The humble Representation of Samuel Lamb of London Merchant. AS Foreign Traffic & Merchandise is one chief way to make a Nation rich and flourishing, so the spare Commodities in some Countries, and want thereof in others, is the cause of such Traffic and Merchandise. In the managing whereof between England and our Neighbour Countries I have, for the public good, briefly set down the evils with the Remedies, humbly submitting it to the grave consideration of this Honourable Committee. 1. We had Bullion, and did Coin money. ☞ Our Neighbour's Countries have much of our money, and now little is coined. 2. We raise wools, and have fullers Earth. They drape with our wools and fullers Earth. 3. We make woollen cloth. They dress and die our cloth and undersell us at market therewith. 4. We make Lead and Tin. They under-sell us at market with our Lead and Tin. 5. We have fishing. They catch our fish, and serve most part of Christendom therewith. 6. We have Coals. They transport and sell our Coals. 7. We decay in Trading Shipping. They increase in Trading Shipping. 8. We buy Spanish fruit and wine at a dear rate: They prohibit English manufactures and buy a few covertly at a low rate. 9 We have no Bank for the furtherance of trade. They have Banks for their advantage to trade. 10. We have no Courts of Merchants. They have Courts of Merchants. First touching Monies. Experience telleth us that all the severe Laws hitherto made in many King's Reigns to restrain transporting it hath been of small effect, whose care endeavoured all that could be to increase and preserve it here, but our Neighbour Princes and States, to gain it from us, have imitated bad neighbours to private men, who to inveigle away a good servant, do proffer higher wages than he had of his old Master; so they raise the value of Bullion (the good Servant to all States) to entice the covetous Merchant to carry it to them, notwithstanding all Laws and penalties to the contrary, the want whereof causeth deadness and decay of Trade, and hindereth levying of it by a Law for public uses. The Remedies. First if a Bank be settled in England, a Law may be made for all strangers to make receipts and payments therein for all they deal for, and then they cannot transport it in specie instead of making returns in Commodities. Secondly to raise the Coins and make our Money as valuable at home as abroad, for when the cause is taken away there will be less need of a Law for a Remedy of this evil. Or by a treaty with other Nations, at least with the Dutch, and French, thereby agreeing on a settled certain value of the coins respectively to be continued without alteration. Secondly for our wools, and fullers Earth. Our wools the material & groundwork of much of our manufactures, for being wrought into Draperies therein employing many people, as clothe the Turkey Merchants in return thereof Import Raw si●k, Grograin Yarn, Cotton-woolls etc. to be also manufactured here, employing multitudes of people, and likewise the Merchants, trading into other Countries, have made returns in Bullion and other useful Commodities; therefore very unfit to be transported unwrought; especially when our Neighbours so much endeavour to exceed us in clothing; But to the end the English eye should not see it, though posterity may rue it, It is not Carded, Combed, and privately steeved into Cask also fullers Earth, and Shipped off by the connivance of the Customer under the name of other goods, and also in the Fleece by stealth in the night, with the privity, i● not assistance, of him that sold it▪ and do not Packers, and other Agents, buy cloth and other Draperies and ship them off in their own names for strangers, against their Oaths and the Laws, to the ruin of their Countrymen, enriching themselves and strangers. The Remedy. Severe letters should be written to the Officers in all Ports, & they also take an oath that they suffer no exportation of Wool and Fuller's Earth beyond Seas upon pain and forfeiture of their places, and such other punishments as shall be requisite, That the laws for true making woollen manufactures, be strengthened, revived, & executed, against transgressors; & that no more charge be laid on them then the market abroad will bear, to the end the Merchant may afford to sell them at as low a price as any of the same kind made in another Country, which will discourage their making any, when we can undersell them, and encourage the wearer to buy of those made in England, rather than 〈◊〉 made in another Country, having as good and better cheap, so they being taken off from ma●●●●, will neither want nor desire the materials of wool and fulling earth, and this with a Bank and other good Orders, will hinder Packers and others in buying Draperies and Shipping them off for strangers, which neither the Laws nor Oaths can restrain. That no woollen cloth be suffered to be imported out of Holland, as now is, nor any other woollen Manufactures. Thirdly for Cloth. Those true-made white and undressed Clothes sent into Holland, the Dutch dye, dress, and strain to such lengths, that by the overpluss of measure they undersell the English in that cloth, which is died and dressed at home, when both sorts meet at the market, and the same strained cloth being found so deceitful in wearing, that it not only brings all English cloth into disesteem, because sold under the English Seal, but hinders the Artist of the manufacture of dying and dressing all the cloth so Shipped out, and also causeth slight making of other cloth in England that it may be afforded as cheap as such strained cloth at Market. The Remedy. That the fift or tenth cloth of those white and undressed Clothes transported be enjoined to be fully manufactured in their dye and dress the first year, and the like number so perfectly manufactured to be increased every year according as the State shall direct, until none but coloured cloth be sent, by which means the English Artist will have the dying and dressing of all the cloth, which used to be Shipped off rough and white, which cannot so well be done in one or two year's time; so the English Merchants trading into other Countries will not then be hindered by those clothes in the sale of others, nor will the English cloth be disesteemed by being abused and falsified under the English Seal when none but true made cloth will be transported. Fourthly for Lead and Tin. They are two Staple Commodities: And as strangers buy our Draperies at the best hand, by their Packers and other Agents, so they may our Lead, which I have known to rise at an herring Season or Turkey Shipping about 20. per Cent. then they buying it at the lowest rate, may afford to sell it at market with profit, at the price it cost the English Merchants at home; also as they buy our cloth white and rough, and die and dress it themselves, and so falsify it by stretching; that with the overplus of measure they are enabled to undersell our true made cloth at Market which is died and dressed in England. So they buy our Tin, part of which they make into Pewter for their own use, and to sell again in other Countries, as formerly to our plantations, and the rest they cast again and mix it with an Alloy of Lead, and send it into other Countries by which means they so undersell our fine Tin. The Remedy. First for the Lead; If a Bank were settled in England, it would so much increase the General stock that the English would buy it themselves at the cheapest season, and so hinder strangers buying it; or keep the market at a certain price and then we could not be undersold in it abroad. Secondly for our Tin, If the Merchant, the Pewterer, and the Tynner, be consulted with, much more may be manufactured at home into pewter, and much less sent abroad in kind; except what is sent into Turkey by the English Merchants. Fiftly for our Fishing. The wonderful providence of Almighty God, storing our Seas with several kinds in the respective Seasons of the year (for the sustenance of mankind) may condemn us of slothfulness if not ingratitude, for so great blessings, when our Neighbours make so great advantage of it beyond ourselves that it proves to them, as our Draperies used to do to us viz. as the West Indies to the King of Spain, and an East Indies to the Dutch; bringing home, with the proceed thereof, out of several Countries from Archangel to the Gulf of Venice, sundry sorts of Commodities bought at the best hand and selling them again in other Countries at the best price. This noble and profitable work, I have heard long talk of, but is not yet undertaken, peradventure by reason of our Domestic Broils, but chief I conceive, through want of a good Stock to begin. The Remedy. First a considerable joint Stock should be raised and managed, as the East-India Company doth theirs, with fitting Orders and Privileges for their Government and Encouragement, which with God's blessing will prove very advantageous to the Nation in general, by increasing Ships and Mariners, employing many people therein; and profitable to the Adventurers in particular; myself having gained clear above two of one within one year dealing therein, and Vessels enough for the work, may be built in New-England cheaper than in Old, and save Timber here. Secondly, in the mean time, that no duty be imposed upon Fish now taken and shipped beyond Seas by the English Merchants. And that all Fish be transported in English Ships, sailed only with Englishmen. Sixtly for Coles. The great blessing of God to this Nation, hath made the very Bowels of the Earth, aswell as the Waters, to yield us Treasure, if we do but stretch forth the hand to receive it and improve it to our advantage, this being so useful a Commodity, that some places in England cannot well subsist without them, and so much desired in many Countries abroad for their especial usefulness, that their necessities also cannot well want them, aswell those of Scotland, as of Newcastle and Sunderland. The Remedy. That as a greater duty is laid on those transported, than on those spent within ourselves, so none should be transported but in English Ships, sailed only with English men. Seventhly for our Trading Shipping. The losses of our great Ships tradeing to the Southward by the French before the Peace. And the loss of some such, besides many lesser Ships since the Spanish War. And so few built in lieu thereof doth manifest a very great decay of Trading Shipping in general, besides the loss every one feels in his particular that is concerned therein; Therefore to strengthen us, and build up the Walls of our Land again, to keep off a foreign Enemy, aught to be the true endeavour of every Englishman that is well affected to his Native Country, and to deny himself the hope of a small profit irregularly gained, which doth enrich and strengthen another Nation, and weaken and impoverish his own, by subtly contriving how to undermine and abuse the intent of the law for increase of Navigation. The Remedy. To enlarge the said Act, and make it more severe, also to employ only English Mariners and Ships wholly belonging to Englishmen, in the two last trades mentioned. Eighthly for the Spanish Trade at present. Although it is believed that that trade in time of Peace did vent more English Manufactures, and did employ as much trading shipping as any one Country, yet it is as certain that the Spaniards, since the War, have strictly prohibited all English Manufactures within his Dominions; So that those few that are sold by connivance, go off at a lower rate than formerly, and not without danger. And those Spanish Goods imported bought at a dearer rate than usually, and colourably brought in Dutch Shipping, to the impoverishing ourselves and enriching of our Enemies, many scores of thousand pounds this last year. The Remedy is short. That as the Spaniard hath prohibited English Manufactures, so we may prohibit Wine and Fruit, if not all Spanish Goods, till a Peace be made. Ninthly, touching a Bank. I have in my Seasonable observations shown some of the benefits the Dutch have received by the help of their Banks, the prejudice we receive by their Banks, and the good we may do ourselves by settling them in England, which are very many and exceedingly useful and advantageous to trade, supplying the want of Money, and increasing the Stock of a Nation, also helpful to many great undertake; by means whereof the Dutch have grown to such greatness and riches, which is believed they have gained by our loss. The Remedy. Is to settle one at London, to countermine them in all their tricks and devices, in governing Exchanges and Trade, which I have in part described, and have also the Orders of their Banks to produce, when called thereunto. Tenthly, touching a Court of Merchants. Which may be also a Council, or Committee for Trade, to continue aswell in the intervals as during the Session of Parliaments. And if it be thought fit to choose such a one as I have described in my Proposals for a Bank, I humbly conceive it may be as great an advantage to Trade for the future, as hitherto it hath been hindered for want of one in England. Our neighbours have found such benefit thereby, as they are unwillng to be without one, aswell for their Advice in regulating Trad, as for their speedy determining Controversies among Merchants with small charge, who now are often hindered in their trades, if not undone by following the Law at great cost and charges. The Remedy. Is to settle one at London, a Model whereof I have ready to produce, when called thereunto. To the Honourable the Grand Committee for Trade, sitting in the Parliament-House at Westminster. The humble Petition of Samuel Lamb, of London Merchant. Humbly showeth, THat your Petitioner lately presented to the Honourable Members of this present Parliament, a Book touching increase of Shipping and trade, entitled Seasonable Observations, And your Petitioner understanding that the Members of this Honourable Committee are the same Members of Parliament which received the said Book, a Breviate whereof is hereunto annexed, with Remedies to every Inconvenience mentioned therein, which your Petitioner contrived for the Public good, and for the better carrying on of so good and public a work. He humbly craves your advice and furtherance therein, being willing to be guided by such Order as in your grave wisdoms shall seem meet. And he shall humbly show his Reasons thereunto when required. And your Petitioner shall pray etc. Friday the Fourth of March 1658. At the Grand Committee for Trade. ORDERED M. Knightly in the Chair. THat the Sub-Committee, to whom it is referred to bring in a Bill or Bills, to prevent the Transportation of Wool, Woollfells &c. be revived, and do meet to morrow at two of the Clock in the Afternoon at the Treasury Chamber. The humble Petition and Representation of Mr. Samuel Lamb of London Merchant. was this day read. ORDERED THat the Paper and Representation of Mr. Samuel Lamb of London Merchant, be referred to the consideration of the said Sub-Committee, and that Mr. Samuel Lamb do attend the said Sub-Committee. Ordered that Sr. Tho. Dickenson. Mr. Topham. Mr. Slingsby bethel. Captain Lilborne. Sr. Robert Honywood. Mr. Ramsden Mr. Martial. Mr. Vincent. Mr. Foley. Coll. Morley Mr. Long. Mr. Minors. Mr. Creston. Mr. LLoyd. Mr. Delves. Mr. Jackson. Mr. Collins. Mr. Thompson. Mr. Jones. Mr. Bence. Alderman Rich. Mr. Herle. Mr. Banks. Mr. Thompson. Mr. Higgins. Colonel Gibbon. Mr. Biddulph. Mr. Kendal. Mr. Boscawen. Be added to the Sub Committee touching Wool and wool-fells. FINIS.