In spite of the want of success (and they received but scanty support) Ministers met in their applications to foreign countries for reciprocity, they resolutely persevered in their policy, resting for their chief support almost wholly on the Free-trade party in the House of Commons. The principles of Free-trade had become the established and predominant policy of the nation, and navigation alone was the exceptional branch which, until then, had successfully resisted innovation. [Sidenote: Progress of Free-trade views.] It was very remarkable, that in the celebrated Petition of the London merchants to the House of Commons, so far back as 1820,[102] from which the Free-trade movement may be dated, no mention is made of the Navigation Laws. Mr. Tooke, who drew the petition, directed chiefly attention to the then unacknowledged fact that freedom from restraint was calculated to give the utmost extension to foreign trade, and the best direction to the capital and industry of the country. That the maxim of buying in the cheapest market and selling in the dearest, the rule of every merchant in his individual dealings, was as strictly applicable to the trade of the nation; but had Mr. Tooke at that time hinted anything about navigation, or the abrogation of the existing Navigation Laws, he would have exposed himself almost to personal danger. The success, however, of the Free-trade measures which had been adopted since 1842 had totally changed the current of public opinion, and it was now only the shipowners, and the still powerful Protectionist party in Parliament, which resisted this last crowning measure of Free-trade. The opposition of the shipowners arose from a deep-seated conviction that utter and inevitable ruin to their class would result from the abrogation of the Navigation Laws. [Sidenote: Parliament of 1849.] Parliament assembled on the 2nd of February, 1849. The commercial and manufacturing interests were rallying, but had not as yet effectually revived from the prostration occasioned by the commercial crisis of 1847, and the general want of confidence resulting from the shock of the foreign revolutions in 1848. The shipping trade was in a state of transition, as it was not until some time later that the gold discoveries in Australia gave a fresh impulse to the “long voyage” trade, and that towards a region of the globe which promised but a slow, however certain, future development of wealth and navigation. The shipowners were, in fact, still suffering a periodical depression of trade after two or three very prosperous years. In the Speech from the Throne delivered by her Majesty in person, she said: “I again commend to your attention the restrictions imposed on commerce by the Navigation Laws. If you shall find that these laws are, in whole or in part, unnecessary for the maintenance of our maritime power while they fetter trade and industry, you will no doubt deem it right to repeal or modify their provisions.”