Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 1).djvu/513

 traders in Italy. In some respects, indeed, these were even more liberal. Besides having the privilege of forming themselves into a corporate body at Pisa, with power to frame their own regulations and to appoint their own officers, they had placed at their disposal a suitable edifice or a site on which to build one, and were to be independent of the jurisdiction of the city, while enjoying all the advantages of its citizens or those of Florence.

From this period the business of the ship-owner may be considered as distinct from that of the merchant, although, to the present day, many of the latter are still owners of ships. For the first time English ships were engaged in the trade between England and Italy as carriers alone, deriving their remuneration entirely from the amount of freight they earned. About this time, also, the spirit for discovery in far distant and then unknown regions began to open up new and vast fields of employment for merchant shipping, from which England, in after years, derived greater advantages than any other nation.