A.D. 1689
—1776.,
ad been
rganised
under
Rlizabeth
90 PARLIAMENTARY COLBERTISM
London in 1574, when a patent was issued for giving a
sertain Richard Candler the sole right to register policies
and instruments of insurance’. Subsequently a mixed com-
mission of merchants and lawyers was established to deal
with cases arising out of this business? But their juris-
diction gave little satisfaction, and the commission was
modified soon after the Restoration. Fire insurance was
developing* and tentative experiments were being made in
life insurance® in the latter part of the seventeenth century.
1 Stow, Survey, vol. m. bk. v. 242. For a curious dispute in 1572, see Hall,
Society in the Elizabethan Age, 57. Compare also the patent for an office for the
agsurance of merchandise granted in 1634. Hist. MSS. Comm.1. 34 (b).
* 43 Eliz. c. 12. 8 14 C. II. c. 23.
+ The successive steps that were taken are detailed by & contemporary: “I find
shis design was first set on foot immediately after His Majesty's Restoration by
several persons of quality, and eminent citizens of London, and Proposals about it
then printed by them. But tho the Project and Authors of it were then recom-
znended to the Common Council of London by his Majesty's letters, yet it was not
wdmitted by them, for the very same reason for which those Gentlemen now are
aot to be countenanced in it; viz. because they thought it impossible for Private
Jersons to manage, and unreasonable that they and not the City should reap the
2rofits of such an undertaking, Hereupon this Design, like some Rivers that
sink into the Ground, and break not out again, but at a considerable distance, was
10 more heard of till the year 1670, when it was afresh propounded to the city by
Mir De Laun, tho not prosecuted by them. However in the Mayorality of Sir
W. Hooker it was briskly revived by Mr Newbold the Merchant, who proposed the
sarrying it on by a Joint Stock to be raised among the Inhabitants and Proprietors
»f the Houses to be insured. This he communicated to the Lord Mayor, and
livers other eminent Citizens. From some of these like an Eves-dropper, this
Observator caught it; it being then generally discussed and approved of and
-esolved to be put in practice. * * Mr Newbold therefore waiting for a more
favourable conjunction found it not till the Majorality of Sir Robert Clayton to
whom on New Year's Day Anno 7§ Le presented the Model of it, and sometime
after printed it under the title ¢ London's Improvement and the Builder's Security.’
Brit. Mus. 816. m. 10 (64).] Sir Robert Clayton approved of the matter, only
\dvised that instead of a joint stock it should be managed by the Chamber of
London.” A second letter to Mr M. T. by L. R., Brit. Mus. 816. m. 10 (80).
\Vithin a short time three fire insurances were started; one was managed by
a» committee of the Common Council, and was opened in December 1681; “but
this would not take.” The Fire Office at the Back side of the Royal Exchange
began business a month earlier, and three years later a Friendly Society was
started for doing similar business but on a different principle. The re-
spective advantages of these various offices, the rates they charged [Brit.
Mus. 816. m, 10 (71 and 78)], and the security they offered, were the object
of a good deal of discussion, in which the respective advantages of municipal
action and of private enterprise were freely canvassed. See 4 letter to a Gentle-
nan in the country by N B. attributed by Dr Bauer to Barbon. He preferred
che Fire Office to the Friendly Society and called forth a defence of the latter from
H. 8. [Brit. Mus. 816. m. 10 (74, 75).
% During the Mayoralty of Sir William Hooker there were tentative efforts at
organising Life Insurance. A ceriain Mr Wagstaffe laid his scheme before the
