Note 30 — PART II. THE EASTERN QUESTION.

“Till this time our merchants were struggling to gain a footing and open up trade between England and different quarters of the globe, and endeavouring to prove that the encouragement of trade was for the royal honour and benefit ... and their interests coincided with the national ambition of out-doing the Dutch, who would not acknowledge our sovereignty on the sea, and of thus attaining a mercantile supremacy throughout the world” (Dr. Cunningham’s “Growth of English Industry and Commerce,” p. 325).