The commerce of the world being in perpetual fluctuation, we can never be too watchful, not only for preserving what we are now in possession of, but for availing ourselves of the mistakes or negligences of other nations, in order to acquire new branches of it. Who could have imagined, three hundred years ago, that those ports of the Levant, from whence, by means of the Venetians, England, and almost all the rest of Christendom, were supplied with the spices, drugs, etc., of India and China, should one day come themselves to be supplied with those very articles by the remote countries of England and Holland, at an easier rate than they were used to have them directly from the East; or that Venice should afterwards lose to Lisbon the lucrative trade of supplying the rest of Europe with them; or lastly, that Lisbon should afterwards lose the same to Amsterdam; or that Amsterdam and Haerlem should gradually lose, as in great part they have done, their famous and fine linen manufactures to Ireland and Scotland? At present, our woollen manufacture is the noblest in the universe; and second to it is our metallic manufacture of iron, steel, tin, copper, lead, and brass, which is supposed to employ upwards of half a million of people. Our unmanufactured wool alone, of one year's produce or growth, has been estimated to be worth two millions sterling; and, when manufactured, it is valued at six millions more, and is thought to employ upwards of a million of our people in its manufacture; whereas in former times all our wool was exported unmanufactured, and our own people remained unemployed. Even within the three last centuries, the whole rental or value of all the lands and houses in England did not exceed five millions; but by the spirited exertions of the City of London, seconded by the merchants of the principal trading towns in the country, the rental of England is now estimated at twenty millions per annum, or more; of which vast benefit our nobility, gentry, and landholders begin to be fully sensible, by the immense increase in the value or fee-simple of their lands, which has gradually kept pace with the increase and value of our commercial intercourse with foreign nations, of which the following are at present the most considerable: To Turkey we export woollen cloths, tin, lead, and iron, solely in our own shipping; and bring from thence raw silk, carpets, galls, and other dyeing ingredients, cotton, fruits, medicinal drugs, etc. To Italy we export woollen goods of various kinds, peltry, leather, lead, tin, fish, and East India merchandise; and bring back raw and thrown silk, wines, oil, soap, olives, oranges, lemons, pomegranates, dried fruits, colours, anchovies, etc.