THE HANSE TOWNS.

wards, in the year 1614, they were revised by another delegation from each of the towns, and many new ordinances were added.

For the convenience of their commercial operations, different towns were selected by the confederacy where they established warehouses and factories, and at which their intercourse with other countries was chiefly conducted. Among the principal of these was Bruges and Antwerp, in the latter of which was erected a splendid hall, at that period the boast of the modern world. There, were brought by the Italians, the rich productions of India, with the ingenious manufactures of their own country, to be exchanged for the bulky and useful products of the north. The articles obtained by the Hanseatic merchants in this intercourse, were transported to the Baltic, and from thence along the larger rivers into the interior of Germany.

An intercourse so profitable to those who were immediately engaged in it, produced other effects than an augmentation of the wealth of the Hanseatic confederacy. The arts of southern Europe began to be known; and a desire to imitate them, and to possess their productions, was the result of this knowledge. This intercourse created new wants as it increased the means of their gratification; and by the demands it excited among the inhabitants of the Netherlands and Germany, for commodities of every kind, industry was promoted; and at a very early period the manufactures of flax and wool had made considerable progress.

As Bruges became the centre of communication between the Hanseatic and the Lombard merchants, the Flemings traded with both in that city, to such extent and advantage as spread among them a general habit of industry, which long rendered Flanders and the adjacent provinces the most opulent, the most populous, and best cultivated counties in Europe.*

The pleasure which is derived from tracing the progress of such associations to prosperity, and noting their influence and connection with the welfare of other states, has induced us to enter more minutely into the history of the Hanseatic body, than was originally proposed.

* Robertson's History of Charles V.

THE HANSE TOWNS.

If their example stimulated other nations to industry and trade, their laws must necessarily have obtained a corresponding estimation. Those institutions which protected the rights and regulated the contracts of these industrious adventurers, could not fail to obtain a due portion of praise and value. Accordingly we find them in extensive application among the northern powers of Europe, and governing them in their commercial transactions. By the most distinguished men of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, whose avocations induced their attention to them, they are spoken of with great respect, and esteemed as the production of great wisdom and extensive experience.

xcvi

THE

LAWS OF THE HANSE TOWNS.

Master un

dertaking to build a ship.

ARTICLE I.

NO master shall undertake to build a ship, unless he is assured that his owners and undertakers are agreed upon what model it shall be built, and on every thing relating to the building of it; which undertakers and owners shall be burghers and inhabitants of one of the Hanse Towns, and no others. However, if the master will go through with the building at his own expense, he may do it; otherwise he must always have the consent of those burghers that are concerned with him, on pain of forfeiting half a dollar a ton.*

Ship built by

a master.

ART. II.

No master shall begin to build a ship, after he and his joint owners or partners have resolved upon it, until they have agreed among themselves of what

In the stile of the Hanse Towns, the owners of ships are called burghers; because none but the burghers of those cities in Germany, were permitted to build ships. The inconvenience provided against by this article is to save the materials of building, that none might undertake what they could not go through with, and thereby the materials be lost: for if he who begins to build a ship, is not very well able to perfect it, and has not the approbation of his joint owners or partners, such is often the end of too rash beginnings of this kind.

REPAIRS AND OUTFITS OF SHIPS.

size, height and depth she shall be, how broad and how long, and this agreement shall be taken in writing on pain of forfeiting 12 sols a ton.*

Art. V.

ART. III.

The master in like manner shall not repair the ship, sails or cordage without the owner's consent, on pain of being at all the charge of it himself, unless in case of necessity, when he is in a strange country.

ART. IV.

purchase on account of the

ship without consent.

the owners'

The master may not buy any thing whatsoever Master not to for his ship, unless it is in the presence, and with the consent of one or two of the partners; if he does he shall forfeit 50 sols: nor shall the master, or any of the owners buy any thing for the ship's use, upon the credit of the other owners who would pay ready money for their part of the disbursement.

ART. V.

An inventory shall be taken of every thing the ship wants, that it may be bought by the master and owners jointly.

Inventory of

articles want

ed by the ship

to be made out.

It is the custom in the Levant, if during the building of a ship, any one of the owners die, his heirs are not obliged to continue the partnership; but the master undertaker is bound to look out for another owner in the room of him that is dead; and this new owner must pay the heirs of the deceased what the latter advanced on this account.

Art. X.

SHIP'S PROVISIONS.

ART. VI.

Purchases made by the

master on account of the

ship.

The master ought to buy every thing at the cheapest rate without fraud, on pain of corporal punishment; and he shall enter in his account the name of the person of whom he bought the goods, and where they live.

ART. VII.

Master or mariners not

ap

If a master or mariner keep back any of the delivering all merchandize he took in on freight, they shall be prehended and punished as robbers, unless it was in case of necessity.

the merchandize.

ART. VIII.

Purchases on account of the ship.

Nor may they give above the market price for any provisions, and what they shall buy shall be carried to the ship's store-house, and be kept there till she is ready to sail.

Master cannot sell the

ship's provisions, except

to vessels in

distress at sea.

Master to deliver up the remaining provisions on his return.

ART. IX.

All masters are forbidden to sell any of the ship's provisions, on pain of being punished as thieves, except it is at sea, when they meet with other ships in distress and danger of perishing for want of them: for which they shall however be accountable to the

owners.

ART. X.

The master when the ship is returned, is obliged