her foreigners; to keep
the discontented masses in poverty, but to deprive them of the power or
disposition to unite with their superiors in rank in demonstrations
against the crown--had sufficed to suppress any extensive revolt in the
various Italian states united under Philip's sceptre. Still more intense
than the hatred of the Italians was the animosity which was glowing in
every Portuguese breast against the Spanish sway; while even the
Arragonese were only held in subjection by terror, which, indeed, in one
form or another, was the leading instrument of Philip's government.

It is hardly necessary to enlarge upon the regulations of Spain's foreign
commerce; for it will be enough to repeat the phrase that in her eyes the
great ocean from east to west was a Spanish lake, sacred to the ships of
the king's subjects alone. With such a simple code of navigation coming
in aid of the other causes which impoverished the land, it may be
believed that the maritime traffic of the country would dwindle into the
same exiguous proportions which characterised her general industry.

Moreover, it should never be forgotten that, although the various
kingdoms of Spain were politically conjoined by their personal union
under one despot, they were commercially distinct. A line of
custom-houses separated each province from the rest, and made the various
inhabitants of the peninsula practically strangers to each other. Thus
there was less traffic between Castile, Biscay, and Arragon than there
was between any one of them and remote foreign nations. The Biscayans,
for example, could even import and export commodities to and from remote
countries by sea, free of duty, while their merchandize to and from
Castile was crushed by imposts. As this ingenious perversity of positive
arrangements came to increase the negative inconveniences caused by the
almost total absence of tolerable roads, canals, bridges, and other means
of intercommunication, it may be imagined that internal traffic--the very
life-blood of every prosperous nation--was very nearly stagnant in Spain.
As an inevitable result, the most thriving branch of national industry
was that of the professional smuggler, who, in the pursuit of his
vocation, did his best to aid Government in sapping the wealth of the
nation.

The whole accumulated capital of Spain, together with the land--in the
general sense which includes not only the soil but the immovable property
of a country being th