European commerce, down to the age of the great geographical discoveries, hinged upon two great trade routes and two great producing areas, the one of manufactured, and the other of raw, material. To these four dominant factors all subsidiary avenues and crafts owed their origin and continued existence. The two primary trade routes were: first, that connecting, by way of the Levant and the nearer East, the Italian cities with the vaguely known and fabulously portrayed wealth of southern Asia; and second, that by which the hardy merchants of the Hanseatic League conveyed the produce of the Baltic shores, of Scandinavia, of the wide plains of Muscovy, and through them the far-fetched wares of Persia and Cathay, to western Europe, which region, stimulated by amenities whence the indolent mind of Asia drew no profit, inevitably became the centre of the world’s progress. Nothing for nothing being a universal law, Europe had to find something of her own to exchange for the furs of the North and the spices of the East. The cities of the Rhine delta supplied, in great part, the indispensable quid pro quo, by devoting themselves to a variety of manufactures amongst which that of cloth assumed a position of paramount importance. Here, then, arose the first producing area necessary to the balance of the mediaeval trading system; England constituted the second and equally indispensable one, for she alone, secured by the sea from the worst scourges of war, could supply the raw material for the cloth industry. The generous wool-sacks of England became her title of entry into the ranks of the progressing nations of the world.
Already, before the dawn of the new era, England had begun to manufacture a portion of her wool into rough, inferior qualities of cloth, but, until the awakening under the Tudor dynasty, she cannot be said to have realized the possibilities of her position. The Hanse merchants and the Italians were in possession of the bulk of her foreign commerce, and only a few subsidiary trades were in the hands of Englishmen, whose education and ability in such matters were inferior to those of the foreigners.
TRADE ROUTES
from and to
ENGLAND
at the commencement
of the
Tudor Period.
A more detailed consideration of the lines of communication with which England was immediately concerned reveals four main commercial avenues, all forming part of the great general system already described: the trade with Germany and the Baltic, chiefly controlled by the great Hansa, whose tentacles spread from Riga to the Rhine; the export of half-made cloth to Flanders, shared between the Hansa, the Flemings, and the English Merchant Adventurers; the wool export, to Calais by the English Staple Merchants, and overland to Italy by the Venetians and Florentines, who maintained business houses for that purpose in London; and the long sea route for wools, wines, and spices, to and from the Mediterranean, again monopolized almost exclusively by the Italians. In addition there were minor, but nevertheless much frequented, trades to Spain for wines and oils, to Gascony for wines, and to Iceland for stock-fish. The two last mentioned were more exclusively in the hands of Englishmen than any of the others.
These mediaeval trade routes, although destined to be profoundly modified by the great extension of the limits of the world as known to Europeans, remained of paramount importance for more than a century to come, and Henry VII set himself to the policy of ousting foreigners from their control, and of fostering, by every means known to his statesmanship, the mercantile enterprise of his own people.
One of the shrewdest business men who ever sat upon a throne, he had no doubt studied and admired the commercial system of Venice. That state, which existed solely by means of and for the purpose of trade, maintained her ascendancy by a fiscal policy which combined rigorous protection with a species of socialism undefiled by any morbidly altruistic ideas. All the familiar weapons of modern protection—preferential duties on goods from Venetian dependencies, navigation laws to encourage Venetian shipping, retaliatory tariffs against rivals, and reciprocal arrangements with such as were disposed to be reasonable—were to be found in the armoury of Venice, and were applied with an unquestioning assurance as to their efficacy, only possible in an age when the doctrines of free trade were yet unborn.
In addition there was in Venice an absolutely complete subordination of the individual to the interests of the State. If the export or import of a certain article was considered prejudicial to the welfare of the city, that trade was stopped forthwith; if the clothworkers of Venice were short of raw material, shipmasters coming from England were ordered to load with wool and nothing else; if the State galleys for the Flanders voyage had difficulty in completing their cargoes, those who preferred to ship their goods in private vessels were forced to pay half or quarter freights to the official ships as well; since it was desirable that Venice should possess a large commercial navy, the overland conveyance of certain wares was forbidden or subjected to paralysing duties. Such are a few examples of the working of an undemocratic republic, of a type which may never be seen again, but which was eminently suited to the needs of its time. And the secrets of the success of this unparalleled interference by the State with individual rights? They were two: first, magnificent discipline, ready obedience enforced by severe penalties; and second, an elasticity of method, an instant variation of policy to meet varying conditions, which could only have been carried out by an assembly of level-headed, patriotic merchant-statesmen, such as filled the benches of the Venetian senate.
Henry VII, then, had before him a pattern of successful mercantile policy, but he was under no illusions as to his powers of enforcing such a discipline on England. Although he far exceeded him in subtlety of mind, he lacked the ferocious mastery of men which his son was afterwards to display. He had to make up his mind to work slowly and cautiously, to be content to sow that others might reap, to lay sure foundations for the greatness of his family and of the country with which its interests were bound up.
Generally speaking, the policy of the Middle Ages had been, in the interests of cheapness, to encourage foreign merchants of all kinds to bring their goods to England, and to establish factories in her ports; in many cases, even, aliens had been granted privileges exceeding those of native traders, and consequently the trade of England was largely in foreign hands. Henry soon gave signs that this policy of cheapness was to be abandoned. His first Parliament passed an Act[[2]] prohibiting the import of Bordeaux wines in other than English vessels, manned by English crews. To avoid friction, the too sudden application of this law was mitigated by the frequent granting to foreign merchants of licences to break it. But these were exceptions; the rule remained, and the grants of licences gradually diminished.