of the Flemings and Hollanders as to that of the Spaniards and
Portuguese, to whom they were originally due. Antwerp and subsequently
Amsterdam had thriven on the great revolution of the Indian trade which
Vasco de Gama's voyage around the Cape had effected. The nations of the
Baltic and of farthest Ind now exchanged their products on a more
extensive scale and with a wider sweep across the earth than when the
mistress of the Adriatic alone held the keys of Asiatic commerce. The
haughty but intelligent oligarchy of shopkeepers, which had grown so rich
and attained so eminent a political position from its magnificent
monopoly, already saw the sources of its grandeur drying up before its
eyes, now that the world's trade--for the first time in human
history--had become oceanic.

In Holland, long since denuded of forests, were great markets of timber,
whither shipbuilders and architects came from all parts of the world to
gather the utensils for their craft. There, too, where scarcely a pebble
had been deposited in the course of the geological transformations of our
planet, were great artificial quarries of granite, and marble, and
basalt. Wheat was almost as rare a product of the soil as cinnamon, yet
the granaries of Christendom, and the Oriental magazines of spices and
drugs, were found chiefly on that barren spot of earth. There was the
great international mart where the Osterling, the Turk, the Hindoo, the
Atlantic and the Mediterranean traders stored their wares and negotiated
their exchanges; while the curious and highly-prized products of
Netherland skill--broadcloths, tapestries, brocades, laces, substantial
fustians, magnificent damasks, finest linens--increased the mass of
visible wealth piled mountains high upon that extraordinary soil which
produced nothing and teemed with everything.

After the incorporation of Portugal with Spain however many obstacles
were thrown in the way of the trade from the Netherlands to Lisbon and
the Spanish ports. Loud and bitter were the railings uttered, as we know,
by the English sovereign and her statesmen against the nefarious traffic
which the Dutch republic persisted in carrying on with the common enemy.
But it is very certain that although the Spanish armadas would have found
it comparatively difficult to equip themselves without the tar and the
timber, the cordage, the stores, and the biscuits furnished by the
Hollanders, the rebellious commonwealth, if excluded from the w