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 that they were so much molested by pirates, especially by the English, that in 1340 the cities of Ghent, Ypres, and Bruges, were obliged to seek and obtain from Edward III. a safe conduct for the merchant shipping of Catalonia, Castille, and Majorca. In spite, however, of the king's protection, so daring and regardless of all law were these marauders, that a few years afterwards two vessels laden with valuable cargoes, and sent by the merchants of Barcelona and Valencia for Flanders, were captured by pirates from Bayonne, and carried into an English port.

The Hanseatic League having now become by far the most important commercial association in Europe, its merchants entered with zeal into the rich and prosperous trade which made Flanders and the Low Countries so conspicuous in the annals of the commercial history of the period. More than seventy cities and towns were associated with the League. Its chief agencies, firmly established at Bruges in Flanders, at Bergen in Norway, and at Novgorod in Russia, entirely monopolized for many years the trade of these countries. Its agents and factors, all of whom were mercantile men, were guided by rules and instructions emanating from head-quarters at Lubeck, and from these they had no power to deviate unless under extraordinary circumstances. They were not permitted to have any common interest with strangers, or to trust their goods no board any other merchant ships than those belonging to the places with which the association was in league. Wholly