olly
superseded, by Antwerp. Italy exported wheat, flax, woad and other
products, but chiefly by land routes or in foreign keels. Nor was
France able to take any great part in maritime trade. Content with the
freight brought her by other nations, she sent out few {526}
expeditions, and those few, like that of James Cartier, had no present
result either in commerce or in colonies. Her greatest mart was Lyons,
the fairs there being carefully fostered by the kings and being
naturally favored by the growth of manufacture, while the maritime
harbors either declined or at least gained nothing. For a few years La
Rochelle battened on religious piracy, but that was all.

[Sidenote: Germany]

In no country is the struggle for existence between the medieval and
the modern commercial methods plainer than in Germany. The trade of
the Hanse towns failed to grow, partly for the reason that their
merchants had not command of the fluid wealth that raised to
pre-eminence the southern cities. There were, indeed, other causes for
the decline of the Hanseatic Baltic trade. The discovery of new
routes, especially the opening of Archangel on the White Sea,
short-circuited the current that had previously flowed through the
Kattegat and the Skager Rak. Moreover, the development of both
wheat-growing and of commerce in the Netherlands and in England proved
disastrous to the Hanse. The shores of the Baltic had at one time been
the granary of Europe, but they suffered somewhat by the greater yield
of the more intensive agriculture introduced at that time elsewhere.
Even then their export continued to be considerable, though diverted
from the northern to the southern ports of Europe. In 1563, for
example, 6630 loads of grain were exported from Koenigsberg, and in 1573
7730 loads.

The Hanse towns lost their English trade in competition with the new
companies there formed. A bitter diplomatic struggle was carried on by
Henry VIII. The privileges to the Germans of the Steelyard confirmed
and extended by him were abridged by his son, partly restored by Mary
and again taken {527} away by Elizabeth. The emperor, in agreement
with the cities' senates, started retaliatory measures against English
merchants, endeavoring to assure the Hanse towns that they should at
least "continue the ancient concord of their dear native country and
the good Dutches that now presently inhabit it." He therefore ordered
English merchants banished, against