn up in the form of a petition, it reads more like a demand,
the memorialists resting their claims upon certain words in their
agreements for servitude, and upon one of the sections of an Act of
Parliament.[402]
[Sidenote: Compensations and increased pensions granted.]
Although opposed to the demand, and furnishing very valid reasons for
their opposition, the Directors,[403] nevertheless, after reference to
a meeting of shareholders, and to Parliament, “being anxious to extend
the measure of relief as widely as possible,” granted compensation
to all commanders and officers who had been actually employed in the
“maritime service” within the period of five years antecedent to the
22nd of April, 1834, upon their declaration that it had been their
intention to continue to follow their profession in the maritime
service of the Company. This compensation amounted to a money payment
of 1,500_l._ to each commander, 1,000_l._ to a master, and sums
ranging from 600_l._ to 150_l._ to the chief mate, down to the fourth
mate and purser. Besides these payments, they gave by way of further
compensation to each commander, upon their declaration as to the number
of voyages which they would have performed had the service continued,
the sum of 4,000_l._ for three unexpired voyages, 3,000_l._ for two
voyages, and for one voyage of which they had been deprived, 2,000_l._
Pensions[404] were likewise granted by the Company on a graduated scale
to commanders and officers who had served ten years in the service,
not for sickness or incapacity, but simply on the ground, for which
their own attestation was sufficient, that they were unable to obtain
employment, and that any income they possessed should go in abatement
of such pension.
The commanders of the ships belonging to the Company (their number
was small compared with those on the hired or “maritime service”) who
had five voyages to perform were each paid, by way of compensation, a
sum of 5,000_l._; four voyages, 4,500_l._; three voyages, 4,000_l._;
two voyages, 3,000_l._, and one voyage, 2,000_l._; while the officers
of these ships received compensation according to the situations they
filled.[405] Nor were they less liberally dealt with in the way of
pensions when the commercial affairs of the Company were brought to a
close. Each commodore then received 400_l._ per annum; each commander
300_l._; and each officer, from the chief down to the warrant officer,
was granted a pension for life, ranging from 200_l._ to 30_l._ per
annum. Widows were allowed two-thirds of their husbands’ pensions
during their widowhood. Nor were the children overlooked, for they too
received pensions according to their wants.
We should have been at a loss to understand the cause of the very
liberal conduct of the East India Company to its servants, had the
Directors themselves not derived emoluments far beyond what they were
entitled to receive by the conditions on which they had agreed to
serve, and our readers also might have been puzzled to understand why
they displayed such extraordinary liberality. No doubt some qualms of
conscience led them to feel that they ought to pluck the beams from
their own eyes before scrutinising too narrowly the motes in those of
their servants.
[Sidenote: Remuneration of the Directors.]
The fixed and acknowledged remuneration to the Directors was 300_l._
per annum; but the general opinion of the day seems to have been
(and this opinion was frequently expressed) that the worth of each
directorship amounted to no less than 10,000_l._ per annum, in one form
or another; and certainly the avidity with which these directorships
were sought after, when a vacancy occurred, and the large sums of money
expended in obtaining the appointment, too clearly show that there were
valid reasons for the popular rumour. Candidates, who were nearly all
men otherwise in the enjoyment of lucrative employment as bankers or
merchants, or who had filled high appointments in the civil or military
service of the Company, would not have sent “carriages and four” to
remote parts of the kingdom for voters, each of whom was limited to
four votes, to secure an appointment to which they were expected to
devote some portion at least of their time, and this, too, for the
paltry remuneration of 300_l._ per annum. Indeed it was not in the
nature of things that they should do so.
[Sidenote: Their patronage.]
The reason, however, may be explained by the fact that, associated
with the position of a Director, there was a large amount of patronage
under his own immediate control, which he claimed by rotation. That
this must have been of very considerable value, may be suspected
from the fact that the successful candidate sometimes gave the whole
of his first year’s patronage to the chairman of his election
committee. The estimated value of these nominations we have no means
of knowing, nor would it be possible to ascertain what other sources
of gain were within the reach of those Directors who felt disposed to
avail themselves of them. Among, however, the more common and direct
appointments, all the cadetships were at their disposal, as were
also assistant-surgeons, chaplains, solicitors, and pilots, who were
constantly required to fill up vacancies, or meet the ever-increasing
demands of the service. Governors and members of the Indian Council had
likewise to be supplied, and their places filled as vacancies occurred.
Then there were writerships, worth from 4,000_l._ to 6,000_l._ per
annum, at the disposal of the Court; while there was a grand plum in
the appointment of young gentlemen to the civil service of the Company
in China, each of whom, if he lived, was certain to reach the office of
“Tyepan,” known to be worth 20,000_l._ per annum. But the appointments
to this special and highly-favoured service were exclusively in the
gift of the chairman, who seems almost invariably to have bestowed
them upon some member of his own family, or near relative, or upon the
son of a Director who, no doubt, reciprocated so great a favour when
he had the opportunity. These nominations, however, were considered
so valuable, that, though the chairman had double patronage, he was
expected not to exercise any portion of it during the remainder of the
year when the nomination to the Tyepanship fell to his lot.
FOOTNOTES:
[359] The first Charter of Incorporation was dated 31st December, 1660.
[360] Macpherson’s ‘Commerce of India,’ p. 81.
[361] Captain Meadows Taylor, in his ‘Manual of the History of India,’
Lond., 1871, has devoted his 5th book to a very clear, full, and
condensed account of the East India Company and its doings from 1613 to
1784 (pp. 387-501).
[362]
£
By this important instrument the Old Company, in
addition to their subscription of 315,000
Agreed to purchase stock at par from the New Company to
the amount of 673,500
-------
Making their joint-stock 998,500
Being equivalent to the remaining New Company’s stock 998,500
Which, with the stock of the separate traders 23,000
---------
Constituted the total united capital of 2,000,000
=========
See further details in ‘Charters of East India Company from 1601,’ etc.
Lon., 4to., 1774.
[363] McCulloch’s ‘Commercial Dictionary,’ p. 567.
[364] ‘Report on the East India Company,’ vol. iv.; Reports of
Committees, House of Commons.
[365] It will be found at p. 264 of these reports, and occupies
fourteen folio pages of closely-printed double columns. Those extracts
from it which required “the attention of the commanders and officers
in the maritime service” of the Company are given in Appendix No. 8 of
this volume.
[366] Pigs of iron cast for permanent ballast.
[367] Compensation due to the shipowner from the freighter for
unduly delaying his vessel in port beyond the time specified in the
charter-party or bill of lading.
[368] At a later period no less than 50_l._ per ton freight was on
more than one occasion paid for the voyage, beyond an allowance for
contingencies. From Hardy’s ‘Registry,’ pp. 18, 20, and 22, at a court
of Directors held on the 23rd September, 1796, the ship _Admiral
Gardner_, of eight hundred and thirteen tons, commanded by “John
Woolmore, Esq.,” appears by the minutes to have been chartered on the
following conditions:—
“Peace freight to China, or circuitously and to all £ _s._ _d._
parts of India alike, for six voyages certain. 21 0 0 per ton.
“Surplus, peace and war 10 10 0 per ton.
“For a variety of expenses arising from war,
including the additional charges of insurance,
beyond 8 guineas per cent., and the expenses
of bounty and manning to be paid, at all events
either on the ship’s arrival or in 18 months,
whichever shall first happen. The difference
of seamen’s wages beyond 26_s._ per month, and
the charges of replacing seamen impressed
into her Majesty’s service, maintenance and
returning of Lascars, to be at the risk of the
Company.” 18 10 0 per ton.
---------------------
Total freight and charges paid to the shipowner £50 0 0
[369] Act of 24 Geo. III., s. 2, c. 29.
[370] Mr. Travers, the wholesale grocer in St. Swithin’s Lane, told
Mr. Pitt that he found a bag of smuggled tea in his area every night:
how it came there he could not tell; but he was sure he should find it
there whilst the duty was so high. Mr. Pitt wisely took the hint, and
reduced the duty.
[371] The rules and regulations established for the shipping of goods
by the private trade will be found in Hardy’s ‘East India Registry,’
Appendix, pp. 58, 59.
[372] ‘Commercial Dictionary,’ p. 570.
[373] Papers published by the East India Company in 1813, Hardy, p. 84.
[374] In the Appendix, No. 9, there will be found a list of the East
India Company’s ships lost, burnt, taken, or otherwise destroyed, from
1700 to 1819, from Hardy’s ‘Registry.’
[375] The conditions respecting merchant shipping will be found
specified in the clauses relating to goods (from 6 to 16, both
inclusive) of the Bill.
[376] Parl. Debates, 16 June, 1813, Hansard, p. 685.
[377] Speech of Sir William Curtis, Hansard, p. 691.
[378] A list of the ships of the Company in 1820, with their tonnage,
number of guns, men, and where built, will be found in the Appendix,
No. 10.
[379] See Appendix, No. 11, for a condensed account of many of these
actions.
[380] Company’s instructions, Hardy, p. 91.
[381] Company’s instructions, Hardy, p. 97.
[382] The strict rule of promotion by seniority only applied to the
eight ships belonging to the East India Company. In the ships belonging
to private individuals, which were chartered by the Company for a
specific number of voyages, the promotion of the officers depended very
much upon their ability and good conduct, or the influence which could
be brought to bear in their favour with the owners, by whom all such
appointments and promotions were made; but the command of these ships
was almost invariably sold to the highest bidder, competent to fill the
situation, the price averaging about 3000_l._
[383] Hardy, pp. 114-118.
[384] Ibid. p. 76.
[385] “Dunnage” is loose wood, horns, rattan, coir, etc., stowed among
casks to prevent their moving, or under dry cargo to prevent the bilge
water getting to it and spoiling it.
[386] Hardy, p. 80.
[387] In 1834, after the Company had been deprived of its trading
privileges, and no longer required to maintain its maritime service,
Captain Innes, of the chartered ship _Abercrombie Robinson_,
memorialised the Company, in his own name and in that of other
commanders, for “compensation for the loss of employment in consequence
of the discontinuance of the Company’s trade.” He therein estimates his
“emoluments and income accruing from his appointment as commander, upon
an average of his last three voyages,” as follows:—
£ s. d.
Eighteen months’ pay, at 10_l._ per month 180 0 0
Fifty-six tons privilege, outward, at 4_1._ £ s. d.
per ton 224 0 0
From port to port, at 30 rupees per candy 336 0 0
Homeward, at 33_l._ per ton 1,848 0 0
------------ 2,408 0 0
Primage 100 0 0
Two-fifths tonnage, from port to port, 478
tons, at 30 rupees per candy 2,868 0 0
Less, charged by the Hon. Co., 2_l._ per ton 956 0 0
------------ 1,912 0 0
Passage-money, after allowing for the provisions and
stores provided for the passengers 1,500 0 0
------------
6,100 0 0
------------
Making 6,100_l._ per voyage for the last three voyages, “exclusive of
the profits on investments.”
[388] See Victualling Bill, Appendix, No. 13; Hardy, p. 81.
[389] Hardy’s “Registry,” p. 51.
[390] In the passage from Bombay to China, where the ships were chiefly
laden with cotton, the commanders and officers, by a resolution of
the Court of the 6th March, 1805, were allowed nearly two-fifths of
the whole tonnage space of the ship’s capacity for their especial use
and benefit, and free of all charge, on the very reasonable condition
that “the Company shall not be subjected to any expense whatever for
securing the Company’s cotton or otherwise.” In the event of the
Company not requiring to ship any cotton or other goods on their own
account on this intermediate voyage, the remaining three-fifths’ space
in the ship’s hold, usually appropriated for their own use, was to
be disposed of to the highest bidder, but the commander and officers
were in all cases to have the preference, with the very prudent and no
doubt necessary precaution, that “they were to deliver their proposal
at the same time with the other tenders, and were not to be allowed to
amend their tenders after their proposals have been opened.” Similar
privileges were granted to the commanders and officers employed in the
intermediate trade between Bengal or Madras and China.—Regulations,
East India Company. Hardy, pp. 132, 133.
[391] Hardy, pp. 119, 120.
[392] Ibid. pp. 121, 122.
[393] Standing orders of the East India Company, Hardy, p. 23.
[394] Minutes of Court of Directors of the East India Company, 8th
April, 1800, Hardy, p. 126.
[395] As every officer in the service, and the greater portion of the
crews, did contribute monthly towards this fund, these pensions were
consequently not altogether gratuitous on the part of the Company.
[396] “Holy-stone” is the sandstone used for cleaning the decks.
The name is originally derived either from tombstones taken from
churchyards for the purpose, or from the fact that the sailors have to
go on their knees to perform this labour (Admiral W. H. Smyth, p. 387).
[397] Returns furnished by the Board of Trade.
[398] ‘Commercial Dictionary,’ p. 571, edition of 1869.
[399] List of large ships belonging to or in the service of the East
India Company in 1831, and how they were disposed of, Appendix, No. 14.
[400] The rates of freight paid to the last vessels chartered by the
Company in 1832-1833 ranged from 12_l._ 15_s._ to 14_l._ per ton to
and from China, and only 7_l._ 12_s._ to 9_l._ 15_s._ to and from
Bombay (Hardy, pp. 20-22); and although these rates were double what
can now be obtained, they were unremunerative, considering the cost of
construction of these vessels, their small capacity in proportion to
their registered tonnage, and their large current expenses.
[401] Although the Company frequently engaged vessels for a single
voyage, those employed in the regular service were invariably chartered
for six consecutive voyages, the custom being for tenders to be
issued, specifying the number of vessels required, their tonnage and
equipment, and inviting their owners to make offers at so much per ton
for six voyages certain (sufficient time being allowed for construction
and outfit), so that nearly all the ships in the regular service of
the Company were specially built for the purpose, shipowners, as a
rule, naturally hesitating to invest a large capital on a particular
description of vessel, unless her employment was secured by contract
for a length of time sufficient to justify the expenditure.
[402] Memorial of Captain Probyn, etc., July 1834, Appendix No. 15, p.
548.
[403] Minutes of Court of Directors, 5th August, 1834. Hardy, p. 29.
[404] The pensions voted by the Proprietors of the East India Company,
and approved by the Directors, were as follows: Commander, 250_l._ per
annum; chief to fourth mate, inclusive, from 160_l._ to 70_l._; fifth,
and sixth mates, 59_l._; surgeons, 160_l._; their assistants, 70_l._;
pursers, 100_l._; midshipmen, 30_l._, and boatswains, carpenters, and
gunners, each 25_l._ per annum. Widows, one-half of their husbands’
pensions during their widowhood; children, the usual allowance. But
these were reduced one-fifth by an order from the President of the
India Board, 12th Nov., 1834.
[405] The two officers who stood first for promotion received each
2,400_l._; the two second officers in a similar position were each
paid 2,200_l._; the third officers, 2,100_l._; and the remaining two
officers received 2,000_l._ each. The other mates were remunerated in
sums of from 1,600_l._ to 150_l._, whilst midshipmen who had made four
voyages were paid 100_l._, and those who had served two voyages, 75_l._
each. Carpenters, gunners, and boatswains who had served five years in
the service received each from 100_l._ to 150_l._
CHAPTER XIV.
Progress of shipping—_Thetis_, West Indiaman—A
“Free-trader”—Internal economy—Provisioning and manning—Shipping
the crew—Crimps and agents—Duties on departure of
ship—Watches—Duties of the Master,—Who has control over
navigation—Making and shortening sail—Tacking, etc.—Ordinary day’s
work, how arranged—Right of the Master over the cabin—Authority
and usages in the English, Dutch, and Prussian marine—Danish and
Norwegian system—Duties of Chief Mate—His duties in port—Tacking
“’bout ship”—Reefing topsails—Log-book—Mate successor in law to
the Master—Mode of address to Chief and Second Mates—Duties of
Second Mate—Ordinary day’s work—Care of spare rigging—Stores—Third
Mate—His general duties—Carpenter—Sail-maker—Steward—Cook—Able
seamen, their duties—Division of their labour—Duties of
ordinary seamen—Boys or apprentices—Bells—Helm—“Tricks” at the
helm—Relieving duty—Orders at the wheel—Repeating of orders at
wheel—Conversation not allowed while on duty—Colliers.
The close of the great European war, combined with the opening of
the trade to the East Indies, and other causes of minor importance,
produced various and somewhat important changes among the merchant
vessels of all nations. The greatly extended field for maritime
commerce, and the competition which arose, obliged the shipowners of
different countries, among whom those of the United States, towards
the close of the period to which we now refer, took the lead, to pay
more attention than they had hitherto done to the combination of
capacity with speed, and greater economy in the navigation of their
vessels. Attention also began to be directed to the substitution, as
far as practicable, of mechanical skill for manual labour. They saw
that the ships of the East India Company, however magnificent, were
not adapted to compete successfully or profitably in an unprotected
trade. That of the British West Indies, which had ever been open to
the free competition of British shipowners among themselves, had given
a greater scope for improvement in these respects than the protected
trade of the East; consequently in the trade with the West we find, at
a comparatively early period of the present century, a class of vessels
much better adapted for competition than any of the vessels in the
service of the East India Company. An illustration of one of these,
copied from Mr. Cooke’s interesting sketches, will be found on the
opposite page.
[Sidenote: _Thetis_, West Indiaman.]
Though the _Thetis_ is somewhat modern, she is a fair representation of
the type of vessels which had long been employed by the enterprising
merchants, more especially of Bristol and Liverpool, in their trade
with the West Indies. Unlike the vessels in the service of the East
India Company, her capacity for cargo was considerably in excess of
her registered tonnage, and her complement of crew less than one-half
in proportion to her tonnage. Nor were these vessels inferior to them,
either in speed or other sea-going qualities, though they too were
greatly surpassed by those of a later period, their owners as yet
understanding but imperfectly the advantages derived by increasing
the length of their vessels in proportion to the breadth.
[Illustration: THE ‘THETIS,’ WEST INDIAMAN.]
Hitherto vessels, for instance, of twenty-five feet beam, seldom
exceeded one hundred feet in length, keel and forerake, and although
the Americans, in their once famous “Baltimore clippers,” set the
example of increasing the length to five, and even to six times the
breadth of the beam, it was not until the English were thrown into
competition with the shipowners of that nation, in every branch of
their carrying trade, that they were induced, or rather obliged, to
adopt, in this respect, the improved models of their enterprising
transatlantic competitors.
After the trade to the East Indies had been thrown open, a number of
vessels, ranging from three hundred and fifty to seven hundred tons
register, were built. They were not, however, exclusively employed in
the trade with the East, but were free to seek employment wherever they
could obtain the most remunerative returns, and were to be found in
all parts of the world in search of freight. An illustration of one of
these vessels, known as Free-Traders, will be found on the following
page.[406]
[Illustration: FREE-TRADE BARQUE.—E. W. COOKE, R.A.]
[Sidenote: Internal economy.]
As sailing vessels of this description, in which we may include all
classes, from the Indiaman to the collier, are now in various branches
of trade being fast superseded by steam, and by the great changes which
the improvements of later years have created, we should ill perform the
duty we have undertaken did we not, though at the risk of wearying our
readers with detail, leave a record, however imperfect, of the internal
economy of the ordinary merchant vessels of a generation now rapidly
passing away, and attempt to furnish an account of the various duties
and responsibilities of the master, officers, and seamen, as they
existed prior to the passing of the Merchant Shipping Act. No special
code then existed, either in Great Britain or the United States, for
the maintenance of discipline, or the provisioning and treatment of
the crews of trading vessels when beyond the jurisdiction of the
Admiralty; but certain usages were, as a rule, recognised by the
courts of justice. In the marine of the United States discipline was
more stringent, and distinctions of rank more rigorously enforced than
in that of England.
[Sidenote: Provisioning and manning.]
But there was a great difference in different ports, among different
owners, as to the part the master was to take in supplying and manning
the vessel. In most cases the owner put on board all the stores,
furnishing the master with directions, sometimes in writing, as to the
manner in which he should dispense them, the directions being more or
less liberal, according to the character of the owner. In other cases
these details were left to the master’s discretion, who generally gave
the owner an inventory of all the stores and provisions he thought
necessary for the use of the crew and the navigation of the ship.
[Sidenote: Shipping the crew.]
[Sidenote: Crimps and agents.]
In the engagement of the seamen various modes prevailed. In most cases
the whole arrangement was left to shipping masters, who were paid so
much a head for each man they engaged, and were responsible for their
appearance on board at the time of sailing. The crews were generally
assembled by them two or three days, sometimes only one day, before
the ship sailed; neither the master nor owner, too frequently, knowing
anything of the men before the vessel went to sea. Occasionally the
seaman saw the ship before he joined her, but often not. In Liverpool,
however, when the men were unable to obtain employment for themselves,
they registered their names at an office opened for that purpose,
whence the captain chose his crew. Moreover, it was no uncommon thing
to see them taken to the ship’s side in cartloads, in such a state of
intoxication that they were unable to walk on board. Riggers generally
had charge of the vessel up to that time. In London the practice for
owners of vessels going on voyages round the Cape of Good Hope or Cape
Horn was to employ an agent, familiarly known as a “crimp,” who engaged
the greater part of the crew. If ten or twenty men were wanted, perhaps
double that number were brought on board, out of which the chief mate
selected a sufficient company; the agent receiving a note for two
months’ wages, a portion of which he had generally advanced previously
to the seamen, either in cash or in slops,[407] and also 5_s._, his
procuration fee. When the agents or crimps, who were too frequently
of questionable character, saw that the seamen had signed the ship’s
articles in due form, they paid them the balance of the advance, taking
care that another fee, varying from 5_s._ to 20_s._, was deducted
from the proceeds of the notes, and that they, or their substitutes,
were on board in time for sailing. In some instances the master, and
occasionally the owner, if he had himself been at sea, selected the
men; but a shipping master was even then needed to see them on board,
and generally to complete the business.
All respectable owners not only attended to the seaworthiness and
proper equipment of the ship, but were wont, in person, when they had
time, though too many of them had not, or did not allow themselves
the requisite time, to inspect the forecastle, to see it properly
cleaned, whitewashed, or painted, and furnished with every reasonable
convenience for the crew.[408]
[Sidenote: Duties on departure of ship.]
Everything being in readiness, the Custom-house and other regulations
complied with, and the crew on board, the vessel was placed under
charge of a pilot, the master having little else to do while the pilot
was on board than to see everything in order, and that his commands
were executed. When, however, the pilot left, the entire control and
responsibility of the crew, ship, and cargo devolved upon the master.
Soon after the pilot left, and when things were settled down, and
in something like order, it was usual for the master, especially if
the vessel was bound on a distant voyage, to call all hands aft, and
briefly address them about the voyage upon which they had entered, and
the respective duties they had to perform. After this the crew was
divided into “watches,” in two equal parts.
[Sidenote: Watches.]
In the generality of merchantmen there are but two watches—the
larboard, being under the charge of the chief, and the starboard, of
the second mate, the master himself not keeping watch, but coming
and going at his discretion. The starboard watch is sometimes called
the captain’s, no doubt from the fact that in the early days of the
merchant marine, when vessels were smaller, there was but one mate,
and then the master stood his own watch, as he does at present in
coasters, colliers, and similar craft. In dividing the crew into
watches the master usually allows the officers to choose the men, one
by one, alternately; but sometimes makes the division himself, after
consultation with his officers. The men are chosen as equally as
possible, with reference to their qualities as able seamen, ordinary
seamen, or boys; but if the number is unequal, the larboard watch
claims the odd “hand,” since the chief mate does not go aloft, or do
other duty on his watch, as the second mate does on his. The cook
always musters with the larboard watch, and the steward with the
starboard. If there is a carpenter, and the larboard watch is the
larger of the two, he generally goes aloft when required with the
starboard watch, otherwise with the larboard; and, as soon as the
division is made, if the day’s work is over, one watch is set, and the
other sent below.
Among many customs prevailing at sea which are difficult to trace to
their origin, we may notice that, on the first night of the outward
passage, the starboard watch takes the first four hours on deck, and on
the first night of the homeward passage the larboard does the same. The
sailors explain this by the old phrase, that the master takes the ship
out, and the mate takes her home. The dog watches, as already explained
in the case of the ships of the East India Company, are the two reliefs
which take place between four and eight o’clock, P.M., each of which
being only two hours on deck instead of four. The intention of these
watches is to change the turn of the night watch every twenty-four
hours; so that the party watching from eight to twelve one night shall
succeed on the following one from midnight till four in the morning.
[Sidenote: Duties of the Master,]
The master takes the bearing and distance of the last point of
departure from the land; from that point the ship’s reckoning begins,
and is regularly entered in the log-book, which is kept by the chief
mate, the master examining and correcting the reckoning every day. The
master also attends to the chronometer, azimuth-compass, and other
instruments on board, and takes the altitude of the sun at mid-day, or
the lunar observations, with the assistance of his officers. Every day,
a few minutes before noon, if there is the least prospect of being able
to get a sight of the sun, the master comes upon deck with his quadrant
or sextant, and the mates usually follow his example. The second mate
does not always perform this duty, but is ready to assist on Sundays,
or when no other work requires his attention. As soon as the sun
crosses the meridian “noon is made,” by striking eight bells, and a
new nautical day commences. The reckoning is then corrected by the
observation, which fixes the latitude of the ship, under the master’s
superintendence. In taking the lunar observations to correct the
longitude, as ascertained by the chronometer, the master is assisted by
both his officers; in which case he measures the angle of the moon with
the star or sun, the chief mate taking the altitude of the sun or star,
and the second mate that of the moon.
In regulating the hours of duty, sleep, meals, etc., the master has
absolute power; the usual times being nearly the same in all vessels.
The hour for breakfast is usually seven bells in the morning (half-past
seven), dinner at noon, and supper whenever the day’s work is over,
generally by six o’clock. If the voyage is of long duration, the crew
are, as a rule, put upon an allowance of food as well as water, the
dispensing of the stores and regulating of the allowance resting, of
course, with the master, though the duty of opening the casks, weighing
and measuring the contents falls upon the second mate. The chief
mate enters in the log-book every barrel or cask of provisions that
is broached. The steward takes charge of all the provisions for the
use of the cabin, and keeps them in his pantry, over which he has the
direct control. The average of allowance in merchant vessels was six
pounds of bread per week, three quarts of water, and one pound and a
half of beef, or one and a quarter of pork a day to each man. But from
want of some fixed scale of allowances in the British service, great
discontent frequently arose on the part of the crews, particularly on
long voyages. In coasting vessels, where the work is hard and constant,
the allowance of beef and bread was generally unlimited; but a large
amount of suffering was too frequently endured by the seamen on long
voyages from the paucity of provisions in store, especially in merchant
vessels of small size, and in particular trades. In the timber trade
the practice of carrying the water and wet provisions for the ship’s
company on deck frequently led to such serious consequences, that it
became necessary to secure the preservation of an adequate portion of
them in some part of the vessel accessible in cases of peril, so as to
prevent the dreadful scenes of hunger, misery, and lingering death to
which so many seamen were and are exposed from the loss of water and
provisions.
[Sidenote: Who has control over the navigation.]
[Sidenote: Making and shortening sail.]
The entire control of the navigation and working of the ship lies with
the master. He gives the course and general directions to the officer
of the watch, who enters upon a slate, at the end of his watch, the
course made, and the number of knots each hour the ship has sailed,
together with any other observations he may think worthy of record.
The officer of the watch is at liberty to trim the yards, to make
alterations in the upper sails, to take in and set royals, topgallant
sails, etc.; but no important alterations can be made, such as reefing
or furling the courses, or topsails, without the special order of the
master, who in such cases always ought to be on deck and take the
command in person. When on deck the weather-side of the quarter-deck
belongs to him, and as soon as he appears the officer of the watch
usually leaves it, and goes over to leeward, or forward, into the
waist. If the alteration to be made is slight, the master usually
tells the officer to take in or set such a sail, and leaves to him
the particular orders as to the braces, sheets, etc. The principal
manɶuvres of the vessel, such as tacking, wearing, reefing topsails,
getting under way, and coming to anchor, require all hands. In these
cases the master ought himself to take the command, and to give his
orders in person, standing upon the quarter-deck. The chief mate
superintends the forward part of the vessel under the master, and the
second mate assists in the waist, the crew being at their respective
stations. The master, except in very small vessels, never goes aloft,
nor performs any work with his hands, unless at his own discretion.
[Sidenote: Tacking, etc.]
In tacking and wearing,[409] he gives all the orders as to trimming
the yards, etc., though the chief mate is expected to look out for the
head yards. Such is also the case in getting under way, and in coming
to anchor, the master taking the entire personal control of everything,
the officers acting under him in their respective stations.
[Sidenote: Ordinary day’s work, how arranged.]
In the ordinary day’s work, however, the state of things is somewhat
different. Here the master does not superintend personally, but
gives general instructions to the chief mate, whose duty it is to
see to their execution. In order to understand this distinction, it
is necessary to define the two great divisions of duty and labour
on shipboard. One is the working and navigating of the vessel; that
is, the keeping and ascertaining the ship’s position on the ocean,
directing her course, the making and taking in sail, trimming the yards
to the wind, and the various nautical manɶuvres and evolutions of a
vessel. The other branch is the work done upon the hull and rigging
to keep them in order, such as fitting, repairing, and tarring the
rigging; all of which, together with the manufacture of “small stuffs,”
to be used on board, constitute a part of “the day’s work” of the crew.
As to the latter, the master usually confers with the chief mate upon
the state of the vessel and rigging, and tells him, more or less in
detail, what he wishes to have done. It then becomes the duty of that
officer to see the work accomplished. If the master sees anything of
which he disapproves, or has any preference in the modes of performing
the work, he should convey his wishes to the officer, instead of giving
his orders direct to the men. The Americans, as especially exhibited
in every rank of their society, even where no rank is supposed to
exist, complain that this considerate conduct is not sufficiently
attended to in British merchant ships;[410] and we concur in the
opinion they have laid down, that a contrary course lessens the
authority of the chief mate over the crew, and indirectly also the
master’s own moral influence. The same remarks apply to any other work
doing upon the ship or rigging; such as bending or unbending sails,
knotting, splicing, serving,[411] etc., which constitute the day’s job
work of a vessel. If the chief officer is a competent man, the master
in person is not expected to trouble himself with the details of any of
these things; indeed, were he to do so to any extent, it would probably
lead to unpleasantness and difficulty.
In the packet ships, either from Liverpool to New York, or in other
important mail vessels, in which there were a considerable number
of passengers, the master had still less to do with the day’s work.
The navigation and working of the ship, with proper attention to his
passengers, being sufficient to occupy his entire thoughts.
[Sidenote: Right of the Master over the cabin.]
The master has the entire control of the cabin, and usually lives in
a state-room by himself. The chief mate dines with him in the cabin,
and the second mate looks out on deck while they are below, dining at
the second table afterwards. In large packet-ships, however, the mates
dine together, and the master looks out for the ship while they are at
dinner, dining with his passengers at a later hour.
[Sidenote: Authority and usages in the English,]
Everything of importance that occurs, as the descrying a sail, or
land, or the like, must be instantly reported to the master, who has
such entire control of the discipline of the ship that no subordinate
officer has authority to punish a seaman, or to use any force, without
the master’s order, except in cases of necessity not admitting delay.
He has also the complete direction of the internal arrangements and
economy of the vessel; and upon his character and the course of conduct
he pursues depend in a great measure the character and success of the
ship, and the conduct of the other officers and men. He has a power
and an influence, both direct and indirect, which may be the means of
much good and much evil. If he is profane, passionate, tyrannical,
indecent, and intemperate, more or less of the same qualities will
spread themselves or break out among officers and men; which would
have been checked if the head of the ship had been a man of high
personal character. He may make his ship almost anything he pleases,
and may render the lives and duties of his officers and men pleasant
and profitable to them, or may introduce disagreements, discontent,
tyranny, resistance; in fact he may make the situation of every one
on board as uncomfortable as can well be imagined. Every master of
a vessel who lays this to heart, and considers the greatness of his
responsibility, may not only be a benefactor to all those whom the
course of many years’ command will bring under his authority, but may
render a service to that very important part of the community to which
he belongs, and do much to raise the character of the merchant navy.
We have had many instances in the British mercantile marine of the
variable and opposite qualifications of masters.
[Sidenote: Dutch, and]
In the Dutch ships the qualifications for both masters and mates are
considerable.[412] Gentlemen of good families and superior education
enter the merchant service of that country, and, long prior to any
system of examination being established in England, the Dutch masters
and mates were subjected to one.
But these examinations were confined to the officers employed in their
largest description of vessels trading to India, or engaged on other
distant voyages. In their coasting vessels, or galliots, of which
on the following page there is an excellent illustration from Mr.
Cooke’s sketches, the masters and mates were not required to pass an
examination except so far as to satisfy the owners of their competency
for their respective duties.
[Illustration: DUTCH GALLIOT.—E. W. COOKE, R.A.]
[Sidenote: Prussian marine.]
In Prussia a mate, before he is licensed, must be twenty years of age,
and have been five years at sea. There are two different grades, for
each of which a licence is obtained. The first qualifies him for every
voyage; the second limits him to the Baltic, in vessels of any size,
but not exceeding forty lasts if they trade to the Cattegat, or the
Skager-rock, as far as the Naze of Norway. Captains have three grades:
the first class qualifying them to navigate to any part of the world;
the second restricting them to the seas of Europe, the Mediterranean,
the Black Sea, and the Atlantic; those who have only a third-class
certificate not being allowed to navigate beyond the Baltic, the
Cattegat, and Skager-rock. A captain of the first class must not be
less than twenty-eight years of age, and have sailed as captain of the
second class for not less than two years, or as mate beyond the limits
prescribed for captains of the next or lower grades. Captains of the
second class are required to be twenty-four years of age, and must
have sailed two years as mates of the first grade beyond the limits
prescribed for a mate of the second class; and no one can be licensed
as captain of the third class at a less age, and unless he has been
for two years a mate of the second class. The commissioners by whom
they are examined are generally shipowners, captains of vessels, and
ship-builders.[413]
Though the maritime commerce of Prussia has been chiefly confined to
the Baltic and Mediterranean, and is limited in extent compared with
that of nations greatly their inferior in other respects, German seamen
are in no way behind those of either Norway or Holland, and their
ordinary trading vessels, of which an illustration will be found on the
following page, are of a substantial and useful description.
[Sidenote: Danish and Norwegian systems.]
In Denmark, before any one can be licensed as a mate, he must have made
two voyages to the Mediterranean, and one to the East and West Indies,
besides being acquainted with the navigation of the Cattegat and the
Baltic. He has also to produce certificates from the captains with whom
he has previously sailed, as to his being a steady and good seaman,
as well as a navigator in all its details, and not under twenty-three
years of age. The qualifications for mate also qualify for captain; but
before being appointed to a command he is required to become a burgher
of the place where he usually resides, and to pay the fees securing him
the right of citizenship. The examinations are conducted by a captain
and two lieutenants of the navy.
Examinations in Norway only extend to mates, but those who are found
qualified as such may command merchant vessels. Their examination is
also conducted by a captain of the royal navy and two lieutenants. The
practice of Sweden is somewhat similar, except that a mate, who is
examined only once, is required to undergo a second examination before
he becomes master.
[Illustration: PRUSSIAN SNOW.—E. W. COOKE, R.A.]
[Sidenote: Duties of Chief Mate.]
We have seen that in all matters relating to the care or, and work done
upon, the ship and rigging, the master gives general orders to the
mate, who attends personally to their execution in detail. And this is
practically the custom prevailing in merchant vessels of all nations.
It is the duty of the chief mate in carrying on the day’s work to find
every man something to do, and to see that it is done. He appoints the
second mate his work, as well as the work of each common seaman; and
if the master is dissatisfied with anything, or wishes a change to be
made, the orders must be given to the chief mate, so as to avoid any
interference of the master with the men individually. It is likewise
his duty to examine all parts of the rigging, reporting anything of
importance which requires attention to the master; he must also see
that there are supplies and instruments ready for every kind of labour,
or for any emergency, although the more immediate care of these things,
when provided, belongs to the second mate or boatswain.
In getting under way, and coming to an anchor, it is his duty to attend
to the ground-tackle, and have everything ready forward for setting
sail. In the former case, stationing himself on some elevated position
on the forecastle where he can see the cable outside of the hawse-hole,
he orders and encourages the men in their work of raising the anchor
from the ground, and informs the master when he sees it is “apeak,”
at the same time ordering the men aloft to loose the sails. The sails
being loosed, he awaits the order from the master to have the windlass
again manned, and the anchor hove up to the bow. When the vessel is
under way, and there is no pilot on board, the master takes immediate
control, ordering the yards to be braced and sail set, the chief mate
seeing to the “catting and fishing”[414] of the anchors.
In coming to anchor, similar duties devolve upon the chief officer, who
must see the anchors and cables ready for letting go, and that spare
hawsers, kedges, and warps are at hand, the master ordering how much
chain is to be overhauled. As the vessel draws in towards her anchoring
ground, the master gives all the orders as to trimming the yards and
taking in sail, and has the entire charge of the man at the helm, it
being the mate’s duty only to see that a competent seaman is there. In
furling the sails the whole superintendence devolves upon the mate, who
sends the men aloft, remaining in his place on deck himself, and giving
his orders to them while on the yards as to the manner of furling, and
seeing the ropes hauled taut, or let go on deck, as may be necessary.
[Sidenote: His duties in port.]
These illustrations suffice to show the distinctions between the duties
of a master and a mate, in the principal evolutions at sea of an
ordinary moderate-sized merchant vessel. While in port the chief mate
has much more the control over the vessel than when at sea. As there is
no navigating or working the vessel to be attended to, the master has
little to engage him, except transactions with merchants and others on
shore, and the general directions as to the care of the ship. Besides
the work upon the ship and rigging, while in port, the chief mate has
the charge of receiving, discharging, stowing, and breaking out the
cargo. In these duties he has the entire control, under the general
direction of the master. It is the mate’s duty to keep an account of
all the cargo as it goes in and comes out of the vessel, and, as he
generally gives receipts, he is bound to use great care and accuracy.
When cargo is coming in or going out he stands in the gangway to keep
an account, while the second mate is in the hold with some of the crew,
breaking out or stowing, he being responsible for the proper stowage
and delivery of the cargo. When the master is on shore, the chief mate
is necessarily commander of the ship for the time, and though the law
will extend his power proportionably for cases of necessity, yet,
except in instances which will not admit of delay, he must not attempt
to exercise any unusual powers, but should refer everything to the
master’s decision. The mate has no right, for instance, to punish a man
during the master’s absence, unless it be a case in which delay would
lead to serious consequences.
Neither of the mates stand watch at night when in harbour, but the
chief should always be the first to be called in the morning, as it
his duty to summon the men to their work, and apportion to them their
respective duties. In cleaning the ship, such as washing down decks,
etc., which is done the first thing in the morning, each mate, while at
sea, takes charge of it in his watch, in turn, as the one or the other
may have the morning watch; but in port the second mate oversees the
washing down of the decks, under the chief mate’s general orders.
[Sidenote: Tacking “’bout ship.”]
We have furnished, in a preceding part of this work, a specimen of the
orders given, and of the language employed by masters two hundred years
ago; we now give a description of an ordinary manɶuvre in the present
century. While at sea, in tacking, wearing, reefing topsails, etc.,
and in every kind of “all-hands work,” when the master is on deck,
the chief mate’s place, as we have said, is forward. In the evolution
of tacking ship, the master, finding that the ship will not “lay her
course,” instructs him to “see all clear for stays,” or “ready about.”
The chief mate then goes forward, orders all hands to their stations,
and sees everything clear and ready on the forecastle. The master asks,
“All ready forward?” and being answered, “Ay, ay, sir,” motions to the
man at the helm to put the wheel down, and calls out, “Helm’s alee,”
to which the mate, in order to let the master know he is heard and
understood, responds, “Helm’s alee,” and sees that the head sheets are
let go. The master then gives the order to “raise tacks and sheets,”
which is executed by the mates and the men with them, loosening all
the ropes which confine the corners of the lower sails, in order that
they may be more readily shifted to the other side. When the ship has
turned her head directly to windward, the order is given by the master
to “brace about,” turn round all the yards on the main and mizen-masts;
the mate attending to the foretack, letting go the bowlines and braces
on one side, and as expeditiously drawing them in on the other side, so
as to wheel the yards about the masts; the lower corner of the mainsail
is then, by means of its tack, pulled down to its station at the
chess-tree; and all the after sails are at the same time adjusted to
stand upon the other board. Finally, when the ship has fallen off five
or six points, the master exclaims, “Let go and haul;” then the sails
on the foremast are with great rapidity wheeled about by their braces.
In this manɶuvre the mate will see to the adjustment of the fore-yards,
while the master usually trims the after-yards, guiding the men at the
work by such exclamations as, “Well! the main yard;” “Topsail yard, a
small pull on weather braces;” “Topgallant yard, well;” so that every
sail may be trimmed up sharp to the wind.
[Sidenote: Reefing topsails.]
In reefing topsails, the chief mate, except in small vessels, keeps his
place forward, and looks out for the men on the yards. But he sometimes
goes aloft with the men in vessels of 500 or 600 tons, and takes his
place at the weather earring. If both topsails are reefed at once, his
place is at the main; but if one sail is reefed at a time, he leads
the men from one yard to the other, in all cases taking the weather
earring,[415] acting in a similar manner when the courses require to
be reefed; but he is not required, as a rule, to work with his hands,
except in an emergency, like the second mate and the seamen, his time
and attention being sufficiently taken up with superintending and
giving orders.[416]
[Sidenote: Log-book.]
The law looks upon the chief mate as standing in a different relation
to the master from that of the second mate or the men. He is considered
a confidential person, to whom the owners, shippers, and insurers
look, in some measure, for special duties and qualifications. The
master, therefore, cannot remove him from office, when abroad, except
under very peculiar circumstances, and then must be able to prove his
action in the matter justifiable. One of these duties which the law
throws upon him, as we have shown, is the keeping of the log-book. This
is a very important trust, as the record of the evidence of everything
occurring during the voyage, the position of the ship, the sail she
was under, the wind, and so forth, at any one given moment, may become
matters of great consequence to all concerned. So it is in like
manner with reference to anything that may occur between the master
or officers and the crew. Each officer, at the end of his watch, not
merely enters on the log-slate, which usually lies on the cabin table,
or in some convenient place, the courses, distances, wind and weather
during his watch, and anything worthy of note that may have occurred,
but it is the duty of the chief mate once in twenty-four hours to
copy from the slate the entries into the log-book, and to vouch for
their accuracy, although the master usually examines it, making any
corrections or observations he may consider necessary. The practice,
however, of copying from the slate after it had been submitted to the
master, led, in many instances, to great abuse, as the chief mate then
became only the instrument of the master, and, too frequently, entered
in the log-book whatever the latter might dictate. But these abuses
have been remedied by the authorization, under the Merchant Shipping
Act, of official logs, to which we shall refer hereafter, as well as
to the numerous important changes in the merchant service of England
which have since been made.
[Sidenote: Mate successor in law to the Master.]
[Sidenote: Mode of address to Chief and Second Mates.]
The law also makes the chief mate the successor to the master in
case the latter should die, or be unable to perform the duties of
his office; and this without any action on the part of the crew when
at sea, or of the consignees of the vessel when in harbour abroad.
It is always important, therefore, that to the practical seamanship
and activity necessary for the discharge of the proper duties of his
office the mate should add a sufficient knowledge of navigation, to
be able to carry the ship on her voyage should anything happen to the
master. In the case of a ship coming from the East Indies, there is
a decision that no ship insured can be deemed _seaworthy_ unless she
have on board, at the time of sailing, a mate competent to take command
of the ship in the event of the death or sickness of the master. This
principle, however, can in strictness only be applied to long voyages,
and a high American authority calls it in question.[417] Both the
chief and second mates are always addressed by their surnames, with
the courteous prefix of “Mr.,” and are answered with the addition
of “Sir.” This is a requirement of ship’s duty, and an intentional
omission of such courtesies constitutes an offence against the rules
and understanding of the service.
[Sidenote: Duties of Second Mate.]
The duties of the second mate are to command the starboard watch when
the master is not on deck, and to lead the crew in their work. It
was not formerly deemed indispensably necessary that he should be a
navigator, or even be able to keep a journal; but it is obvious that
many advantages must have resulted from his being acquainted with
navigation, together with a general competency to keep the log, so
that he might have the chance of promotion, in the contingency of any
accident happening to the chief mate, or of his removal from office.
The second mate, however, does not even now, either by law or custom,
necessarily succeed to the office of chief mate in the same manner that
the chief mate succeeds to that of master: it lies in the discretion
of the master, for the time being, to appoint whom he pleases to the
office of chief mate; nevertheless, if the second mate be really fit to
perform the duties of the office, he is usually appointed.
When the starboard watch alone is on deck, and the master is below, the
whole of the duties devolve on the second mate, he alone being then in
charge of the ship. In furling sails, the second mate also goes aloft
to the topsails and courses, and takes the “bunt,”[418] that being an
important place in all such operations. He is not expected to go on the
mizen topsail-yard for any service, and though, in bad weather, and in
case of necessity, he would do so, yet it would be out of the usual
course. He might also, in heavy weather, assist in furling the jib, but
he never furls a top-gallant sail, royal, or flying-jib. In short,
the fore or main-topsail and the courses are the only sails which the
second mate is expected to handle, either in reefing or furling.
Although the proper place for the second mate on a yard is the bunt in
furling, and at the weather earring in reefing, when the first mate is
not aloft [and it is the custom to give him every chance] yet he cannot
retain them by virtue of his office; and if he has not the necessary
strength or skill for the stations, it is no breach of duty in a
seaman to take them from him; on the contrary, he must always expect
in such a case to give them up to a smarter man. If the second mate
is a youngster, as is sometimes the case, being put forward early for
the sake of “promotion,” or if he is not active and ambitious, he will
refrain from attempting to take the bunt or weather earring.
[Sidenote: Ordinary day’s work.]
In the ordinary day’s work on shipboard the second mate works with his
hands like a common seaman. Indeed he ought to be the best mechanical
seaman on board, and be able to take upon himself the nicest and most
difficult jobs, or to show the men how to do them. Among the various
pieces of work constantly going forward on the vessel and rigging there
are some that require more skill and are less irksome than others. The
assignment of all these duties belongs to the chief mate, and if the
second mate is a good seaman, he will have the best and most important
work allotted to him; as, for instance, fitting, turning in, and
setting up rigging, rattling[419] down, and making the neater straps,
coverings, graftings,[420] pointings, etc.; but if he is not, he will
have to employ himself upon the inferior jobs, such as are usually
assigned to ordinary seamen and boys. But whatever may be his capacity,
he “carries on the work,” when his watch alone is on deck, under
directions previously received from the chief mate or commander.
It is a common saying among seamen that a man does not get his hands
out of the tar-bucket by becoming second mate. The obvious meaning of
which is, that as a great deal of tar is used in working upon rigging,
and it is always put on by hand, the second mate is expected to put
his hands to it as the others do. If the chief mate were to manipulate
any piece of work, and it should be necessary to put any tar on it,
he might call some one to tar it for him, as all labour by hand is
voluntary with him; but the second mate would be expected to do this
for himself, as a part of his work. These matters, however trivial
in themselves, serve to illustrate the different lights in which the
duties of the officers are regarded by all seafaring men. But there are
some inferior services, such as slushing down masts and sweeping decks,
in which the second mate takes no part; and if he were ordered to do so
it would be considered as a punishment, and if resisted might lead to a
difficulty.
In working ship, making or taking in sails, the second mate pulls and
hauls about deck with the rest of the men. Indeed, in all the work he
is expected to join in, he should be the first man to take hold, both
leading the men and working himself. In one point, however, he differs
from the seamen, in that he never takes the helm. That duty is left
to the men, who steer the vessel under the direction of the master or
officer of the deck. He is also not expected to go aloft to reeve or
unreeve rigging, rig in and out booms when making or taking in sail, or
other minor duties. In the event, however, of any accident, as carrying
away a mast or yard, or if any unusual work is going on aloft, as the
sending up or down of topmasts or topsail yards, or getting rigging
over the mast-head, sending down or bending a heavy sail in a gale of
wind, or the like, then the second mate should be there to take charge
of the work.
[Sidenote: Care of spare rigging.]
[Sidenote: Stores.]
Another important part of the duties of a second mate, when there
is no boatswain on board, is to take charge of the spare rigging,
hawsers, blocks, sails, and small stuffs, and of the instruments for
working upon rigging, as marlinspikes, serving-boards, and so forth.
If, for instance, the chief mate orders a man to do a piece of work
with certain implements and certain kinds of materials, the man will
apply to the second mate for them, and he must supply them. If there is
no sail-maker on board, the second mate is required to attend to the
stowing away of the spare sails, and whenever one is called for it is
his duty to go below and find it. So also with the stores. It is his
duty to see to the stowing away of the water, bread, beef, pork, and
all the provisions of the vessel; and whenever a new cask of water or
barrel of provisions is to be opened, the second mate must attend to
it.
While in port, when cargo is taking in or discharging, the place of
the second mate, as we have pointed out, is in the hold; but if the
vessel is lying at anchor, so that the cargo has to be brought on or
off in the boats belonging to the ship, then the boating duty falls
upon the second mate, who goes and comes in the boats, and looks after
the landing and taking off of the goods. The chief mate seldom leaves
the vessel when in port; he is considered as the shipkeeper. So if a
warp or kedge is to be carried out, or a boat is lowered at sea, as in
boarding another vessel, or when a man has fallen overboard, in all
such cases the second mate should take charge of the boat.
[Sidenote: Third Mate.]
[Sidenote: His general duties.]
Merchant vessels bound on long voyages, in which there are many
vicissitudes to be anticipated, sometimes carry a third mate; this
practice has only obtained of late years, and his precise duties
have scarcely become settled by usage. He does not, however, command
a watch, except in very large vessels, but belongs to the larboard
watch, and assists the chief mate in his duties. He goes aloft with
the larboard watch to reef and furl, as the second mate does with the
starboard, and performs very nearly the same duties aloft and about
decks. If he is a good seaman he will take the earring and bunt on
the head-yards, as the second mate does on the after-yards; and in
the allotment of work he will be favoured with the most important
jobs, if fit to perform them; otherwise he will be put upon the work
of an ordinary seaman. He is not expected to handle the light sails.
He stands no helm, lives aft, and will look out for the vessel at
meal-times, if the second mate dines with the master and chief mate.
While in port he should be in the hold or in the boats, as his services
may be needed, thus dividing the labour with the second mate. Perhaps
his place would more properly be in the boats, as that is considered
more in the light of fatigue duty. He also relieves the second mate of
the charge of the stores, and sees to the weighing and measuring of the
allowances; and in his watch on deck he relieves the chief mate of the
inferior parts of his duty, such as washing decks in the morning, and
looking after the boys in clearing up the decks at night.
Here it may be remarked that the expression _mate_ implies, in its
general sense, an assistant, as boatswain’s mate, carpenter’s mate,
sail-maker’s mate, steward’s mate, cook’s mate, and when a surgeon is
on board, and has an assistant, he too is designated a mate.
[Sidenote: Carpenter.]
Almost every merchant vessel of a large class, or bound upon a long
voyage, carries a carpenter. His duty is to work at his trade under the
direction of the master, and to assist in all-hands work, according to
his ability. If he ships for an able seaman as well as carpenter, he
must be capable of doing seaman’s work upon the rigging, and taking
his turn at the wheel, if called upon. If he does not expressly ship
for seaman as well as carpenter, no nautical skill can be required of
him; but he must still, when all hands are called, or if ordered by
the master, pull and haul about decks, and go aloft in the work usual
on such occasions, as reefing and furling. Though not an officer,
and unable to give an order to the smallest boy, he is nevertheless
a privileged person. He lives in the steerage with the other petty
officers, has charge of the ship’s chest of tools, and in all things
connected with his trade is under the sole direction of the master.[421]
[Sidenote: Sail-maker.]
Almost all ships of the largest class carry a sail-maker, although
usually the older seamen are sufficiently skilled in the trade to make
and mend sails, and the master or chief mate should know how to cut
them out. With regard to the duties of the sail-maker, the same remarks
apply to him that were made upon the carpenter. If the sail-maker
ships also for seaman, he must do an able seaman’s duty, if called
upon; and if he does not so ship, he will still be required to assist
in all-hands work, according to his ability; and in bad weather, or
in case of necessity, he may be put with a watch, and required to
do ship’s duty with the rest. In all-hands work he is mustered with
either watch, according to circumstances. He usually lives in the
steerage[422] with the carpenter, and always, like him, takes his food
from the galley. He has no command, and when on deck his place is on
the forecastle with the rest of the crew. In the work of his trade he
too is under the sole direction of the master, or of the chief mate in
the master’s absence; and in ship’s work he is as strictly under the
command of the mates as is a common seaman.
[Sidenote: Steward.]
The duties of steward vary according to the description of merchant
or passenger vessel in which he may be employed. In the higher class
of packet-ships, where there are numerous first-class passengers, and
where a good table is kept, the steward has waiters or under-stewards,
who perform most of the labours of attendance, the chief having the
general superintendence of the whole. It is his duty to see that
the cabin and state-rooms are kept in order; to see to the laying
and clearing of the tables; to take care of the dishes and utensils
appertaining thereto; to provide the meals, under the master’s
directions, preparing the most delicate dishes himself; to keep the
general charge of the pantry and stores for the cabin; to look after
the cook in his department, and generally to attend to the comfort and
convenience of the passengers. These duties generally absorb all his
time and attention, and he is not called upon for any ship’s duty.
In ordinary merchant vessels the steward performs the work which
falls to the under-stewards of the large packets; cleans the cabin
and state-rooms; sets, tends, and clears away the table; provides
everything for the cook; and has charge of the pantry, where all
the table furnishings and the small stores are kept. He is also the
body-servant of the master. His relation to the chief mate is not,
it appears, quite settled; but the general understanding is, that,
although he waits upon him at table, and must obey him in all matters
relating to the ship’s work, yet he is not in any respect his servant.
If the mate wished any personal service done, he would solicit it, or
make some compensation.
In small vessels the steward must come on deck whenever all hands
are called, and in working ship pulls and hauls about decks with the
men. The main sheet is called the steward’s rope, and this he lets go
and hauls aft in tacking and wearing. In reefing and furling he is
expected to go upon the lower and topsail yards, and especially the
mizen topsail yard of a ship. No seamanship is expected from him, and
he stands no watch, sleeping in at night, and turning out at daylight;
yet he must do ship’s duty according to his ability when all hands are
called for working ship, or for taking in or making sail. In these
things he obeys the mates in the same way that a common seaman would,
and is punishable for disobedience.
[Sidenote: Cook.]
The cook almost always lives in the forecastle, though sometimes in the
steerage. He stands no watch, sleeping in at night, and working at his
business during the day. He spends his time mostly in the cook-house,
which is called the “galley,” where he cooks both for the cabin and
forecastle. This, with keeping the galley, boilers, pans, kids, and
other cooking utensils in order, occupies him during the entire day. He
is, however, called with all hands, and in tacking and wearing, works
the fore-sheet. He is also expected to pull and haul about decks in
all-hands work, and is occasionally called from his galley to give a
pull at a tackle or halyards.[423]
Seafaring persons, before the mast, are divided into three classes:
able seamen, ordinary seamen, and boys, or “green hands.” If any man is
found incompetent to perform the duty he contracts for, his wages can
not only be reduced to the grade for which he is fitted, but something
additional is occasionally deducted for the deception practised, and
for the loss of service, besides the difficulties which too frequently
arise from his misrepresentation, the crew justly deeming it a sort of
fraud upon themselves. If, for instance, the articles provide for six
able seamen, the men expect as many; and if one of them proves unequal
to his assumed rating, the duties which would be commonly done by six
seamen will fall upon the five, leaving the vessel short-handed for
the voyage. But the hardship is felt still more in the watches, for
if the delinquent is not a capable helmsman, the increased duty at
the wheel alone would of itself be a serious evil. The officers also
feel at liberty to punish a man who has so imposed upon all hands, and
accordingly every kind of inferior and disagreeable duty is put upon
him; and as he finds no sympathy from the crew, his situation on board
is made very unpleasant.
[Sidenote: Their duties.]
To “haul, reef, and steer” constitute a sailor in ordinary phraseology,
but something more is required from an able seaman, who should, in
addition to these duties, be a good workman on rigging; and a man’s
skill in this work is the chief test of his seamanship; a competent
knowledge of steering, reefing, furling, and the like being taken for
granted, and being no more than is expected from an ordinary seaman,
though there is, of course, a great deal of difference in the relative
skill and neatness of the work of different men; but no man will pass
for an able seaman, in a square-rigged vessel, who cannot make a
long and short splice, fit a blockstrap, pass seizings[424] to lower
rigging, and make the ordinary knots in a fair and workmanlike manner.
[Sidenote: Division of their labour.]
In working ship the able seamen are stationed variously; though for the
most part upon the forecastle, at the main tack or fore and main lower
and topsail braces; the light hands being placed at the cross-jack, and
fore and main top-gallant and royal braces. In taking in and making
sail, and in all things connected with the working of the vessel, there
is no duty which may not be required of an able seaman; yet there are
certain things requiring more skill and strength, to which he is always
put, and others which are as invariably assigned to ordinary seamen and
boys.[425] In reefing, the able seamen go out to the yard-arms, and
the light hands stand in toward the slings; while in furling, the bunt
and quarters belong to the able seamen, and the yard-arms to the boys.
The light hands are expected to loose and furl the light sails, such
as royals, flying-jib, and mizen top-gallant sail, and the men seldom
go above the cross-trees, except to work upon the rigging, or to send
a mast or yard up or down. The fore and main top-gallant sails, and
sometimes the flying-jib of large vessels, require one or more able
seamen for furling, but are loosed by light hands.
[Sidenote: Duties of ordinary seamen.]
An ordinary seaman is expected to hand, reef, and steer, under the
usual circumstances, and to be competent to “box the compass.”[426]
He must likewise be acquainted with all the running and standing
rigging of a ship; be able to reeve the studding sail gear, and set
a top-gallant or royal studding sail out of the top; loose and furl
a royal, and a small top-gallant sail or flying-jib; and perhaps
also send down or cross a royal yard. But he need not be a complete
helmsman, and if an able seaman should be put into his place at the
wheel in bad weather, or when a ship is steered with difficulty, it
would be no imputation upon him, provided he could take his turn[427]
creditably under ordinary circumstances. But his duty depends a good
deal upon whether there are boys or green hands on board or not. If
there are, he has a preference over them, as an able seaman has over
him in the light work; and since he stands his helm regularly, and
is occasionally set to work upon rigging with the men, he will be
favoured accordingly in the watch, and in common duty about decks. The
distinction, however, between ordinary seamen and boys is not very
nicely observed in the merchant service, and an ordinary seaman is
frequently called upon for boy’s duty, though there are boys on board
and at hand. If an officer wished for some one to loose a royal, take
a broom and sweep the decks, hold the log-reel, coil up a rope, or the
like, he would probably first call upon a boy, if at hand; if not, upon
an ordinary seaman; but upon either of them indifferently before an
able seaman.
[Sidenote: Boys or apprentices.]
We have already defined the term _boys_, as embracing all green hands
of whatever age; as well as boys who, though they may have been at
sea before, are not strong enough to rate as ordinary seamen. It is a
common saying that a boy does not ship as knowing anything. Accordingly
if any one enters as a boy, and upon boy’s wages, he cannot be blamed,
although he may not know the name of a rope in the ship, or even the
stem from the stern. In the ordinary day’s work the boys are taught to
draw and knot yarns, make spun yarn, foxes, sennit, and so forth, and
are employed in passing a ball, or otherwise assisting the able seamen
in their jobs. Slushing masts, sweeping and clearing up decks, holding
the log-reel, coiling up the running rigging, and loosing and furling
the light sails are duties which are invariably put upon the boys or
green hands. They stand their watches like the rest, are called with
all hands, go aloft to reef and furl, and work whenever and wherever
the men do, the only difference being in the description of work upon
which they are put. In reefing, the boys lay in towards the slings of
the yard, and in furling go out to the yard-arms. They are sent aloft
immediately as soon as they get to sea, to accustom them to the motion
of the vessel, and to moving about in the rigging and on the yards.
Setting top-gallant studding sails, and reeving the gear, shaking
out reefs, learning the names and uses of all the ropes, and how to
make the common hitches, bends, and knots, are also included in the
knowledge first imparted to beginners. There is some difference in the
manner in which boys are put forward in different vessels. Sometimes
in large vessels, where there are plenty of men, the boys never take
the wheel, and are seldom put upon any but the most simple and inferior
duties. In others, they are allowed to take the wheel in light winds,
and gradually, if they are of sufficient age and strength, become
regular helmsmen. So also, in their duties aloft, if they are favoured,
they may be kept at the royals and top-gallant sails, and gradually
come to the earring of a mizen topsail.
[Sidenote: Bells.]
Bells mark the time at sea. At noon, eight bells are struck, that is
eight strokes are made upon the bell: and from that time it is struck
every half-hour throughout the twenty-four, beginning at one stroke,
but never exceeding eight. A watch of four hours runs out the bells.
Even bells come at the full hours, and the odd bells at the half-hours.
For instance, eight bells is always twelve, four, or eight o’clock;
and seven bells always half-past three, half-past seven, or half-past
eleven. They are sounded by two strokes following each other quickly,
and then a short interval: after which two more; and so on. If it is an
odd number, the odd one is struck alone, after the interval. This is to
make the counting more sure and easy; and by such means the distinction
between a full hour and a half-hour is more plainly indicated.
[Sidenote: Helm.]
Each watch steers the ship in its turn, and the watch on deck supplies
the helmsman, even when all hands are called. Each man stands at the
helm two hours, which is called his “trick.” Thus there are two tricks
in a watch. Sometimes, in very cold weather, the tricks are reduced
to one hour, and if the ship steers badly in a gale of wind, two men
are sent to the wheel at once. In this case the man who stands on the
weather side of the wheel is the responsible helmsman, the other at the
lee side merely assisting him by steadying it or aiding its more rapid
revolution.
[Sidenote: “Tricks” at the helm.]
The men in the watch usually arrange their tricks among themselves,
the officers being satisfied so long as there is always a man ready to
take the helm at the proper time. In steering, the helmsman stands on
the weather side of a wheel, and on the lee side of a tiller. But when
steering by tiller-ropes with no hitch round the tiller-head, or with a
tackle, as in a heavy gale and a rough cross sea, when it is necessary
to ease the helm a good deal, it is better to stand up to windward and
steer by means of the tiller-ropes.
[Sidenote: Relieving duty.]
In relieving the wheel, the man should come aft on the lee side of the
quarter-deck, as indeed he almost invariably does, and go to the wheel
behind the helmsman, taking hold of the spokes so as to have the wheel
in command before the other lets go. Before letting go the helmsman
gives the course in an audible voice to the man that relieves him, who
repeats it aloud, just as it was given, so as to make it sure that he
has heard it correctly. This is especially necessary, since the points
and half-points are so much alike that a mistake might easily be made.
It is the duty of the officer of the watch to be present when the wheel
is relieved, in order to see that the course is correctly reported and
understood; which is another reason why the course should be spoken in
a loud tone of voice.
[Sidenote: Orders at the wheel.]
If a vessel is sailing close-hauled and does not lay her course, the
order is “Full and by;” which means, by the wind, yet all full. If she
lays her course, the order then is her course, as N.W. by W. or W.S.W.,
and the like. When a man is at the wheel he has nothing else to attend
to but steering the ship, and no conversation should be allowed with
him. If he wishes to be relieved, it should not be done without the
permission of the officer, and the same form of giving and repeating
the course must be gone through, even though absent from the helm for
only a few minutes.
[Sidenote: Repeating of orders at wheel.]
If an order is given to the man at the helm as to his steering, he
should always repeat the order distinctly, that the officer may be sure
he is understood. For instance, if the order is a new course, or “Keep
her off a point,” “Luff a little,” “Ease her,” “Meet her,” or the like,
the helmsman should answer by repeating the course or order, echoing
the precise words, and should not answer, “Ay, ay, sir,” or simply
execute the order as he understands it. This practice of repeating
every word, even the most minute order at the wheel, is well understood
among seamen, and a failure or refusal to do so is an offence sometimes
leading to disagreeable results. If, when the watch is out and the
other watch has been called, all hands are detained for any purpose,
such as reefing topsails, setting studding sails, or the like, the helm
should not be relieved until the work is done and the watch ready to go
below.
[Sidenote: Conversation not allowed while on duty.]
In well-disciplined vessels no conversation is allowed among the
men when they are employed at their work; that is to say, it is not
allowed in the presence of an officer or of the master; and although,
when two or more men are together aloft, or by themselves on deck,
a little low conversation might not be noticed, yet if it seemed to
take off their attention, or to attract the attention of others, it
would be considered a misdemeanour. In this practice variations occur
in different vessels. Coasters, colliers, or other small vessels on
short voyages, do not preserve the same rule; but no seaman who has
been accustomed to first-class ships will object to a strictness as
to conversation and laughing, while at the day’s work, very nearly
as great as is observed in a school. While the crew are below in the
forecastle great licence is given them; and the severest officer will
never interfere with the noise and sport of the forecastle, unless it
is an inconvenience to those who are on the deck. In working ship,
when the men are at their stations, the same silence and decorum are
observed. But during the dog-watches, as already noticed, and when the
men are together on the forecastle at night, and no work going forward,
smoking, singing, spinning yarns (telling stories), and so forth are
allowed; and, in fact, a considerable degree of noise and skylarking is
permitted, unless it amounts to positive disorder and disturbance.
It is a good rule to enforce, that whenever a man aloft wishes anything
to be done on deck, he should hail the officer of the deck, and not
call out, as is sometimes done, to any one whom he sees about the deck.
The proper place for the seamen when they are on deck, and are not at
work, is on the forecastle, which comprises so much of the upper deck
as is forward of the after fore-shroud. There the crew may have their
meals, if they choose, in fine weather. Their food is cooked in the
galley. It is placed in wooden tubs, or “kids,” by the cook and taken
away by the men. Tea or coffee is also served out to the men, each of
whom provides his own eating utensils, usually consisting of a tin pot,
an iron spoon, and his “jack-knife,” which serves alike for fork and
carver, and numerous other purposes. Such was, and still is to a large
extent, the internal economy of the ordinary merchant sailing vessels
of all nations.
Before closing our remarks on the vessels of other days, there is one
class which ought to receive more than a passing notice, and that is
the English collier. Mr. Cooke furnishes an admirable illustration
of one of these vessels, now being fast superseded by steam, in the
following sketch.
[Illustration: COLLIER.—E. W. COOKE, R.A.]
The average size of the regular collier has long been about 230 tons
register, with a capacity of from fourteen to seventeen keels of
coals;[428] and they were chiefly employed in the trade between the
northern coal ports and London, although a considerable number of them
were required to supply the wants of the outports (especially before
the introduction of railways), and to these many of them still trade
as well as to London. The crew of each vessel generally consisted
of ten persons, all told, comprising the master, mate, and cook—who
also performed seaman’s duty—five sailors, and two boys. Their duties
were of the most arduous description. They were usually engaged for
the voyage at a sum which included the discharge of the cargo, and
sometimes the supply of their own provisions. Mr. Cooke furnishes an
illustration of one of these vessels discharging her coals in the
Pool (see below). The men are employed, as will be seen, “jumping” the
coals in baskets, which, after passing through the weighing machine,
are delivered into barges alongside. This jumping operation required a
good deal of practical skill, and greenhorns often got awkward falls.
It consisted of four men who held in their hands whip lines, attached
to a rope, which was passed over a single pulley with a basket fastened
to the end of it. As the basket was being lowered into the hold the men
walked up a temporary platform, not unlike an ordinary four-barred
gate placed slightly on the incline. When the basket was filled with
coals they “jumped” from the top of this stage on to the deck, the
weight of their bodies raising the basket in one whip to a point where
a man in attendance could instantaneously capsize its contents into the
weighing machine; thus the operation of discharging the coals proceeded
with extraordinary rapidity.
[Illustration: COLLIER DISCHARGING.—E. W. COOKE, R.A.]
Perhaps no branch of maritime commerce ever produced hardier or more
alert seamen than that of the Northern coal trade. During her great
naval engagements England looked to that trade more than to any other
for the best, or at least the hardest and most daring seamen for her
navy. Indeed, it afforded a supply of men who could go aloft in any
weather and fight the guns, with the green sea frequently rolling
through the port-holes. They never saw danger. Accustomed to work their
way amongst shoals and sandbanks, and along iron-bound coasts in their
frail craft, and during the most tempestuous weather, the shelter of a
man-of-war was like a haven of rest to them. But though they frequently
faced dangers without a thought which would have made the regular
man-of-war’s man tremble, they stood sadly in want of discipline, and
were with great difficulty trained to order, so that the comparatively
easy life of a man-of-war’s man had few attractions for them. On board
of the collier, master, mate, and men smoked their pipes together; and
if they did not mess from the same kid, they were in all other respects
pretty much alike, creating an equality and freedom more in accordance
with their habits and tastes than the drill and daily routine of the
royal navy.
FOOTNOTES:
[406] It was not until 1850, when the English Navigation Laws were
repealed, that any material advance was made by the shipowners of Great
Britain in the improvement of their vessels. In that year, when they
were in a very desponding state, seeing nothing before them but “ruin,”
the result, as they conceived, of an entirely free-trade policy, the
author had the hardihood to order to be built, for his own use in the
trade between London, Australia, and India, six ships, each of an
average size of eight hundred tons register, and with a capacity of
from eleven hundred to fourteen hundred tons, according to the nature
of the cargo. The crew of each of these vessels consisted of the
master, first and second officers, steward, cook, boatswain, carpenter,
sail-maker, seventeen seamen, and five apprentices, or thirty “all
told;” a very great difference, as will be seen, in the capacity
and current expenditure, but no great advance in the proportionate
dimensions, for the length was only one hundred and forty-five feet
to a beam of thirty-one feet, and twenty-two feet depth of hold. Such
was the popular prejudice even then among British shipowners against
any material increase in the length. The impression had prevailed for
centuries that a long ship must be weak, and a narrow one dangerous,
from her “liability to capsize;” and no amount of argument would
convince the old school of shipowners to the contrary. At last the
author, anxious to practically test this question, built in 1853,
contrary to the advice of numerous well-meaning friends, an iron
sailing ship, which in length measured close upon seven times the width
of her beam. Such a “monstrous” deviation from “established rules,”
and that, too, in a “tin kettle,” the name by which the comparatively
few iron ships then built were familiarly known, created considerable
discussion, mingled with many gloomy forebodings as to the result. The
ship, when finished, loaded in London and sailed, with a general cargo
and her full complement of passengers, for Australia. She encountered
rough weather, and meeting with some slight accident, had to anchor
in the Downs for repair. The captain, officers, and crew were fully
satisfied with the strength, safety, and good sea-going qualities of
the ship; but after this trivial accident the popular outcry against
her became so strong that the author recalled her, and despatched
the passengers to their destination in another vessel. Though his
pecuniary loss was very considerable, he resolved to make it rather
than encounter the howl of indignation which must have arisen had he
sent the ship to sea and any disaster befallen her, which might have
happened to any other ship, whereby the lives of the passengers were
lost or placed in jeopardy. The crew remained by her. No alteration
whatever was made in her construction. She proceeded almost immediately
afterwards, with a full cargo of general merchandise, to Bombay, and
on her return the captain reported that he never sailed in a finer or
safer sea-going vessel. Such vessels are now very common, and many
of them, especially steamers, are much more extreme in length in
proportion to their beam.—So much for popular prejudice.
[407] “Slops,” general term for ready-made clothes (Maydman, 1691). In
a MS. wardrobe of Queen Elizabeth there is an order to John Fortescue
to deliver some fustian for “sloppe for Jack Green, our foole” (Adm. W.
H. Smyth, p. 633).
[408] These duties were too frequently overlooked, and the
accommodation for seamen when at sea, or in harbour abroad, is
still far from being as comfortable as the ordinary run of cheap
lodging-houses on shore, although it has been greatly improved of
late years, more especially since the Merchant Shipping Act came into
operation. Previously it was generally of a wretched description, and
as the Author has the most vivid recollection of the forecastle of the
ship in which he served his apprenticeship, a description of it may
serve to illustrate an ordinary specimen of the sea homes of sailors
forty years ago.
The vessel in which he served was about four hundred and twenty tons
register, and of North American build. She was ship-rigged, and had a
flush deck, that is, there were no erections upon the deck except the
galley or cook-house, which stood before the long-boat; on each side of
both were lashed, to ring-bolts in the deck, the spare spars, and to
these were again lashed a row of puncheons or butts filled with fresh
water. This vessel was employed in the trade between Great Britain
and Demerara, making occasionally a voyage to the Bay of Fundy (Nova
Scotia) for lumber, a description of boards used for the heading of rum
and molasses casks and sugar hogsheads. Her crew (she had more than the
usual complement) consisted of twenty-one persons all told, comprising
the master, or “captain,” first and second mates, and steward, all
of whom lived in the cabin. Besides these there were the carpenter,
cooper, and cook—who with the steward were expected to assist in
seaman’s duties—ten seamen, and four apprentices. One of the latter
lived with the carpenter and cooper in a place called the “steerage,”
that is, a small space temporarily separated by some rough stauncheons
and boards from the cargo in the square of the after-hatch. Here their
tools, with various rope and sail stores, were also kept. The cook,
ten seamen, and three apprentices had their abode in the forecastle.
This place, which was in the “’tween decks” at the extremity of the
bow, may have been about twenty-one feet in width at the after or
widest part, tapering gradually away to a narrow point at the stern.
The length in midships was somewhere about twenty feet, but much less
as the sides of the vessel were approached. The height was five feet
from deck to beam, or about five feet nine inches from deck to deck at
the greatest elevation between the beams; the only approach to it being
through a scuttle or hole in the main deck, about two and a half feet
square. Beyond this hole there were no means of obtaining either light
or ventilation, and in bad weather, when the sea washed over the deck,
the crew had to do as best they could without either, or receive the
air mixed with spray, and sometimes accompanied by the almost unbroken
crest of a wave, which, in defiance of all the tarpaulin guards, too
frequently found its way through the scuttle. Here fourteen persons
slept in hammocks suspended from the beams, and had their daily food.
There was no room for tables, chairs, or stools, so that the tops
of their sea-chests in which they kept their clothes and all their
possessions, were substituted for those useful and necessary household
articles. In fact so closely were these chests packed that it was
difficult to sit astride them, the mode which the sailors found most
convenient for taking their meals, especially in rough weather. But
the whole of this limited space was not appropriated to the use of
the crew, for it contained a rough deal locker, in which the beef and
soup-kids and other utensils were kept, while the stout staunchions
or knight-heads which supported the windlass on the upper deck came
through the forecastle, and were bolted to the lower beams; and too
frequently, when the ship was very full of cargo, a row of water-casks
and provisions were stowed along the after-bulkhead, which was a
temporary erection; while on the top of these, cables, coils of rope,
and numerous other articles were piled. At all times it was a foulsome
and suffocating abode, and in bad weather the water and filth which
washed about the deck and among the chests and casks created the most
intolerable and loathsome stench. Here, however, these fourteen sailors
and apprentices slept, washed, dressed, and had their food, except in
fine weather, when they took their meals on deck, their food consisting
almost entirely of inferior salted pork, beef, which was sometimes
nearly as hard and unpalatable as the kids in which it was served, and
brown biscuits, too often mouldy and full of maggots. To make matters
worse, the forecastle of the ship to which the Author refers was full
of rats, and he has the most vivid recollection of one of these animals
on more than one occasion finding its way into the hammock where he
slept. In the West Indies the place was so suffocatingly hot that
the sailors invariably slept wherever they could find a clear place
upon deck or in the tops; and in winter, when approaching the English
Channel, or when on an intermediate voyage to the Bay of Fundy, it was
as bitterly cold, no stoves or fires of any kind being allowed on board
except in the galley and in the cabin. No Siberian slaves ever suffered
so much from the intensity of the cold as did those of the sailors and
apprentices of that ship, who had not deserted, during two months of
a winter when she lay at anchor in one of the roadsteads of the Bay.
The bow ports were then obliged to be open to receive the cargo, and
could only be covered with matting during the night. One of these ports
opened upon the forecastle, so that its occupants might almost as well
have slept upon deck, their damp clothes as they lay upon the chests or
hung suspended from the beams being frequently frozen to such an extent
that the ice had to be beaten from them before they could be again used.
[409] “Wearing” is the reverse of tacking. The head of the vessel in
this operation is put away from the wind and turned twenty points of
the compass, instead of twelve, and without strain is brought up on
the opposite tack. Lords St. Vincent, Exmouth, and other distinguished
naval officers preferred “wearing” when possible, as less damaging
to the sails and spars than tacking; but in merchant vessels, where
progress is an object, tacking, when practicable, is invariably adopted.
[410] Dana’s ‘Seaman’s Friend.’
[411] “Serving,” or service-rope, is spun yarn wound round a rope by
means of a serving board or mallet (Adm. W. H. Smyth, p. 608).
[412] The Dutch government do not compel the owners of merchant vessels
to take any fixed number of seamen, as was required in British ships
under the Navigation Act, but the Dutch Commercial Society, a very
large trading company, appears to have made a regulation in the year
1843, that every Dutch ship which went out to Batavia should take on
board one ass for every hundred tons! Evidence of Mr. William von
Houten before a Committee of the House of Commons, 1843.
[413] Evidence given before a Committee of the House of Commons, 1843.
[414] Nautical terms for raising and stowing the anchor.
[415] The “earrings” are small ropes to fasten the upper corners of the
sail to the yard. The “courses” are the sails hanging from the lower
yards of a ship, viz, the mainsail, foresail, and mizen. A ship is said
to be “under her courses” when no other sails are set (Admiral W. H.
Smyth, pp. 270 and 218).
[416] In a man-of-war there is always a lieutenant of the watch on the
weather side of the quarter-deck, but it is not so in the merchant
service. When the ordinary day’s work is going forward the mates must
be about the decks or aloft, like the petty officers of a ship of war;
and it is only while the work is going forward, or in bad weather, on
Sundays, or at night, that the officer of the watch, if the master is
not there, keeps the quarter-deck.
[417] Chancellor Kent impugns this decision, and says the warranty of
seaworthiness implies no more than that the assured must have a sound
and well-equipped vessel, with reference to the voyage, and have on
board a competent person as _master_, a competent person as _mate_,
and a competent crew as _seamen_; and he cites cases where, as regards
the American coasting and West India trades, this doctrine has been
discarded. (See Arnold’s work, p. 721.)
[418] The “bunt” is the middle part or cavity of the square sails, that
is, of the mainsail, foresail, topsails, and top-gallant sails.
[419] “Ratlings,” or rat-lines, are small ropes crossing the shrouds
parallel with the deck, and answering the purpose of the rounds of a
ladder.
[420] “Graftings” are ornamental weavings of fine yarn, etc, on the
strop of a block; applied also to the tapering ends of ropes, sometimes
called “pointings” (Admiral W. H. Smyth, pp. 562 and 345).
[421] The chief mate has no authority over the carpenter _in his
trade_, except in the case of the master’s absence or disability. In
all things pertaining to the working of the vessel, however, and as far
as he acts in the capacity of seaman, he must obey the orders of the
officers as implicitly as any of the crew; though, perhaps, an order
from the second mate would come somewhat in the form of a request.
Nevertheless there is no doubt, in point of discipline, he must obey
the second mate in his proper place, as much as he would the master in
his. Although the carpenter lives in the steerage, he gets his food
from the galley, from the same mess with the men in the forecastle,
having no better or different fare in any respect, and he has no right
on the quarter-deck, but must take his place on the forecastle with
the common seamen. In many vessels, during fine weather and on long
voyages, the carpenter stands no watch, but “sleeps in” at night, is
called at daylight, and works all day at his trade.
[422] “Steerage” generally means the portion of the ’tween-decks just
before the gun-room bulk-head in ships of war, and below the after
hatchway in merchant vessels.
[423] In regular passenger-ships the cook is not required to do any
duty about decks, except in case of necessity, or of common danger. In
other vessels, if strongly manned, neither the cook nor steward is sent
upon the yards, yet it can, without doubt, be required of them, by the
usage and understanding of the Merchant Service, to go upon a topsail
or lower yard to reef or furl. In a merchant vessel where all hands are
called the order applies to every one on board except the passengers.
Those of the crew who do not keep watch are termed “idlers,” who
besides turning out with all hands, are sometimes called up to help the
watch on deck in any heavy or difficult duty in cases, when it is not
desirable to call the other watch, who may have had severe service.
[424] “Seizings,” the fastening of any two ropes, or of different parts
of the same rope, with turns of small stuff (Admiral W. H. Smyth, p.
606).
[425] In allotting the jobs among the crew, reference is always had to
a man’s rate and capacity, and it is considered a decided imputation
upon an “able seaman,” to put him upon inferior work, such as turning
the spunyarn winch, knotting yarns, or picking oakum, while there are
boys on board, or other work to be performed more within the line of
his knowledge and capacity.
[426] To repeat the names of the thirty-two points of the compass
in order and backwards, and to answer any questions relative to its
subdivisions (Admiral W. H. Smyth, ‘Sailor’s Word Book,’ p. 127).
[427] A seaman’s spell at the wheel is called his “trick.” (Ibid. p.
697.)
[428] A keel is 21 tons 5 cwt.
LIST OF ARTICLES IN APPENDIX.
No. PAGE
1. Letter of Mr. Robert Thorne to Dr. Ley, ambassador of
Charles V 541
2. Letter of Advice and Instruction from the Merchant Adventurers
Co. 555
3. Inventory of ye Great Barke, A.D. 1531 557
4. Furniture of the Harry Grâce à Dieu, in Pepysian Library
at Cambridge 559
5. Names of all the King’s Majesty’s Shippes, Galleys, etc.,
(official return, 1 Edw. VI.) (Archæologia) 561
6. Note of all Shippes bound to Turkey, etc., etc. 563
7. Mersey Docks and Harbour board 564
8. Extracts from Charter Party of E. I. C. 570
9. Ships of E. I. Company, etc., 1700-1819 572
10. Ships of E. I. C. in 1820 576
11. Historical Abstract of services of E. I. C. 578
12. List of Wages, E. I. C. 583
13. Victualling Bill of E. I. C. 585
14. List of Large Ships of E. I. C. in 1831 586
15. Memorial of Capt. George Probyn 588
APPENDICES.
APPENDIX No. 1, Vol. ii., p. 70.
_The Booke made by the Right Worshipful Mr. Robert Thorne, in the
yeere 1527, in Sivil, to Doctour Ley, Lord ambassadour for King
Henry the Eight, to Charles the Emperoar, being an information
of the parts of the world, discovered by him and by the King of
Portingal: and, also of the way to the Moluccaes by the North._
Right noble and reverend in I.C. I have received your letters, and have
procured and sent to know of your servant, who, your Lordship wrote,
should be sick in Merchena. I cannot there, or elsewhere heare of
him, without he be returned to you, or gon to _S. Lucar_, and shipt.
I cannot judge but that of some contagious sicknesse hee died, so
that the owner of the house, for defaming his house, would bury him
secretly, and not be knowen of it. For such things have often times
happened in this countrey.
Also to write unto your Lordship of the new trade of Spicery of the
Emperour, there is no doubt but that the Islands are fertile of cloues,
nutmegs, mace, and cinnamom; and that the said islands, with other
there about, abound with golde, rubies, diamonds, balasses, granates,
jacincts, and other stones and pearls, as all other lands that are
under and near the Equinoctiall. For we see where nature giveth
anything she is no nigard. For as with us, and other, that are aparted
from the said Equinoctiall, our mettals be lead, tin, and iron, so
theirs be gold, silver, and copper. And as our fruits and grains be
apples, nuts, and corne, so theirs be dates, nutmegs, pepper, cloues,
and other spices, and as we have jeat, amber, cristal, jasper, and
other like stones, so have they rubies, diamonds, balasses, saphyres,
jacincts, and other like. And though some say that of such precious
mettals, graines, or kind of spices, precious stones, the abundance
and quantity is nothing so great as our mettals, fruits, or stones,
above rehearsed; yet if it be well considered, how the quantitie of
the earth under the equinoctiall to both the Tropicall lines (in which
place is found the said golde, spices, and precious stones), is as
much in quantity as almost all the earth, from the Tropickes to both
the Poles; it cannot be denied but there is more quantitie of the sayd
mettals, fruites, spices, and precious stones, then there is of the
other mettals, and other things before rehearsed. And I see that the
preciousness of these things is measured after the distance that is
between us, and the things that we have appetite unto, for in this
navigation of the Spicerie was discovered, that these Islands nothing
set by golde, but set more by a knife and a nayle of iron, then by his
quantitie of golde, and with reason, as the thing more necessary for
mans service. And I doubt not but to them should be as precious our
corne and seeds, if they might have them, as to us their spice; and
likewise the pieces of glasse that here we have counterfeited are as
precious to them as to us their stones; which by experience is seen
daylie by them that have trade thither. This of the riches of those
countries is sufficient.
[Sidenote: Doctor Ley’s letters.]
[Sidenote: This was the fleet wherein Cabot discovered the river of
Plate, 1526.]
Touching that your Lordship wrote, whether it may bee profitable to
the Emperor or no; it may be without doubt of great profite; if, as
the king of _Portingal_ doth, he would become a merchant, and prouide
shippes and their lading, and trade thither alone, and defend the trade
of these Islands himselfe. But other greater businesse withholdeth
him from this. But still, as now it is begunne to be occupied, it
would come to much. For the shippes coming in safetie, there would
thither many every yere, of which to the Emperour is due of all the
wares and jewels that come from thence the fifth part for his custome
cleare without any cost. And besides this, hee putteth in every note a
certaine quantitie of money, of which hee enjoyeth of the gaines pound
and pounds like as other adventurers doe. In a fleete of three shippes
and a carauel that went from this city armed by the merchants of it,
which departed in April last past, I and my partener have one thousand
four hundred duckets that we employed in the said fleete, principally
for that two Englishmen, friends of mine, which are somewhat learned in
the Cosmographie, should goe in the same shippes, to bring me certaine
relation of the situation of the countrey, and to be expert in the
navigation of those seas, and there to have informations of many other
things, and advise that I desire to knowe especially. Seeing in these
quarters are shippes, and mariners of that countrey, and cardes by
which they saile, though much unlike ours, that they should procure to
have the said cards and learne how they understand them, and especially
to know what navigation they have for those islands northwards, and
northeastwards.
[Sidenote: The Newe found Islands discovered by the English.]
[Sidenote: Mappe of the World.]
For if from the said islands the sea did extend, without interposition
of land, to saile from the north point to the northeast poynt, one
thousand seven hundred, or one thousand eight hundred leagues, they
should come to the Newfound Islands that we discovered, and so we
should be neerer to the sayd Spicerie by almost two thousand leagues
then the Emperour, or the King of _Portingal_ are. And to advise your
Lordship whether of these Spiceries of the King of _Portingal_ or the
Emperours is nearer, and also of the titles that either of them hath,
and howe our New found lands are parted from it (for that by writing
without some demonstration it were hard to give any declaration of it)
I have caused that your Lordship shall receive herewith a little Mappe
or Carde of the World: the which I feare me shall put your Lordship
to more labour to understand than me to make it, onely for that it is
made in so little roome, that it cannot be but obscurely set out, that
is desired to be seene in it, and also for that I am in this science
little expert: yet to remedy in part this difficulty it is necessary
to declare to your Lordship my intent, with which I trust you perceive
in this Card part of your desire, if, for that I cannot expresse mine
intent, with my declaration I doe not make it more obscure.
First, your Lordship knoweth that the Cosmographers have divided the
earth by 360 degrees in latitude, and as many in longitude, under the
which is comprehended all the roundnes of the earth: the latitude being
divided into foure quarters, ninetie degrees amount to every quarter,
which they measure by the altitude of the Poles, that is the north and
south starres, being from the line Equinoctiall till they come right
under the north starre the said ninetie degrees, and as much from the
said line equinoctiall to the south starre be other ninety degrees. And
as much more is also from either of the said starres, agayne to the
Equinoctiall. Which imagined to bee round, is soone perceived thus,
360 degrees of latitude to be consumed in the said foure quarters of
ninetie degrees a quarter: so that this latitude is the measure of
the worlde from north to south, and from south to north. And the
longitude, in which are also counted other 360, is counted from west to
east or from east to west, as in the Card is set.
[Sidenote: To know the latitudes.]
The sayd latitude your Lordship may see marked and divided in the
ende of this Card on the left hand, so that if you would know in what
degrees of latitude any region or coast standeth, take a compasse, and
set the one foot of the same in the Equinoctial line, right against
the said region, and apply the other foote of the compasse to the said
region or coast, and then set the sayd compasse at the end of the
Card, where the degrees are divided. And the one foote of the compasse
standing in the line Equinoctial, the other will show in the scale the
degrees of altitude or latitude that the said region is in. Also the
longitude of the world I have set out in the nether part of the Card,
containing also 360 degrees which begin to be counted after _Ptoleme_
and other Cosmographers from an headland called _Capo Verde_, which is
over against a little crosse, made in the part occidental, where the
division of the degrees beginneth, and endeth in the same _Capo Verde_.
[Sidenote: To know the longitudes.]
Now to know in what longitude any land is, your Lordship must take a
ruler or a compasse, and set the one foot of the compasse upon the
land or coast whose longitude you would know, and extend the other
foot of the compasse to the next part of one of the transversal lines
in the Oriental or Occidental part: which done, set the one foot of
the compass in the said transversal line at the end of the nether
scale, the scale of longitude, and the other foot sheweth the degree of
longitude that the region is in. And your Lordship must understand that
this Card, though little, containeth the universal whole world betwixt
two collaterall lines, the one in the occidentall part descendeth
perpendicular upon the 175th degree, and the other in the orientall on
the 170th degree, whose distance measureth the scale of longitude. And
that which is without the two said tranversall lines, is onely to show
how the Orientall part is joined with the Occident, and Occident with
the Orient, for that that is set without the line in the Oriental part,
is the same that is set within the other line in the Occidentall part;
and that that is set without the line in the Occidental part, is the
same that is set within the line in the Orientall part, to show that
though this figure of the world in plaine or flatte seemeth to have an
end, yet one imagining that this said Card were set upon a round thing,
where the endes should touch by the lines, it would plainely appeare
howe the Orient part joyneth with the Occident, as there without the
lines it is described and figured.
And for more declaration of the said Card, your Lordship shall
understand, that beginning on the part occidental within the line,
the first land that is set out is the maine land, and islands of the
Indies of the Emperour. Which maine land or coast goeth northward, and
finisheth in the land that we found, which is called here _Terra de
Labrador_. So that it appeareth the said land that we found, and the
Indies, to be all one maine land.
[Sidenote: Now called the straight of Magelane.]
The sayd coast from the sayd Indies southward, as by the Card your
Lordshippe may see, commeth to a certaine straight sea, called
_Estrecho de Todos Santos_: by which straight sea the Spainiards goe to
the Spiceries, as I shall declare more at large; the which straight sea
is right against three hundred fifteene degrees of longitude, and is
of latitude or altitude from the Equinoctiall three and fifty degrees.
The first land from the sayd beginning of the Card toward the Orient
are certaine islands of the _Canaries_, and islandes of _Capo Verde_.
But the first maine land next to the line Equinoctial is the sayd
_Capo Verde_, and from thence northward by the straight of this sea of
_Italie_. And so followeth _Spayne_, _France_, _Flanders_, _Almaine_,
_Denmarke_, and _Norway_, which is the highest part toward the north.
And over against Flanders are our islands of _England_ and _Ireland_.
Of the landes and coastes within the streights I have set out onely the
regions, dividing them by lines of their limits, by which plainely I
thinke your Lordship may see, in what situation everie region is, and
of what highnesse, and with what regions it is joyned. I doe thinke few
are left out of all _Europe_. In the parts of _Asia_ and _Affrica_ I
could not so well make the sayd divisions: for that they be not so well
knowen nor need not so much. This I write because in the said Card be
made the said lines and strikes, that your Lordship should understand
wherefore they doe serve. Also returning to the aforesaid _Capo Verdo_,
the coast goeth southward to a cape called _Capo de buona Speransa_,
which is right over against the 60 and 65 degree of longitude. And
by this cape go the Portingals to their Spicerie. For from this cape
toward the Orient, is the land of _Calicut_, as your Lordship may see
in the headland over against the 130 degree. Fro the sayd Cape of
_Buona Speransa_ the coast returneth toward the line equinoctiall, and
passing forth, entreth the Red Sea, and returning out, entreth again
into the gulfe of Persia, and returneth toward the Equinoctiall line,
till that it commeth to the headland called _Calicut_ aforesayd, and
from, thence the coast making a gulfe, where is the river of _Ganges_,
returneth toward the line to a headland called _Malaca_, where is the
principal Spicerie: and from this Cape returneth and maketh a great
gulfe, and after the coast goeth right toward the Orient, and over
against this last gulfe and coast be many Islands, which be Islandes of
the Spiceries of the Emperour. Upon which the Portingals and he be at
variance.
[Sidenote: Doctor Ley’s demand.]
The said coast goeth toward the Orient, and endeth right against the
155 degrees, and after returneth toward the Occident northward: which
coast not yet plainely knowen, I may joyne to the New found lande
found by us that I spake of before. So that I finish with this briefe
declaration of the Card aforesayd. Well I know I should also have
declared how the coasts within the straights of the Sea of _Italie_
runne. It is playne that passing the straights on the north side of
that Sea after the coast of _Granado_, and with that which pertaines
to _Spaine_, is the coast of that which _France_ hath in _Italie_. And
then followeth in one piece all _Italie_, which land hath an arme of
the sea, with a gulfe which is called _Mare Adriaticum_. And in the
bottome of this gulfe is the citie of _Venice_. And on the other part
of the sayd gulfe is _Sclavonia_, and next _Grecia_, then the streights
of _Constantinople_, and then the sea called _Euxinus_, which is within
the sayd streights: and coming out of the said streights, followeth
_Turciamaior_ (though now on both sides it is called _Turcia_). And
so the coast runneth southward to _Syria_, and over against the sayd
_Turcia_ are the Islands of _Rhodes_, _Candie_, and _Cyprus_. And over
against _Italie_ are the Islands of _Sicilia_ and _Sardinia_. And over
against _Spaine_ is _Majorca_ and _Minorca_. In the ende of the gulfe
of Syria is _Judea_. And from thence returneth the coast toward the
Occident, till it commeth to the streights where we began, which all
is the coast of _Affrike_ and _Barbarie_. Also your Lordship shall
understand that the coastes of the sea throughout all the world, I
have colored with yellow, for that it may appeare that all that is
within the line colored yellow is to be imagined to be maine land or
Islands, and all without the line so coloured to bee Sea: whereby it
is easie and light to know it. Albeit in this little roome any other
descriptions would rather have made it obscure than cleere. And the
sayd coasts of the sea are all set justly after the maner and forme as
they lie, as the navigation approveth them throughout all the Card,
save onely the coastes and Isles of the Spicerie of the Emperour which
is from over against the 160, to the 215, degrees of longitude. For
these coastes and situations of the Islands every of the Cosmographers
and pilots of _Portingal_ and _Spayne_ do set after their purpose.
The Spanards more toward the Orient because they should appeare to
appertain to the Emperour: and the Portingals more toward the Occident,
for that they should fall more within their jurisdiction. So that the
pilots and navigants thither, which in such cases should declare the
truth, by their industrie do set them falsely every one to favour his
prince. And for this cause can be no certaine situation of that coast
and islands till this difference betwixt them be verified. Now to come
to the purpose of your Lordships demand touching the difference between
the Emperour and the king of _Portingal_, to understand it better, I
must declare the beginning of this discoverie. Though peradventure your
Lordship may say that in that I have written ought of purpose, I fall
in the proverbe, _a gemino ouo bellum_. But your Lordship commanded
me to be large, and I take license to be prolixious, and shall be
peradventure tedious, but your Lordship knoweth that _Nihil ignorantia
verbosius_.
[Sidenote: The Pope reprehended.]
In the yeere 1484 the king of _Portingal_ minded to arme certaine
Carvels to discover this Spicerie. Then forasmuch as he feared that
being discovered, every other prince woulde sende and trade thither, so
that the cost and peril of discovering should be his, and the profite
common; wherefore first he gave knowledge of this his mind to all
princes Christened, saying that hee would seeke amongst the infidels
newe possessions of regions, and therefore would make a certaine armie:
and that if any of them would helpe in the cost of the sayd armie,
he should enjoy his part of the profite or honour that should come
of it. And as then this discovering was holden for a strange thing
and uncertaine; nowe they say that all the Princes of Christendome
answered, that they would be no part of such an armie, nor yet of
the profit that might come of it. After the which he gave knowledge
to the Pope of his purpose, and of the answere of all the Princes,
desiring him that seeing that none would helpe in the costes, that
he would judge all that should bee found and discovered to be of his
jurisdiction and command that none other princes should intermeddle
therewith. The Pope said not as Christ saith, _Quis me constituit
judicem inter vos?_ He did not refuse, but making himself as Lord and
judge of all, not onely granted that all that should be discovered
from Orient to Occident should be the kings of _Portingal_, but also,
that upon great censures no other Prince should discover but he. And if
they did, all to bee the kings of _Portingal_. So he armed a fleete,
and in the yeere 1497 were discovered the Islands of _Calicut_, from
whence is brought all the spice he hath.
After this in the yere 1492, the kinge of Spaine willing to discover
lands toward the Occident without making any such diligence, or taking
licence of the king of _Portingal_, armed certaine carvels, and then
discovered this _India_ Occidental, especially two Islands of the sayd
_India_, that in this Card I set forth, naming the one _La Dominica_,
and the other _Cuba_, and brought certaine golde from thence, of the
which when the king of _Portingal_ had knowledge, he sent to the king
of _Spaine_, requiring him to give him the sayd islands. For that by
the sentence of the Pope all that should be discovered was his, and
that hee should not proceede farther in the discoverie without his
licence. And at the same time it seemeth that out of _Castil_ into
_Portingal_ had gone for feare of burning infinite number of Jewes
that were expelled out of _Spaine_, for that they would not turne to
be Christians, and carried with them infinite number of golde and
silver. So that it seemeth the king of _Spaine_ answered, that it was
reason that the king of _Portingal_ asked, and that to be obedient to
that which the Pope had decreed, he would give him the sayd Islands
of the _Indies_. Nowe for as much as it was decreed betwixt the sayde
kings that none should receive the others subjects, fugitives, nor
their goods, therefore the king of _Portingal_ should pay and returne
to the king of _Spaine_ a million of golde or more, that the Jewes
had caryed out of _Spaine_ to _Portingal_, and that in so doing he
would give these Islands and desist from any more discovering. And not
fulfilling this, he would not not onely not give these Islands, but
procure to discover more where him thought best. It seemeth that the
king of _Portingal_ would not, or could not with his ease pay this
money. And so not paying, that he could not let the king of _Spaine_
to discover: so that he enterprised not toward the Orient where he had
begun and found the Spicerie, and consented to the king of _Spaine_,
that touching this discovering they should divide the worlde betweene
them two. And that all that should be discovered from _Cape Verde_,
where this Card beginneth to be counted in the degrees of longitude, to
180 of the sayd scale of longitude, which is halfe the world toward
the Orient, and finisheth in this Card right over against a little
crosse made at the said 180 degrees, to be the king of _Portingals_.
And all the land from the said Crosse towarde the Occident, until it
joyneth with the other Crosse in the Orient, which containeth the other
hundreth and eightie degrees, that is the other halfe of the worlde, to
be the king of _Spaines_. So that from the land over against the said
hundreth and eighty degrees untill it finish in the three hundred and
sixtie on both the ends of the Card, is the jurisdiction of the king of
Spaine. So after this maner they divided the world betweene them.
[Sidenote: The Longitudes hard to be found out.]
Now for that these Islands of Spicery fall neere the terme and limites
betweene these princes (for as by the sayd Card you may see they
begin from one hundred and sixtie degrees of longitude, and ende in
215), it seemeth all that falleth from 160 to 180 degrees should be
of _Portingal_: and all the rest of _Spaine_. And for that their
Cosmographers and Pilots coulde not agree in the situation of the sayde
Islandes (for the _Portingals_ set them all within their 180 degrees,
and the _Spanards_ set them all without): and for that in measuring,
all the Cosmographers of both partes, or what other that ever have bene
cannot give certaine order to measure the longitude of the worlde,
as they doe of the latitude: for that there is no starre fixed from
East to West, as are the starres of the Poles, from North to South,
but all mooveth with the mooving divine: no maner can bee founde howe
certainly it may bee measured, but by conjectures, as the Navigants
have esteemed the way they have gone. But it is manifest that _Spaine_
had the situation of al the lands from _Cape Verde_, toward the Orient
of y’e _Portingals_ to their 180 degrees. And in all their Cardes they
never hitherto set the saide Islands within their limitation of the
sayd 180 degrees, (though they knew very well of the Islands,) till
now that the _Spaniards_ discovered them. And it is knowen that the
king of _Portingal_ had trade to these Islands afore, but would never
suffer _Portingal_ to go thither from _Calicut_: for so much as he knew
that it fell out of his dominion: least by going thither there might
come some knowledge of those other Islands of the king of _Spaine_, but
bought the cloves of marchants of that countrey, that brought them to
_Calicut_, much deerer than they would have cost, if he had sent for
them thinking after this maner it would abide alwayes secret. And now
that it is discovered he sendes and keepes the Spaniards from the trade
all that he can.
Also it should seeme that when this foresaid consent of the division
of the worlde was agreede of betweene them, the king of _Portingal_
had already discovered certaine Islandes that lie over against _Cape
Verde_, and also certaine part of the maine lande of _India_ toward
the South, from whence he sette _Brasill_, and called it the land of
_Brasil_. So for that all should come in his terme and limites, hee
tooke three hundred and seventie leagues beyond _Cape Verde_: and
after this, his 180 degrees, being his part of the worlde, should
begin in the Carde right over against the 340 degrees, where I have
made a little compasse with a crosse, and should finish at the 160
degree, where also I have made another little marke. And after this
computation without any controversy, the Islands of the Spicery fal out
of the _Portingals_ domination. So that nowe the _Spaniards_ say to the
_Portingals_, that if they would beginne their 180 degrees from the
sayde _Cape Verde_, to the intent they should extende more toward the
Orient, and so to touch those Islandes of the Spicerie of the Emperour,
which is al that is betweene the two crosses made in this Card, that
then the Islands of _Cape Verde_ and the lande of _Brasil_ that the
_Portingals_ nowe obtaine is out of the said limitation, and that they
are of the Emperours. Or if their 180 degrees they count from the 370
leagues beyond the said _Cape Verde_, to include in it the said Islands
and lands of _Brasil_, then plainely appeareth the said 180 degrees
should finish long before they come to these Islands of the Spicerie
of the Emperour: As by this Carde your Lordship may see. For their
limits should begin at the 340 degrees of this Carde, and ende at the
160 degrees, where I have made two little markes of the compasse with
crosses in them.
So that plainely it shoulde appeare by reason, that the _Portingals_
should leave these Islands of _Cape Verde_ and land of _Brasil_, if
they would have part of the Spicerie of the Emperours: or els holding
these, they have no part there. To this the _Portingals_ say that
they will beginne their 180 degrees from the self same _Cape Verde_:
for that it may extende so much more toward the Orient, and touch
these Islandes of the Emperours: and woulde winne these Islands of
_Cape Verde_ and land of _Brasil_ neverthelesse, as a thing that they
possessed before the consent of this limitation was made.
So none can verely tell which hath the best reason. They be not yet
agreed. _Quare sub Judice lis est._
But without doubt (by all conjectures of reason), the sayd Islands fall
all without the limitation of _Portingal_ and pertaine to _Spaine_,
as it appeareth by the most part of all the Cardes made by the
_Portingals_, save those which they have falsified of late purposely.
[Sidenote: New found land discovered by the Englishmen.]
But now touching that your Lordship wrote, whether that which we
discovered toucheth anything the aforesayd coastes: once it appeareth
plainely, that the Newefound land that we discovered, is all a maine
land with the _Indies_ occidentall, from whence the Emperour hath all
the gold and pearles; and so continueth of coast more than 5000 leagues
of length, as by this Carde appeareth. For from the said New lands it
proceedeth toward the Occident to the _Indies_, and from the _Indies_
returneth toward the Orient, and after turneth southward up till it
come to the Straits of _Todos Santos_, which I reckon to be more than
5000 leagues.
[Sidenote: Note.]
So that to the _Indias_ it should seeme that we have some title, at
least that for our discovering we might trade thither as others doe.
But all this is nothing neere the Spicerie.
[Sidenote: To sail by the Pole.]
[Sidenote: Of the Straites of Magelane.]
Now then if from the sayd New found lands the sea be navigable, there
is no doubt, but sayling northward and passing the Pole, descending to
the Equinoctiall line, we shall hit these Islands, and it should be a
much shorter way, than either the _Spanards_ or the _Portingals_ have.
For we be distant from the Pole but thirty and nine degrees, and from
the Pole to the Equinoctiall be ninetie, the which added together,
bee an hundred twenty and nine degrees, leagues 2489, and miles 7440:
Where we should find these Islands. And the Navigation of the Spaniards
to the Spicerie is, as by this Card you may see, from _Spaine_ to the
Islandes of _Canarie_, and from these Islandes they runne over the line
Equinoctiall southwarde to the Cape of the maine land of the Indians,
called the _Cape of Saint Augustine_, and from this Cape southwards
to the straites of _Todos Santos_, in the which navigation to the
said straites is 1700 or 1800 leagues; and from these Straites being
past them, they return towarde the line Equinoctiall to the Islands
of Spicerie, which are distant from the saide Straites 4200, or 4300
leagues.
The navigation of the Portingals to the said Islandes is departing
from _Portingal_ southward toward the _Cape Verde_, and from thence
to another Cape passing the line Equinoctiall called _Capo de Bona
Speransa_, and from _Portingal_ to the Cape is 1800 leagues, and from
this Cape to the Islands of Spicerie of the Emperour is 2500 leagues.
So that this navigation amounteth all to 4300 leagues. So that (as
afore is sayd) if between our Newe found lands, or _Norway_, or Island,
the seas towards the north be navigable, we should goe to these Islands
a shorter way by more than 2000 leagues.
[Sidenote: Note.]
[Sidenote: Benefite to England.]
And though we went not to the sayd Islandes, for that they are the
Emperours or kings of _Portingal_, wee shoulde by the waye and comming
once to the line Equinoctiall, finde landes no lesse riche of golde and
Spicerie, as all other landes are under the sayd line Equinoctiall: and
also should, if we may pass under the North, enjoy the navigation of
all _Tartarie_. Which should be no lesse profitable to our commodities
of cloth than these Spiceries to the Emperour, and king of _Portingal_.
[Sidenote: Objection.]
But it is a generall opinion of all Cosmographers, that passing the
seventh clime, the sea is all ice, and the colde so much than none can
suffer it. And hitherto they had all the like opinion, that under the
line Equinoctiall for much heate, the land was unhabitable.
[Sidenote: Answere.]
[Sidenote: A true opinion.]
[Sidenote: A voyage of discovery by the Pole.]
[Sidenote: M. Thorne and M. Eliot discoverers of New found land.]
[Sidenote: The cause why the West Indies were not ours; which also
Sebastian Gabot writeth in an Epistle to Baptista Ramusius.]
Yet since (by experience is proved) no lande so much habitable nor
more temperate. And to conclude, I thinke the same should be found
under the North, if it were experimented. For as all judge, _nihil fit
vacuum in rerum natura_. So I judge there is no land unhabitable, nor
sea innavigable. If I should write the reason that presenteth this
unto me, I should be too prolixe, and it seemeth not requisite for
this present matter. God knoweth that though by it I should have no
great interest, yet I have had and still have no little mind of this
businesse: so that if I had facultie to my will, it should be the first
thing that I woulde understand, even to attempt, if our seas northward
be navigable to the Pole, or no. I reason, that as some sicknesses
are hereditarious, and come from the father to the sonne, so this
inclination or desire of this discoverie I inherited of my father,
which with another marchant of _Bristow_ named _Hugh Eliot_, were the
discoverers the New found lands, of the which there is no doubt (as
nowe plainely appeareth), if the mariners would then have bene ruled,
and followed their pilots minde, the lands of the West Indies (from
whence all the gold commeth) had bene ours, For all is one coast, as by
the Carde appeareth, and is aforesayd.
Also in this Carde by the Coastes where you see C. your Lordship shall
understand it is set for Cape or headland, where I. for Iland, where
P. for Port, where R. for River. Also in all this little Carde, I
think nothing be erred touching the situation of the land, save only
in these Ilands of Spicerie; which for that (as afore is sayd) every
one setteth them after his mind, there can be no certification how they
stand. I doe not denie that there lacke many things, that a consummate
Carde should have or that a right good demonstration desireth. For
there should be expressed, all the mountaines and rivers that are
principall of name in the earth, with the names of Portes of the sea,
the names of all principall cities, which all I might have set, but not
in this Carde, for the little space would not consent.
Your Lordship may see that setting onely the names almost of every
region, and yet not of all, the roome is occupied. Many Islands are
also left out, for the said lack of roome, the names almost of all
Portes put to silence, with the roses of the windes or points of the
compasse: For that this is not for Pilots to sayle by, but a summary
declaration of that which your Lordship commanded. And if by this
your Lordship cannot wel perceive the meaning of this Carde, of the
which I would not marveile, by reason of the rude composition of it,
will it please your Lordship to advise me to make a bigger and a
better mappe or els that I may cause one to be made. For I know myself
in this and all other nothing perfect, but _Licet semper discens,
nonquam tamen ad perfectam scientiam perueniens_. Also I know, to set
the forme sphericall of the world in Plano after the true rule of
Cosmographie, it would have bene made otherwise than this is: howbeit
the demonstration should not have bene so plaine.
And also these degrees of longitude, that I set in the lower part of
this Card, should have bin set along by the line Equinoctiall, and so
then must be imagined. For the degrees of longitude neere either of the
poles are nothing equalled in bignesse to them in the Equinoctiall. But
these are set so, for that setting them along the Equinoctial, it would
have made obscure a great part of the map. Many other curiosities may
be required which for the nonce I did not set downe, as well for that
the intent I had principally, was to satisfy your doubt touching the
spicerie, as for that, I lack leasure and time. I trust your Lordship
correcting that which is erred, will accept my good will, which is to
doe anything that I may in your Lordships service. But from henceforth
I knowe your Lordship will rather command me to keep silence than to be
large, when you shall be wearied with the reading of this discourse.
Jesus prosper your estate and health.
Your Lordships,
ROBERT THORNE, 1527.
Also this Carde, and that which I write touching the variance between
the Emperour and the king of _Portingal_ is not to be shewed or
communicated there with many of that court. For though there is nothing
in it prejudicial to the Emperour, yet it may be a cause of paine to
the maker; as well for that none may make these Cardes but certaine
appointed, and allowed for masters, as for that peradventure it would
not sound well to them, that a stranger should know or discover their
secretes: and would appeare worst of all, if they understand that
I write touching the short way to the Spicerie by our seas. Though
peradventure of troth it is not to be looked to, as a thing that by all
opinions is impossible, and I thinke never will come to effect: and
therefore neither here nor elsewhere is to be spoken of. For to move it
amongst wise men, it should be had in derision. And therefore to none
I would have written nor spoken of such things; but to your Lordship
to whom boldly I commit in this all my foolish fantasie as to myself.
But if it please God that into England I may come with your Lordship,
I will show some conjectures of reason, though against the general
opinions of Cosmographers, by which shall appeare this that I say not
to lacke some foundation. And till that time I beseech your Lordship,
let it be put to silence; and in the meane season, it may please God
to send our two Englishmen, that are gone to the Spicerie, which may
also bring more plaine declaration of that which in this case might be
desired.
Also I know I needed not to have been so prolixe in the declaration
of this Carde to your Lordship, if the sayd Carde had beene very well
made, after the rules of Cosmographie. For your Lordship would soone
understand it better than I, or any other that could have made it:
and so it shoulde appeare that I shewed _Delphinum natare_. But for
that I have made it after my rude maner, it is necessary that I be the
declarer or gloser of my own worke, or els your Lordship should have
had much labour to understand it, which now with it also cannot be
excused, it is so grossely done. But I knew you looked for no curious
things of mee, and therefore I trust your Lordship will accept this,
and hold me for excused. In other mens letters that they write they
crave pardon that at this present they write no larger; but I must
finish, asking pardon that at this present I write so largely. Jesus
preserve your Lordship with augmentation of dignities.[429]
Your servant, ROBERT
THORNE, 1527.
APPENDIX No. 2.
_Letter of the Company of the Merchant Adventurers to Russia to their
Agents._—Vol. ii. p. 83.
“You shall understand we have fraighted for the parts of Russia foure
good shippes to be laden there by you and your order: That is to say,
the _Primerose_ of the burthen of 240 Tunnes, Master under God, John
Buckland: The _John Evangelist_, of 170 Tunnes, Master under God,
Laurence Roundal: The _Anne_ of London, of the burthen of 160 Tunnes,
Master under God, David Philly; and the _Trinitie_ of London of the
burthen of 140 Tunnes, Master under God, John Robins, as by their
charter parties may appeare; which you may require to see for divers
causes. You shall receive, God willing, out of the said good ships,
God sending them in safety for the use of the Company, these kinds of
wares following, all marked with the general marke of the Company as
followeth, 25 fardels containing 207 sorting clothes, one fine violet
in graine, and one skarlet, and 40 cottons for wrappers, beginning
with number 1, and ending with number 52. The sorting clothes may cost
the first peny 5_l._ 9_s._, the cloth, one with the other. The fine
violet 18_l._ 6_s._ 6_d._ The skarlet 17_l._ 13_s._ 6_d._, the cottons
at 9_l._ 10_s._ the packe accompting 7 cottons for a packe: more 500
pieces of Hampshire kersies, that is 400 watchets, 43 blewes, 53 reds,
15 greenes, 5 ginger colours, 2 yellowes which cost the first peny
4_l._ 6_s._ the piece, and three packes containing 21 cottons at 9_l._
10_s._ the packe, and part of the clothes is measured by Arshines.
More 9 barrels of Pewter of Thomas Hasels making &c. Also the wares
bee packed and laden as is aforesayde, as by an invoyce in every
shippe more plainly may appeare. So that when it shall please God to
send the saide good shippes to you in safetie, you are to receive our
said goods, and to procure the sales to our most advantage either for
ready money, time or barter: having consideration that you doe make
good debts, and give such time, if you give any, as you may employ and
returne the same against the next voyage; and also foreseeing that you
barter to a profit and for such wares as be here most vendible, as
waxe, tallowe, traine oile, hempe and flaxe. Of furres we desire no
great plentie, because they be dead wares. And as for felts we will
in no wise you send any. And whereas you have provided tarre, and as
we suppose, some hempe ready bought, our advise is that in no wise
you send any of them hither unwrought because our fraight is 4_l._ a
Tunne or little less: which is so deare, as it would not beare the
charges; and therefore we have sent you 7 ropemakers, as by the copies
of covenants here inclosed shall appeare; whom we will you set to worke
with all expedition in making of cables and ropes of all sorts. Let
all diligence be used that at the returne of these shippes we may see
samples of all ropes and cables if it be possible, and so after to
continue in worke, that we may have good store against the next yeere.
Therefore they have neede to have a place to work in, in the winter;
and at any hand let them have hempe ynough to spinne their stuffes;
for seeing you have great plentie of hempe there, and at a reasonable
price, we trust we shall be able to bring as good stuffe from thence,
better and cheaper than out of Danske; if it be diligently used, and
have a good overseer.
“Let the chiefest lading of these foure shippes be principally in
waxe, flaxe, tallowe, and trayne oyle. And if there be any more wares
than these ships be able to take in, then leave that which is least
in valeu and grossest in stowage untill the next shipping; for wee do
purpose to ground ourselves chiefly upon those commodities, as waxe,
cables and ropes, traine oyle, flaxes and some linen yarne. As for
Masts, Tarre, Hempe, Feathers, or any such other like, they would not
bear the charges to have any considering our deere fraight. We have
sent you a skinner to be there at our charges for meate, drinke and
lodging, to view and see such furres as you shall consider cheape and
buye, not minding nevertheless, that you shall charge yourselves with
many, except those which be most vendible, as good martens mimures,
otherwise called Lettis and Mynkes. Of these you may send us plentie,
finding them good and at a reasonable price. As for sables and other
rich furres, they bee not every mans money; therefore you may send the
fewer, using partly the discretion of the Skinner in that behalfe.
“We heare that there is great plentie of steele in Russia and Tartarie
whereof wee would you sent us part for an example and to write your
mindes in it what store is to be had; for we heare say there is great
plentie and that the Tartars steele is better than that in Russia. And
likewise we be informed that there is great plentie of Copper in the
Emperours Dominions; we would be certified of it what plentie there
is and whether it be in plates or in round flat cakes, and send us
some for example. Also we would have you to certifie us what kind of
woolen cloth the men of Rie and Reuel and the Poles and Lettoes doe
bring to Russia and send the scantlings of them with part of the lists
and a full advice of the lengths and breadths, colours and prices, and
whether they be stained or not: and what number of them may be uttered
in a yeare, to the intent that we may make provisions for them for the
like sorts, and all other Flemish wares which they bring thither and
be most vendible there. And to certifie us whether our set clothes be
vendible there or not and whether they be rowed and shorne; because
of times they goe undrest. Moreover, we will you send us of every
commodity in that Country part, but no great quantity other than such
as is before declared. And likewise every kind of Lether, whereof we
be informed there is great store bought yeerely by the Esterlings and
Duches for hie Almaigne and Germanie.
“More that you doe send us for a proofe a quantity of such earth,
hearbes, or what thing soever it be, that the Russes do die, and colour
any kind of cloth, linen or wollen, Lether or any other thing withall:
and also part of that which the Tartars and Turkes doe bring thither,
and how it must be used in dying and colouring. Moreover that you have
a special foresight in the chusing of your Tallowe and that it may be
well purified and dried, or else it will in one yeere putrifie and
consume.
“Also that you certifie us the truth of the weights and measures, and
howe they do answere with ours, and to send us 3 nobles in money, that
we may try the just value of them.
“Also we doe send you in these ships ten young men that be bound
Prentises to the Companie whom we will you to appoint every of them
as you shall there find most apte and meete, some to keep accompts,
some to buy and sell by your order and commission, and some to send
abroad into the notable cities of the Countrey for understanding and
knowledge.”[430]
APPENDIX No. 3.
_Inventory of ye Great Barke_, A.D. 1531.—Vol. ii. p. 93.
“Thys is the inventory of the Great Barke vyeuwyd by youre humble
servant Christopher Morris, the 6th day of October, the 23 year of our
soverayne King Henry the 8th.
“Item, in primis, the shype with one overlop (overloop or orlop, deck):
Item the fore castell, and a cloos tymber deck from the mast forward,
whyche was made of lait: Item, above the fore castell, a decke from the
mayne mast afterward: Item a nyeu mayne mast of spruce (a sort of fir
so called), with a nyeu staye hounsyd (bound round), and skarvyd (or
scarfed, one piece of timber let into another in a firm joint) with
the same wood; whyche mast ys of length from the hounse to the step 25
yards; the mayne mast, about the patnas, ys 23 hands about: Item a nyeu
mayne mast yaerd of spruce of oon piece.
“Item, the takyll pertaynyng to the said mayne maste, 6 takells on a
syd.
“Item, 9 shrowds, and a back staye on either syde.
“Item, in all the takylles, 6 shyvers (sheevers or sheaves, which
run in the blocks, whether brass or wood) of brass; that is to say 4
shyvers in three pennants, and two in the bowser takylls. Item a payer
of thyes (ties or lifts, the ropes by which the yards hang) and a payer
of hayliards: Item a gyver (a double block) with two brasing shyvers:
item the mayne parrel, with trussys and two drynghs: Item 2 lysts
(tysts, ropes which belong to the yard-arms); item 2 braseys: Item 2
tregets: Item a mayne kerse; Item a bonnet (bonnet belonging to another
sail) haulf warren, with shouts tacks and bollyings: Item a nieu mayne
top: Item a top mast, and a top sayle, with all theyr apparrell: Item a
mayne myssen mast; and a mayne myssyn yaerd of spruce of oon pece.
“Item a payer of haylleards, and a tye for the sayd mayne myssen yaerd:
item 5 shrouds on eyche (each) syd: item a mayne myssen haulf a top:
item a mayne myssen sayle haulf worren.
“Item a bonaventure mast; with a yaerd of spruce of oon pece, with 3
shrouds on a syde. Item a payer of hayliards: item a tye with haulf a
top: item a bonaventure sayle, sore worren.
“Item, a foer mast with 4 takylls, and 7 shrouds on a syd: with a tye
and a payer of hayliards with 4 brasyn shyvers: Item a fore sayle yaerd
with the apparrells, 2 trussys;—item 2 lysts; 2 braessys; 2 top sayll
shoutts; 2 bollyngs; a fore staye; item fore sayll shoutts; two tacks
such they be, Item foer sayle koors, with 2 bonnetts, sore worren: item
a fore top mast, with a yaerd, with sayles, and takyll pertayning to yt.
“Item a bowsprytt of ooke, item a sprytt sayle yard, skarvyd with a
sprytt sayle sore worren.
“Item 4 ankers, with two old cabulls;—and another old cabull whyche
they say ys in the watar.
“Item towe katt howks (catt hooks to raise the anchor): and two fysche
hooks (fish hooks for fishing the anchor): item 4 pollys with brasyn
shyvers: item, a snatche polly; a luff hoke (a takell with 2 hooks):
item 2 pollys for the mayne top sayle: item 2 great dubbell pollys with
woddyn shyver: item 17 pollys, great and small: item 4 kuyll of small
ropys of roers stuff: item 4 boye ropys, good and bad; a fyd of iron
(an instrument used for splicing ropes known as a marlin-spike): item
a shype kettel of 24 gallons: item a pytche pott of brasse: item a
grynding stoen: item a crowe of yeron: item a pytche trouth.
“Item a pompe with three boxys; and a pomp stavys: item 3 compasses,
and a kenning glass (spy-glass or telescope): item 5 lanternnes.
“Item a great boat pertayning to the shyppe; with a davyd, with a
shyver of brass: item xii owers, and a schulb.
“Hereafter followeth the ordinances pertayning to the sayde shype,
item, in primis, two brazyn pecys called kannon pecyes on stokyes which
wayith, The one 9c. 3q. 11lb. the other 10c. 1q. 17lb. whole weight
20c. 28lb: Item 2 payer of shod wheeles nyeu: item 2 ladyng ladells.
“Starboard side. Item oon port pece of yeron cast with 2 chambers: item
a port pece of yeron, with one chamber: Item a spruyche slyng with one
chamber.
“Larboard side. Item oon port pece with 2 chambers: Item another port
pece, with oon chamber, whyche chamber was not made for the sayd pece.
“In the forecastell. Item a small slyng with 2 chambers. Item another
pece of yeron with 2 chaembers, the oon broken.”[431]
APPENDIX No. 4.
_Furniture of the Harry Grâce à Dieu, in Pepysian Library at
Cambridge_, Vol. ii. p. 94.
GONNES OF BRASSE. | GUNNES OF YRON.
Cannons iiii | Port Pecys xiiii
Di-Cannons iii | Slyngs iiii
Culveryns iiii | Di-Slyngs ii
Sakers iiii | Fowlers viii
Cannon Pesers ii | Baessys lx
Fawcons ii | Toppe peces ii
| Hayle shotte pecys xl
| Hand Gonnes complete c
________________________
GONNEPOWDER. SHOTTE OF YRON.
Lasts. | For Cannons c
Serpentyn Powder in | For Di-Cannons lx
Barrels ii |
Corn Powder in Barrels vi | For Culveryns cxx
| For Di-Culveryns lxx
| For Sakers cxx
| For Fawcons c
| For Slyngs c
| For Di-Slyngs l
| Crosse barre Shotte c
| Dyce of Yron for Hayle
| Shotte iiii^m
________________________
SHOTTE OF STOEN AND LEADE. MANYCIONS.
For Canon Peser lx | Pych hamers xx
For Porte Pecys ccc | Sledges of Yron xii
For Fowlers c | Crows of Yron xii
For Toppe Pecys xl | Comaunders xii
For Baessys Shotte of | Tampions v^m
Leade ii^m | Canvas for
| Cartowches i^quar
| Paper Ryal for
| Cartowches vi
Arrowes, Morry Pycks
Byllys, Daerts for Toppys
Bowes, Bowestryngs
Bowes of Yough v^c
Bowe Stryngs x Grocys
Morrys Pykes cc
Byllys cc
Daerts for Toppis, Doussens c
________________________
HABILLIMENTS OF WARRE.
Ropis of Hempe for wolyng and brechyng x Coyll
Naglis of sundere sorts i^m
Baggs of Ledder xii
Fyrkyns with Pursys vi
Lyme Potts x Douss.
Spaer Whelys iiii Payer
Spaer Truckells iiii Payer
Spaer Extrys xii
Shepe Skynnys xxiiii
Tymber for Forlocks c Feet
APPENDIX No. 5.
_Names of all King’s Majesty’s Shippes, Galleys, Pynnasses, and
Row barges; with their tonnage and number of Soldiers, Mariners,
and Gunners; and also the places where they now be._
_5 Jan. A. R. Ed. VI. primo._
Vol. ii. p. 95.
SHIPPES AT WOLWIDGE.
The _Harry Grâce à Dieu_, 1000 tons. Souldiers, 349. Marryners,
301. Gonners 50. Brass Pieces, 19. Iron Pieces, 103.
AT PORTSMOUTH.
Tons. Soldiers. Brass Iron
Pieces. Pieces.
The Peter 600 400 12 78
The Matthewe 600 300 10 121
The Jesus 700 300 8 66
The Pauncy 450 300 13 69
The Great Barke 500 300 12 85
The Lesse Barke 400 250 11 98
The Murryan 500 300 10 53
The Shruce of Dawske 450 250 10 39
The Cristoffer 400 246 2 51
The Trynytie Henry 250 220 1 63
The Swepe Stake 300 230 6 78
The Mary Willoughby 140 160 6 23
GALLIES AT PORTSMOUTH.
Tons. Soldiers. Brass Iron
Pieces. Pieces.
The Anne Gallant 450 250 16 46
The Sallamander 300 220 9 40
The Harte 300 200 4 52
The Antelope 300 200 4 40
The Swallowe 240 100 8 45
The Unycorne 240 140 6 30
The Jeannet 180 120 6 35
The New barke 200 140 5 48
The Greyhounde 200 140 8 37
The Teager 200 120 4 39
The Bulle 200 120 5 42
The Lyone 140 140 2 48
The George 60 40 2 26
The Dragone 140 120 3 42
PYNNASSES AT PORTESMOUTH.
Tons. Soldiers. Brass Iron
Pieces. Pieces.
The Fawcone 83 55 4 22
The Black Pynnes 80 44 2 15
The Hynde 80 55 2 26
The Spannyshe Shallop 20 26 2 7
The Hare 15 30 2 10
ROW-BARGES AT PORTESMOUTH.
Tons. Soldiers. Brass Iron
Pieces. Pieces.
The Sonne 20 40 2 6
The Cloude in the Sonne 20 40 2 7
The Harpe 20 40 1 6
The Maidenheade 20 37 1 6
The Gilly Flowre 20 38 1 6
The Ostredge Flowre 20 37 1 6
The Roose Slipe 20 37 2 6
The Flower de lewce 20 43 2 7
The Rose in the Sonne 20 38 1 6
The Port quilice 20 38 1 6
The Fawcone in the Fetterlock 20 45 3 8
DEPTFORD STRAND.
Tons. Soldiers. Brass Iron
Pieces. Pieces.
The Graunde Mrs 450 250 1 22
The Marlyon 40 50 4 8
The Galley Subtill, or Roo
Galley 200 250 3 28
The Brickgantyne 40 44 3 19
The Hoye barke 80 60 3 5
The Hawthorne 20 37 3 5
IN SCOTLAND.
Tons. Soldiers. Brass Iron
Pieces. Pieces.
The Mary Hamborrow 400 246 5 67
The Phɶnix 40 50 4 33
The Saker 40 50 2 18
The Doble Roose 0 43 3 6
Tons. Nombre of Men.
Totale Number of Ships, &c. 53 6255
Soldiers 1885
Maryners 5136
Gonners 759
----
7780[432]
APPENDIX No. 6.
Vol. ii. p. 177.
“_A note of all the Shipps that’s bound for Turkey out of England, and
the Burden of them and the Captaynes Names as followeth_:[433]
THE KING’S MATIES SHIPPS.
Tunns Capt.
The Lyon 668 Sir Robert Mansell
The Vantgard 661 Sir Rich. Hawkins
The Raine bow 661 Sir Tho. Batten.
The Reformation 620 Cap. Manering.
The Destine 550 Cap. Love.
The Anthelopp 443 Sir Hen. Palmer.
THE MARCHANTS.
The Low fenex 300 Cap. Cave.
The Hercules 300 Cap. Pennington.
The Samuell 300 Cap. Harris.
The Hector 300 Cap. Towerson.
The Neptune 300 Cap. Haughton.
The Bonaventure 300 Cap. Chidlie.
The Centurion 250 Sir Fra. Tanfield.
The Marigold 250 Sir John Fearns.
The Primrose 180 Sir John Handen.
The Barbery 180 Cap. Porter.
The Restore 130 Cap. Raymond.
The George 130 Cap. Pett.
The Robert 100 Cap. Gyles.
The Marmaduke 100 Cap. Harbest.”
APPENDIX No. 7. VOL. ii. p. 433.
MERSEY DOCKS AND HARBOUR BOARD.
_Tabular Statement, showing the Water Area, Quay Space, Width
of Entrance, and Depth of Sill for each of the Liverpool and
Birkenhead Docks, with particulars of the Graving Docks, Open
Basins, Landing Stages, and Gridirons._
JANUARY, 1872.
_The Old Dock Sill is the Datum to which all Levels refer, and is
preserved on a Tide Gauge at the West side of the Centre Pier of
the Entrances to the Canning Half-Tide Dock._
The Old Dock contained an Area of 3 acres 1890 yards, and 557 lineal
yards of Quay Space.
Its Passage contained an Area of 3 acres 675 yards, and 90 lineal yards
of Quay Space.
LIVERPOOL DOCKS.
------------------------------+------------------+----------+----------+---------+----------
| Position | Sill |Coping at | |
LIVERPOOL DOCKS. | and Width of | below | Hollow | Water | Lineal
| Entrance | Datum. | Quoins | Area. | Quayage.
| or Passage. | |above Dtm.| |
------------------------------+------------------+----------+----------+---------+----------
| Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Ft. In. |Ac. Yds. |Miles Yds.
North Carrier’s Dock | West 40 0 | 6 0 | 27 0 | 2 3423 | 0 641
South Carrier’s Dock | West 40 0 | 6 0 | 27 0 | 1 4515 | 0 615
Canada Half-Tide Dock | West 60 0 | 7 9 | 28 0 | 11 1010 | 0 1002
Do. do. | South 80 0 | 7 9 | 28 0 | .. | ..
Do. (Lock 110 feet long) | N. West 32 0 | 6 0 | 28 0 | .. | ..
Do. do. | S. West 20 0 | 6 0 | 28 0 | .. | ..
Canada Lock (498 ft. long) | 100 0 | 7 9 | 28 0 | 1 3479 | 0 487
Canada Dock | S. East 50 0 | 6 6 | 29 0 | 17 4043 | 0 1272
Do. | S. West 80 0 | 6 6 | 29 0 | .. | ..
Huskisson Dock | .. .. | .. | .. | 14 3451 | 0 1039
Huskisson Branch Dock. | .. .. | .. | .. | 7 592 | 0 910
Huskisson Lock (338 ft. long) | East 80 0 | 6 6 | 38 0 | 0 4682 | 0 342
Do. | West 45 0 | 6 0 | 26 0 | 0 3650 | 0 330
Sandon Dock | West 70 0 | 6 6 | 30 11 | 10 100 | 0 867
Wellington Half-Tide Dock. | East 70 0 | 6 9 | 30 9 | 3 813 | 0 400
Do. do. | West 50 0 | 6 6 | 28 0 | .. | ..
Wellington Dock | West 70 0 | 6 6 | 31 0 | 7 4120 | 0 820
Bramley-Moore Dock | North 60 0 | 6 0 | 26 0 | 9 3106 | 0 935
Do. | South 60 0 | 6 0 | 26 0 | .. | ..
Nelson Dock | South 60 0 | 6 6 | 26 0 | 7 4786 | 0 803
Stanley Dock | West 51 0 | 5 8 | 29 0 | 7 120 | 0 753
Do. | Canal 18 0 | 2 6 | 29 0 | .. | ..
Canal Basin, let to } | West 18 0 | O.D.S. | 26 0 | 0 920 | 0 110
Bridgewater Trust } | | | | |
Collingwood Dock | West 60 0 | 6 9 | 26 0 | 5 244 | 0 553
Do. | Canal 18 0 | 2 6 | 26 0 | .. | ..
Salisbury Dock | West | | | |
Do. | {North 60 0 | 6 11 | 26 0 | 3 2146 | 0 406
Do. | {South 50 0 | 6 11 | 26 6 | .. | ..
Do. | {Lock 18 0 | 2 6 | 26 0 | .. | ..
Clarence Graving Dock Basin | North 45 0 | 4 9 | 26 0 | 1 1056 | 0 291
Do. Do. | South 45 0 | 4 6 | 26 6 | .. | ..
Clarence Half-Tide Dock | West 50 0 | 5 0 | 26 8 | 4 1794 | 0 635
Clarence Dock | West 47 0 | 3 2 | 26 0 | 6 273 | 0 914
Trafalgar Lock | North 45 0 | 6 7 | 23 10 | 0 2937 | 0 256
Trafalgar Dock | North 45 0 | 6 7 | 21 11 | 5 4546 | 0 764
Victoria Dock | North 45 0 | 4 11 | 21 11 | 5 3559 | 0 755
Do | South 50 0 | 6 6 | 26 0 | .. | ..
Waterloo Dock | South 60 0 | 8 0 | 22 1 | 3 2146 | 0 533
Corn Warehouse Dock | South 60 0 | 8 0 | 22 1 | 2 3375 | 0 506
Half-Tide Dock to do. | West | | | |
Do. | {North 65 0 | 8 0 | 31 0 | 4 3250 | 0 429
Do. Lock (110 ft. long) | {Middle 32 0 | 8 0 | 31 0 | .. | ..
Do. | {South 65 0 | 8 0 | 31 0 | .. | ..
Prince’s Dock | North 45 0 | 5 11 | 27 5 | 11 1490 | 0 1178
George’s Dock | .. .. | .. | .. | 5 154 | 0 645
George’s Dock Passage | South 40 3 | 4 6 | 24 5 | 0 2439 | 0 356
| |Sill above| | |
| | Datum. | | |
Manchester Dock | {West 32 10 | 0 3 | 23 3 | 1 595 | 0 339
| { |Sill below| | |
| { | Datum. | | |
Manchester Lock (86 ft. long) | {West 33 8 | 3 9 | 24 3 | 0 315 | 0 57
Canning Dock | West 45 0 | 6 1 | 26 2 | 4 376 | 0 585
Canning Half-Tide Dock | West | | | |
Do. Do. | {North 45 0 | 6 3 | 28 3 | 2 2688 | 0 429
Do. Do. | {South 45 0 | 6 3 | 28 3 | .. | ..
Albert Dock | North 45 0 | 6 4 | 26 0 | 7 3542 | 0 885
Do. | East 45 0 | 6 0 | 26 0 | .. | ..
Salthouse Dock | North 45 0 | 6 0 | 26 0 | 6 2019 | 0 784
Wapping Basin | North 50 0 | 6 0 | 26 0 | 1 3151 | 0 454
Do. | South 50 0 | 6 0 | 26 0 | .. | ..
Do. | West 40 0 | 6 0 | 25 0 | .. | ..
Wapping Dock | West 50 0 | 6 0 | 26 0 | 5 499 | 0 815
Do. | South 50 0 | 6 0 | 26 0 | .. | ..
King’s Dock | South 42 0 | 5 0 | 26 1 | 7 3896 | 0 875
Queen’s Half-Tide Dock. | West | | | |
Do. Do. | {North 70 0 | 6 9 | 31 0 | 3 3542 | 0 445
Do. Do. | {South 50 0 | 6 9 | 31 0 | .. | ..
Queen’s Dock | West 50 0 | 6 0 | 26 0 | 10 1564 | 0 1214
Do. | South 60 0 | 6 6 | 28 9 | .. | ..
Coburg Dock | West 70 0 | 6 0 | 30 6 | 8 26 | 0 1053
Brunswick Dock | North 60 0 | 6 6 | 27 0 | 12 3010 | 0 1086
Do. | West 42 0 | 5 6 | 26 0 | .. | ..
Brunswick Half-Tide Dock | West 45 0 | 6 0 | 26 6 | 1 3388 | 0 491
Toxteth Dock | West 40 0 | 5 0 | 26 0 | 1 469 | 0 393
Harrington Dock | West 29 9 | 1 2 | 23 1 | 0 3740 | 0 315
Herculaneum Half-Tide Dock | North 80 0 | 8 0 | 31 0 | 3 3000 | 0 416
Do. Do. | South 60 0 | 8 0 | 31 0 | .. | ..
+---------+----------
Total Water Area and Quay Space of the Liverpool Docks |243 1559 | 17 263
-----------------------------------------------------------------------+---------+----------
LIVERPOOL BASINS.
+----------------------+-----------+----------+------------+------------+
| | | Height | | |
| LIVERPOOL BASINS. | Width of | of Piers | Water | Lineal |
| | Entrance. | above | Area. | Quayage. |
| | | Datum. | | |
+----------------------+-----------+----------+------------+------------|
| | Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Acres Yds. | Miles Yds. |
| Canada Basin | 250 0 | 32 0 | 6 4528 | 0 546 |
| Sandon Basin | 200 0 | 31 0 | 6 904 | 0 702 |
| George’s Ferry Basin | 67 0 | 23 8 | 0 1344 | 0 160 |
| Chester Basin | 36 0 | 22 2 | 0 2568 | 0 288 |
| South Ferry Basin | 60 0 | 30 6 | 0 2927 | 0 205 |
| Harrington Basin | 40 0 | 23 3 | 0 3917 | 0 308 |
| Herculaneum Basin | 40 0 | 26 0 | 0 2200 | 0 204 |
| +-----------+----------+------------+------------|
| Total Water Area and Quay Space of the } | 15 3868 | 1 653 |
| Liverpool Basins } | | |
| Do. do. do. Docks | 243 1559 | 17 263 |
| +------------+------------+
| Total | 259 587 | 18 916 |
+---------------------------------------------+------------+------------+
+-----------------------------------------------------------+
| AREA OF THE DOCK ESTATE. |
+-----------------------------------------------------------+
| Liverpool 1,032 Acres. |
| Birkenhead 506 Acres. |
| ----- |
| Total 1,538 Acres. |
+-----------------------------------------------------------+
BIRKENHEAD DOCKS.
------------------------------+------------------+----------+----------+---------+----------
| Position | Sill |Coping at | |
BIRKENHEAD DOCKS. | and Width of | below | Hollow | Water | Lineal
| Entrance | Datum. | Quoins | Area. | Quayage.
| or Passage. | |above Dtm.| |
------------------------------+------------------+----------+----------+----------+---------
| Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Ac. Yds. |Miles Yds.
WEST FLOAT | .. .. | .. | .. | 52 19 | 2 210
Basin near Canada Works | West 50 0 | .. | .. | 1 2554 | 0 543
Do. do. | East 50 0 | .. | .. | 1 84 | 0 390
Duke Street Passage | 100 0 | 7 6 | 26 6 | .. | ..
EAST FLOAT | .. .. | .. | .. | 59 3786 | 1 1506
Corn Warehouse Dock | 30 0 | O.D.S. | 26 0 | 1 453 | 0 555
Railway Companies’ Basin | .. .. | .. | .. | 0 606 | 0 113
Lock from Low-Water Basin } | 50 0 | .. | 26 0 | 0 1333 | 0 234
238 feet long } | | | | |
Inner Sill | .. .. | 9 0 | .. | .. | ..
Outer Sills | .. .. | 12 0 | .. | .. | ..
Inner Northern Entrances | North 100 0 | 9 0 | 26 0 | .. | 0 242
Lock 198 feet long | Middle 30 0 | .. | 26 0 | 0 667 | 0 264
Inner Sill | .. .. | 9 0 | .. | .. | ..
Outer Sills | .. .. | 12 0 | .. | .. | ..
Lock 274 feet long | South 50 0 | .. | 26 0 | 0 522 | 0 300
Inner Sill | .. .. | 9 0 | .. | .. | ..
Outer Sills | .. .. | 12 0 | .. | .. | ..
Alfred Dock | .. .. | .. | .. | 8 2922 | 0 482
Outer Northern Entrances— | | | | |
Lock 348 feet long | North 100 0 | 12 0 | 31 0 | 0 3888 | 0 352
Lock 198 feet long | Middle 30 0 | 12 0 | 26 0 | 0 667 | 0 377
Lock 398 feet long | South 50 0 | 12 0 | 26 0 | 0 2222 | 0 391
Egerton Dock | West 70 0 | 7 4 | 25 0 | 3 4011 | 0 754
Morpeth Dock | West 70 0 | 5 5 | 25 0 | 11 2404 | 0 1299
Railway Companies’ Basin | South 25 0 | O.D.S. | 26 0 | 0 3144 | 0 319
Morpeth Branch Dock | West 85 0 | .. | 26 0 | 4 243 | 0 637
Morpeth Lock 398 feet long | River 85 0 | 12 0 | 26 0 | 0 3777 | 0 441
+----------+---------
Total Water Area and Quay Space of the Birkenhead Docks | 147 722 | 8 609
-----------------------------------------------------------------------+----------+---------
BIRKENHEAD BASINS.
+----------------------+-----------+----------+------------+------------|
| | | Height | | |
| BIRKENHEAD BASINS. | Width of | of Piers | Water | Lineal |
| | Entrance. | above | Area. | Quayage. |
| | | Datum. | | |
+----------------------+-----------+----------+------------+------------|
| | Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Acres Yds. | Miles Yds. |
| Low-Water Basin | 300 0 | 26 0 | 14 0 | 0 1360 |
| North Basin | 500 0 | 31 0 | 4 2843 | 0 689 |
| +------------+------------|
| Total Water Area and Quay Space of the } | 18 2843 | 1 269 |
| Birkenhead Basins } | | |
| Do. do. do. Docks | 147 722 | 8 609 |
| +------------+------------|
| Total | 165 3565 | 9 878 |
+---------------------------------------------+------------+------------+
TOTAL AREA OF THE LIVERPOOL AND BIRKENHEAD DOCKS AND BASINS.
+---------------------------------------------+------------+------------+
| | Acres Yds. | Miles Yds. |
| Total Water Area and Quay Space of the } | | |
| Liverpool Docks and Basins } | 259 587 | 18 916 |
| | | |
| Total Water Area and Quay Space of the } | | |
| Birkenhead Docks and Basins } | 165 3565 | 9 878 |
| +------------+------------+
| Total | 424 4152 | 28 34 |
+---------------------------------------------+------------+------------+
LEVELS OF TIDES AT LIVERPOOL.
_Derived from the Record of the Self-Registering Gauge at George’s Pier
deduced from Ten Years’ Observations, 1854 to 1863. Datum Old Dock Sill._
------------------------------------------------------+-------------+---------
| Ft. In. |
An extraordinary High Tide, as marked on the } | 25 0 | { Above
Leasowe Lighthouse } | | { Datum.
An extraordinary High Tide, 20 January, 1863 | 23 9 | ”
Average High-Water Mark of Equinoctial Spring Tides. | 21 1 | ”
Average High Water of Spring Tides, including | |
Equinoctial Tides | 19 0½ | ”
Average High-Water Mark of Ordinary Spring Tides, | |
excluding the Equinoctial Tides | 18 10 | ”
Mean High-Water Level | 15 6 | ”
Highest High-Water Mark of Neap Tides | 14 8 | ”
Average High-Water Mark of Ordinary Neap Tides | 11 7 | ”
Lowest High-Water Mark of Neap Tides | 8 7 | ”
Mean Tide Level (Ordnance Datum) | 5 0 | ”
Highest Low-Water Mark of Neap Tides | 4 1 | ”
Average Low-Water Mark of Ordinary Neap Tides | 1 5 | { Below
| | { Datum.
Lowest Low-Water Mark of Neap Tides | 3 10 | ”
Mean Low-Water Level | 5 6 | ”
Average Low-Water Mark of Ordinary Spring Tides, | |
exclusive of Equinoctial Tides | 8 8 | ”
Average Low-Water Mark of Spring Tides, inclusive of | |
Equinoctial Tides | 8 10 | ”
Lowest Low-Water Mark of Equinoctial Spring Tides | 10 4 | ”
------------------------------------------------------+-------------+---------
LIVERPOOL GRAVING DOCKS.
-----------------------------+------------------+---------+---------+---------+---------
| Position | Sill |Coping at| Length | Total
LIVERPOOL GRAVING DOCKS. | and Width of | below | Hollow | of | Length
| Entrance. | Datum. | Quoins | Floor. | of
| | | above | | Floor.
| | | Dtm. | |
-----------------------------+-----------------+----------+---------+---------+---------
| Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Ft. In.
Canada Lock as a Graving Dock| 100 0 | 7 9 | 28 0 | .. | 588 0
Huskisson Lock as a Graving | | | | |
Dock | 80 0 | 6 6 | 38 0 | .. | 395 0
Sandon Graving Docks, No. 1 |East 60 0 | 3 6 | 26 0 | 565 0 |
No. 2 |East 70 0 | 3 6 | 26 0 | 565 0 |
No. 3 |East 60 0 | 3 6 | 26 0 | 565 0 |
No. 4 |East 70 0 | 3 6 | 26 0 | 565 0 |
No. 5 |East 45 0 | 3 6 | 26 0 | 565 0 |
No. 6 |West 45 0 | 3 6 | 26 0 | 565 0 |
| | | +---------+ 3390 0
Clarence Graving Docks, No. 1|N. Outer 45 0 | 3 0 | 26 6 | 451 0 |
|N. Inner 45 0 | 0 6 | 18 0 | 289 0 |
No. 2|S. Outer 45 0 | 3 0 | 26 6 | 454 0 |
|S. Inner 32 0 | 0 6 | 18 0 | 286 0 |
| |Sill above| +---------+ 1480 0
| | Datum. | | |
| | | | |
Canning Graving Docks, No. 1 |North 35 9 | 1 8½ | 23 3 | 436 0 |
| |Sill below| | |
| | Datum. | | |
No. 2 |South 35 9 | 0 0½ | 23 3½ | 482 0 |
| | | +---------+ 918 0
Queen’s Graving Docks, No. 1 |East 42 0 | 1 8¼ | 27 7¾ | 465 0 |
No. 2 |West 70 0 | 3 6 | 27 5 | 467 0 |
| | | +---------+ 932 0
Brunswick Graving Dks. No. 1 |East 41 0 | 2 6 | 26 6 | 460 0 |
No. 2 |West 41 6 | 2 6 | 26 6 | 462 0 |
| | | +---------| 922 0
Herculaneum Grvg. Dks. No. 1 |West 60 0 | 4 0 | 26 0 | 758 6 |
No. 2 |East 60 0 | 4 0 | 26 0 | 753 0 |
| | | +---------+ 1511 6
+---------
Total Length of Floor of the Liverpool Graving Docks |10136 6
------------------------------------------------------------------------------+---------
BIRKENHEAD GRAVING DOCKS.
-----------------------------+-----------------+----------+---------+---------+--------
| Position and | Sill |Coping at| Length | Total
BIRKENHEAD GRAVING DOCKS. | Width of | under | Hollow | of |Length of
| Entrance. | Datum. | Quoins | Floor. | Floor.
| | |abv. Dtm.| |
-----------------------------+-----------------+----------+---------+---------+--------
| Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Ft. In. | Ft. In.
Morpeth Lock as a Graving | | | | |
Dock | 85 0 | 12 0 | 26 0 | .. | 468 0
West Float No. 2 | East 50 0 | 7 9 | 25 0 | 750 0 | ..
No. 3 | West 85 0 | 7 9 | 25 0 | 750 0 | 1500 0
| | | +---------+---------
Total Length of Floor of the Birkenhead Graving Docks | 1968 0
Ditto of the Liverpool Graving Docks | 10136 6
+---------
Total | 12104 6
------------------------------------------------------------------------------+---------
LIVERPOOL GRIDIRONS.
-----------------------------------------------------------+----------+-------
| Breadth |Length.
GRIDIRONS. | of |
| Gridiron.|
-----------------------------------------------------------+-----------+-------
| Ft. In. |Ft. In.
Clarence Graving Dock Basin—The Blocks are laid 2 feet } | 25 6 | 313 6
2 inches below the Datum at the South end of the } | |
Gridiron, and 3 inches below at the North end } | |
| |
King’s Pier—The Blocks are laid at the level of the Datum | 26 0 | 509 0
+-------
Total Length of the Liverpool Gridirons | 822 6
----------------------------------------------------------------------+-------
LANDING STAGES.
Liverpool.—Prince’s Stage 1002 6 long; 80 wide, 4 Bridges from the shore.
George’s Stage 505 0 long; 80 wide, 2 Bridges from the shore.
Birkenhead.—Low Water } 1040 0 long; 50 & 2 Bridges from the shore.
Basin Stage } 35 wide,
Woodside Stage 800 0 long; 80 wide, 2 Bridges from the shore.
NOTE.—The South end of the Woodside Stage, for a length of 300
feet, including one of the Bridges, is appropriated to the use of
the Birkenhead Commissioners. The 500 feet Northwards, and the
other Bridge, is under the superintendence of the Dock Board. In
connection with this stage there is a Floating Bridge, 678 feet in
length by 30 feet in width, by means of which an easy incline for
Carriage Traffic is maintained at all times of the Tide.
--------------------------------+---------------+-----------------+--------+-----------
DOCKS BELONGING TO THE | | LEVEL OF SILL. |Level of|
CORPORATION OF LIVERPOOL | Width of +--------+--------+ Coping | Water
AND OTHERS. | Entrance. | Above | Below | above | Area.
| | Datum. | Datum. | Datum. |
--------------------------------+---------------+--------+--------+--------+-----------
_The Corporation of Liverpool._ | Ft. In. | Ft. In.| Ft. In.| Ft. In.| Acres Yds.
| | | | |
The River Craft Dock | Outer 30 0 | 0 3 | .. | 25 4 | 1 3416
Lock, and Eagle Basin | Inner 30 0 | 1 3 | .. | 25 10 | ..
Ditto Anderton Basin | .. 40 0 | .. | .. | .. | 0 1198
| | | | |
_The Trustees of the late | | | | |
Duke of Bridgewater._ | | | | |
| | | | |
Duke’s Dock | Outer 40 0 | .. | 4 6 | 25 6 | 2 1336
| Middle 28 10 | 0 6 | .. | 22 9 | ..
| Inner 40 0 | .. | 6 0 | 25 0 | ..
Ditto Egerton Dock | .. 20 0 | 0 6 | .. | 23 0 | 0 2700
| | | | |
_The London & North-Western | | | | |
Railway Company._ | | | | |
| | | | |
Garston Dock | North 20 0 | .. | 6 0 | 26 0 | 6 1200
| South 50 0 | .. | .. | .. | ..
+-----------
| 11 170
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Leeds and Liverpool Canal is in communication with Stanley
Dock through Four Locks and Five intermediate Basins. The Locks
are each 81 feet long by 16 feet 6 inches wide, and the Total Rise
is 46 feet 6 inches. The Level of the Water in the Canal is 58
feet above the Datum.
APPENDIX No. 8, VOL. ii. p. 448.
_Extracts from the Ship’s Charter party, which requires the
attention of the Commanders and Officers in the Maritime Service
of the East India Company._
58. The commander to give notice to the secretary, in writing, when the
ship arrives at Gravesend, outward bound.
59. The commander also to give notice to the secretary at the
expiration of the time limited for the stay of the ship at Gravesend,
or in the Hope, outward bound.
60. The Company are to have liberty to survey the ship at any time, and
to lay by for their surveyors, who are to be civilly treated, and to be
provided with reasonable and convenient food and lodging.
61. The ship not carrying the full number of guns, the commander
and owners to forfeit for each gun wanting, 40_l._, and not to be
disposed of without leave of the Company’s servants to whom the ship is
consigned. The owners and commander to forfeit 100_l._ for every gun
sold, and the commander rendered incapable of continuing in the service.
62. The commander or master to obey the Company’s orders during the
voyage, and also committees appointed by them, or their governors,
president, agents, chief factors, or assigns.
63. The master or officers displaced (or by decease), the next in rank
to succeed him.
64. The command, or any office in the ship, not to be bought, or sold.
65. An order of encouragement, to the following effect, to be put up in
the ship, and to be continued during the voyage.
66. “The Court of Directors of the United Company of Merchants of
England, trading to the East Indies, being willing to encourage the
mariners of all their ships to be just to the said Company, and careful
of their effects and trade, and observant of all injuries done or doing
thereto, as also to animate them to defend their said ships and their
estates on board, in case they should be assaulted by any enemy, do
hereby declare that they will allow and pay the following rewards, at
the return of the ship from the East Indies, into the River Thames, and
finishing this present voyage; that is to say, to every seaman that
shall prevent any wilful and malicious damage to any part of the said
Company’s effects, or shall save the same from being lost, a reward
suitable to their merit therein. To the widow, children, father or
mother of every seaman that shall lose his life in the defence of the
ship, as aforesaid, thirty pounds. To every seaman that shall lose a
leg or arm, or both, in such defence, thirty pounds. To every seaman
that shall receive any other wound, such sum of money as the said Court
of Directors shall think fit, upon producing a certificate from their
commander or superior officer, touching their merits. That every seaman
so wounded in defence of the ship shall be cured of his wounds at the
charge of the said Company and owners.”
67. The ship to touch at such places as shall be ordered; receive in
and deliver out any goods.
68. The ship not to touch at any place, but what ordered to touch at;
or to take any foreign coin or bullion, goods or provisions, at any
place short of her consigned port, without an especial licence from the
Court of Directors. Penalty, the forfeiture of the goods, and 100_l._
per day for detention of the ship.
69. The cargo to be stowed in the best manner, to prevent damage; and
disposed of in the ship in such manner and in such places as will not
lumber or incommode her working, or render her incapable of defence.
70. No goods are to be shot loose in the hold, nor any luggs to be cut
off the bales, under penalty of the Company paying but half the freight
of goods thus damaged; and bales not to be opened without giving
notice, under penalty of 10_l._; for pepper shot loose between decks,
the freight will not be paid for.
71. The ship to make no deviation, and the whole cargo to be delivered
into the Company’s warehouses.
72. The ship, if she touch at the island of Ascension or St. Helena,
must not sail without leave of the governor and council. Penalty,
200_l._
73. The ship not to touch at Barbadoes, or any port in America, or any
of the Western Islands, or Plymouth, or put into any port of England
or Ireland, without orders (unavoidable dangers of the sea excepted).
Penalty, 500_l._
74. The commander, chief and second mates to keep journals of the
ship’s daily proceedings, from her first taking in cargo in the River
Thames to her return and discharge of her cargo in England, and of
the wind and weather, and all remarkable transactions, accidents, and
occurrences during the whole voyage; also of everything received into
and delivered from the ship; and are afterwards to be delivered to the
Company on oath, if required.
75. No unlicensed goods to be carried in the ship; or to take any
passengers without leave.
76. The ship to have her complement of men during the voyage.
77. That it shall not be lawful for the master of the ship, or any
other officer of the ship, to furnish any of the seamen with money,
liquor, provisions beyond the value of one-third of what the wages of
such seaman shall amount to at the time of furnishing the same.
78. The paymaster to be appointed by the Company, and owners to pay
seamen’s wives, etc., one month’s wages in six.
79. The commander to have the use of the great cabin, unless for the
use of the Company’s servants.
80. That the part-owners or master do send in the ship the value of
500_l._ in foreign coins or bullion (the same to be weighed in and
passed through the Company’s Bullion Office), to be made use of for
extraordinary expenses during the voyage. Penalty, 20_l._ per cent.
81. The commander to be supplied with 200_l._ per month, by way of
impress or provisions, while in India or China.
82. The Company to pay for the hire of Lascars, in the room of seamen
employed in India.
APPENDIX No. 9. VOL. ii. p. 458.
_Ships belonging to or in the service of the East India Company
burnt, lost, taken, or otherwise destroyed, from the year 1700 to
the year 1819._
------+------------------------+------+----------------
Date. | Ships’ Names. | Tons.| By what Means.
------+------------------------+------+----------------
1702 | Queen | 320 | Taken.
1703 | Neptune | 275 | Lost.
-- | Dover | 180 | Taken.
1704 | Hester | 350 | Lost.
-- | Albemarle | 320 | Lost.
1705 | Edward and Dudley | 300 | Taken.
-- | Bombay | 300 | Blown up.
1707 | Herbert | 210 | Taken.
-- | Dispatch | 110 | Blown up.
1708 | Godolphin | 280 | Lost.
-- | New George | 400 | Taken.
1709 | Sherborne | 400 | Lost.
1709 | Dutchess | 430 | Taken.
-- | Phɶnix | 400 | Lost.
1710 | Jane | 180 | Taken.
1711 | Blenheim | 250 | Burnt.
1715 | Catherine | 350 | Lost.
1716 | Success | 250 | Lost.
1718 | Vansittart | 480 | Lost.
1719 | St. George | 480 | Lost.
-- | King George | 450 | Lost.
-- | Cassandria | 380 | Taken.
-- | Chandos | 480 | Lost.
1720 | Addison | 400 | Lost.
-- | Dartmouth | 400 | Lost.
1721 | Nightingale | 480 | Lost.
1729 | Berrington | 440 | Lost.
1731 | Eyles | 400 | Lost.
1733 | Oakham | 480 | Burnt.
1734 | Derby | 480 | Taken.
1735 | Pelham | 480 | Lost.
-- | Compton | 480 | Burnt.
1736 | Deckar | 490 | Lost.
-- | Sussex | 490 | Lost.
-- | Newcastle | 495 | Lost.
-- | Devonshire | 495 | Lost.
1737 | Resolution | 495 | Lost.
-- | Anglesea | 490 | Lost.
1738 | Normanton | 495 | Lost.
1741 | Grantham | 495 | Lost.
1742 | Princess Louisa | 498 | Lost.
1743 | Nottingham | 498 | Lost.
-- | Northampton | 498 | Lost.
1744 | Prince of Orange | 495 | Lost.
-- | Princess Mary | 498 | Taken.
1745 | Princess Amelia | 498 | Taken.
1746 | Heathcote | 498 | Lost.
-- | Winchelsea | 498 | Lost.
-- | Anson | 499 | Taken.
1747 | Lincoln | 498 | Lost.
-- | Dolphin | 370 | Lost.
1749 | Duke of Cumberland | 499 | Lost.
-- | Lynn | 499 | Lost.
1754 | Doddington | 499 | Lost.
1756 | Grantham | 499 | Taken.
-- | York | 499 | Lost.
1756 | Expedition | 350 | Taken.
1759 | Streatham | 499 | Lost.
1760 | Denham | 499 | Taken.
1761 | Griffin | 499 | Lost.
1762 | Walpole | 499 | Taken.
1763 | Elizabeth | 499 | Burnt.
1764 | Earl of Holderness | 499 | Lost.
-- | Ajax | 499 | Lost.
-- | Earl Temple | 499 | Lost.
-- | Winchelsea | 499 | Lost.
1765 | Albion | 499 | Lost.
1766 | Falmouth | 499 | Lost.
1767 | Lord Clive | 499 | Lost.
1768 | Earl of Chatham | 499 | Lost.
1769 | Lord Holland | 499 | Lost.
1771 | Verelet | 499 | Lost.
1772 | Duke of Albany | 499 | Lost.
1773 | Lord Mansfield | 499 | Lost.
-- | Royal Captain | 499 | Lost.
1774 | Huntingdon | 499 | Lost.
1777 | Marquis of Rockingham | 758 | Lost.
1778 | Colebrooke | 723 | Lost.
-- | London | 723 | Lost.
1779 | Valentine | 676 | Lost.
-- | Osterley | 758 | Taken.
-- | Stafford | 804 | Lost.
1780 | Royal George | 758 |} Taken by the
-- | Hillsborough | 723 |} combined Fleets
-- | Mountstuart | 758 |} of France and
-- | Gatton | 758 |} Spain, August
-- | Godfrey | 716 |} 9th, 1780.
1781 | General Barker | 758 | Lost.
1782 | Earl Dartmouth | 758 | Lost.
-- | Grosvenor | 729 | Lost.
-- | Fortitude | 758 | Taken.
-- | Earl of Hertford | 758 | Lost.
-- | Brilliant | 703 | Lost.
1783 | Blandford | 606 | Taken.
-- | Hitchinbrooke | 528 | Lost.
-- | Duke of Athol | 755 | Burnt.
-- | Fairford | 755 | Burnt.
-- | Duke of Kingston | 723 | Burnt.
1784 | Major | 755 | Burnt.
1785 | Montague | 755 | Blown up.
1786 | Halsewell | 758 | Lost.
1787 | Hartwell | 937 | Lost.
-- | Mars | 696 | Lost.
1789 | Vansittart | 828 | Lost.
1791 | Foulis | 765 | Never heard of.
1792 | Winterton | 771 | Lost.
1793 | Princess Royal | 805 | Taken.
1794 | Pigot | 765 | Taken.
1796 | Triton | 800 | Taken.
-- | Dutton | 761 |}
-- | Ganges | 784 |} Lost on the West
-- | Middlesex | 852 |} India Expedition.
-- | Pousborne | 804 |}
1797 | Ocean | 1189 | Lost.
-- | Martha | 406 | Lost.
1798 | Princess Amelia | 808 | Burnt.
-- | Raymond | 793 | Taken.
-- | Woodcot | 802 | Taken.
-- | Henry Addington | 1200 | Lost.
1799 | Earl Fitzwilliam | 803 | Burnt.
-- | Osterley | 755 | Taken and retaken.
1800 | Queen | 801 | Burnt.
-- | Kent | 820 | Taken.
-- | Earl Talbot | 1200 | Foundered.
1803 | Culland’s Grove | 576 | Taken.
-- | Lord Nelson | 820 | Taken and retaken.
-- | Hindostan | 1248 | Lost.
-- | Prince of Wales | 820 | Foundered.
-- | Admiral Aplin | 558 | Taken.
-- | Comet | 529 | Taken.
1804 | Princess Charlotte | 610 | Taken.
-- | Brunswick | 1200 | Taken.
1805 | Earl of Abergavenny | 1200 | Lost.
-- | Warren Hastings | 1200 | Taken and retaken.
-- | Ganges | 1200 | Lost.
-- | Britannia | 770 | Lost.
1806 | Lady Burges | 820 | Lost.
-- | Fame | 492 | Taken.
-- | Shelton Castle | 584 | Foundered.
1808 | Lord Nelson | 818 |}
-- | Glory | 549 |} Foundered.
-- | Experiment | 502 |}
-- | Walpole | 820 | Lost.
-- | Travers | 577 | Lost.
1809 | Britannia | 1200 | Lost.
-- | Admiral Gardner | 813 | Lost.
-- | Calcutta | 819 |}
-- | Jane, Duchess of Gordon| 820 |}
-- | Bengal | 818 |} Foundered.
-- | Lady Jane Dundas. | 820 |}
1809 | Europe | 820 |}Taken and retaken.
-- | Streatham | 819 |}
-- | Asia | 820 | Lost.
-- | Windham | 820 | Taken and retaken.
-- | United Kingdom | 820 |}Taken.
-- | Charlton | 818 |}
-- | True Briton | 1198 | Foundered.
1810 | Earl Camden | 1200 | Burnt.
-- | Ocean | 1200 | Foundered.
-- | Ceylon | 818 | Taken and retaken.
1812 | Harriet | 549 | Burnt.
1813 | Euphrates | 596 | Lost.
-- | Marquis Wellesley | 820 | Lost.
-- | Earl Howe | 876 | Lost.
-- | William Pitt | 572 | Foundered.
1814 | Devonshire | 820 | Lost.
1815 | Bengal | 950 | Burnt.
1817 | Elphinstone | 1200 | Burnt.
1818 | Cabalva | 1200 | Lost.
-----+------------------------+------+----------------
APPENDIX No. 10. VOL. ii. p. 462.
_A list of Ships belonging to or chartered by the East India Company,
in 1820, where built, tonnage, and number of guns and men._
---------------------+---------------------+--------+------+----
Ship’s Name. |Where and when built.|Tonnage.| Guns.| Men.
---------------------+-------------+-------+--------+------+----
Apollo |Paul | 1812 | 693 | 12 | 65
Asia |Barnard’s | 1811 | 1012 | 26 | 115
Astell |Mestaer’s | 1810 | 871 | 26 | 100
Atlas |Paul | 1812 | 1291 | 26 | 130
Bombay |Bombay | 1809 | 1246 | 26 | 130
Bridgewater |Brent’s | 1812 | 1339 | 26 | 130
Buckinghamshire |Bombay | 1816 | 1369 | 26 | 130
Canning |Wigram’s | 1817 | 1326 | 26 | 130
Carnatic |Perry’s | 1808 | 863 | 26 | 102
Castle Huntly |Bengal | 1812 | 1274 | 26 | 130
Charles Grant |Bombay | 1810 | 1252 | 26 | 130
Cornwall |Bengal | 1811 | 798 | 12 | 75
Dorsetshire |Barnard’s | 1799 | 1268 | 16 | 110
Duke of York |Wigram’s | 1817 | 1327 | 26 | 130
Dunira |Barnard’s | 1817 | 1325 | 26 | 130
Earl of Balcarras |Bombay | 1815 | 1417 | 26 | 130
Essex |Perry’s | 1812 | 1352 | 26 | 130
General Harris |Brent’s | 1812 | 1339 | 26 | 130
General Hewitt |Bengal | 1811 | 894 | 26 | 110
General Kyd |Bengal | 1813 | 1327 | 26 | 130
Herefordshire |Bombay | 1813 | 1342 | 26 | 130
Inglis |Penang | 1811 | 1321 | 26 | 130
Kellie Castle |Wigram’s | 1818 | 1350 | 26 | 130
Lady Campbell |River | 1816 | 684 | 12 | 65
Lady Melville |Wigram’s | 1813 | 1321 | 26 | 130
Larkins |India | 1807 | 676 | 12 | 60
London |Pitcher’s | 1817 | 1352 | 26 | 130
Lord Castlereagh |Randall’s | 1802 | 847 | 26 | 110
Lowther Castle |Pitcher’s | 1811 | 1507 | 26 | 130
Marchioness of Ely |Well’s | 1802 | 1016 | 26 | 115
Marquis Camden |Pitcher’s | 1812 | 1329 | 26 | 130
Marquis of Ely |Perry’s | 1801 | 1316 | 12 | 115
Marquis of Huntly |Brent’s | 1811 | 1348 | 26 | 130
Marquis of Wellington|Barnard’s | 1812 | 1033 | 26 | 115
Matilda |India | 1803 | 774 | 12 | 75
Minerva |Bombay | 1813 | 976 | 26 | 115
Moffatt |India | 1804 | 846 | 12 | 75
Orwell |Ipswich | 1817 | 1335 | 26 | 130
Prince Regent |Barnard’s | 1811 | 1036 | 26 | 115
Perseverance |Pitcher’s | 1801 | 1335 | 26 | 130
Phɶnix |Barnard’s | 1814 | 887 | 26 | 102
Princess Amelia |Barnard’s | 1808 | 1319 | 26 | 130
Princess Charlotte } | | | | |
of Wales } |Dudman’s | 1812 | 1016 | 26 | 115
Regent |Bengal | 1811 | 910 | 12 | 90
Rose |Well’s | 1811 | 1024 | 26 | 115
Streatham |Dudman’s | 1804 | 861 | 26 | 110
Scaleby Castle |India | 1798 | 1237 | 26 | 130
Thames |Barnard’s | 1819 | 1360 | 26 | 130
Thomas Coutts |Wigram’s | 1817 | 1334 | 26 | 130
Thomas Grenville |Bombay | 1809 | 923 | 26 | 107
Vansittart |Bengal | 1813 | 1313 | 26 | 130
Warren Hastings } | | | | |
(Rawes) } |Perry’s | 1793 | 1356 | 26 | 130
Warren Hastings } | | | | |
(Larkins) } |Barnard’s | 1802 | 1004 | 26 | 120
Waterloo |Wigram’s | 1816 | 1325 | 26 | 130
Winchelsea |River | 1803 | 1310 | 12 | 115
Windsor |Barnard’s | 1818 | 1332 | 26 | 130
William Pitt |Barnard’s | 1804 | 857 | 26 | 110
APPENDIX No. 11, VOL. ii. p. 464.
_Historical Abstract of Public Duties performed by the East India
Company’s Maritime Service._
In 1601 the first fleet, under Lancaster, took possession of St.
Helena, entered into a treaty with the King of Acheen, settled a
factory at Bantam, and captured a valuable carrack of nine hundred tons
burthen.
During 1609 the Company’s ship _Solomon_ engaged and defeated several
Portuguese ships, and in 1611 their fleet, under command of Captain
Saris, proceeded to Japan, and settled a Company’s factory at Firando;
while in this year a large ship belonging to the Company, assisted
by a pinnace, maintained five several engagements with a squadron of
Portuguese, and gained a complete victory over forces much superior.
In 1612 the Company’s fleet, under the command of Captain Thomas Best,
engaged the Portuguese fleet, consisting of four galleys and twenty-six
frigates, in two separate actions, when the Portuguese were defeated
with great loss.
In 1613 the Company’s fleet, under the command of Captain (General)
Downton, attacked and defeated the Portuguese fleet near Surat, sinking
and burning most of the enemy’s ships; and in 1616 their fleet, under
Captain Pring, took a valuable Portuguese frigate, and defeated the
Dutch fleet in a severe action at Batavia.
1619. A great naval action between four Company’s ships, under the
command of Captain Shilling (who was killed), and a Portuguese fleet,
in which the Company’s ships were victorious. This fleet also took
possession of Saldanha Bay.
1620. Four of the Company’s ships defeated the Portuguese fleet and
captured several junks belonging to the Mogul.
1622. Ormuz taken by the Company’s fleet, in concert with the King of
Persia’s forces. By this capture the first and most valuable commercial
treaty with that monarch was obtained.
1623. In the twenty-first year of the reign of James I. he authorized
the Company to exercise martial law in their ships at sea.
1630. A great naval battle near Surat, in which the Company’s fleet was
victorious over the Portuguese.
1635. The Company’s fleet, under Sir Thomas Grantham, recapture Bombay.
The Company’s fleet captured forty sail of Mogul ships at Ballasore.
1662. At the expiration of more than _half a century_ after the
commencement of the trade to India, men-of-war first sent out.
1690. The Company’s ship _Herbert_ fought a desperate action at Johanna
against four ships of superior force, and beat them off, but in the
moment of victory she unfortunately took fire and blew up.
1703. The Company’s ships _Chambers_ and _Canterbury_, in the Straits
of Malacca, engaged _in the night_ a French sixty-four and a frigate.
The _Canterbury_ was taken, but the _Chambers_ gallantly renewed the
action at daylight, and having crippled her opponents, escaped. The
following is an extract from the commander’s log: “To prevent all
thought among my men of surrendering ye ship, and make ym desperate,
I nailed the ensigne to the staff from head to foot, stapled and
fore-cockt the ensigne staff fast up. I resolved to part with ship and
life together.”
1746. A French squadron, consisting of _L’Achille_, sixty-four, and
two frigates, appeared off St. Helena to intercept the homeward-bound
fleet. An Indiaman’s long-boat was fitted out under the command of a
midshipman, who succeeded in gaining the weather-gage of the enemy’s
squadron unperceived, and cruised for the purpose of warning the
expected fleet. Six of the Company’s ships fell in with the squadron,
and maintained a running fight for several days, till they anchored
in All Saints’ Bay, where they were blockaded by _L’Achille_ and her
consorts, notwithstanding which, they ultimately escaped and reached
England in safety.
1757. The Company’s ships _Suffolk_, _Houghton_, and _Godolphin_ fell
in with two French frigates off the Cape, and after a smart action
beat them off. The Court of Directors highly commended the conduct
of the commanders, officers, and crews upon this occasion, and each
ship received a gratuity of 2,000_l._ These ships were commanded by
Captain Wilson, who was made commander of all the Company’s ships, and
appointed to the _William Pitt_, in which ship he discovered Pitt’s
Straits, 1759, and “pointed out to admiring nations a new track to
China, founded on philosophic principles.”
1758. At the recapture of Fort William many of the Company’s ships were
employed, and in some instances the crews were engaged on shore.
1759. When the Dutch, with four frigates of thirty-six guns each, two
frigates of twenty-six guns each, and another ship mounting sixteen
guns, with crews of fifteen hundred men on board, attempted to capture
the British possessions of Bengal, they were driven back, and captured
by the Company’s ships _Calcutta_, _Duke of Dorset_, and _Hardwicke_.
In the same year the Company’s ship _Hardwicke_ fought an action with a
French frigate.
1760. The Company’s ships _Royal George_ and _Oxford_ intercepted and
captured three Dutch ships and three sloops off Culpec. In 1761 the
Company’s ship _Shaftesbury_ stood into Madras Roads, in defiance of
two French ships there blockading the town, who attacked her, but,
succeeding in beating them off, she then embarked a detachment of
troops, and proceeded to St. Thomas, where she engaged and beat off a
French frigate. The captain, officers, and crew of the _Shaftesbury_
were warmly commended for their gallant conduct on this occasion, and
received a reward of 2,000_l._
The Company’s ship _Winchelsea_ fought a French frigate single handed
and beat her off. The Court in this case also distributed the sum of
2,000_l._ among the crew for their gallant conduct.
1779. The Company’s ship _Bridgewater_ fought an American privateer of
superior force, and beat her off, for which the crew received a reward
of 2,000_l._ from the Court of Directors.
1782. The Company’s ships, under Commodore Johnstone, fought a gallant
action at Port Praya, in which the enemy were defeated.
1786. The _Princess Royal_, Captain Horncastle, fought an action in the
Straits of Malacca.
1793. The Company’s ships _Triton_, _Royal Charlotte_, and _Warley_,
in company with H.M.S. _Minerva_, were employed in the blockade of
Pondicherry, and assisted at the capture of that place.
1794. The Company’s ship _Pigott_ fought a gallant action at Bencoolen
with three French frigates. In this year, there not being a single
English man-of-war in the Indian Seas, or to the eastward of the Cape,
and while the port of Calcutta was blockaded, and the whole trade of
India a prey to large and well-appointed privateers, the Company’s
ships _William Pitt_, _Britannia_, and _Houghton_, under Commodore
Mitchell (who was knighted for his services on this occasion), cruised
in the Indian seas as men-of-war for the protection of commerce. They
captured two large privateers, and defeated a French squadron of two
frigates, a brig of war, and an armed ship, the _Princess Royal_.
When, in 1795, the great expedition was ordered for the West Indies,
application was made to the Company for assistance, and fourteen of the
Company’s ships were fitted out immediately, and ten others sold to
Government and equipped as line-of-battle ships.
In the same year an expedition was fitted out at St. Helena, consisting
of the Company’s ships _Goddard_, _Mauship_, _Hawkesbury_, _Airly
Castle_, _Asia_, _Essex_, and _Busbridge_; which proceeded to cruise
to windward of the island, where they intercepted and captured a
valuable fleet of nine Dutch Indiamen. This undertaking involved in its
consequences the annihilation of the Dutch East India Company.
The Company’s ships _Bombay Castle_, _Exeter_, and _Brunswick_ were
fitted out as men-of-war at Bombay, and assisted in taking the Cape of
Good Hope.
1797. When at the mutiny of the Nore, the Court of Directors called
upon their officers to serve on board his Majesty’s ships for the
defence of the river, the request was promptly and zealously answered
by the maritime service at large.
Commodore Farquharson, of the Company’s service, with a fleet of
their ships, fell in with the French Admiral De Sercey and a powerful
squadron of men-of-war; the Indiamen immediately formed the line of
battle, and gave chase to the enemy, who crowded all sail, and was soon
out of sight. This bold manɶuvre saved a valuable fleet to the Company
and to the nation.
In 1797, on the expedition against Manilla, several of the Company’s
ships were fitted out to act as men-of-war, and in 1798 the _Hughes_
was equipped at Bombay to protect the trade on the Malabar Coast. That
year the Company’s ships _Royal Charlotte_, _Cuffnells_, _Phɶnix_, and
_Alligator_ assisted H.M. ships _La Pomone_, _Argo_, and _Cormorant_
in convoying a large fleet of merchantmen and transports to Lisbon.
On the 25th of September they fell in with a French fleet of nine
sail, consisting of one eighty-gun ship and eight frigates. The signal
was made for the Company’s ships to form the line with those of his
Majesty’s, and the convoy were ordered to push for Lisbon. This
manɶuvre, and the warlike appearance of the Indiamen, deterred the
French admiral from attacking them, so that the whole fleet reached
Lisbon in safety.
1799. The Company’s ships _Earl Howe_ and _Princess Charlotte_ received
instructions from H.M.S. _Victorious_ to cruise between the Palmyra
Rocks and Pigeon Island. The commander and officers having received
commissions from Government, they were occupied in this service until
the close of 1800.
1800. The French frigate _Melée_ was taken single-handed by the
Company’s ship _Exeter_, Captain Meriton. In the same year a gallant
defence was made by the Company’s ship _Kent_ against the _Confiance_
of twenty-six guns, commanded by the celebrated Surcoufe, and though
the _Kent_ was captured, it was only after having lost her commander
and twenty-two men killed and thirty-four wounded; the action lasted
nearly two hours.
On the 27th of June the Company’s ship _Arniston_, Captain Campbell
Majoribanks, having just anchored at Bencoolen, was attacked by a
French sloop of war, supposed to be the _Confiance_, of twenty-six
guns. The _Arniston_ promptly cut her cable, gave chase, and fired
several broadsides into her: but, outsailing the _Arniston_, by beating
to windward, she escaped after a chase of several hours.
That year the _Hughes_, cruising in the Bay of Bengal for the
protection of trade, engaged a French ship, which also escaped from
superiority of sailing, after having thrown her guns overboard.
In 1801 the Company’s ship _Phɶnix_, Captain Moffat, captured a French
privateer single-handed, and the Company’s ship _Admiral Gardner_,
Captain Saltwell, beat off the _Bellona_, French frigate, single-handed.
1803. The Company’s homeward-bound China fleet (with a number of
country ships and whalers under protection), having no men-of-war in
company, fell in with the French Admiral Linois, in the _Marengo_,
eighty-four-gun ship, _Semillante_, forty guns, _Belle Poule_, forty
guns, _Corvette_, twenty-eight guns, and a brig of eighteen guns. The
enemy being to windward, Commodore Dance, at the suggestion of Captain
Timins, made the general signal to tack. The Indiamen then stood
towards the French fleet, engaged, defeated, and chased them out of
sight. The details of this extraordinary victory of English _merchant
ships_ over French _men-of-war_ are familiar to the readers of naval
history. The fleet, consisting of China ships, was valued at six
millions, and the revenue on the tea alone amounted to upwards of three
millions sterling. Commodore Dance was knighted, and various rewards
were distributed among the captains, officers, and seamen. In that year
the Company’s ships _Lord Castlereagh_ and _Lady Castlereagh_ were
fitted out and cruised in the Bay of Bengal for the protection of trade.
In that year also the Company’s ship _Preston_ acted as guard-ship at
Kedjaree.
During 1804 the _Hughes_ sailed from Bombay by request of the
Government, cruising in company with H.M.S. _Concord_ to intercept
French frigates expected off the coast.
In 1805 the Company’s ships _Camden_ and _Wexford_ were fitted out in
Bombay Harbour, and cruised in the Indian seas for the protection of
trade, whilst the _Cumberland_, Captain Farrer, under convoy of Sir
Thomas Troubridge, received and returned several broadsides, within
pistol-shot, from the French line-of-battle ship _Marengo_, and from a
large frigate, her consort.
In 1806 the Company’s ship _Warren Hastings_ fought a most gallant
action against the French frigate _Piedmontese_, and although at last
captured, the enemy hauled off several times during the action, which
lasted for four hours.
In 1810 the Company’s ships and seamen were employed at the taking
of the Isle of France; and in 1812 the Company’s ship _Astell_ was
gallantly defended against a very superior force, and escaped, in
consequence of the crippled state of her opponents.
APPENDIX No. 12, VOL. ii. p. 467.
_List of Wages of the East India Company’s Ships._
By the Month.
£ _s._ _d._
1 Commander 10 0 0
1 Chief Mate 5 0 0
1 Second Mate 4 0 0
1 Third Mate 3 10 0
1 Fourth Mate 2 10 0
1 Fifth Mate 2 0 0
1 Sixth Mate 1 15 0
1 Surgeon 5 0 0
1 Purser 2 0 0
1 Boatswain 3 5 0
1 Gunner 3 5 0
1 Master-at-Arms 2 15 0
1 Carpenter 4 0 0
1 Midshipman and Coxswain 1 15 0
4 Midshipmen, each 1 15 0
1 Surgeon’s Mate 3 10 0
1 Caulker 3 10 0
1 Cooper 2 15 0
1 Captain’s Cook 3 5 0
1 Ship’s Cook 2 0 0
1 Captain’s Steward 1 15 0
1 Ship’s Steward 2 0 0
2 Boatswain’s Mates, each 2 0 0
2 Gunner’s Mates, each 2 0 0
1 Carpenter’s First Mate 3 0 0
1 Carpenter’s Second Mate 2 10 0
1 Caulker’s Mate 2 10 0
1 Cooper’s Mate 2 0 0
6 Quartermasters, each 2 0 0
1 Sail-maker 2 5 0
1 Armourer 2 5 0
1 Butcher 1 15 0
1 Baker 1 15 0
1 Poulterer 1 15 0
2 Commander’s Servants, each 1 3 0
1 Chief Mate’s Servants, each 1 0 0
1 Second Mate’s Servants, each 0 18 0
1 Surgeon’s Servants, each 0 15 0
1 Boatswain’s Servants, each 0 15 0
1 Gunner’s Servants, each 0 15 0
1 Carpenter’s Servants, each 0 15 0
50 Foremast Men, each 1 15 0
---
Total 102
APPENDIX No. 13. VOL. ii. p. 471.
_Copy of the Victualling Bill of the East India Company’s Ships._
By whose order the
under-mentioned For Regular Ships. 1200 950 800 ton ships.
are to be received
on board. { Ale, Beer, Wine, or }
{ other liquors, in casks }
Company’s Husband { or bottles, for the use of} 13 13 13 tons.
or Assistant. { the Commander’s table, }
{ allowing 252 gallons, or }
{ 86 doz. quart bottles per }
{ ton. }
Sealers at the { *Beef, Pork, Bacon, } 40 35 25 tons.
India Wharf. { Suet, and Tongues. }
Ship’s Husband. { Beer, strong and small, } 28 28 28 tons.
{ in casks (not bottles). }
Sealers at the } *Bread. 350 310 270 cwt.
India Wharf. }
{ Butter. 30 30 30 firkins.
{ Brandy, or other spirits, }
{ for the ship’s company. } 10 9 8 punches.
Ship’s Husband. { Billet Wood. 25,000 25,000 25,000
{ Brimstone. 2 2 2 cwt.
{ Coals. 20 20 15 chaldron.
{ Candles. 50 50 50 dozen.
{ Cheese. 50 50 50 cwt.
Sealers at the } *Chirurgery and Drugs. 65 55 50_l._ value.
India Wharf. }
Ship’s Husband. Canvass. 30 25 20 bolts.
{ Confectionery. 6 6 6 cases.
Sealers at the { *Essence of Malt. 260 230 200 lbs.
India Wharf. { *Essence of Spruce. 260 230 200 lbs.
{ *Flour. 134 100 88 cwt.
Ship’s Husband. Fish. 21 18 16 cwt.
Sealers at the } Grocery. 80 70 50 cwt.
India Wharf. }
Ship’s Husband. { *Gunpowder. 63 60 50 barrels.
{ *Iron Shot. 6 7 4 tons.
Company’s Husband, }
or Assistant } Iron for store. 6 4 4 tons.
Ship’s Husband. }
{ *Lime or Lemon Juice. 130 115 100 gallons.
{ Lead Shot of sorts. 5 5 5 cwt.
Sealers at the { *Mustard Seed. 10 10 10 bushels.
India Wharf. { Oatmeal. 50 50 50 bushels.
{ Oil, Sweet and Lamp. 300 300 300 gallons.
{ Oats, Barley, and Bran. 500 500 500 bushels.
{ Oranges and Lemons. 6 6 6 chests.
{ Oilman’s Stores. 8 8 8 cases.
{ *Pease. 200 190 180 bushels.
{ Pitch. 20 20 20 barrels.
{ Potatoes. 15 15 10 tons.
{ Red and White Herrings
Ship’s Husband. { and Salmon. 5 5 5 barrels.
{ Rosin. 6 6 6 cwt.
{ Spare Cordage. 7 5 5 tons.
Sealers at the } Sheet Lead for store. 2 2 2 tons.
India Wharf. }
Ship’s Husband. Salt, White and Bay. 40 40 40 bushels.
Sealers at the { Slops. 2 2 2 chests.
India Wharf. { Tobacco. 30 25 20 cwt.
{ Tar. 20 20 20 barrels.
{ Turpentine. 3 3 3 barrels.
Ship’s Husband. { *Vinegar. 11 11 9 hds.
{ *Water. 70 60 50 tons.
* Boatswain’s, Gunner’s, and Carpenter’s stores, as usual, that are not
particularly before mentioned, seeing them to be such.
APPENDIX No. 14, VOL. ii. p. 483.
_A List of the Large Ships belonging to the East India Company’s
Service in 1831, and how disposed of, with the prices realised for
them._
-------+-----------------------------+------------------------+----------------
Sum. | Ships’ Names. | By whom purchased. | Date.
-------+-----------------------------+------------------------+----------------
£8,000 | Abercrombie Robinson |{Messrs. Palmer, } | Oct. 9, 1834.
| |{ McKilloh and Co. } |
6,500 | Asia | Thomas Heath, Esq. | Sept. 20, 1831.
4,100 | Atlas, _broke up_ | Charles Carter, Esq. | May 20, 1831.
.. | Berwickshire, _at sea_ | .. | ..
.. | Bombay, _at sea_ | .. | ..
10,550 | Buckinghamshire |{Messrs. Thacker and } | June 25, 1834.
| |{ Mangles } |
5,750 | Canning, _broke up_ | Joseph Somes, Esq. | May 7, 1834.
10,000 | Castle Huntly | Bought in by Owners | Decr. 11, 1834.
8,500 | Charles Grant | Messrs. Hyde and Lennox| Feby. 15, 1834.
.. | Duchess of Athol | .. | ..
.. | Duchess of Sussex | .. | ..
.. | Dunira, _to be broken up_. | .. | ..
10,700 | Earl of Balcarras | Thomas A. Shuter, Esq. | Sept. 17, 1834.
7,500 | Edinburgh | James Gardner, Esq. | July 2, 1834.
6,000 | Farquharson, _laid up_. | Joseph Somes, Esq. | May 23, 1834.
6,600 |{George the Fourth, } | John Nicholson, Esq. | May 28, 1834.
|{ _outward bound_ } | |
6,600 | General Harris, _broke up_ | Joseph Christall, Esq. | Oct. 29, 1831.
6,250 | General Hewett | William Tindall, Esq. | Sept. 22, 1830.
9,100 | General Kyd | John Pirie, Esq. | Oct. 8, 1834.
.. | Herefordshire | .. | ..
9,150}| |{Bought in by Owners | Oct. 30, 1834.
8,000}| Inglis |{Bought in by Capt. } | Nov. 15, 1834.
| |{ J. C. Lochner. } |
5,900 | Kellie Castle | Capt. R. Pattallo | Nov. 1834.
10,000 | Lady Melville | John Campbell, Esq. | Aug. 1832.
8,650}| Lowther Castle, } | Joseph Somes, Esq. |{Sept. 24, 1830.
5,300}| _to be broken up_ } | |{June 18, 1834.
5,900 | London, _broke up_ | Thomas Ward, Esq. | May 7, 1834.
7,500 | Lord Lowther | Capt. A. Grant | July 16, 1834.
.. | Marquis of Camden, _at sea_ | .. | ..
.. |{Marquis of Huntly, } | |
|{ _to be broken up_ } | .. | ..
7,000 | Marquis of Wellington | Don Pedro | Sept. 11, 1832.
9,400}| Minerva, _for Captain’s_ } | |
2,400}| _stores at sea_ } | Henry Templer, Esq. | Aug. 20, 1831.
6,600 | Orwell, _at sea_ | Messrs. Isacke and Co. | Jany. 21, 1834.
6,500 | Prince Regent, _at sea_ |{Messrs. Wigrams } | Sept. 28, 1830.
| |{ and Green } |
3,000 |{Princess Charlotte of } | |
|{ Wales, _broke up_ } | J. Childers, Esq. | April 20, 1831.
.. | Reliance | .. | ..
4,500 | Rose | Bought in by Owners | Oct. 16, 1834.
6,900}| |{Henry Templer, Esq. | Aug. 6, 1834.
13,500}| Scaleby Castle. |{Bought by Jas. } | Oct. 11, 1834.
| |{ Walkingshaw, Esq., } |
| |{ with stores, and } |
| |{ ready for sea } |
.. | Sir David Scott | .. | ..
10,700 | Thames | John R. Pidding, Esq. | Aug. 1832.
3,550 | Thames, 40/64th of ship | James Christall, Esq. | Sept. 10, 1834.
.. |{Thomas Coutts, _outward_ } | |
|{ _bound_ } | .. | ..
.. | Vansittart | .. | ..
6,650 | Thomas Grenville, _laid up_ | Messrs. Ward and Somes | July 2, 1834.
.. | Warren Hastings | .. | ..
.. |{Waterloo, _materials sold,_}| |
|{ _and began breaking up,_ }| At Public Sale | June 11, 1834.
|{ _fetched about £7,200_.} | |
.. | William Fairlie | .. | ..
.. | Winchelsea, _broke up_ | .. | 1833.
7,950 | Windsor | William Dallas, Esq. | Nov. 13, 1834.
-------+-----------------------------+------------------------+----------------
APPENDIX No. 15. VOL. ii. p. 84.
_Memorial Letter from Captain George Probyn, Chairman of the
Committee of Commanders and Officers of the Maritime Service,
dated 30th July, 1834._
To the Honorable the Court of Directors of the East India Company. The
Memorial of the Commanders and Officers of the Maritime Service of the
Company
SHEWETH:
That the Maritime Service of the East India Company has existed for
a period of upwards of two hundred years; that the ships and seamen
employed by the said Company have been, in a great degree, instrumental
in acquiring and securing the now vast territory of British India, and
in advancing its commercial success to that degree which it so long
maintained. That your Memorialists entered into that service in the
confident expectation that it was a provision for their lives, and
they were justified in such expectation by the fact that the Company’s
trading Charter was perpetual, and that the continuance of their trade
must have rendered a Maritime Service necessary. That by the measure
of last session of Parliament, the trade of the Company being suddenly
stopped, your Memorialists are altogether deprived of their profession,
and those prospects on which they relied for their advancement in life,
in entering the service of your Honorable Company, are destroyed.
Under such circumstances, your Memorialists, on behalf of themselves
and the other members of the service, most respectfully urge their
claim on your Honorable Court for that compensation which, by the Act
referred to, the Company is authorized to grant to persons employed
“by or under the Company, who have suffered loss by the discontinuance
of their trade.” Your Memorialists trust that it is not necessary for
them now to urge the validity of their claim as persons employed by or
under your Honorable Company. The words in question were introduced
into the Act expressly to meet the claims of your Memorialists, which
were recognised by Parliament as within the scope and object of the
Legislature; and if it were doubtful whether your Memorialists were
employed “by,” there could be no doubt that they were employed “under”
your Honorable Company. The Maritime Service, however, has been so
frequently recognised by the Company as a branch of its establishment,
that no substantial doubt can exist that your Memorialists were in the
direct service of the Company. It is true that, by the arrangements of
the Company, the Commanders and Officers were allowed to be recommended
by the Ship-Owners, but they were recommended to the service of the
Company. They were examined and approved by your Honorable Court, and
sworn into the service of the Company; they were paid by the Company,
and subject to fine, suspension, and dismissal by the Company, and
not by the Owners; they wore the uniform of the Company, enjoyed
rank and command under the Company, and became eligible to offices
of high honour and emolument. The officers of the Maritime Service
took precedence of the officers of the Company’s Bombay Marine; the
Commanders ranked with Field Officers in India, and were eligible to
the office of Master-Attendant and other offices of profit in India.
The Commanders in the Maritime Service, though serving in different
ships, owned by different parties, held seniority according to the
date of their being first sworn into the Company’s service, and gave
orders to the Commanders and Officers of such ships. In all these
respects there was no preference to the Commanders of the few ships
belonging to the Company. Seniority was the title to command, and the
Officers of the Company’s own ships were in the same grade as those
of the regular ships. Your Memorialists forbear to enter into details
on this question, they will merely, therefore, refer to the following
Resolution of Court:—
“Sec. 6. It is ordained, that the Court of Directors shall, as soon
as reasonably may be, from time to time, preserve and keep a list or
register of all existing Commanders and Sworn Officers which have
been or shall be employed in the Company’s Maritime Service, except
Commanders and Officers who have been or shall be dismissed or removed
for misbehaviour, or shall have resigned and quitted the service; and
all the Commanders and Sworn Officers of ships already built, now
building, or to be built for the service of the Company, or taken up
as regular ships, shall be selected from such list or register, but
with liberty to admit new Officers to the lowest station of Sworn
Officers as the service may require, with the approbation of the Court
of Directors, so as always to keep up a sufficient number of Commanders
and Officers regularly bred in the service.”
In conformity with the policy proposed in the above resolution, the
Honorable Company has encouraged the formation of a class of Commanders
and Officers for their particular service, and your Memorialists, under
that encouragement, have been induced to enter the service, and have
committed their prospects in life to your Honorable Company; and now
that the service, from no fault of your Memorialists, from no decline
in trade or natural fluctuation of events, but by the violent hand of
power, and with views to public policy, is destroyed, your Memorialists
confidently rely upon the justice of your Honorable Court to award them
compensation. The policy of the Honorable Company, in thus forming
Officers for their Commercial Navy, was based upon the most accurate
view of their own interest and advantage. The Maritime Service of your
Honorable Company was one of great trust and responsibility. The most
valuable cargoes were necessarily entrusted to your Commanders, and
such was the confidence justly reposed in them, that this property was
left altogether uninsured either against sea-risk or barattry. Without
assuming extraordinary merit to your Memorialists, they confidently
assert that this important pecuniary saving could not have been
effected but by Commanders and Officers who had been educated for, and
brought up in, the particular service: your Memorialists, however, find
that the qualifications which were so important to the service of your
Honorable Company are of small account in the open trade system, and
Ship-Owners object to employ individuals who have navigated only in
vessels of so high a class of equipment as those in the service of your
Honorable Company. This is no fancied evil.
The education and habits of your Memorialists as Officers of the
Company’s service afford a decided objection to their employment in the
free trade; and in proof of this fact, your Memorialists beg to state,
that although the tonnage now engaged in the trade to India and China
has doubled, not one-fifth of the Officers of the Company’s service
have obtained employment.
Your Memorialists moreover entered the service of your Honorable
Company from their interest in that particular connection. That
interest is of no avail to advance them in another service; and even
were employment obtained, your Memorialists could not look to be
remunerated upon a scale in any degree commensurate with the emolument
derived from the Company’s service, where higher qualifications were
required and paid for.
From the regulations of your service, your Memorialists were alone
eligible to stations in the Company’s regular ships, while in the
general Commercial Navy of the country, they have not even a fair
prospect of competing with others; they have not only lost a profession
in which they had graduated, and in which they had expected to find
a provision for life, but they have lost a connection by which their
interest in that profession would have been insured. This is the ground
of your Memorialists’ present claim. All the service sustain the loss
of profession and connection, and it is in respect of this loss that
they ask for compensation.
Your Memorialists state this the more prominently, because they
have heard it proposed that compensation should be limited to such
Officers as could show an engagement for future employment; but your
Memorialists conceive that this is an unsound principle. The Honorable
Company established a service with a view to insure a succession
of Officers for their employ. There are not now Officers more than
sufficient for the supply of the average number of ships employed by
your Honorable Company; it is obvious, therefore, that these Officers
had a reasonable and just ground to expect, and would have found,
employ in the service of the Company but for the Act of last session,
which has suddenly destroyed this prospect. Many cases exist, in which,
from illness and other temporary causes, Officers were not at the
moment of the closing of the Company’s trade in active service, though
they might, and probably would, have resumed it; and your Memorialists
conceive that all are entitled to compensation who have not absolutely
resigned or been dismissed from the Company’s service. If it should
be determined to draw a line, to exclude those who have discontinued
the service for a certain period, there must be cases of exemption,
otherwise the most meritorious Officers would be excluded: but your
Memorialists are satisfied, that the attempt to restrict compensation
to those who were in actual service, or about immediately to resume
it, would be in its operation partial and unjust, and would not afford
relief commensurate with the injury. Your Memorialists cannot too
strongly press upon the consideration of the Court the fact, that
as the number of Commanders and Officers is not excessive, all had
a reasonable expectation of employment of which they are altogether
deprived, and yet few might be able to show any actual contract for
employment, particularly having regard to the temporary system adopted
by the Company in the last two or three years, of chartering old ships
from voyage to voyage.
Your Memorialists cannot enter into speculations as to what might
have been the extent of the Company’s trade if continued. They are
fully satisfied that it must have been carried on upon a scale of
great magnitude; but this must be mere matter of conjecture. It is by
reference only to the past, which is capable of being ascertained, that
the loss of your Memorialists can be estimated, and not by surmising a
state of things which has no existence.
Your Memorialists have not hitherto proposed any particular scale of
compensation, conceiving it to be more respectful to your Honorable
Court to await a suggestion from them, and satisfied, from the scale
of pensions granted to your Home Establishment, of the desire of the
Court to relieve those who have suffered from the consequences of the
abolition of the Company’s trade.
The subject, however, having been referred to your Honorable Court with
the favourable recommendation of the Proprietors, your Memorialists beg
respectfully to present their case before your Honorable Court, with an
earnest hope that they may be compensated upon the only principle which
can afford them adequate relief, viz., by grant of pensions to the
Commanders and Officers who have served the Company. Your Memorialists
therefore beg respectfully to submit to your Honorable Court a scale
of compensation, which has been prepared with an anxious desire to
preserve the utmost moderation.
Your Memorialists are aware that a scale of allowance has been
previously prepared, slightly differing from that now submitted. The
alterations your Memorialists have made are in favour of the Junior
grades of the service, upon which the loss will fall heavily, while
the compensation proposed is not considerable. Upon a point so deeply
affecting them, your Memorialists feel assured that their suggestion
will be received with a favourable consideration, and that your
Memorialists will experience at the hands of your Honorable Court that
liberality which has ever characterised the conduct of the Honorable
Company towards its Officers.
And your Memorialists, etc., etc.
(Signed) GEORGE PROBYN,
_Chairman of the Committee of Commanders
and Officers_.
_London, 30th July, 1834._
FOOTNOTES:
[429] Hakluyt, vol. i. pp. 214-220.
[430] Hakluyt, vol. i. pp. 297-9.
[431] Cotton Library, British Museum.
[432] Archæol. vol. xxvi.
[433] Harl. 1579, f. 150.
INDEX.
_Act of Parliament_ passed in 1733 for the encouragement of the
sugar trade, p. 228
_Acts_, various retaliatory, and hostile legislation against England,
pp. 404-6
_Adams, W._, settles in Japan and opens the trade with England, p. 159
_African Company_, sketch of the history of, p. 203, _note_
_Alexander I. of Russia_ takes off the embargo and makes peace, p. 271
_Alva, Duke of_, seizes all the English residents in the Netherlands,
p. 135
——, ships escorting him to Netherlands capture Spanish merchantmen
in Calais roads, p. 139
_America, North_, discovered by the English, p. 56, _note_
——, not to be more favoured commercially than other nations, p. 251
——, instead of asserting the independence of her flag, intrigues
with Napoleon for special immunities in the trade with England,
p. 308
——, war between, and England, due to an intrigue which was a
masterpiece of perfidy, p. 328
——, fraudulent certificates provided for sailors in, p. 330
——, committee of House of Representatives in, pass a measure
opening the door to future measures of reciprocity, p. 376
——, many enlightened statesmen in, p. 377
—— quietly looks on, while England prepares to resist invasion by
Bonaparte, p. 383
_American Colonies_, rapid commercial progress and prosperity of, p.
226
_American Commissioners_ evince the strongest desire for
conciliation, p. 393
—— satisfied with article in Treaty about the circuitous trade
route, p. 393
_American Government_ pass an Act of Non-intervention, March 1st,
1809, p. 400
_American Independence_ recognised by England in 1783, p. 346
_American Laws_ almost wholly founded upon English laws, p. 364
_American Ships_, six hundred seized, under orders of Council, Nov.
6, 1793, and March 28, 1794, p. 256
—— become liable to capture by both France and England, owing to
order of Convention, May 1793, p. 262
——, extensive seizure of, under the decision of the English
Admiralty Courts, p. 386
——, lists of those taken and condemned by the French and English,
p. 395
_American Shipowners’_ belief is, that every act of the English
Legislature is specially directed against them, p. 368
—— frightened at the mere suggestion of a policy of reciprocity,
p. 369
—— maintain that the two countries are not on an equal footing
while England stands by her Navigation Acts, p. 370
—— say that the English Navigation Act will prevent their carrying
anything except their own produce, p. 373
——, various arguments of, addressed to different classes of their
countrymen, _ibid._
——, etc., stand by Lord Hawkesbury’s minute, p. 387
_American Statesmen_ try to turn the attention of their countrymen to
agricultural pursuits, p. 365
_Americans_ form associations to dispense with English manufactures,
p. 232
—— resolve to import no goods from Great Britain with the
exception of Ireland, p. 233
——, immediately after their Independence, adopt a Registration
system similar to the English, p. 246
—— lay a general embargo on their shipping in reply to Order in
Council of Nov. 11, 1807, and complain that they are losing
their carrying trade owing to the stringency of this Order, p.
321
—— prefer risking capture to keeping their ships unemployed, p. 322
——, in spite of his treatment of them, unequivocally aid Napoleon,
_ibid._
——, disposition of, to be subservient to Napoleon, while hating
England, p. 324
—— assume that Napoleon must conquer Russia, and therefore declare
war against England, May 18, 1812, p. 326
—— aware of the fresh promulgation of the Berlin and Milan Decrees
before they went to war with England, p. 327
—— pretend that England has impressed 15,000 to 20,000 American
sailors, p. 329
—— take a very short-sighted view of European affairs, _ibid._
—— complain that their vessels are searched not only for enemies’
goods, but for seamen to man English ships, p. 382
_Amiens_, preliminaries of the peace of, signed Oct. 1, 1801, p. 271
——, many of the articles of the treaty of, not carried out by the
French, p. 274
_Angediva_, Portuguese, under De Gama, anchor at the Island of, p. 18
_Anson, Commodore_, sails in 1740 with six ships, chiefly to make
reprisals on the Spaniards in the Pacific, p. 217
—— returns with only one ship, the _Centurion_, having lost nearly
all his crews by scurvy and other sickness, _ibid._
——, scandalous manner in which his ships were manned, p. 218
_Anthony, Anthony_, ships of Henry VIII. drawn by him, in the British
Museum, p. 96
_Antigua_, extraordinary robbery of vessel from, p. 415
_Archæologia_, inventory in, of the ships of Henry VIII., p. 95
_Antwerp_, the fall of, favourable to the concentration of trade in
Holland, p. 178
_Armada_, the Spanish, size of, more than twice that of English
fleet, p. 146
_Armstrong, General_, states that the Americans have the highest
deference for the French Emperor, p. 400
—— and that if France will and England will not give explanation,
war shall at once be declared, p. 401
_Assurance Companies_, Royal Exchange and London, founded during the
period of the South Sea Bubble, and still existing as sound
speculations, p. 214
_Author_, successful attempt by, in 1850-3, to improve the form and
construction of merchant ships, pp. 492-4 _note_
——, description by, of the hard service he underwent when a
sea-apprentice, pp. 497-9, _note_
_Badajos_, conference at, with reference to the Spanish rights in the
Eastern seas, p. 69
_Baltic_, many new ports opened in, in anticipation of an ultimate
rupture with Spain, p. 136
_Baltimore_, shipwrights of, strongly urge on Congress the necessity
of protective duties, and maintain that they require more
protection than the English when the Navigation Act of 1660 was
passed, p. 366
_Baltimore_, a vessel from, reaches Canton in 1785, p. 377
“_Baltimore Clippers_,” a greatly improved class of American ships,
p. 492
_Baring, Alexander_ (Lord Ashburton), celebrated pamphlet by, p. 268
——, maintains English right of impressment, stating that there were
more than 16,000 English sailors serving in American ships, p.
331
—— moves a resolution, 1813, requiring that all ships from India
should unload in London, p. 460
_Barlow, Mr., U. S. Envoy_, receives, _a year after the date_, a
decree revoking those of Berlin and Milan, p. 326
_Basto, Mr. E. Pinto_, supplies drawing of Vasco de Gama’s ship, p. 3
_Baticala, King of_, remonstrance of, on the way that De Gama was
behaving, p. 31
——, Vasco de Gama levies tribute on, p. 32
_Bells_, used to mark time at sea, are struck every half hour, p. 531
—— sounded by two strokes following each other quickly, then a
short interval, and then two more, p. 532
——, even, come at the full hours, odd bells at the half-hours,
_ibid._
_Bere, O’Sullivan_, his piratical armament at Berehaven, p. 118
_Berlin Decree_, (Nov. 10 and 24, 1806) principal articles of, p. 292
—— not fully enforced till the spring of 1807, p. 297
_Bill_, prohibiting importation into English America of W. Indian
produce except in English ships, p. 237
_Bonding_, the privilege of, at present granted to eighty-five towns
in Great Britain, p. 430
_Boys or apprentices_ are sent at once aloft, to get accustomed to
the ship’s motion, and though they stand watch like the rest of
the crew, are generally set at first to light work, p. 530
_Breda_, Articles of the Peace of, require the Dutch to strike their
flag to the English in the Channel, p. 195
_Bridport_, petition of the people of, p. 101
_British Subjects_ allowed to carry in _British_ vessels naval
stores, lumber, etc., from U.S. of America to West Indies (July
2, 1783), p. 252
_Brougham, Mr._, in speech on the “Licence Trade,” quotes a circular
of a Liverpool firm offering to forge licences, p. 318
_Bull, Papal_, question how far it limits the right of Spain in the
Eastern Seas, p. 68
_Byron, Commodore_, sails, in 1764, on a voyage of special discovery
to ascertain the existence of the Pepys and Falkland Islands,
etc., p. 218
——, voyage of, valuable for his survey of the Straits of Magellan,
and of many groups of islands in the Pacific, _ibid._
_Cabot, John_, question whether he went with the earliest voyage, p.
59
_Cabot, Sebastian_, first certain journey of, 1497, p. 55
——, patent granted to, by Henry VII., _ibid._
——, discoveries of, and their order, pp. 56-9 and _notes_
—— unquestionably preceded Columbus as the discoverer of the
mainland of America, p. 59
——, like Columbus, believed that Cathay would be reached by sailing
to the N.W., _ibid._
——, evidence in favour of his discoveries from Privy Purse
expenses, p. 61
——, how employed from 1498 to 1512, pp. 61-2
—— did not leave England till after the death of Henry VII., p. 63
—— enters the service of Spain in 1512, and is employed in the
revision of Spanish maps, p. 64
—— nominated pilot-master for Spain; returns to Spain with Charles
V., p. 68
—— placed at the head of a Spanish association for trade with the
East, p. 69
—— appointed on commission to ascertain Spanish rights in the
Eastern seas of India, and takes command of a Spanish
expedition to the East, _ibid._
——, bitter hostility of the Portuguese against, as supporting Spain
against them in the question of the rights they claimed in the
Eastern seas, p. 70
—— compels the malcontents in his fleet to land, _ibid._
—— ascends the Rio de la Plata and the Parana, p. 71
—— has a sanguinary encounter with the natives on the Parana, p. 72
—— is detained long on the Plata owing to want of support from
Charles V., _ibid._
—— returns ultimately to Bristol about 1549, p. 73
—— chief employment on return to England, the reduction of his
observations on the variation of the needle, p. 74
——, during his retirement, largely consulted on all questions
relating to the Mercantile Marine, _ibid._
—— forms the association known by the name of the ‘Merchant
Adventurers’ Company,’ and becomes governor of that Company, p.
75
—— proposes to send ships to discover the “north” of Europe, p. 76
—— draws up the letters of instruction for the guidance of the
Northern discoverers, p. 77
——, England more indebted to, than to “the navigation laws of
Oliver Cromwell,” p. 84
—— much injured by death of Edward VI. and the accession of Philip
and Mary, p. 85
——, not known when or where he died, but alive as late as May 25th,
1557, p. 86
_Calçadilha, Bishop_, celebrates mass previously to the starting of
Vasco de Gama, p. 7
—— preaches on “the grandeur of India and its miraculous
discovery,” p. 23
_Calicut_, arrival of the Portuguese at, p. 13
——, Moorish traders of, mistrust the Portuguese, _ibid._
——, treaty concluded with, by the Portuguese, p. 15
——, treachery of the Moors and king of, p. 16
——, destruction by Vasco de Gama of large Moorish ships from, p. 32
——, de Gama refuses all peace with the people of, and bombards it,
_ibid._
——, king of, determines to avenge himself on the cruelty of de
Gama, p. 37
——, second embassy from king of, to de Gama, p. 40
_Canada_, emigration encouraged with, partly with a view of England’s
becoming independent of the Baltic and Russian trade, p. 288
——, great value of the trade with, in timber for ship-building
purposes, _ibid._
_Cananore, King of_, friendly relations between, and the Portuguese,
p. 16
——, arranges trade with the Portuguese, p. 33
——, factory built at, by the Portuguese, p. 34
——, and completed before de Gama returns to Europe, p. 43
_Carew, Sir Peter_, ordered by Queen Elizabeth to suppress piracy in
West of England, 1564, p. 118
_Carpenter_, if he ships as an able seaman, must do seaman’s work, p.
523
_Carteret, Capt._, the discoverer of Pitcairn’s Island, the future
home of the mutineers of the _Bounty_, p. 219
_Castlereagh, Lord_, extraordinary influence of, in counteracting the
schemes of Napoleon, p. 338
_Catherine, Empress_, declaration of, 1780, to the Courts of St.
James, Versailles, and Madrid, p. 260
—— places herself at the head of an armed neutrality of Denmark,
Sweden, and Russia, p. 261
——, attempt of the Emperor Paul to carry out the plan of the armed
neutrality proposed by, p. 262
_Catholics_, all the ships of, considered by the English fair prize,
p. 137
_Cavendish, T._, memorable voyage of, to the East Indies in 1591, p.
153
_Chancellor, Richard_, reaches the bay of St. Nicholas, where now
Archangel, and making his way across Russia to Moscow, opens
the first commercial intercourse between England and Russia, p.
81
—— returns to England with the first Russian ambassador—but is
drowned at Pitsligo, Nov. 7, 1556, p. 82
_Charles I._ seizes charters of Colonies on the pretence that they
were not rightly granted, p. 168
_Chaumont_, treaty of, and league between England and the European
powers against Napoleon, p. 338
_Child, Sir Josiah_, terms Charles II.’s Navigation Act “The Maritime
Charter of England,” p. 188
—— points out that ships can be built much more cheaply by the
Danes, etc., than by us, p. 199
_Clarke_, an English shipowner, captures 18 prizes worth 50,000_l._,
p. 110
_Cobham, Thomas Lord_, desperate piratical deeds of, p. 114
—— sews up the captain and survivors of the crew of a Spanish ship
in their own sails and throws them overboard, p. 115
_Cochym, King of_, asks de Gama to settle with the Queen of Coulam
about the pepper from her country, p. 39
_Collier Service_, the nursery of our most daring seamen in the old
war, p. 538
_Colliers_, very hard life of those who serve on board them, p. 536
——, skill required in “jumping” or unloading colliers, p. 537
_Colonial System of England_ not so disastrous to the Colonies as
partial American writers assert, p. 196
—— secured the exclusive carrying trade of all produce from our
own plantations, _ibid._
_Colonies_, a Secretary of State appointed, and a council for the
affairs of trade, organised as at present, in 1786, p. 210
——, northern and southern in North America, have widely differing
interests, p. 237
_Colonies, French_, in the W. Indies, vigorously blockaded in 1804,
p. 283
_Colonists, English_, in the W. Indies claim exclusive monopoly of
the trade with the colonies on the continent, p. 227
_Colquhoun, Mr. Patrick_, able essay by, on the commerce and police
of the Thames, p. 412
——, estimate given by, of the trades of London and the number of
vessels employed in each, p. 413, _note_
——, estimate of the amount of plunder from the W. and E. India
trades, etc., p. 414
——, list given by, of the different plunderers in the port of
London, and of the nick-names whereby they were known, p. 415
——, numbers given by, of persons engaged in plundering merchant
vessels in port of London, p. 420
_Commerce_, legitimate of England did not exceed 50,000 tons in 14th
Eliz., p. 139
_Commercial Docks_, on Surrey side of the Thames, opened A.D. 1660,
p. 409
_Commercial Intercourse_, between N. American Colonies, France, and
Holland connived at, p. 235
_Commercial Rights_, controversy about the, to be conceded to
America, p. 346
_Confederacy against England_ of France, Prussia, Denmark, Sweden,
Russia, and United States, p. 268
_Congress_, in 1784, recommends the prohibition, for fifteen years,
of the importation of all merchandise from nations who have not
commercial treaties with U.S., p. 253
——, in reply to England and France, passes an Act (May 1st, 1810)
excluding from their waters English and French armed vessels,
p. 323
——, Secretary of State of, attempts to adopt Free-Trade, p. 349
_Congress_, vested by its constitution with the power of regulating
commerce with foreign nations, p. 348
—— proposes in 1784 to prohibit for fifteen years the import or
export of merchandise with nations not having treaties with
America, p. 347
——, and, without the consent of each separate State, to levy duties
on exports and imports, p. 349
—— declines to increase the differential duties, p. 375
_Consul_, the first English, established in Chios in 1513, p. 54
_Control, Board of_, require that all matters concerning revenue in
India be submitted to them, p. 455
_Convention between England and America_ to regulate commerce and
navigation—on the model of the English reciprocity treaties, p.
402
_Conversation_ not allowed among the seamen, when at work, in
presence of their officers, p. 534
_Cook, Capt._, early distinguishes himself on the St. Lawrence in aid
of General Wolfe, p. 219
——, employed under Sir Hugh Palliser on surveys of the Coast of
Newfoundland, p. 219
——, in command of the _Endeavour_, goes to Otaheite to view the
transit of Venus, 1768, and is accompanied by Mr. (afterwards
Sir Joseph) Banks, Dr. Solander, and Mr. Wales, p. 220
——, spends three months at Otaheite on first voyage, and names the
group of Islands round it the “Society Islands,” _ibid._
——, surveys West Coast of New Zealand, discovers Cook’s Straits,
and runs along the Coast of New Holland for 2000 miles, p. 221
——, remarkable for his humanity and his enlarged views as to the
rightful manner of dealing with the natives, _ibid._
——, sails on second voyage July 13th, 1772, in the _Resolution_,
surveys the S. Antarctic Ocean, and, after traversing 3660
leagues, reaches Dusky Bay in New Zealand, p. 222
——, lands on the shores of New Zealand several domestic animals,
and sows there seeds of various vegetables, _ibid._
——, examines New Amsterdam and Easter Island, and the groups of the
New Hebrides and Friendly Islands, p. 223
——, sails on his third voyage in the _Resolution_, July 12, 1776,
_ibid._
——, principal object of this voyage being to ascertain if any water
communication between North Pacific and North Atlantic, p. 224
——, on this voyage examines more fully Amsterdam Island (or
Tongataboo), Fiji groups, Nootka Sound in Vancouver Island, and
the Sandwich Islands, _ibid._
——, is murdered Dec. 26, 1779, on the shore of Owhyhee, the largest
of the Sandwich Islands, p. 226
_Cook_, chief business of, to attend to the “galley” and to keep the
cooking utensils clean, p. 526
——, may be required to lend a hand in all-hands work, p. 527
_Cooke, E. W., R.A., F.R.S._, drawing by of the _Discovery_, one of
Capt. Cook’s ships on his last voyage, p. 225
_Copenhagen_ attacked and bombarded by Nelson, April 2, 1801, p. 270
_Corn_, extraordinary high prices of, in England in 1795, p. 259
_Corn Vessels_ bound to France seized, but their cargoes paid for, p.
259
_Coulam_, the chief place where the pepper grows, p. 38
_Coulam, the Queen of_, sends an embassy to de Gama, p. 38
——, de Gama dissembles with, _ibid._
——, de Gama bids her send embassy to the king of Cochym, p. 39
_Council, the_, general corruption of, in reign of Edward VI., pp.
106-7
_Council, orders in_, list of the dates, etc., of each, p. 292, _note_
_Council, English_, believe that few articles are specially brought
from America, and that these may be got elsewhere, p. 351
_Courts_, English Admiralty, reverse (practically) Lord Hawkesbury’s
minute, p. 387
_Covilhan, Pero de_, sent by the king of Portugal to make researches,
p. 3
_Crimps_ and other disreputable agents employed in collecting the
crews, p. 496
_Cromwell_ compels the Dutch to strike their flag to the ships of the
Commonwealth, p. 187
_Crown Lands_ sold to remedy the evils of a debased currency, p. 109
_Currency_, depreciation and debasement of, in 1549, p. 106
_Dampier, W._, one of the buccaneers, makes an interesting voyage to
the Eastern Archipelago, p. 216
——, sent out by government to make further discoveries in the
Eastern Archipelago, 1699, in which he surveys part of the east
coast of New Holland, Timor, and New Guinea, _ibid._
_Dartmouth_, two French ships attempt to cut out two merchantmen from
harbour of, p. 90
_Davis, John_, discovers the Straits named after him in 1585, p. 151
——, is killed, after five voyages to India, by the Japanese in
1605, p. 152
_Despotic government of India_, evil effect of, as established by De
Gama, p. 45
_Discovery, New voyages of_, by Johnson, Finner, and Frobisher, p. 147
_Docks, London_, opened for business in 1805, p. 426
——, now amalgamated with the St. Katharine’s and Victoria Docks, p.
428
_Docks, St. Katharine’s_, partially opened for traffic, Oct. 1828, p.
427
_Docks, Victoria_, constructed 1850, _ibid._
_Docks, Millwall_, opened for traffic in 1868, p. 429
_Dock Companies_, charges levied by each, are, on the whole, very
similar, p. 430
_Docks, wet_, now existing in thirteen towns of Great Britain, _ibid._
_Dover_, the Mayor of, one of the most lawless plunderers of French
ships, p. 116
_Drake, Sir Francis_, rides from Plymouth to London to relate the
misfortunes of Hawkins’ expedition, p. 132
——, the first Englishman to circumnavigate the globe, in 1577, p.
148.
——, and Sir John Norris, employed to ravage the Spanish coasts, p.
152
——, capture sixty ships belonging to the Hanse Towns, which the
Queen condemns, p. 153
_Dutch_ massacre English traders at Amboyna, p. 160
—— openly and derisively claim the dominion of the Narrow Seas, p.
172
—— drive the Portuguese out of the Japan trade in 1638, and secure
Ceylon in 1656, p. 174
—— fail to make an establishment in China, p. 176
—— trade greatly advantaged by its perfect freedom, p. 178
—— owed much to ancient laws of England, forbidding exports in
home bottoms, p. 179
—— allow their country to be an asylum for all foreigners who
choose to come there, _ibid._
—— perceive that the English Navigation Acts are directed against
their trade, p. 185
——, violent animosity in England against, p. 186.
——, on the whole, the severest sufferers by the first war with
England, _ibid._
—— force the chain in the Medway and burn three ships in Chatham
harbour, p. 193
_Dutch East India Company_ established soon after the English, p. 156
—— drives the Portuguese from the Moluccas, p. 157
_Dutch East Indiamen_ then far superior to the English, p. 175
_East India Company_, first plan for, sanctioned by Queen Elizabeth,
1600, p. 154
——, first voyage of, quite successful, p. 156
——, in difficulties, abandons the Greenland fisheries, p. 161
——, old and new companies, quarrels between, p. 445
——, different parties in the State side with one or the other, p.
446
——, united company, trade of, thrown open to the highest bidder,
1698, and joined under one title, ‘The United Company of
Merchants trading to India,’ 1702, p. 447
——, charter-party of, and conditions of their trades, p. 448
—— absorbs most of the trade of the East, as the Dutch and
Portuguese were ruined, p. 454
——, ships built in India first admitted in the trade, 1795, _ibid._
——, a secret board of three directors to transact business with the
Board of Control, p. 455
——, charter renewed 1796, with privileges of trade granted to
outsiders and to civil servants of Company, p. 456
—— suffers heavily from loss of ships in 1808-9, and from the
French War, p. 458
——, trade to India thrown open 1814, but not that to China, p. 459
——, comparative loss of the ships built by, and of those built by
the shipowners of the out-ports, p. 460
——, number of ships employed by, varied very much and generally
according to the demand, p. 462
——, no captain of a ship of, to be less than twenty-five years of
age, p. 464
——, gallant actions and other services performed by their ships,
Appendix, No. 11, _ibid._, _note_
——, naval service of, various particulars relating to, pp. 464-472
——, captains of ships required “to keep up the worship of Almighty
God” every Sunday, when possible, p. 466
——, promotion in naval service of, strictly according to seniority,
supposing character, abilities, etc., good, _ibid._
——, details of pay, etc., in the naval service of, Appendix, p.
467, _note_
——, officers serving in the navy of, allowed largely to participate
in the Company’s trade, _ibid._
——, captains of ships in, able rapidly to realise large fortunes,
p. 468
——, vast amount of illicit trade in, promoted by its own servants,
p. 472
——, one captain in service of known to have realised, in one
voyage, £30,000, _ibid._
——, clerk of the Company of Private Trade required to ascertain
from each ship’s books all details of her voyage out and home,
p. 474
——, officers of the customs connive with its servants in the
promotion of illicit trade, p. 475
——, ample remuneration of its servants on retirement from active
duties, p. 476
——, usual regulations of the service on board of their ships, pp.
477-480
——, territorial aggrandisement by, the end and object of its later
policy, p. 480
——, very doubtful whether, at any period of its history, its purely
commercial operations were successful, p. 481
——, history of the ships sold by, on giving up their trade with the
East, Appendix, No. 14, p. 483, _note_
——, Trade with China ceases, 1834, _ibid._
——, all privileges taken from, and government placed directly under
the Queen, 1858, _ibid._
——, memorials of officers for pensions, etc., on the close of the
trading operations, p. 484
——, actual and probable remuneration of the directors, pp. 487-8
——, enormous patronage of the directors of, p. 488
_Edward VI._, early youth of, and great expectations of, from his
remarkable youthful ability, p. 73
——, remarkable knowledge of, and taste for all matters connected
with shipping, _ibid._
—— gives letters to the northern discoverers in Greek, Latin, and
Chaldee, p. 76
——, king, too ill to witness the departure of his ships for the
North, p. 80
_Elizabeth, Queen_, weakness of the Royal Navy at the commencement of
her reign, p. 111
——, gives Hawkins _The Jesus of Lubeck_, p. 124
——, takes the treasure captured, and proposes to use it as a
“loan,” p. 134
—— arrests all the Spanish merchants in England, p. 135
—— compelled to rely for the defence of her coasts on a fleet of
privateers, p. 138
_England_, effect on, by the discoveries of the Portuguese,
especially of Magellan, p. 50
——, noble families of, command the ships in Henry VIII.’s first
fleet, p. 93
—— maintains her right to carry on her over-sea trade in her own
ships, p. 185
——, large subsidies of money voted by, to Austria, Russia, Prussia,
etc., p. 342
—— liable to lose more than any other nation by the present laws
as to captures at sea, p. 358
—— imposes countervailing duties in reply to the American
protectionists, p. 368
_Englishmen_ of all ranks gallantly support Henry VIII. in his
resistance to the French, p. 92
—— arm ships on pretence of avenging the misdeeds of the
Inquisition, p. 111
—— acquire more knowledge of West Indies and Mexico through
accession of Philip and Mary, p. 109
_English Protection System_ (under Henry VIII.), defensible on the
ground that the Italian republics did the same, p. 52
_English Merchant Vessels_ of sixteenth century badly built, and slow
as sailors, p. 54
_English Trade_ less injured than had been expected by the quarrels
with Spain, p. 54
_Food_, ordinary allowances of, per head, in merchant vessels bound
on long voyages, p. 502
_Foreign and Neutral Shipping_, immense increase of, in English ports
on the recommencement of the French War, p. 286
_Fox, Mr._, tries to make peace with France, 1806, p. 290
——, issues the first Order of Council for the blockade of the
French Coasts April 18, 1806, p. 291
_France_ collects vast fleets with the view of crushing Henry VIII.,
p. 91
—— furious at the Treaty concluded by Mr. Jay and Lord Grenville,
p. 358
—— issues a decree that she will treat neutrals as they allow
England to treat them, p. 359
—— condemns and destroys American vessels with every form of
injustice, pp. 360-2
_France, Coast of_, blockaded in 1804, from Fécamp to Ostend, p. 383
_Free-Trade_, the warmest advocates of, saw no harm in depriving
Africans of their liberty, p. 204
—— not really acknowledged by the Americans any more than by the
mother-country, p. 256
_Free Traders of the outposts_ think themselves as well qualified to
judge of the Indian Trade as the directors of the E. I. C., p.
460
——, whenever they had once established a footing in India, always
beat the Company, p. 481
_Gage, General_, seizes stores at Boston, p. 236
_Gama, Estevan de_, expedition of, p. 30
_Gama, Paul de_, brother of Vasco, dies at Terceira, p. 21
_Gama, Vasco de_, names of his ships different in different
chroniclers, p. 4
——, solemn preparations for his departure, p. 7
——, commencement of his voyage, July 9, 1497, p. 8
—— threatens revenge on the King of Calicut, p. 16
—— obtains pilots for the King of Melinde, and sails for Portugal,
p. 20
—— reaches the Tagus on return from his first voyage, Sept. 18,
1499, p. 21
—— created “Dom,” page 22
——, great value of the goods brought by him from India on first
voyage, p. 23
——, second expedition of, for revenge rather than for commerce, p.
24
—— agrees with King of Portugal to revenge themselves on the Moors
of Calicut, p. 24
——, second expedition of, starts March 25, 1502, attacks the Moors
on Coast of India, and wars on all the people except those of
Cananore, Cochym, and Coulam, p. 34
——, horrible barbarities of, at Calicut, p. 35
—— sails for Cochym and Coulam, p. 37
——, horrible cruelty of, to the second ambassador of the King of
Calicut, p. 40
—— entirely destroys the fleet collected by the King of Calicut,
p. 42
—— reaches Portugal at the close of his second voyage, Nov. 10,
1503, p. 43
—— goes to India for the third time in 1524, p. 47
——, establishes the rule of Portugal over all persons to the East
of the Cape, and dies three months after, Dec. 24, 1524, p.
45-47
——, very inferior to either of his contemporaries, Columbus or
Magellan, p. 47
——, had advantages in his command that neither Columbus nor
Magellan enjoyed, p. 47
_Georgia_, state of, founded by General Oglethorpe in 1732, chiefly
with the view of raising silkworms, p. 227
_Glasgow, Port_, docks at, commenced A.D. 1662, p. 409
_Goods_, enormous prices of many, owing to their circuitous routes
through the Continent, p. 312
_Goods not contraband of war_, growing feeling that these should be
exempt from capture, p. 358
_Gosnold, Capt._, the first to sail directly across the Atlantic to
America, p. 167
_Great Britain_ may fairly claim the honour of the first discovery of
the American mainland, p. 60
_Greenland_, fisheries along the Coast of, ill-supported by the
English, p. 206
——, fisheries along coast of, thrown open to all nations by Act of
Parliament 1702, p. 207
_Hampden_, defeated in the Courts of Law, and the writs for
Ship-Money pronounced legal, p. 170
_Hampton Roads_, action in, between H.M.S. _Leopard_ and
_Chesapeake_, p. 392
_Hawkesbury, Lord_, view of, with reference to the meaning of “direct
trade,” p. 384
_Hawkins, John_, induces some lords of the Council and Queen
Elizabeth to take shares in a slaving cruise, p. 123
—— and Thomas Hampton the first English slavers, _ibid._
—— reaches West Indies with 400 slaves, whom he compels the
colonists to buy (1565), p. 125
——, a third expedition—at first successful, but is surrounded by
the Spanish Admiral at St. Jean d’Ulloa, and all his ships but
one destroyed, p. 130
——, persuades Philip that he will help in placing Mary Queen of
Scots on the throne, p. 144
——, thus obtains money from Philip and the release of the English
prisoners from Seville dungeons, p. 144
_Hawkins and Cartel_ sail on a slaving-cruise, but quarrel over the
division of the spoil, p. 124
_Hawkins and Drake_ start on a third expedition, having overcome the
pretended scruples of Queen Elizabeth, 1567, p. 129
_Heligoland_, Island of, secured to England by the treaty of, p. 312
_Helm_ always taken by the men, under the direction of the Master or
deck-officer for time being, p. 521
_Henry VII._ passes a law prohibiting importing of Bordeaux wines,
except in English, Irish, or Welsh bottoms, p. 51
—— asserts “that the earth is the common mother of mankind,” his
chief object being to secure improved advantages for the
English in foreign parts, and concludes a commercial treaty
with Scotland, p. 52
—— removes differential duties in force against English shipping,
p. 50
—— a merchant on his own account, as well as an encourager of
distant expeditions, _ibid._
_Henry VIII._ commences the formation of a Royal Navy, p. 89
——, Royal fleet, first successful engagement by, near Mount’s Bay,
p. 91
——, great ship, _The Harry Grâce à Dieu_, p. 94
——, the average of his whole fleet was under 240 tons each, p. 96
——, before the time of, no reliable account of England’s Maritime
Commerce, p. 100
—— makes many mistakes in his laws, especially in regulating
labour, _ibid._
_Hojeda_, story of, his seeing Englishmen in America during his
voyage, p. 62
_Holland_ not unlike Tyre and Venice, p. 178
_Hollar_, drawing of Dutch East Indiaman by, showing resemblance to
much later English ships, p. 180
_Hostilities_, first effect of the renewal of, on the Maritime
Commerce of England, p. 284
_Hotham, Sir Richard_, evidence of, as to the excessive cost of the
ships built for the E. I. C., p. 450
_Humphreys, Capt._, of H.M.S. _Leopard_, conduct of, considered, p.
392, _note_
_Iceland_, the English fishermen to, the first sailors in Henry
VIII.’s fleet, p. 89
_India_, private traders to, permitted under certain circumstances,
1698, p. 446
_Insurance-rates to China_, during the whole French war, did not
exceed half what they had been in 1782, p. 265
_Ireland_ secures commercial freedom for herself during the war
between England and America, but fails altogether to become a
leading naval power, p. 243
—— always a clog on the industry of England, p. 243
_Jay, Mr. John_, sent as Envoy Extraordinary from United States to
London in 1794, p. 256
——, at the close of treaty concluded by, holds out the flag of
Free-Trade, p. 256
—— proposes that, in war between United States and England,
privateers shall not be allowed, p. 356
_Jay, W. W._, description by, of the state of feeling in England when
Mr. John Jay arrived here, p. 355
_Jefferson, Mr._, in report to Congress of American trade, omits all
notice of cotton, p. 357
_Jenkinson, Master Anthonie_, sent to Persia, p. 85
_John, Dom, of Portugal_, follows up the discoveries of Prince Henry,
and sends two young men to make researches, p. 2
—— takes care that Vasco de Gama’s ships are properly supplied, p.
4
_Kalitsch_, treaty of, signed March 1, 1813, p. 335
_Labour_, great demand for, in the Plantations of America, p. 120
_Levant_, general character of the trade with, under Henry VII., and
first voyages to, in “tall ships,” p. 52
——, many particulars of the voyages to, preserved in Hakluyt,
_ibid._
_Lexington_, skirmish at, the commencement of the war between England
and America, p. 236
_Licences_, pernicious system of, adopted by England from France, p.
313
——, values of fees, etc., recoverable on, p. 314
——, statement about, by Mr. Alex. Baring, M.P., p. 315
_Licensing system_, scandalous practices in England, p. 316
—— leads to perjury on the parts of the owners, captains, and
seamen of merchantmen, p. 318
_Lighters, etc._, vast number required for loading and unloading
ships in the Thames in 1796, p. 412
_Lindsay, of Pitscottie_, account of the _Great Michael_ of Scotland,
p. 98
_Lisbon_, joy of the people of, at the safe arrival of Vasco de Gama,
p. 21
—— becomes, what the Italian republics had been, the entrepôt of
Eastern merchandise, p. 44
_Liverpool_, first wet-dock proposed for, A.D. 1709, p. 409
——, docks at, incomparably greater than those of the ancient Roman
port of Ostia, p. 431
——, far larger dock accommodation than any other port in the world,
_ibid._
—— _Docks_, general history of, with the area and amount of
accommodation for shipping, pp. 432-437
——, as a private undertaking, receive no aid from government, p. 437
_Loan_, temporary, advanced to the merchants of London, Bristol,
etc., p. 258
_Log_, to be carefully kept by the ships proceeding to the North, p.
77
_London_, a central council in, to regulate every branch of trade by
the aid of the municipal bodies, p. 102
——, only ten ships of 200 tons in port of, in 1615, p. 166
——, accommodation for vessels arriving from foreign parts far too
limited before construction of the Docks, p. 420
_M^cCulloch, I. R._, doubts, but unwisely, the value of the British
Registry Act, p. 246
——, remarks on the inconvenient system of levying duties previously
to 1802, p. 410
——, observations by, on the privileges granted on renewal of E. I.
C.’s charter in 1796, p. 457
——, remarks on the unfairness of the purchases of E. I. C., p. 482
_Martin, Capt._, of the _Cincinnatus_, tortured by the French, p. 362
_Massachusetts_, in 1785, prohibits the export of American produce in
British vessels, p. 347
_Master_, special duties of, has absolute power in regulating the
hours of duty, sleep, meals, etc., pp. 500-507
——, on the leaving of the pilot, all responsibilities devolve on,
p. 499
—— has the entire control of the navigation and working of the
ship, p. 502
——, the weather side of the quarter-deck belongs to; does not go
aloft or perform manual labour; in tacking and wearing gives
all the orders for trimming the yards, p. 503
—— does not generally superintend during the ordinary day’s work,
p. 504
—— to give his orders to the officers, and not directly to the
men, _ibid._
——, authority of, would be lessened by giving orders direct to
crew, p. 504
——, in the large packet-ships, has little to do with the day’s
work, but has entire control of cabin, and generally lives in
state-room by himself, p. 505
——, the good and evil on board ships mainly depends on his
character and conduct, p. 506
——, everything to be reported to, and no man punished but by his
order, _ibid._
——, relative ages of, in Dutch and Prussian Marine, p. 507
_Masters and Mates_ in Dutch and Prussian Marine, generally from a
superior class of society, p. 507
_Mate, Chief_, looks after the head yards, p. 504
——, special duties of, as distinct from the captain, pp. 510-517
—— has, generally, to see that each man has something to do, and
that he does it, with special duties at the times of anchoring
or of getting under weigh, p. 511
—— has the chief care of the ship when in port, and commands the
ship in the master’s absence, but does not inflict punishments,
p. 513
—— directly superintends the evolutions of the ship under the
master’s directions, pp. 513-515
—— is, in some sense, the confidential agent of the shippers, and
cannot abroad be removed by master except for very special
reasons, p. 516
—— responsible for correct keeping of the log, and successor, by
law, to the master in case he should die, pp. 516, 517
_Mate, Second_, commands starboard watch when master is not on deck,
and leads the men in their daily work, but does not necessarily
succeed to the post of chief mate, p. 518
——, in furling sails goes aloft with the men, and, if fit, takes
his place at the “bunt,” _ibid._
——, in reefing, goes aloft with men, if fit, taking his place at
the “weather earring,” p. 519
—— ought to be able to show the men how to do the neatest and the
most difficult jobs, _ibid._
—— expected, like ordinary seamen, to handle the tar-bucket, and,
in making or taking in sail, hauls on the deck with and leads
the men, p. 520
——, when no boatswain, has charge of spare tackle, rigging, etc.,
p. 521
——, when in port, stowing or discharging cargo, ought to be in the
hold, p. 522
—— commands any boats sent out from the ship for any purpose, p.
522
_Mate, Third_, his duties not exactly defined, p. 522
—— generally goes aloft with the larboard watch to furl and reef
sails, _ibid._
—— generally divides his labours with the second mate, or looks
after the boats, p. 523
_Mate, Chief and Second_, always addressed as “Mr.,” p. 517
_Mate_, a term generally used in the sense of “assistant,” as
“boatswain’s mate,” etc., p. 523
_Mecklenburg-Schwerin_, the Duke of, the first to join the Alliance
against Bonaparte, p. 335
_Medals_ given by the King of Portugal to those who would make
researches, p. 3
_Mediterranean_, wise suggestion to promote as far as possible trade
with, p. 288
_Melinde_, King of, offers guides for the Portuguese to Calicut, p. 11
——, letter from King of, on a leaf of gold, p. 18
——, arrival of Vasco de Gama on second expedition, p. 29
——, rich gifts exchanged between the King of, and Vasco de Gama, p.
30
_Merchant Adventurers and Cabot_, England owes a deep debt of
gratitude to, p. 83
_Merchants, English_, general corruption of, in the reign of Edward
VI., p. 109
_Merchants, Foreign_, refuse to buy English wares as “fraudulent in
make, weight, and size,” p. 109
_Merchant Shipping Act_ has greatly benefited the condition of the
crews trading beyond the jurisdiction of the Admiralty, p. 494
_Mersey_, character of the estuary of, p. 431
_Mersey Board_, laws of, drawn up agreeably with several Acts of
Parliament, p. 438
_Middleton, Sir Henry_, commands the _Trades Increase_, the largest
vessel hitherto built, but fails, p. 158
_Moors_, eight hundred burnt alive at Calicut by De Gama, p. 36
_Mortier, Marshal_, seizes the Hanseatic towns of Bremen, Hamburg,
Lubeck, etc., p. 296
_Mozambique_, De Gama arrives there March 10, 1497, p. 9
——, Sheikh of, takes De Gama and his company for Turks, _ibid._
_Mulberry-trees_, attempt to grow them in Chelsea as food for
silkworms, though found by experience not to flourish well
north of the Loire in France, p. 213, _note_
_Napoleon_ sends military officers to England to spy out the state of
her ports, trade, etc., p. 276
——, unsuccessful expedition of, against St. Domingo, and terrible
losses, p. 277
—— declares he would rather see the English on the heights of
Montmartre than in Malta, p. 279
—— denounces the conduct of England in a violent speech addressed
to Lord Whitworth, _ibid._
——, extravagant paper by, in the _Moniteur_, p. 280
—— determines on the invasion of England, p. 281
—— arrests all English people travelling in France, p. 284
—— tries to destroy the commerce of England by his “continental
system,” p. 291
——, decrees of, list of the dates of, p. 292, _note_
——, Berlin Decree of, declares the blockade of the English coasts,
_ibid._
——, skill of, in framing his Berlin Decree so as to appear to be
the champion of liberty, p. 293
—— stigmatises the Hamburg merchants as “smugglers by profession,”
p. 295
—— meditates the invasion of Russia, p. 296
——, decree of, from Milan, Dec. 17, 1807, p. 304
——, decrees of, from Bayonne, April 17, 1808, and from Rambouillet,
March 23, 1810, against the Americans, with the intention of
forcing them into declaring war against England, p. 306
—— seizes all the American ships at Antwerp, Bordeaux, and
Bayonne, and burns those at St. Sebastian, p. 307
——, by granting special licences, is the first to evade his own
decrees, p. 308
——, scheme for excluding British goods from the continent wholly
fails, p. 310
—— triumphant that “England has now a new enemy,” p. 327
—— compels the Pope to sign a concordat, p. 336
—— reaches the Tuileries, March 21, 1815, p. 341
—— finally overthrown at Waterloo, June 18, 1815, p. 343
—— pays no attention to the remonstrances of the American minister
in Paris, p. 397
—— asserts that war had been practically declared against America
when England issued her Orders in Council, p. 398
_Natal_, so named, from having been discovered on Christmas Day,
1497, p. 8
_Naval battles_ between English and Dutch in 1652-3, p. 186
—— between the Dutch and English, 1664-1667, p. 191
_Navigation Act_, extreme stringency of, p. 181
_Navigation laws of England_, first prohibitory Act, 1646, with the
object of restraining the Dutch, p. 183.
——, second Act, 1656, _ibid._
——, Act of Cromwell, passed Oct. 9, 1651, p. 184
——, confirmed by Charles II. 1660, p. 188
——, supplemental statute of, 14 Charles II., prohibits all trade
with the Dutch, p. 189
——, orders sent from England to enforce them in all their
strictness, p. 231
——, dispute whether they apply to American as to other foreign
shipping, p. 257
—— necessarily relaxed during the American war, as the Americans
relayed their embargoes, p. 333
_Nelson, Capt._ (_Lord Nelson_), commands H.M.S. _Boreas_ in 1784, in
the West Indies, p. 254, _note_
——, carries out Act of Parliament against planters and Americans in
the West Indies, _ibid._
——, takes command of the Channel fleet, p. 283
_Neutral nations_, general views of, relative to the question whether
the flag covers the merchandise, and on the right of search and
the conditions thereof, p. 267
_Neutrals’ right_ proclaimed in the name of the Emperor Napoleon by
his minister, M. de Champigny, p. 397
_Newfoundland_, fisheries of, first opened up by the Merchant
Adventurers, p. 85
——, the French, in reign of Louis XIV., encroach on the English
fisheries there, p. 205
——, peculiar customs among the fishermen on its coasts, p. 206
_New York Shipowners_, views of, on duties of neutrals, private
armed vessels, etc., pp. 388-391
—— admit the right of search of neutral ships at sea, p. 391
_North, Expedition to_, sails May 20, 1553, p. 79
_Officers, chief_, relative qualifications required for, in Danish
and Norse ships, p. 509
_Orders, English, in Council_, principal provisions of, pp. 297-303
——, a necessary reply to Napoleon’s Berlin decree, p. 297
——, indignation in England against, on the part of merchants not
owners of ships, p. 306
——, generally beneficial to British shipping interests except in
the Baltic, p. 309
——, their effects on American trade, 1810, p. 320
——, made a stalking-horse by the Whigs, p. 325
_Oxenham_, in 1585, the first Englishman to sail on Pacific, p. 148
_Panic, commercial_, on the breaking out of the war with France, Feb.
1, 1793, p. 258
_Paris, Treaty of_, with provisions for settling the new boundaries
of Europe, p. 339
_Pavia, Gonsalvo de_, sent by the King of Portugal to make
researches, p. 3
_Pembroke, Lord_, and others, realise 60 per cent. by Hawkins’s
slaving, p. 126
_Peter the Great_, extraordinary story of, p. 207
—— works with his own hands at ship-building at Saardam,
Amsterdam, and Deptford, p. 208
_Petty, Sir W._, estimates by, of the value of European shipping, and
of the quantity assignable to each state, p. 200
_Philip II. of Spain_ retaliates, by seizing thirty English vessels
in Spanish ports, p. 117
—— confiscates Hampton’s cargo of hides, procured by money earned
by slaving, p. 123
—— peremptorily forbids his colonies to purchase the slaves
brought in the English ships, p. 123
——, through his ambassador, remonstrates, but in vain, against the
piracies, p. 128
——, the furniture from his chapel publicly burnt in Cheapside, p.
137
—— slowly plans complete vengeance on England, p. 142
——, the chief objects of, in his attacks on England, p. 143
_Pickering, Mr._, maintains that the English capture of American
vessels, carrying French goods, is warranted by the law of
nations, and in reply to the French, asserts that “free ships
should make free goods,” p. 263
_Pilots of the Mersey_ subject to a special committee of the Mersey
Board, p. 439
—— undergo three examinations before admitted to full licence, p.
440
——, very various duties of the general superintendent of, p. 439
_Pilot-boats of the Mersey_ not less than forty tons each, p. 440
——, each one has a master, second and third master, and ten
apprentices; and the boats have seven stations, the last to
take the pilots out of the ships and back to Liverpool, p. 441
_Pirates, English_, even when seized by the government, rarely
punished with any severity, p. 120
_Pitt, Mr._, the firm supporter of the merchants, shipowners, and
agriculturists, p. 265
—— retires from the Administration, owing to differences between
him and the King with reference to Catholic Emancipation, p. 266
—— (supported by Mr. Fox) strenuously denies that “free bottoms
make free goods,” p. 269
—— reduces the duties on many Indian articles of produce, 1784, p.
452
_Pitt, Mr._, establishes the Board of Control, including six members
of the Privy Council, 1784, p. 455
_Planters, West Indian_, demand unrestricted freedom of trade with
the Americans, p. 251
_Portugal_, enormous wealth accruing to, from the discovery of the
way to India round the Cape of Good Hope, p. 44
_Portugal, King of_, his great joy on the return of Vasco de Gama
from his second voyage, p. 43
_Prayers_ to be said morning and evening in ships proceeding to the
North, p. 78
_Privateers and pirates_ naturally ready to take up slave-dealing, p.
120
_Privateers, American_, as reckless and as daring as the buccaneers,
p. 379
_Privateers, English_, sailing under flag of the Prince of Orange,
capture large treasures on their way to the Netherlands, p. 133
_Proclamation_ ordering that the coins of the realm shall only be
worth their intrinsic value, p. 108
—— relating to Ship-Money, and Hampden’s resistance, p. 170
—— to German Princes, stating that the only object of the Alliance
was the rescuing Germany from France, p. 335
_Protection System_, gradual growth of the desire for, in all
classes, p. 228
_Protectionists_ in America carry a measure imposing differential
duties, p. 369
_Prussia_, unprovoked attacks on Hanover, p. 301
_Quiloa_, an important city at the time of De Gama’s voyage, trading
with Mecca, p. 10
——, Armenian merchants at, who call themselves “Christians,” p. 11
——, speeches of De Gama to the King of, pp. 26-29
——, treatment of the Moor of, by Vasco de Gama, p. 29
_Raleigh, Sir W._, first personal adventure in 1595, but had aided in
seven previous ones, p. 150
——, remarkable views of respecting English commerce and how to
benefit it, p. 162
—— shows that the position of England ought to make her the
storehouse of all nations, p. 162
——, and how superior the Dutch were to us as traders, p. 163
_Read, Capt._, adopts great circle sailing between the Cape and China
in 1788, p. 377
_Registry, British Act of_, Aug. 1, 1786, requires that every vessel
above 15 tons should be accurately measured and registered, p.
245
_Revolutionary War_ creates an immense demand for American ships, p.
363
_Roberts_, the most famous of the buccaneers, has one ship mounting
40 guns, p. 211
_Roe, Sir J._, sent as ambassador to the court of the Moghul Emperor
of Delhi, p. 158
_Russell, Admiral Lord_, restores the prestige of England in the
Mediterranean, p. 202
_Russia_, first ambassador from, enters London February 1557, and
leaves it for his own country May 1557, after the signature of
an important commercial treaty between England and, pp. 82, 83
——, trade with, practically thrown open, 1699, a small fee only
being required for admission to the Russia Company, p. 207
——, bribed by the acquisition of Finland, Moldavia, and Wallachia,
declares war against England, p. 303
_Ryswick_, peace of, 1697, causes great prosperity, p. 203
_Sargarço_, sea covered with, found by De Gama on his homeward
voyage, 1499, p. 20
_Sail-maker_, if he ships as an able seaman, must do seaman’s work,
and is expected to go aloft and help in furling sails, etc., if
required, p. 524
_Scotland, commerce of_, chiefly, during the last century, with W.
Indies and the plantations of North America, p. 209
_Scotland_, list (from Chalmers) of ships entering ports of, between
1769 and 1785, p. 244, _note_
_Scott, Sir William_, declines to say what is _bonâ fide_
importation, p. 365
—— asserts that all writers on the Law of Nations unanimously
admit the right of search, p. 391
_Seafaring persons_ generally divided into three classes, able and
ordinary seamen, boys or “green hands,” p. 527
_Seaman, able_, expected to be a good workman on rigging, making
knots, etc., p. 528
_Seamen, ordinary_, expected to know how to “haul, reef, and steer,”
and all the ordinary rigging, etc., but not expected to be
complete helmsmen, p. 529
_Seamen, proving incompetent_, may be reduced from the grade for
which they had contracted, p. 527
_Seely, Dorothy_, petition of, to Elizabeth’s Council, p. 113
_Seven Years’ War_, heavy expenses of, lead the Legislature to pass,
in 1764, several acts unwisely pressing upon the Americans, p.
229
_Seymour, Sir T._, plans a separate kingdom in the Scilly Islands, p.
112
_Sierra Leone_, settlement formed at, in 1786, for free negroes, p.
249
_Simulated papers_ provided for ships under the licensing system, p.
317
_Shannon, H. M. S._, captures the _Chesapeake_ in Boston Bay, p. 332
_Sheffield, Lord_, and _Mr. Chalmers_ maintain that the loyal
colonies are able to supply W. Indies with lumber and
provisions, p. 251
_Ship-Money_, story of the demand for, p. 170
——, struggle about, tends to the separation of the Royal and
Mercantile Navy, p. 171
_Shipowners_, general complaints of the English, after the
recommencement of the war with France, p. 285
_Shipping Interests in England_ strenuously advocate the most
restrictive policy, p. 252
_Slave Trade_, commencement and original causes of, p. 120
——, from its commencement, rendered infamous by the characters of
those who first engaged in it, p. 121
——, returns of the vessels employed between 1760 and 1786, p. 248
_Slaver, Brooks’_, details of her capacity, fittings, provisioning,
etc., p. 248, _note_
_Smith, Adam_, in his ‘Wealth of Nations,’ remarks of, on the wages
of English seamen, p. 244
_Smith, Capt. John_, adventures of, the hero of the ballad, ‘The
Honour of a London ’Prentice,’ p. 167
_Smuggling_, measures for the suppression of in America, p. 231
_Smyrna Merchantmen_, nearly the whole fleet of, captured by the
French, 1692, p. 201
_South Dock_, forming the city canal, added to West India Docks in
1829, p. 424
_South Sea Bubble_, remarkable list of the strange schemes suggested
for public support by, p. 212
—— peculiarly fatal to genuine commerce, as largely inducing among
the people the habit of gambling, p. 212
_South Sea Company_ (1710) had no real basis but the privilege of
slaving on a large scale, p. 211
—— prosecutes some rival bubble companies, which leads to a
collapse, p. 213
_South Sea Directors_, several of them severely and justly punished,
p. 214
_Spain_, war with, the immediate result of the accession of
Elizabeth, p. 109
——, English hatred of, like that of the Crusaders of the Infidels,
p. 110
_Spitzbergen_, the whale fisheries at, first opened up by the
Merchant Adventurers, p. 85
_Spragge, Sir Edward_, gallant defence of the mouth of the Thames,
etc., p. 194, _note_
_Stamp Act of the Grenville Administration_, passed March 22, 1765,
p. 232
—— burnt in a bonfire in New York, _ibid._
_Steel-yard, Merchants of_, obtain relief from the Act of Edward VI.
on the accession of Queen Mary, p. 86
——, largely defraud the revenue by giving rights of denizenship to
other foreigners, p. 99
_Steward_, his duties depend on the class of ship in which he sails,
p. 525
—— may be required, in cases of necessity, to lend a hand in
working the ship, but not to stand watch, p. 526
_Swearing_ not permitted in ships sent to the North by the Merchant
Adventurers’ Co., p. 78
_Sweating Sickness_, distinctive character of, in 1517, p. 65
_Taxation Act_, new, passed in 1767, imposes import duties on teas,
glass, and other articles, p. 234
_Taylor’s, Capt. Meadows_, excellent account of the East India Co.,
given in his ‘Manual of the History of India,’ p. 444, _note_
_Tea_, thrown overboard in the harbour of Boston, in 1774, p. 235
_Thorne, Mr. Robert_, a distinguished merchant of Bristol in the
early part of the 16th century, p. 54
——, letter to Henry VIII., on the progress of the discoveries, p. 65
——, in association with Cabot for promoting Spanish trade with the
East, p. 69
_Tobias, “gentleman fisher and mariner,”_ views of, p. 165
_Tooke_, ‘History of Prices,’ note from, on the prices of 1808, p.
309, _note_
_Torture_, permitted in some French cruisers against the Americans,
p. 362
_Trade, Board of_, first planned by Charles II. 1668—erected into a
permanent establishment 1696, p. 209
——, had originally exclusive superintendence of the commerce of the
plantations, p. 210
_Trade between England and America_, perfectly free on the
recognition of American Independence, p. 250
_Trade, circuitous routes of_, remarkable instances of the, pp.
310-311, _notes_
_Treaty, Commercial, between France and England_, signed Sept. 26,
1786, p. 247
_Treaty between United States and England_, chief articles of, pp.
352-3.
——, date when signed and sanctioned, p. 354
——, a masterpiece of diplomacy, p. 357
——, commercial regulations of, framed on fair and liberal
principles of reciprocity, p. 394
——, not carried out owing to the outburst in England on news of the
Berlin Decree, p. 394
_Treaty of reciprocity between United States and Bremen_, p. 407
——, between United States and the King of the Netherlands, _ibid._
“_Trick, the_,” or time at the helm, is two hours, p. 532
_Trinity House_ memorial to King in 1615 strongly recommending
protection, p. 166
_Turkey Company_, great success of, in the Levant, p. 177
_Union, Legislative_, between England and Scotland in 1707, p. 208
_United States_ strenuously maintain “that the flag covers the
merchandise,” p. 266
_Vienna_, Congress of, interrupted by the news of Napoleon’s escape
from Elba, p. 340
_Wallis, Capt._, the first navigator to give any account of King
George’s Island, or Otaheite, p. 219
_Walpole, Sir R._, recommends, in 1733, the adoption of a system of
warehousing, p. 409
——, violent opposition to his excise scheme, 1733, p. 411
_War_ first declared between England and Holland, 1652, p. 186
——, general result that England’s maritime resources increased as
the Dutch declined, p. 195
—— formally declared against France, May 18, 1803, p. 283
_Watch_, each steers in turn, the watch on deck supplying the
helmsman, p. 532
—— officer of, expected to stand by helm whenever relieved, p. 533
_Watches_, on board merchantmen, generally only two, the larboard and
starboard, p. 499
_Weavers_, petition of, in the reign of Philip and Mary, p. 104
_Wellington_, advance of the troops into France, 1813-14, p. 336
_West India Docks_ (Isle of Dogs), usual mode of conducting business
in, p. 425
——, now amalgamated into one Co., with the East India Docks, p. 424
_West India merchants_, the first to construct wet-docks in London,
p. 422
_West India Trade_, great improvements in the ships employed in, p.
490
_West Indies_, further concession made to, in 1788, p. 255
——, all vessels from, compelled to deliver their cargoes either in
the docks or in the river below Blackwall, p. 423
_Wheaton, Mr._, says that Americans admitted that their flag could
not cover enemy’s goods, p. 303, _note_
——, fully describes the “rights of war as to neutrals,” in his
‘Elements of International Laws,’ p. 391, _note_
_Whitworth, Lord_, applies in vain for equal justice to the English
property in France, p. 275
_Willoughby, Sir Hugh_, and Richard Chancellor despatched to the
North, on the recommendation of Sebastian Cabot, p. 76
——, driven on the coast of Lapland, and the whole of the crews of
his two ships frozen to death, p. 81
_Willoughby, Lord_, forms a settlement at Surinam, p. 169
_Wines_, none from Guienne or Gascony to be imported (during reign of
Henry VII.) except in English ships, p. 51
END OF VOL. II.
LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
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