Note 173 — Chapter IV

The cargoes from England of the vessels of the Muscovy Company chiefly consisted of the cloths of Suffolk, Gloucestershire, Worcestershire, and Coventry, dyed and dressed; kerseys of Hampshire and York; lead, tar, and a great quantity of Indian spices, indigo and calicoes; their return cargoes consisting of raw silks from Persia, Damascus and Tripoli; galls of Mosul and Tocat; camlets, grograins, and mohairs of Angola; cotton and cotton yarns of Cyprus and Smyrna, and sometimes the gums of India and drugs of Egypt and Arabia, with the currants and dried fruits of Zante, Cephalonia, and the Morea. The recital of cotton among these imports indicates that already the English had commenced the important business of weaving calicoes; and indeed, in a work published in 1641, Manchester is pointed out as the place where the raw material was made up, and when manufactured into “fustians, dimities and vermilions,” became an article of export for her merchantmen, a branch of business which has since reached an extent altogether unexampled in the history of commerce and navigation.