Page:Craik History of British Commerce Vol 1.djvu/268

266 : any cloth of gold or silver, velvet, satin, damask, taffeties, fringes, passments (a kind of lace), or embroidery of gold, silver, or silk; or (with the exception of certain officers and magistrates) any lawn, cambric, or woollen cloth made in foreign parts; and all persons under the above-mentioned degrees were also forbidden the use of confections, foreign drugs, and costly spices, which, it is affirmed, were wont to be lavishly used at weddings, christenings, and other banquets, by persons of low estate. At the same time the exportation of wool was absolutely prohibited. The admission of representatives of shires and burghs to seats in the Scottish parliament, which took place in 1587, was soon followed by the enactment of various laws for confining both trade and manufactures, as far as possible, to the freemen of burghs—with so quick an instinct did the new class that had thus obtained a share in the legislature proceed to turn the power they had secured to account in the promotion of their own interests or selfish views! Towards the close of the present period, however, we begin to perceive symptoms of the relaxation or giving way of the old legislation against foreign commerce, as it may be correctly designated. In 1597 the parliament, while it renewed the prohibition against the exportation of wool, found itself obliged to allow the bringing over of craftsmen from foreign parts to work it up; and, while it laid a duty of five per cent, upon all cloth and other merchandise imported from abroad, it permitted peers, barons, and freeholders both to send their own goods beyond sea without paying custom, and also to import wines, cloths, and other furniture, duty free, provided they did so, not for merchandise, but for their own particular use This was a permission which we may be sure would be taken advantage of to introduce foreign commodities into the country to a much greater extent than the act professed to contemplate. Another of the acts of the parliament of this year, however, absolutely prohibited the importation into the country of English woollens, which, it was pleased to say, had, for the most part, only an outward show, and were wanting in that