CHAPTER XX.

HOLLAND, GERMANY, AND SWITZERLAND.

HOLLAND.

“ A country that draws fifty feet of water,

In which men live ns in the hold of nature.

And when the sea does in them break,

And drowns a province, does hut spring a leak.”

Iluilibrat.

We know little of the early manufactures of this country. Thelaces of Holland, though made to a great extent, were overshadowedby the richer products of their Flemish neighbours. “ TheNetherlander,” writes Fynes Moryson, who visited Holland in1580, “ wear very little lace, 1 and no embroidery. Their gownsare mostly black, without lace or gards, and their neck-ruffs ofvery fine linen.”

We read how, in 1667, France had become the rival ofHolland in the trade with Spain, Portugal, and Italy; but shelaid such high duties on foreign merchandise, the Dutch them-selves set up manufactures of lace and other articles, and found amarket for their produce even in France.” 2 A few years later,the revocation of the Edict of Nantes 3 * 5 caused 4000 lace-makersto leave the town of Alenpon alone. Many took refuge in Holland,"here, says a writer of the day, “they were treated like artists.”Holland gained more than she lost by Louis XIV. The French

1 III the census of 1571, giving the qui ordonno l’execution d’une sentence

names of all strangers in the city of du maitre de poste de Rouen, portant

London, we find mention but of one confiscat n des dentelles venant d Am-

Dutchman, Richard Thomas, “a worker sterda m. Arch. Nat. Coll. Rondoneau.of billament lace.” 3 1685.

5 In 1689 appears an “Arrest dn Roi

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