CHARLESTON—CHARTERED COMPANIES 691 steamship lines to the great northern and southern seaCharlottenburg-, a town of Prussia, on the ports. Charleston is thus a commercial rather than a Spree, lying immediately to the west of Berlin, of which manufacturing city, but its manufactures had in 1898 ; it practically forms the entire western suburb. Although a capital of $7,345,000, employed 5500 persons, and retaining its own municipal government, it was in 1900, the output was valued at $9,000,000. The College of together with the adjacent suburban towns of Schoneberg Charleston, founded in 1785, had in 1898 a faculty of six and Rixdorf, included in the police district of the capital. professors and an attendance of 36 students. It had Of new public buildings, the technical academy and the property valued at $372,000, and an income of $12,627. Kaiser Wilhelm memorial church are referred to in the The city contains also the South Carolina Military Academy. article Berlin. There are also a new Catholic church and The assessed valuation of real and personal property (the two high schools for music and art respectively. It was former being assessed on a basis of about 40 per cent, of in the Schloss that the Emperor Frederick ITT took over the full value) was in 1900, $17,246,142, the net debt of the reins of government in 1888, and resided for nearly the corporation was $3,798,200, and the municipal tax rate the whole of his three months’ reign. In the mausoleum $29.50 per $1000. The death-rate in 1900 was 37 5 per in the castle grounds the Emperor William I. and the 1000. In 1886 an earthquake destroyed a large part of Empress Augusta lie interred in two white marble the city, and many lives were lost, but the city has been sarcophagi—masterpieces of the sculptor Encke. In rebuilt and few traces of the disaster remain. Population addition to the famous royal porcelain manufactory, which (1880), 49,984 ; (1890), 54,955 ; (1900), 55,807, of whom has of late been much enlarged, Charlottenburg has 2592 were foreign-born and 31,522 were negroes. Out of many flourishing industries, notably iron-works, grouped 14,167 males of voting age 2259 were illiterate (unable to along the banks of the Spree. Its main streets are laid write), of whom 2163 were negroes. The city has profited by out on a spacious plan, while there are many quiet streets the deepening of its harbour entrance, and also by the dis- containing pretty villa residences. Population (1880), covery of valuable beds of phosphates in the neighbourhood. 30,483; (1890), 76,859; (1900), 189,290. Charleston, a city of West Virginia, U.S.A., Charlottesville, a city of Virginia, U.S.A., capital of Kanawha county and of the state. It is situated near the centre of the state, in 38° 22' N. lat. and 81° 38' situated a little north of the centre of the state, in the W. long., on the north bank of Kanawha river, at the Piedmont region, on Rivanna river, at an altitude of 451 mouth of Elk river, at an altitude of 600 feet. It has a feet. Though within Albemarle county, and containing level site on land lying above the river, and the plan is the court-house, it is independent of the county governregular. Among its buildings is a fine new state capitol. ment. It is entered by the Chesapeake and Ohio and the It is on the main line pf the Chesapeake and Ohio railway, Southern railways. The University of Virginia, near and is entered by two smaller railways. It has large traffic Charlottesville, had, in 1898, 24 professors and was by rail and river, especially in the shipment of bituminous attended by 489 students. Its property was valued at coal. This is mined from horizontal beds, which outcrop nearly $1,500,000, and its total income was $125,000. on the face of the river bluffs in the neighbourhood. Population (1880), 2676; (1890), 5591 ; (1900), 6449. Population (1880), 4192; (1890), 6742; (1900), 11,099. Charlottetown, a city of Canada, the capital of Charlotte, capital of Mecklenburg county, North Prince Edward Island, situated on Hillsborough river. Carolina, U.S.A., situated in the south-western part of the It is well supplied with gas, electric light, and splendid state, on the Southern railway and on two branches of water-works, and contains 8 churches, 3 banks, 3 daily the Seaboard Air line. It is at an altitude of 725 feet, and 6 weekly newspapers, and numerous factories. It is surrounded by a fertile farming district, and is a ship- exports large quantities of butter, cheese, potatoes, &c. ping-point for cotton and tobacco. Biddle University and The head offices and workshops of the Prince Edward Elizabeth College are situated in this place. Population Island railway are situated here. For the fiscal year 1900 (1880), 7094; (1890), 11,557; (1900), 18,091, of whom the exports were $1,147,574 and the imports $435,032. Population, about 12,000. 287 were foreign-born and 7151 were negroes. CHARTERED CHARTERED company is a trading corporation enjoying certain rights and privileges, and bound by certain obligations under a special charter granted to it by the sovereign authority of the State, such charter The early defining and limiting those rights, privileges, chartered and obligations, and the localities in which they comSuch companies existed in are to be exercised. panics. early times, but have undergone changes and modifications in accordance with the developments which have taken place in the economic history of the states where they have existed. For the influence of the early trading companies on mediaeval industry and commerce the reader is referred to the articles Commerce, Shipping, and Hanseatic League, in the ninth edition of this work. In Great Britain the first trading charters were granted, not to English companies, which were then non-existent, but to branches of the Hanseatic League, and it was not till 1597 that England was finally relieved from the presence of a foreign chartered company. In that year Queen Elizabeth closed the steel-yard where Teutons had been established for 700 years.
COMPANIES. The origin of all English trading companies is to be sought in the Merchants of the Staple. They lingered on into the 18th century, but only as a name, for their business was solely to export English products which, as English manufactures grew, were wanted at home. Of all early English chartered companies, the “Merchant Adventurers” conducted its operations the most widely. Itself a development of very early trading guilds, at the height of its prosperity it employed as many as 50,000 persons in the Netherlands, and the enormous influence it was able to exercise undoubtedly saved Antwerp from the institution of the Inquisition within its walls in the time of Charles V. In the reign of Elizabeth British trade' with the Netherlands reached in one year 12,000,000 ducats, and in that of James I. the company’s yearly commerce with Germany and the Netherlands was as much as £1,000,000. Hamburg afterwards was its principal depot, and it became known as the “ Hamburg Coripany.” In the “ Merchant Adventurers’ ” enterprises is to be seen the germ of the trading companies which had so remarkable a development in the 16th and 17th centuries.
