stantial accounts of the different branches of trade carried on at that time by the cities of Italy; and as they were intended, not for speculative or philosophical inquirers, but for the use of practical merchants; they abound in minute and exact details on every subject of which they treat. They describe the exports and imports of every town or harbour frequented by the merchants of Pisa and Florence, and explain their weights and measures, and customhouse regulations, and contain a variety of other particulars interesting to merchants and navigators. From these books we may form an idea of the state of commerce and manufactures in Spain, during the 14th, and in the early part of the 15th century. But, when we look into these authorities, we find that Spain, instead of being a great manufacturing country, received manufactured goods of every description from Italy and Flanders, and that her own exports consisted chiefly of the rude produce of her soil, or other raw materials used in manufactures. Her chief article of export was wool; the next was iron; the others were honey, wax, hides and tallow, sheep skins and goat skins, gold and silver in bullion, quicksilver, kermes, fruits, sugar, wine, wheat, rice, oil, soap, saffron, raw silk and salt. It appears from this catalogue of exports, that Spain was at that time, not only destitute of manufactures for foreign commerce, but that a great part of the country was then, as it is still, in a state of pasturage. It is worth remarking that, though Spanish wool was sent to Italy in the time of Balducci, it was not yet exported to Flanders nor does it seem to have been held in estimation for its superior qualities, till the latter part of the 14th century, when it was improved by crossing the breed of native sheep with English sheep from Gloucestershire. These sheep are said to have been sent from England, as part of the marriage portion of the Princess Catherine, daughter of John of Gaunt, who was betrothed to Henry III. of Castille, in 1389, and married to him some years afterwards. This operation of crossing the Spanish with English sheep succeeded so well, that it was repeated during the reign of Edward IV. of England; but it was not for more than a century afterwards, that Spanish wool acquired that decided superiority over the wool of other nations, which it still maintains. In 1440, when Uzano wrote, the exportation of Spanish wool to Flanders had become a considerable branch of commerce, and it probably had been at first introduced by the difficulty which the Flemings found of obtaining wool from England. But, though we find no mention of manufactures for the sup ply of foreign commerce in the dominions of Castille, there is no doubt that there existed manufactures of that description in the provinces of Arragon. Woollen manufacturers had been long long established in Roussillon, Catalonia, Valencia, and Majorca, and cloths of various colours and qualities were exported from these countries to Italy and other foreign parts. Paper from Valencia, cordovan and chamois leather from the same city, and earthen ware from Majorca, are also mentioned among the exports from those countries; but, notwithstanding the vulgar opinion, that the Moors were a manufacturing people, red Morocco leather seems to have been the only manufactured article exported from Granada, unless we include raw sugar in that description of goods. There is not the slightest allusion in Balducci and Uzano, to the woollen manufactures of Toledo, Segovia or Burgos, or to the fairs of Medina del, Campo, of which such incredible stories are related by subsequent authors; an incontestible proof, in our opinion, that these manufactures, if they existed at all, were confined to the fabrication of coarse cloths for home consump tion. Barcelona is mentioned, by the Florentine merchants, as a commercial city of the first importance; and it seems to have been the great emporium by which the interior of Spain was supplied with merchandize from the Mediterranean. Neither the Moors of Granada, nor the Christians of Andalucia, appear to have been actively engaged in commerce or navigation. The Guipuzcoans and Gallicians, who have been at all times more addicted to a seafaring life than the other inhabitants of Castille, are not mentioned by these authors, though the Guipuzcoans were at that time celebrated for their fisheries, and had commercial factories established in Flanders and at Rochelle. * A politico-commercial poem, called the Libell of English Policie, which is referred to by Mr MacPherson in his Annals of Commerce, confirms the account of the trade of Spain, which Capmany has collected from the works of the Florentine merchants. According to this book, written about the middle of the 15th century, Spain imported fine cloth and linen from Flanders, and sent in return, figs, raisins, bastard wine, dates, liquorice, seville oil, grain, castille soap, wax, iron, wool, wadmole, skins of goats and kids, saffron, and quicksilver; of these, wool was the chief article. These conclusions Capmany further confirms by an appeal to the acts and proceedings of the Cortes of Castille, in the 15th, and the beginning of the 16th century, from which it appears, that the woollen manufactures of Castille were at that time of Ee 3 the * Diccionario Hift. Geograf. de Efpana, 18c2,-art. Guipuzcoa, +MacPherfon's Annals of Commerce, vol. 1. p. 651, Can this be grana ?. i, e. kermes, the coarsest and most ordinary quality, and fit only for inferior uses. The finest cloth of Valladolid and Segovia was sold at 40 maravedis the yard, and that of Palencia, Cuença, and Cordoba, at only 34; while fine cloth of Florence was sold at 167, and that of Burgos at 140. In addition to this conclusive and incontestable evidence, Capmany next refers us to the account book of Ferdinand the Catholic, which is still preserved in the archives of Barcelona, and extends from the year 1496, to the death of that prince in 1516. This curious and authentic record is perhaps the surest and most unequivocal evidence of the inferiority of the woollen manufac tures of Spain to those of other countries, at the very time when they are supposed by later writers to have been the most flourish ing. We find, that, in the court of that severe and parsimonious monarch, none but his domestic servants were clothed in the manufactures of Spain; while Italy, Flanders, and England, furnished cloth for the use of himself and the royal family. Lastly, It appears from the book of customs belonging to the city of Burgos, as it was settled in 1514, that the chief export from Spain, at that time, was wool, which was sent to Flanders, France and Italy, to be made there into cloth, for the supply of Spain as well as of other countries. The remaining articles of export, as enumerated in the same book, are iron, oil, figs, and raisins, from Xeres, Valencia, and Malaga; cordovan leather, rabbit skins, saffron, raw silk, wax, kermes, liquorice, cumin seed, almonds, rice; sugar from Valencia; and wine from Alicant. The same account of the Spanish exports is given in a book of ordonnances passed in 1511, which regulate the trade of the north coast of Spain, from Fuontarabia to Corunna. * With regard to the second period of our inquiry, it is true that, for some time after the conquest and settlement of America, the manufactures of the mother country flourished more than they had done at any former period. We have the testimony of Guicciardini, that in 1560 the export of wool from Spain to Flanders, was reduced from 40,000 to 25,000 packs a year, in consequence of the increase of the woollen manufactures in Spain; and in 1552, we know from the acts of the Cortes, that Spain actually exported cloth to foreign countries, particularly to Italy, where the black and blue cloths of Spain were in high request for the use of ecclesiastics and magistrates, on account of the softness of the texture, and stability of the colours. This was also the period when the silk manufactures of Spain were most flourishing. Naviger, the ambassador of the Venetian re MacPherson's Annals of Commerce, vol. 2. p. 126, public public at the court of Charles V, mentions the silk manufactures of Granada, and adds, that silk stuffs of that city had great sale in Spain; but, with the exception of velvets, serges and taffeties, he gives a decided preference to those of Italy. He adds, however, that the silk stuffs made at Valencia were better than those of Granada. But, even at this period, when the manufactures of Spain were in a more flourishing condition than at any former time, that kingdom was supplied by foreign countries with almost all articles of luxury and accommodation, and even with many articles of the first necessity. In 1545, Spain received from Flanders, in return for wool and other raw materials, cloth, linen, cotton goods, silks, and a vast variety of other manufactures. The manufacture of linen was unknown in that kingdom. In 1555, the Cortes complain of the vast quantity of money sent out of the kingdom to purchase linen in France and Flanders, and recommend premiums for the cultivation of flax at home, in order to establish linen manufactures within the kingdom. Hardware and glass were imported from Germany, and even arms and ammunition came from abroad. Milan and Flanders supplied Spain with these articles; and it is an extraordinary fact, that the first cannon foundery in Spain was established at Barcelona in 1719. Lastly, in a solemn petition of the Cortes to Charles V. in 1542, itwas stated, though probably with great exaggeration, that the whole commerce of the kingdom was in the hands of strangers; and in 1548 and 1593, the same complaints were repeated by the Cortes with great bitterness. But the strongest proof, that, even at that time, arts and manufactures had made no solid progress in Spain, is afforded by the views of the Spanish character and the pictures of Spanish manners, left us by contemporary authors; and the force of this evidence is strengthened, by the universal contempt and disrepute in which tradesmen and manufacturers continued to be held in Spain, for many ages afterwards. According to Naviger, Venegas, Medina, and a number of other persons who wrote under Charles V. and Philip II., the Spaniards of that age were proud and lazy, prodigal and ostentatious, and willing to derive a precarious and disgraceful subsistence from alms, or to practise the most dishonest arts for a livelihood, rather than follow a mechanical trade, which they thought a degradation to practise. Perez de Herrera, who lived in the latter part of the reign of Philip II. paints in the liveliest colours those features in the character of his countrymmen, and describes at great length, the artifices and impostures of the Spanish beggars. He probably exaggerates their numbers, when he reckons 150,000 beggars and vagabonds in Spain, at the accession of Philip III.; but, besides the testimony of political writers, the royal proclamation of Charles V. in 1540, and innumerable petitions of the Cortes in his reign, and that of his successor, prove incontestably, that the number of beggars and disorderly persons, who had no settled occupation or place of resi dence, was on the increase in Spain, during the whole time of its supposed prosperity. The aversion of the Spaniards to mechanical trades was not the effect of laziness alone, but had its origin in ancient prejudices, strengthened and confirmed by the authority of the laws and municipal institutions of the kingdom. Clean ness of blood was necessary for admission into corporations; but the lineage of a candidate was tainted by his descent from an cestors who had followed certain trades, as well as by a Jewish or Moorish origin. The trades of tanner, currier, shoemaker, tailor, smith and carpenter, are stigmatized in the laws of Philip II. as low and vile; and as late as the year 1783, it was necessary to declare, by a royal cedula, that these and other trades were not to be held disgraceful, and should not disqualify those who followed them, from offices in corporations. But, is it conceiv able that such prejudices should have existed in a manufacturing country, or that manufactures could have flourished in a country where such prejudices prevailed? Catalonia has been always the most industrious and manufacturing country in Spain; but in Catalonia tradesmen enjoy a certain rank and consideration, and derive importance from the incorporated trade to which they be long. Soy menestral honrado would be the retort of a Catalonian tradesman to a gentleman who insulted or offended him. Yo qui soy Christiano viejo would, in the same circumstances, be the no Jess indignant exclamation of a Castillian. Our limits will not permit us to follow Capmany in his examination of the fabulous, or at least highly exaggerated accounts transmitted to us by authors, of the ancient manufactures of Seville, Toledo, Segovia, and other cities of Castille. He shows, to our perfect conviction, that the statements which they have handed down to us, are, in most particulars, extremely improbable, and in many points positively false. These incredible relations, it must be observed, to which such implicit faith has been given by travellers and historians, rest on no contemporary evi dence whatever, are confirmed by no public or private documents of any sort, and are grossly and palpably inconsistent with the description of those cities left us by the most respect able authors of that age. Naviger gives a minute description of Seville and Toledo, without even mentioning those wonderful maufactures of silk, which, in Seville alone, are supposed to have given occupation to 130,000 souls, and, in Toledo, to nearly as |