* * * * *
_Crusades._--Mr. Hallam, in his excellent _History of the Middle
Ages_, (vol. iii. p. 359), gives the following view of these
misconceived glories of history:--"The crusades may be considered as
martial pilgrimages on an enormous scale; and their influence upon
general morality seems to have been altogether pernicious. Those who
served under the cross would not indeed have lived very virtuously at
home; but the confidence in their own merits, which the principle of
such expeditions inspired, must have aggravated the ferocity and
dissoluteness of their ancient habits. Several historians attest the
depravation of morals which existed both among the crusaders, and in
the states formed out of their conquests."
_Slave Trade in England._--In England it was very common, even after
the conquest, to export slaves to Ireland; till, in the reign of Henry
II., the Irish came to a non-importation agreement, which put a stop
to the practice. William of Malmesbury accuses the Anglo-Saxon
nobility of selling their female servants as slaves to foreigners. In
the canons of a council at London, in 1102, we read--"Let no one from
henceforth presume to carry on that wicked traffic, by which men of
England have hitherto been sold like brute animals." And Giraldus
Cambrensis says that the English, before the conquest, were generally
in the habit of selling their children and other relations, to be
slaves in Ireland, without having even the pretext of distress or
famine, till the Irish, in a national synod, agreed to emancipate all
the English slaves in the kingdom.
_Opulent English Merchants._--Some idea of the ancient commercial
wealth of Great Britain may be gathered from a glance at the rapid
increase of English trade from about the middle of the fourteenth
century. Thus, in 1363, Ricard, who had been lord mayor, some years
before, entertained Edward III. and the Black Prince, the Kings of
France, Scotland, and Cyprus, with many of the nobility, at his own
house in the Vintry, and presented them with handsome gifts. This
eclipses the costliest entertainments of our times, at the public
expense. Philpot, another eminent citizen in Richard II.'s time, when
the trade of England was considerably annoyed by privateers, hired one
thousand armed men, and dispatched them to sea, where they took
fifteen Spanish vessels with their prizes. We find Richard obtaining a
great deal from private merchants and trading towns. In 1379, he got
5,000_l._ from London, 1,000 marks from Bristol, and in proportion
from smaller places. In 1386 London gave 4,000_l._ more, and 10,000
marks in 1397. The latter sum was obtained also for the coronation of
Henry VI. Nor were the contributions of individuals contemptible,
considering the high value of money. Hinde, a citizen of London, lent
to Henry IV. 2,000_l._ in 1407, and Whittington one half of that sum.
The merchants of the staple advanced 4,000_l._ at the same time. Our
commerce continued to be regularly and rapidly progressive during the
fifteenth century. The famous Canynges, of Bristol, under Henry VI.
and Edward IV. had ships of 900 tons burden.
_Gold-beating._--Reaumur asserts, that in an experiment he made, one
grain of gold was extended to rather more than forty-two square inches
of leaf-gold; and that an ounce of gold, which in the form of a cube,
is not half an inch either high, broad, or long, is beat under the
hammer into a surface of 150 square feet. The process is as
follows:--The gold is melted in a crucible, and taken to the
flattening mills, where it is rolled out till it becomes of the
consistence of tin; it is then cut into small square pieces, and each
piece is laid between a leaf of skin (known by the name of
goldbeaters-skin); two parchment bands are then passed over the whole,
and each band is reversed; it is then hammered out to the size of the
skin, taken out, cut and hammered over again, and so on till it is
sufficiently thin; when it is placed in books, the leaves of which are
rubbed with red ochre, to prevent the gold adhering to them. There are
gold leaves not thicker, in some parts, than the three hundred and
sixty thousandth part of an inch. BURTON.
_Ancient Pitch-in-the Hole._--A soldier was brought to Alexander to
exhibit a trick which he had acquired, of pitching a pea into a
distant hole, which just fitted it;--when the reward which the great
conqueror bestowed upon the soldier for his useless application of
time was a peck of peas. P.T.W.
_Pekin._--Balducci Pegalotti, a Florentine writer upon commerce, about
the year 1340, describes Pekin (under the name of Cambalu) the capital
city of China, as being one hundred miles in circumference. He also
states the journey from the Genoese territories to Pekin as of rather
more than eight months, going and returning; and he assures us it was
perfectly secure, not only for caravans, but for a single traveller,
with a couple of interpreters and a servant.
_Mercers and Drapers._--Among the trading companies into which the
middling ranks were distributed on the continent, in the twelfth
century, those concerned in silk and woollens were most numerous and
honourable. None were admitted to the rank of burgesses in the towns
of Aragon who used any manual trade, with the exception of dealers in
fine cloths.
_Usury._--The interest of money was exceedingly high throughout the
middle ages. At Verona, in 1228, it was fixed by law at 12-1/2 per
cent.; at Modena, in 1270, it seems to have been as high as 20. The
republic of Genoa, towards the end of the fourteenth century, when
Italy had grown wealthy, paid only from 7 to 10 per cent. to her
creditors. But in France and England the rate was far more oppressive.
An ordinance of Philip the Fair, in 1311, allows 20 per cent. after
the first year of the loan. Under Henry III., according to Matthew
Paris, the debtor paid 10 per cent. every two months; but this is
absolutely incredible as a general practice.
_Worsted._--Blomefield, the historian of Norfolk, thinks that a colony
of Flemings settled, as early as the reign of Henry II., at Worsted--a
village in that county--and immortalized its name by their
manufacture. It soon reached Norwich, though not conspicuous till the
reign of Edward I.
_The Lord's Prayer in Arawaak._[21]--Kururumanny--haamary caleery
oboraady--bachooty deweet bossa--baynse parocan, bayin so
pareeka--yahaboo ororoo adiako--meherachehbeyn dacotooniah--Ebehey
nebehedow wakayany odomay--Mayera toonebah dayensey--Boboro
talidey.--_Hedouainey._--_Jour. Geog. Soc._
[21] An Indian nation, settled in British Guiana.
* * * * *
*** Our Correspondent E. has been misinformed. The translation of the
Letter of Lord Byron, inserted in our Number 575, as the first, will
be found in Moore's Life of Byron, vol. vi. p. 147, new edit.--but
without the subscription of "Peer of England."
* * * * *
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