ABSTRACT
European Powers were engaged in one long struggle for the heritage of Henry the Navigator, and it is impossible to understand the history of the shipping industry during this period without some study of the attitude of the statesmen towards ships, colonies, and commerce. Both the balance of trade theory and the importance attached to naval power led the statesmen of the time to look with peculiar favour on the trade with distant colonies or factories. Indian colonies and her ministers devoted a large share of their attention to building up a mercantile marine and a flourishing foreign commerce, by means of subsidies, pro-tective duties, navigation laws, and the formation of privileged companies. For good or ill, the spirit of the Navigation Acts continued to dominate British commercial policy throughout the whole of the eighteenth century.
