[1200] Green's ship and crew were first seized without form of law in reprisal for the seizure in England, by the East India Company, of a Scotch ship belonging to the old Darien Company, whose trade the India Company held to be a breach of its monopoly. The charge of slaying a Scotch captain was an afterthought.
[1201] On this see Burton, viii, 178-85; and cp. Buckle, 3-vol. ed. iii, 160, as to the rise of the trading spirit.
[1202] Burton's History of Scotland, viii, 3, note.
[1203] Id. viii, 168.
[1204] "It is a marvel how the Edinburgh press of that day could have printed the multitude of denunciatory pamphlets against the Union" (Burton, viii, 131). "The aristocratic opponents of the Union did their utmost to inflame the passions of the people" (id. p. 137, cp. p. 158, etc.).
[1205] Following Hallam, Middle Ages, iii, 327.
[1206] Properly speaking, the action of "England" was the action of the merchant class, which in this case most exerted itself and got its way.