BOOK cities, as the only fanctuaries in which it could be III. fecure to the perfon that acquired it. The inhabitants of a city, it is true, muft always ultimately derive their fubfiftence, and the whole materials and means of their industry, from the country. But thofe of a city fituated near either the fea-coaft or the banks of a navigable river, are not neceffarily confined to derive them from the country in their neighbourhood. They have a much wider range, and may draw them from the most remote corners of the world, either in exchange for the manufactured produce of their own industry, or by performing the office of carriers between diftant countries, and exchanging the produce of one for that of another. A city might in this manner grow up to great wealth and fplendor, while not only the country in its neighbourhood, but all thofe to which it traded, were in poverty and wretchednefs. Each of thofe countries, perhaps, taken fingly, could afford it but a small part, either of its fubfiftence, or of its employment; but all of them taken together could afford it both a great fubfiftence and a great employment. There were, however, within the narrow circle of the commerce of thofe times, fome countries that were opulent and induftrious. Such was the Greek empire as long as it fubfifted, and that of the Saracens during the reigns of the Abaffides. Such too was Egypt till it was conquered by the Turks, fome part of the coaft of Barbary, and all thofe provinces of Spain which were under the government of the Moors. The III. The cities of Italy feem to have been the firft CHAP. in Europe which were raifed by commerce to any confiderable degree of opulence. Italy lay in the centre of what was at that time the improved and civilized part of the world. The crufades too, though, by the great wafte of stock and deftruction of inhabitants which they occafioned, they muft neceffarily have retarded the progrefs of the greater part of Europe, were extremely favourable to that of fome Italian cities. The great armies which marched from all parts to the conqueft of the Holy Land, gave extraordinary encouragement to the shipping of Venice, Genoa, and Pisa, sometimes in transporting them thither, and always in fupplying them with provifions. They were the commiffaries, if one may fay fo, of thofe armies; and the most destructive frenzy that ever befel the European nations, was a fource of opulence to thofe republics. The inhabitants of trading cities, by importing the improved manufactures and expenfive luxuries of richer countries, afforded fome food to the vanity of the great proprietors, who eagerly purchased them with great quantities of the rude produce of their own lands. The commerce of a great part of Europe in thofe times, accordingly, confifted chiefly in the exchange of their own rude, for the manufactured produce of more civilized nations. Thus the wool of England used to be exchanged for the wines of France, and the fine cloths of Flanders, in the fame manner as the corn in Poland is at this BOOK day exchanged for the wines and brandies of III. France, and for the filks and velvets of France and Italy. A tafte for the finer and more improved manufactures, was in this manner introduced by foreign commerce into countries where no fuch works were carried on. But when this tafte became fo general as to occafion a confiderable demand, the merchants, in order to fave the expence of carriage, naturally endeavoured to eftablifh fome manufactures of the fame kind in their own country. Hence the origin of the first manufactures for diftant fale that feem to have been established in the western provinces of Europe, after the fall of the Roman empire. No large country, it must be observed, ever did or could fubfift without fome fort of manufactures being carried on in it; and when it is faid of any fuch country that it has no manufactures, it must always be understood of the finer and more improved, or of such as are fit for diftant fale. In every large country, both the clothing and houfhold furniture of the far greater part of the people, are the produce of their own industry. This is even more univerfally the cafe in those poor countries which are commonly faid to have no manufactures, than in thofe rich ones that are faid to abound in them. In the latter, you will generally find, both in the clothes and houfhold furniture of the lowest rank of people, a much greater proportion of foreign productions than in the former. III. Thofe manufactures which are fit for diftant CHA P. fale, feem to have been introduced into different countries in two different ways. Sometimes they have been introduced, in the manner above mentioned, by the violent operation, if one may fay fo, of the flocks of particular merchants and undertakers, who eftablished them in imitation of fome foreign manufactures of the fame kind. Such manufactures, therefore, are the offspring of foreign commerce, and fuch feem to have been the ancient manufactures of filks, velvets, and brocades, which flourished in Lucca, during the thirteenth century. They were banished from thence by the tyranny of one of Machiavel's heroes, Caftruccio Caftracani. In 1310, nine hundred families were driven out of Lucca, of whom thirty-one retired to Venice, and offered to introduce there the filk manufacture*. Their offer was accepted; many privileges were conferred upon them, and they began the manufacture with three hundred workSuch too feem to have been the manufactures of fine cloths that anciently flourished in Flanders, and which were introduced into England in the beginning of the reign of Elizabeth; and fuch are the prefent filk manufactures of Lyons and Spital-fields. Manufactures intro duced in this manner are generally employed upon foreign materials, being imitations of foreign manufactures. When the Venetian manu men. See Sandi Iftoria Civile de Vinezia, Part 2. vol. i. page 247, and 256. VOL. III. I facture III. BO OK facture was firft established, the materials were all brought from Sicily and the Levant. The more ancient manufacture of Lucca was likewife car, ried on with foreign materials. The cultivation of mulberry trees, and the breeding of filkworms, feem not to have been common in the northern parts of Italy before the fixteenth century. Thofe arts were not introduced into France till the reign of Charles IX. The manufactures of Flanders were carried on chiefly with Spanish and English wool. Spanish wool was the material, not of the firft woollen manufacture of England, but of the first that was fit for diftant fale. More than one half the materials of the Lyons manufacture is at this day foreign filk; when it was firft established, the whole or very nearly the whole was fo. No part of the materials of the Spital-fields manufacture is ever likely to be the produce of England. The feat of fuch manufactures, as they are generally introduced by the fcheme and project of a few individuals, is fometimes established in a maritime city, and fometimes in an inland town, according as their intereft, judgment or caprice happen to determine. At other times manufactures for diftant falegrow up naturally, and as it were of their own accord, by the gradual refinement of thofe houfhold and coarfer manufactures, which muft at all times be carried on even in the pooreft and rudeft countries. Such manufactures are generally employed upon the materials which the country produces, and they feem frequently to |