War with France, Feb. 1, 1793. war, while at the same time her exports had risen to 5,457,733l.; and when the great war with France broke out, early in 1793, she owned 16,079 merchant vessels of 1,540,145 tons, under the management of 118,286 seamen.[1]
Commercial panic.
Government lends assistance.
Yet though comparatively ready for war, its actual
declaration caused a serious monetary convulsion,
nor have we any record of so many commercial
failures on the declaration of any previous war. The
struggle for the retention of the American colonies
had produced, as war invariably does, numerous evils;
and the South Sea Bubble, many years earlier, had
spread general ruin among those of her trading community
who had rushed wildly into the field of speculation;
but now commercial houses of the highest
standing gave way under the shock. Indeed the
sufferings of the people became so intense that Parliament,
after much discussion, resolved to issue
5,000,000l. of exchequer bills as a temporary loan
to such of the merchants of London, Bristol, Hull,
Liverpool, Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Leith as could
furnish property equal to double the extent of the
loan they requested. The announcement of the intention
of the government to support the mercantile
interests went so far towards dispelling the wide-prevailing
alarm, that the entire amount applied for
did not, after all, exceed 3,855,624l.; and in spite
of this panic and of the calamities of war, English
merchant shipping continued to prosper. Indeed
- ↑ Abundant evidence on the elasticity of the commerce of England in spite of all the odds against her may be seen in Macpherson, vol. iv. passim; in Lord Sheffield's 'Observations on the Treaty with America;' and Chalmers' 'Comparative Estimate of the Strength of Great Britain,' 1794.
