Section 196. THE HANSE. III.
Reading edition
There were no bounds to its greed and selfishness[1]. It did its utmost to crush all growing trade[2], navigation, and even manufactures, which in the least interfered with its gains[3]. It warned away[4] all strangers[5] from the Baltic; and when it found them there, it seized and destroyed their vessels[6]. In order to maintain this monopoly, it[7] was ready to make[8] the greatest sacrifices, to equip fleets, and sustain long and costly campaigns. With Denmark it waged a desperate war; and it also came into collision[9] with Sweden and Norway. From[10] these contests it came off victorious, and the whole of Scandinavia was compelled to acknowledge its commercial supremacy[11]. It[12] had a rupture also with the Netherlands, whose flag it banished from the Baltic[13].
These unbounded pretensions naturally excited a great deal of ill feeling[14] against the Hanse, and, in the end, proved fatal[15] to it. One after another[16], the markets which it had been accustomed to regard as its own private estates, threw off their allegiance, and admitted[17] the traders of other nations. Then[18] it was that the league began to suffer in another way from its narrow-minded selfishness. As long as it had exclusive command of[19] foreign sources of supply, it did not trouble itself to develop the resources of Germany—indeed it rather endeavoured[20] to repress them, when it thought that others were likely to profit by them; but when one by one its monopolies exploded[21], it found reason to repent that it had neglected to cultivate[22] the productive powers of its own country.
These causes, combined[23] with the change[24] of route to India, led to the gradual decline of this famous confederation[25]; and at the last general assembly, held at Lübeck in 1630, the deputies from the several cities appeared merely to declare their secession[26]. In a modified form[27], however, the Hanse lingered on[28] till the beginning of the present century—the[29] shadow of a great name. The Free Cities of Lübeck, Hamburg, Bremen, and Frankfort-on-the-Maine, are now only nominally the representatives of the Hanse.—J. H. Fyfe.