]
CHAPTER III
FRANCE
France has been rightly termed the bounty-giving nation _par
excellence_.[BD] She first adopted a policy of State protection of
native shipping in the middle of the sixteenth century with the
enactment (1560) of an exclusive Navigation Act, forbidding her subjects
to freight foreign vessels in any port of the realm, and prohibiting
foreign ships from carrying any kind of merchandise from French
ports.[BE] This was followed up in the next century with the institution
of the direct bounty system to foster French-built ships.[BD]
In the reign of Louis XIV, Colbert, Louis's celebrated finance minister,
perfected (about 1661) an elaborate system of navigation laws, evidently
copied from the rigorous English code. This was directed primarily
against the commerce of Holland and England, with the ultimate object of
upbuilding the home merchant marine and the laying of a broad basis for
a national navy.[BF] These acts included decrees giving French ships the
monopoly of trade to and from the colonies of France; imposing tonnage
duties on foreign shipping; awarding direct premiums on French-built
ships. England retaliated immediately. Holland remonstrated first, then
made reprisals.
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