other countries than it had ever before enjoyed. If any such effect as this was produced, the law, at the same time that it restrained the native ship-owners from importing goods, probably removed some restrictions that had previously been imposed on the entry into the kingdom of foreign merchants. In the wars between England and Scotland, in the reign of Edward III., the latter country frequently made considerable naval exertions, sometimes by itself, sometimes in conjunction with its allies. In 1335, a vessel belonging to Southampton, laden with wool and other merchandise, was taken by some Scottish and Norman privateers in the mouth of the Thames; and in the following year a numerous fleet of ships and galleys, equipped by the Scots, attacked and plundered Guernsey and Jersey, and captured several English vessels lying at anchor at the Isle of Wight. In the autumn of 1357, again, three Scottish ships of war, carrying 300 chosen armed men, are stated to have cruised on the east coast of England, and greatly annoyed the trade in that quarter, till the equinoctial gales drove them, along with a number of English vessels, into Yarmouth, where they were taken. These appear to have been unauthorised private adventurers, there being at this time a truce between the two countries. The bold enterprise of the Scottish captain, John Mercer, in 1378, till a stop was put to his career by the public spirit of a citizen of London, John Philpot, is famous in our annals. Mercer is said to have been the son of a burgess of Perth, one of the most opulent merchants of Scotland, who, the year before, when returning from abroad, had been driven by stress of weather upon the English coast, and there seized and confined for some time in the castle of Scarborough. It was to revenge this injury that the son fitted out his anmament. A few years after this, some privateers of Hull and Newcastle captured a Scottish ship, the cargo of which, according to Walsingham, was valued at 7000 marks.
The most ancient record which presents a general view of the foreign trade of England is an account, preserved in the Exchequer, of the exports and imports, together
