Page:Craik History of British Commerce Vol 1.djvu/196

194 Earl of Douglas to trade with Normandy and Rochelle, and of another navigated by a master and twenty-four sailors, and laden with six hundred quarters of malt, of which the Duke of Albany was proprietor. In 1404 a richly-laden vessel, belonging to Wardlaw, Bishop of St. Andrew's, was taken by the English. In 1473 another, called the Salvator, the property of his successor, Bishop Kennedy, being the finest vessel that had ever been built in Scotland, was wrecked at Bamborough, when the cargo was plundered, and the crew made prisoners by the people of the country,—an outrage for which redress was soon after demanded by the Scottish parliament, and which it was finally agreed should be compensated by the King of England paying the merchants to whom the goods belonged a composition of five hundred marks.

Very few notices respecting the trade of Ireland occur during this period. The exports from that country, according to the author of the 'Libel of English Policy,' were hides, wool, salmon, hake (a kind of fish), herrings, linen, falding (a kind of coarse cloth), and the skins of martens, harts, otters, squirrels, hares, rabbits, sheep, lambs, foxes, and kids. Some gold ore had also lately been brought thence to London. The abundant fertility and excellent harbours of Ireland are celebrated by this writer. In connexion with the subject of trade and commerce it may be mentioned, that to the close of this period we owe the first establishment in England of public posts for the conveyance of intelligence. The plan was first carried into effect in France by Louis XI., about the year 1476, and was introduced in England by the Duke of Gloucester (afterwards Richard III.), while conducting the Scottish war in 1481. By means of post-horses changed at every twenty miles, letters, we are told, were forwarded at the rate of a hundred miles a day. Both in France and in England, however, the post in this, its earliest form, was exclusively for the use of the government.

The English coins of this period were, with one