[Illustration: Fig. 195.--Measurers of Corn in Paris.
Fig. 196.--Hay Carriers.
Fac-simile of Woodcuts from the "Royal Orders concerning the Jurisdiction
of the Company of Merchants and Shrievalty in the City of Paris," in small
folio goth.: Jacques Nyverd, 1528.]
It may be asserted as an established fact that the gradual extension of
the power of the king, produced by the fall of feudalism, was favourable
to the extension of commerce. As early as the reign of Louis IX. many laws
and regulations prove that the kings were alive to the importance of
trade. Among the chief enactments was one which led to the formation of
the harbour of Aigues-Mortes on the Mediterranean; another to the
publication of the book of "Weights and Measures," by Etienne Boileau, a
work in which the ancient statutes of the various trades were arranged and
codified; and a third to the enactment made in the very year of this
king's death, to guarantee the security of vendors, and, at the same time,
to ensure purchasers against fraud. All these bear undoubted witness that
an enlightened policy in favour of commerce had already sprung up.
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