Immediately Before The
Revocation Of The Edict Of Nantes, Her Commerce Was At Its Greatest
Heighth, As The Following Estimates Of That She Carried On With England And
Holland Will Prove.
To the former country the exportation of manufactured
silks of all sorts is said to have been to the
Value of 600,000_l_.; - of
linen, sail-cloth, and canvass, about 700,000_l_.; - in beaver hats,
watches, clocks, and glass, about 220,000_l_.; - in paper, about
90,000_l_.; - in iron ware, the manufacture of Auvergne, chiefly, about
40,000_l_.; - in shalloons, tammies, &c. from Picardy and Champagne, about
150,000_l_.; - in wines, about 200,000_l_.; and brandies, about 80,000_l_.
The exports to Holland, shortly before the revocation of the edict of
Nantes, in silks, velvets, linen, and paper, are estimated at 600,000_l_.;
- in hats, about 200,000_l_.; - in glass, clocks, watches, and household
furniture, about 160,000_l_.; - in small articles, such as fringes, gloves,
&c., about 200,000_l_.; - in linen, canvass, and sail cloth, about
160,000_l_.; and in saffron, dye-wood, woollen yarn, &c., about 300,000_l_.
In the year 1700 a council of commerce was constituted in France,
consisting of the principal ministers of state and finance, and of twelve
of the principal merchants of the kingdom, chosen annually from Paris,
Rouen, Bourdeaux, Lyons, Marseilles, Rochelle, Nantes, St. Maloe, Lisle,
Bayonne, and Dunkirk.
From the first report of this board, we gain some information of the state
of French commerce at this time; according to it, the French employed in
their West India and Guinea trade only 100 vessels, whereas the English
employed 500. The principal articles they drew from these islands were
sugar, indigo, cotton, cocoa, ginger, &c. The exclusive trades formed in
1661, when France was little versed in commerce and navigation, are
deprecated: the chief of them were, that granted to Marseilles for the sole
trade to the Levant; - the East India Company; - the prohibiting foreign raw
silk to be carried to Paris, Nismes, Tours, &c., till it had passed through
Lyons; - the Canada and Guinea Companies, besides various farms or
monopolies of certain merchandize in trade: the principal of these last was
lead from England, with which, made into shot, the persons who had the
monopoly supplied not only France, but, through France, Spain, Portugal,
Switzerland, the Levant, and the French West Indies.
The report contains some information respecting the comparative commerce of
France, and the other nations of Europe. The Spaniards, it is observed,
though they possess within their own country wool, silk, oil, wine, &c.,
and are in no want of good ports, both on the ocean and Mediterranean,
nevertheless neglect all these advantages. Hence it happens that the raw
silk of Valencia, Murcia, and Grenada, is exported to France: the wool of
Castile, Arragon, Navarre, and Leon, to England, Holland, France, and
Italy; and these raw articles, when manufactured, are sent back to Spain,
and exchanged for the gold and silver of the American mines. France also
supplies Peru and Mexico, through Spain, receiving in return, cochineal,
indigo, hides, &c., besides a balance of eighteen or twenty million of
livres, and by the flotas, seven or eight million more. The report adds, on
this head, that latterly the English and Dutch have interfered with some
branches of this trade with Spain; and it also complains that the former
nation carry on the Levant trade to much more advantage than the French,
their woollen cloths being better and cheaper. The English also carry to
the Levant, lead, pewter, copperas, and logwood, together with a great deal
of pepper; - with these, and the money received on the coasts of Portugal,
Spain and Italy, for the dry fish and sugar they sell there on their
outward voyage, they purchase their homeward cargoes. This superiority of
England over France in the Levant trade, is ascribed in the report to the
monopoly enjoyed by Marseilles.
The report, in relation to the commerce of France with the northern nations
of Europe, observes, that it appears from the custom books, that the Dutch
had possession of almost the whole of it. The Dutch also are accused of
having, in a great measure, made themselves masters of the inland trade of
France. In order to secure to this latter country the direct trade with the
north of Europe, certain plans are suggested in the report; all of which
were objected to by the deputies from Nantes, principally, it would seem,
on the ground, that the Dutch trade to the Baltic was so well settled, that
it governed the prices of all the exports and imports there, and that the
Dutch gave higher prices for French goods than could be obtained in the
Baltic for them, while, on the other hand, they sold at Amsterdam Baltic
produce cheaper than it could be bought in the Baltic. One objection to a
direct trade between France and the Baltic affords a curious and
instructive proof of the imperfect state of navigation at this time, that
is, at the beginning of the eighteenth century. The deputy from Marseilles
urged that the voyage from Dantzic, or even from Copenhagen to Marseilles,
was too long for a ship to go and come with certainty in one season,
considering the ice and the long nights; and that therefore, there is no
avoiding the use of entrepots for the trade of Marseilles. Mr. Anderson, in
his History of Commerce, very justly observes, "that the dread of a long
voyage from the north to the south parts of Europe, contributed, in a great
measure, to make Antwerp, in former times, the general magazine of Europe."
The decline of the commerce of the Italian states, in consequence of the
discovery of the Cape of Good Hope, has been already mentioned; their
efforts however to preserve it were vigorous, and we can trace, even in the
middle of the sixteenth century, some Indian commerce passing through
Venice.
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