the comfort of the Lands belonging to a Deanery Prebenda or Prebendship of Lands and other Revenues annexed to the Cathedrals many if not most of which with the Deanerles and Prebendships thereunto belonging as the Deanerie and twelve Prebends of Westminster by Queen Elizabeth were of the foundation and gift of the Kings Royal Progenitors Which comfortable and necessary supports of our Bishops administred by their Clergie are ex antiquo and long agoe resembled by some or the like usages in Ireland where the Coloni or Aldiones such as hold in Socage of the Irish Bishops did besides their Rents and Tributes erga reparationes Matricis Ecclesiae quidpiam conferre give something yearly towards the reparation of the Cathedral or Mother Churches and the Herenaci another sort of Tenants so called did besides their annual rent cibarià quaedam Episcopo exhibere bring to the Bishop certain provisions for his Houshold which was very frequent with the Tenants of Lands holden of our English Abbies and Religious Houses by an inquisition in the County of Tirone in anno 1608. it was by a Jury presented upon oath that there were quidam Clerici sive homines literati qui vocentur Herinaci certain learned men of the Clergy who were called Herinaci ab antiquo seisiti fuerunt c. And anciently were seised of certain lands which did pay to the Arch-bishop or Bishop of the Diocess quoddam charitativum subsidium refectiones pensiones annuales secundum quantitatem terrae consuetudinem patriae a dutifull and loving aid and some provisions and pensions according to the quantity of their lands and custome of their Country and the grants of such lands as appeareth by a Deed of the Dean and Chapter of Armach in Anno Domini 1365. to Arthur and William Mac Brin for their lives and the longer liver of them at the yearly rent of a mark and eight pence sterling una cum aliis oneribus servitiis inde debitis consuetis with all other charges and services due and accustomed had in them sometimes a condition of quam diu grati fuerint obedientes so long as they should be gratefull and obedient unto them Wherefore the Barons Nobility and Gentry of England who did lately enjoy those beneficiall Tenures by Knight-service now unhappily as the consequence and greater charges and burdens upon the people will evidence converted as much as an Act of Parliament in the twelfth year of the Reign of his Majesty that now is can doe it into Socage which were at the first only given for service and assistance of their King and Country and their mesne Lords in relation thereunto and have besides the before recited conditions many a beneficiall custome and usage annexed and fixed unto them and at the dissolution of the Abbies and Religious Houses had much of the Lands given and granted unto them and their Heirs in tail or otherwise with a reservation of a Tenth now a great deal below the value can doe no less in the contemplation of their honours dignities and priviledges received from them and many great favours continued unto their Heirs and Successors from Generation to Generation then doe that in the matter of Praeemption Pourveyance or Contribution towards the Composition or serving in of victuals or Provision for his Majesties Royal Houshold and the honor of his House and Kingdome which their Ancestors did never deny The Lord Maiors of London who doe take and re-receive yearly a payment or Tribute called Ale-silver and the Citizens of London who doe claim and enjoy by the Kings Grants Charters or Confirmations a freedom from all â—olls Lastage throughout England besides many other large priviledges and immunities and the Merchants of England and such as trade and trauell through his Ports and over his Seas into forrain parts and are not denied their Bills of Store to free their Trunks and wearing Clothes and other necessaries imported or exported from paying any Custome and other duties which with many other things disguised and made Custome-free under those pretences for which the Farmers of the Customes have usually had yearly allowances and defalcations would amount unto a great part of the peoples pretended damage by the compositions for Royall Pourveyance should not trouble themselves with any complaints or calculations of it when as both Citizens and Merchants can derive their more then formerly great increase of trade and riches from no other cause or fountain then the almost constant â—esidence of the King and Courts of Justice in or near London and the many great priviledges granted unto them and obtained for them by the Kings and Queens of England The Tenants in ancient Demeasne claiming to be free from the payment of Tolls for their own houshold provisions and from contribution unto all wages assessed towards the expences of the Knights of the Shires or Burgesses sent unto the Parliament which Sir Edward Coke believes was in regard of their helping to furnish the Kings Houshold provisions though since granted to other persons and their services turned into small rents now much below what they would amount unto and many Towns and Corporations of the Kingdome the Resiants in the Cinque Ports and Romney Marsh Universities of Oxford and Cambridge and the Colledges and Halls therein and the Colledges of Winton and Eaton claiming to be acquitted from the payment of Subsidies by antient Exemptions may be willing to pay or bear as much as comes to their share in that one of the smallest parts of duty which is not to be refused by such as will fear God and honour the King And all the Subjects of England who enjoy their Common of Estovers in many of the Kings Woods or Forrests Pannage or feeding of Swine with Acorns or fetching of Ferne from thence Priviledges of Deafforrestations Assart lands Pourlieus and Browse wood and have Common of Vicinage and Common appendant not only therein but in most of his Manors by a continuance or custome of the charity or pitty of his Royal Progenitors and where they have no grant to produce for those and many other favours will for refuge and to be sure not to part with it fly to praescription and time beyond the memory of man and suppose that there was a grant thereof because that possibly there might have been one should not think much to let him pertake of some of their thanks and retributions which will not amount to one in every twenty for all the benefits which they have received of his Royal Ancestors or doe yearly receive of him Nor should forget that God Almighty the maker of heaven and earth giver of all good things and bestower of blessings who fed his people of Israel with Quails in the Wilderness where none were bred Manna where none was either before or since and made the Rocks to yeild water did in his Theocraty or Government of them by his Laws and Edicts written
of himself and his own posterity to further and advance the peoples cheating and oppressing of one another or to cause the King to pay the dearer or incur so great a damage as now it plainly appears he doth in his house-keeping for want of his Pourveyance when as all the Landed and rich men in England all the Farmers and all the Citizens and Tradesmen of the Nation the later of whom like aqua fortis can eat and make their way to be sauers thorough the dearest or highest rates or prices of houshold provisions by adulterating or raising their Commodities or as a London Brewer lately said concerning the Excise upon Ale and Beer that it should never hurt him whilst there was water enough in the Thames those of that profession being not contented to be repaid by the house-keeper the six pence rated for the Excise upon every Barrel of six shillings Beer unless they may leave out of such a Barrel of Beer six penny worth of Malt and make it by an half Boyling of it to save the expence of fire little better then so much half sodden water and are not satisfied also with such an unchristian cozening of the people and making their drink by such their doings and puting in Broom and other noxious ingredients in stead of Hopps to be as unwholsome as it is weak and naughty unless they may likewise cozen the King of his Dues upon the Excise and put as many tricks as they can upon him and his Laws and Officers and when by these and many other devices they make themselves very great gainers by the Excise in abusing both the King and his people are as busie as any in raising the cry against the Excise as a very great grievance and when all the Mechanick and Rustick part of the Nation workmen day-laborers maid-servants and men-servants shall not onely be savers but gainers by the enhance of rates and prices and the King onely and the poor of the Kingdom be the very great loosers and sufferers by it Or for the interest of the body Politick that the pinch and hardship should lye all on the Princes part and he onely be the greatest looser by his want of Praeemption Pourveyance or Compositions of the Counties as he had formerly be as an Amorite or stranger in our Israel and pay usury for his victuals by being constrained to give two parts in three or more sometimes then fourty per cent for the houshold provisions which his officers and servants do buy or provide for him four parts in five in many things six parts in seven in some other more then the Market rates and prices were in the beginning of the Raign of Queen Elizabeth when the Compositions were made by the Counties and willingly assented unto or that now there is a greater plenty of Food and houshold provisions Trade and Manufâ—cture then were in the former ages and all things may be afforded to be sold as cheap as they were retroactis seculis or some hundred years ago or as they were in the four and twentieth year of the Raign of King Henry the eight and cheaper then they were in the beginning of the Raign of Queen Elizabeth every thing should be dearer to him then to others or that so great an increase of Rates and Prices as have been within this last hundred years and all the mischiefs and inconveniencâ—s of them which have been brought upon the King and his people by private and particular interests the non execution of good Laws and the neglect and carelesseness of the subordinate Magistrates Justices of Peace and Clerks of the Markets should with an addition be continued and fixt upon the King who if he should resume but his Tolles in Fairs and Markets which the Civilians do rightly enough derive a tollendo from taking many of which are now accompted to be as the proprieties inheâ—itance of private men or Lords of Mannors are in some cases more by the indulgence of the Kings Royal Progenitors and a prescription claimed by long enjoyments or continuance of favors then de jure or were by grants or confirmations allowed where they were before but usurped and with-held from him and a Royalty and prerogative so antiently allowed in the Roman Empire as Valens and Valentinian the Emperors a mercatoribus seu negotiatoribus quae ad domum imperialem pertinent exegerunt necessitatem debitam pensionum ex emolumentis negotiationum did raise a good part of their Pourveyance or provisions for their houshold out of the Tolles or profits made by Fairs and Markets those of the people of England who do claim an exemption from the payment of them and those very many proprietors of Lands or Mannors who by many Royal grants and favors do claim and enjoy the profit of the Tolles would finde to be a greater damage and prejudice unto them then that which the Olivariaâ— party and the troublers of our Israel pretended to be by the Royal Pourveyance or Compositions for them or should as he never doth let his Lands to the uttermost penny measure his gifts or bounties by that of private men and proportion his favors according to his wants or occasions of keeping or saving what he can for himself or the ingratitude or forgetfulness of those which receive them and be as unwilling to answer acknowledge benefits as too many are unto him or take his Reliefs Herriots First fruits Fee Farms Quit Rents Customes Fines for alienation Fines certain or incertain of his Copyhold estates at the full and present value and the Fees for his Seals in Chancery and the other Courts and all his Subsidies according to the alteration of monys the disproportion betwixt the present and the former rates there would be cause enough for them to acknowledge his favouâ—s already received and believe that those small retributions in his Pourveyance or Compositions for them will bear so small a part in the Ballance as they should rather lay their hands upon their mouths and rest assured that they which are daily craving and gaining by the King and blest with a peace and plenty under his government cares and protection should be ashamed to make him to be so great a looser and themselves such gainers by his loss and damages And that it can no way become them to suffer him that granted or confirmed their Fairs and Markets to be oppressed by them pay a shilling and many times more for every groat he disburses for his necessary occasions and at the same time in the distribution of his bounties and rewards give a shilling more for every groat which he intended to give shall be kind to every body and receive in acknowledgement thereof no more then to get keep all they can from him which in their own particular estates would bring no less then ruine to all the people of England and those that so very much enrich themselves by putting him to more expences then
that purpose seene themselves attended in the plenty State and greatest of Royalty of the King or Prince from which they were sent and in the mean time nothing wanting or missing in that of the Kings attendance or magnificence in his Court oâ— Family From whence at all times Carelesnes Profusenes and all manner of wast were so banished as the Porters at the Gates were charged to watch and hinder the carrying out of meat and provision by such as should not the Pastrie rated in their allowances for Spice Sugar Corance c. the servants took an oath of duty and obedience and the Treasurer and Comptroller to make due allowance and payments with favourable demeanings and cherish love betwixt the King and his people In Anno 7 Jac. Rates and orders were made and set touching the Kings Breakfast and his particular fare as to qualities and proportions for Dynner and Supper and Fish dayes for the dyet of the great Officers and all other Officers and Servants having diet and the like on the Queens side Rates for Bouche of Court for Mornings and Evenings Lights and Candles and the Yeomen of the Guards diet and Beefe ordered to be on Flesh dayes for the King Queen and Houshold In anno 16 Jac. by advice of the Earl of Middlesex Sir Richard Weston Knight Sir John Wolstenholme Sir William Pyt Knight and other discreet men very much experienced in the Affairs of the world appointed to lessen as much as might be the charges of his house many good orders were made for the regulation of the Kings Houshold some abatements made in the allowance for his Breakfast by his own order a Limitation and stint of Joynts of Meat to make Jellies and all other compositions the number and names of all Noblemen and Ladies attending the Court to be quarterly presented And that the Prince should pay for his diet at his coming to Court which the most narrow-hearted and frugall of fathers in private Families and Societies have not done and his Countrymen of Scotland and many English could not say he was according to the rates he paid at his own House and that when he should repair to any of the Kings Houses in remote places he should pay for such of the Kings provisions as he should expend there according as they should be worth at the next Market And yet in all that frugality and care to prevent wast and the daily meeting of some of the Officers of the Green-cloth in the Compting house there were 240 gallons allowed at the Buttery Bar per diem three gallons per diem at the Court gate for thirteen poor men six Services or Mess of meat and seven pieces of Beefe per diem as wast and extraordinary for the Kings honour And there was no Sunday or other day of the week but the Tables of the great Officers and Lords entertained many Lords Knights and Gentlemen which were not of the Houshold but came to see the King or make and attend their petitions and suits and few Gentlemen of quality Citizens or other persons of those multitudes whose busines or desires to see the Court brought them thither but were taken in as Guests to dinner with some of those many other Officers of the Court that had diet allowed them it having been an antient custome after the King was set to dinner to search through all the Lodgings and Rooms of the House to find out Gentlemen and Strangers fit for and becoming the invitation of the Kings Servants to the Kings meats and provision for his servants and in all those treatments and largess of house-keeping there wanted not a sober plenty of wine and beer out of the Kings Sellers and an open house-keeping with so much sobriety as if it had not been an open housekeeping wherein no drunkenness or debauchery was to be seen as is too commonly in the now almost out of fashion open or free house-keeping at Christmas or other Festivals 18 Jac. Regis Divers Ordinances were made for the diminution of the charge of the Kings house-keeping the allowances of wast to be given dayly for the Kings honour reduced to a certainty viz. 200 loaves of bread 240 gallons of beer remains of Wax and Torch-lights to be returned the number of Artificers Victualleâ—s and Landresses ascertained number of Carts for Carriages stinted and proportioned to all degrees and Offices the charge of the Stable being almost doubled to what it was in Queen Elizabeths time to be lessened as much as may be none to be sworn Servants before the number of Officers should be reduced to what was formerly no Offices or Places in the Kings House to be sold all other good Orders to be put in Execution yet could at the same time by his especiall grace and favour remit to certain places some of his compositions Nor did those contrivances and endeavors to lessen the Kings charge of house-keeping die with King James but were found to survive to his Son and Successor his late Majesty King Charles the first in the third year of whose Reign half the allowance for houshold diets was abated on fasting nights and the carriages in every office reduced to a certain number and when the composition or Country provision of Oxen or Sheep did by the Courts frugality sometimes exceed or make an overplus they were sold and exactly brought unto an accompt for the defraying of other houshold charges where as his Royal Progenitors used to doe he could in his greatest wants and care of all fitting Espargne in his own diet and houshold cause the Lord High Stewards Table in time of Parliament to be constantly abundantly and extraordinarily kept and furnished to treat and dine the then numerous nobility and persons of honour coming to the Court and Parliament But all that was of Innocency antient legall and just Rights in it backt and seconded by right Reason the Lawes and reasonable Customes of the Land the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy taken by all Magistrates Justices of Peace Officers and many of the better sort of the people and of every Freeman of every Trade and Company in London and ordered to be taken by all men in the Kingdome to defend and maintain the Rights and Jurisdictions of the King and his Crown and the interests concernments good honor safety welfare and happiness of every man in particular being involved in that of their King or Prince were not enough to perswade those who had found the sweetness of ruining him and all which were loyal and well affected to him from pursuing the sinfull and abominable ends and designes of themselves and their great Master of Delusion the Devil to murder him but whilst they hunted him like a Partridge upon the mountains and through more persecutions of mind and body and a longer time then ever the righteous and holy David endured in his greatest afflictions could take all that he had from him his Lands Revenues and Estate and so much as
should be assessed by the said Clerk of the Market in avoiding her Highness displeasure and further punishment at her Graces pleasure Which as to the enforcing of reasonable rates and pâ—ises for victuals and houshold provisions was no more then that which all Maiors and Bailiffs of Cities Boroughs Merchant Towns and others and of the Ports of the Sea and other places are by the Statute of 23 Ed. 3. cap. 6. authorised to doe and is to be given in charge and inquired of by the Justices of Peace of every County at their Quarter Sessions For if by the rules of Reason Policie and Prudence it was alwayes adjudged to be necessary and profitable for the people in general that the King or Prince should restrain them from deceiving or oppressing one another or not permit the cunning false or richer part of the people to deceive and put what rates or prises they please or can heighten and invent upon the plain dealing honest simple hearted poor and necessitous part of them but should rather resist the Nimrods Tormentors of them and by putting them into some method of righteousness imitate the care and designs of the Almighty to succour relieve and help the poor and needy And that it can never be for the good of the Nation so to encourage the evils and deceitfulnes of mens hearts one towards another as to suffer every one to hatch or spawn as many cheating and cozening tricks perjuries deceipts and false or aequivocal oathes as they can possibly or under a counterfeit shew of godliness make contrive and invent to blind deceive delude or oppress one another or to be like Cut-purses Jews Bandities Wild Arabs or crafty deceitfull Bannyans to the well-doing as well as well-meaning little part of the people or like Rooks cawing wrangling and making a noyse in the trees make it their perpetual business when they are not asleep to steal and filch away one anothers Nests and provisions and being guilty of as bad themselves to be in a perpetuall watch of keeping as well as they can their own whilest they are busie in stealing from others or to make old England to be a Country of Rooks and Jackdaws It cannot be certainly adaequate to any rule of Justice that the King who is to make it his daily care to provide peace plenty and benefits for all his Subjects regulates by his Magistrates and Officers rates and prices of victuals at Markets and Fairs moderates and abates such as are excessive and unreasonable and by Law may seize as forfeit the Court Leets of Lords of Manors for not providing Pillories to punish offending Bakers and ordaineth by his Laws that every Lord or other having the priviledge of a Market shall forfeit it if he have not a Clerk of the Market to look unto it should provide blessings for every one but himself and partake of none or very little of them and that his Subjects should not be at liberty to cozen and oppress one another and yet every man should be at liberty and make it his designe and business to cozen and lay burdens upon him which would be as little for the good of the body politick as it would be in the body natural to wear the head downward and make it to be subservient to the business and humor of the ignoble and less to be taken care of parts of the body Or to give liberty not only in a Siege or publick necessity like that of Samaria but at all other times unto as many as will like the gain or content of it to be as Bears and Wolves one to another and by hardening of their hearts and oppressing one another make a Wilderness and Desert in our Land of Canaan which if well ordered flows with more then milk and honey and by reason of an universall pride ingrossing enhauncing and cheating to maintain it cause a dearth when there may be a plenty And reducing him thereby into the condition of the King of Israel in that Siege when an Asses head was sold for fourscore pieces of silver and the fourth part of a kab of Doves dung for five pieces of silver enforce him to answer as he did the woman which cryed unto him Help my Lord O King if the Lord doe not help thee whence shall I help thee out of the Barn floor or out of the Wine-presse Or that the King when he shall as the King of Israel did in an unseasonable and dry year search the Land for grass to save the peoples horses mules and beasts alive should let his own not pertake of his cares but perish whilst he mittigates unjust and unconscionable rates and prices in the Markets beÌ„ himself exposed to all manner of unconscionable and deceitfull dealings Which his just and alwaies until now allowed right of Praeemption which heretofore made the Kings provision for his houshold when it was bought in the Markets or Fairs to be much cheaper then what were bought upon the vie or endeavours who should give most to purchase it at such unreasonable prices as the Sellers could strain or scrue them unto And the Commissions not seldome made by his Royal Progenitors to the Sheriffs and other Officers and Magistrates which had the delegated power of Assise and Correction of Markets and unreasonable prices and the rating of them to make his houshold provisions and where the Pourveyors and the owners could not otherwise agree were to be rated and ascertained as some Acts of Parliament and Statutes have appointed by Constables and some honest men of their Neighbourhood upon their oaths which cannot be supposed to make or admit them to be high or immoderate together with a due regulation of the Markets by the Clerks of the Markets and that care with the Law enjoyneth the Lords of Manors in their Court Leets the Sheriffs in their Tornes the Justices of Peace of every Countie and the Magistrates of every City and Towns Corporate to take in the supressing of unreasonable prices Forestallers Ingrossers and Regrators which are no small part of the causes of them would have prevented or greatly lessened And the Markets would not have risen to that excess of price which is now heavily complained of and every where to be met with by the sleepiness or sluggishness of Magistrates and Justices of the Peace neglect of their oathes and duties which are too often and easily obliterated or put out of memory by sprinkling or dipping them in the waters of some Lethe or Oblivion or by some unrighteous or unbecoming partialties connivance and kindness to their Neighbours and friends or such as they would make to be their friends a timerousness or unwillingness to displease or irritate such as are or may be their enemies or the allurements and temptation of their own Interests in letting their Lands at the rack or very much dearer then it was when the Kings price or compositions were agreed upon and by tentering the Tenants Rents
to see or understand it and makes the former Market prizes and rates to be but as Pigmies or Dwarfs to those which are now so immense and Gigantine So as if the Laws of God Nature and Nations right reason and the heretofore well approved custome of England with the care of avoiding of evils and inconveniencies which was wont to be the primum mobile and greatest Orator in worldly affairs to incite and stir up most mens cares and preventions mâ—ny of whom have had cause to lament the not allowing of that and oother the Kings ancient and just rights and a due submission thereunto cannot perswade or lead them unto that great part of reason duty called Prae-emption Pourveyance or Compositions for them the consideration of the lâ—berties and happiness which they do now enjoy more then many of their Ancestors might certainly drive or carry them into their more laudable ways and courses When the peoples want of a liberty of unmannerliness or Praeemption before their Soveraign or his servants on his behalf begets no other loss or grievance unto them then a disturbance of their Fancies or their not obtaining that which did not become them or their Humor of hindring their betters from having of it or to make a vie betwixt them and the Kings servants either to hinder him from having of it or to make him pay for it a great deal more then it was worth Which Davids three Worthies who hazarded their lives And brake thorough the host of the Philistims to draw water out of the Well of Bethlehem and brought it to David who longed and had a desire to drink of it would never have done but would have been ashamed to offer unto their Prince so great an indignity And the charge and enhaunce of the prices of all Commodities necessary for houshold provisions will by the needless racking of rates and prices and the Insana praetia intollerable rates and prices which the King by the avarice and insatiableness of the sellers is and shall be inforced to give so infect and spoile the markets of such part of the people as shall have occasion to buy which are many to every one that is a seller those that are sellers having sometimes also occasion to be buyers as if the wisdom of the King and his great and Privy Councel prevent it not there will in a few years be ten times or a greater charge more then was in the same year when the Pourveyance or Compositions for it were abolished imposed upon the subjects by the Tyranny of rates and prices then ever the Compositions for the Kings Pourveyance or houshold provisions did amount unto And when the difference in the Compositions for the Kings Pourveyance betwixt the Market rates and the Kings price do amount at the utmost but unto sixty five thousand pounds per annum or thereabouts and is charged upon so many and in so easie and petit proportions And being no greater a charge or inconvenience the people who in a legal and Parliamentary way are to help him to sustain and bear his burdens if they love and tender their own good and the well being of themselves and their posterities will too prodigally cast away too much of their own happiness and as much of their own Estates if they shall for want of so small and easie accommodations which are so just and so necessary to the honor and support of their Prince enforce him into so great a prejudice and damage as to pay yearly four times as much as sixty five thousand pounds per annum shall amount unto in many if not all the particulars of his houshold provisions as may be instanced in four and twenty shillings the price of a Sheep which was in the Compositions to be served in at three shillings four pence Aâ— Oxe twelve pounds which was to have been furnished at four marks three shillings or two shillings six pence for a Hen which was to be furnished for two pence four shillings for a Goose which was to be sent in for four pence Lambs at twelve pence a piece for which he now pays eleven or twelve shillings and at Christmas sixteen or twenty shillings Wheat at ten pence a Bushel the Market rate being no more for Wheat in 18. of Queen Elizabeth for which he lately paid before the late dearth 7 s. 6 d. a Bushel and cannot furnish sixteen dishes of meat to the Table of one of his great Officers of his houshold if report be true under twenty shillings a dish And if weather beatâ—n by such an exaction and enhaunce of prices he shall seek a shelter or Port by putting one thousand two hundred and fourty servants the Queens servants above and below staiâ—s not included to Boardâ—wages the profits and allowed avails of their places which contrary to the Laws of England the honor of the King the weal and profit of him and his people too many have deaâ—ly bought and paid for will to reduce their vails and profits of their places into a certain yearly Board-wages their standing Wages and Pensions being so very petit and inconsiderable cost him in such an unreasonable and intollerable exaction and enhaunce of Rates and Prices as there is in the Markets ten times more in money and twenty times more in some then what he now paies if his servants shall not like hunger bitten starved and ragged Beggars be enforced to torment aswell as shame him with their daily Petitions and importunities or be as the naked attendants about the Salvage Kings Or if he shall not make them recompence for the losses of their Diet and availes arising by it will undoe and ruine very near so many Families and Dependencies who have nothing to live upon but his Majesties service and their hopes of subsistance by it Or if the loss of Pourveyance or Compositions for them shall in his house-keeping endamage him but two hundred thousand pounds per annum it will with one hundred thousand pounds per annum profit which was heretofore made by the Tenures amount unto three hundred thousand pounds per annum which will be more then that part of the Excise which was allowed in lieu of the Tenures and Pourveyance and the supplemental Revenue of the Chimney money deductis deducendis will yearly bring into the Kings Exchequer So great a damage will arise unto the King by the loss of his Pourveyance and Compositions for them and so much the greater if he shall put his servants which never King of England was yet inforced unto and the Nobility and Gentry of England untill of late disdained to do to Board-wages and give them recompence for their losses and will be not onely a very great damage and inconvenience in the consequence to the people But a great dishonor unto the King whose sublimity Majesty and Honor is not to be measured or managed by the narrow rules of private men or house-keepers for although it may relish very well
or avarice by taking advantage of some particular persons folly or over-bidding and keeping up the excessive rates of the Market to the same or a more unreasonable price and not being willing to let them fall again to a lower price though there be plenty and reason enough to do it unlawful combinations and confederacies of Trades men to raise their prices or cause their wares to be made Slight or insufficient unconscionable adulterating of Commodities and making them seem what they are not to raise the greater prices evil Artifices of Forestallers of the Markets Ingrossers and Regrators who for their own ungodly gains can make a dearth and scarcity in the midst of plenty and like Caterpillars spoil and devour the Hopes of the years fertility the Landlords racking of rents and the price of all manner of houshold provisions and other things raised by the Tenants to enable them to pay them an universal pride and vanity of the Nation and enhaunce of prices to support them plunder miseries and desolations of War numberless tricks and deceipts of Tradesmen and fraud of the common and Rustick part of the people in the Counties neer London in keeping many of their Cattel half a mile or some little distance from the Fairs untill the Evening or much of the day be spent to make them to sell at greater rates frequent deceits of stocking or Tying up the Udders of Kine a day before hand to make them swell and seem to give great store of Milke And as many other tricks of Trade and deceit as the Devil and deluded consciences can invent And truely looked upon as causes or concurrent parts of the cause of the now grand and most intollerable inhaunce of the rates and pâ—ices of Victuals houshold provisions and other Commodities there will be little or no room for the supposed plenty of Gold and Silver to be either a cause or so much as any part of a cause of it Nor can be well imagined when as notwithstanding that betwixt the middle of the Raign of King Henry the eight and the beginning of the Raign of Queen Elizabeth the Gold and Silver Mines of the West Indies had by the Spanish cruelty to the Indians and their almost extirpation afforded such quantities of these baites of Satan and temptations as two hundred and sixty millions of Gold did appear by the Records of the Custom house of Sivill to have been brought from the West Indies into Spain all the plenty of that riches either by our Merchants bringing in of Bullion from Spain and its other Kingdomes and Provinces by Commerce or return of Merchandize did not so in England raise enhaunce the rates and prices of Victuals and houshold provisions but that we finde the Parliament of 24. H. 8. ordaining that Beef Pork Mutton and Veal should be sold by the weight called haber dupois no person should take for a pound of Beef or Pork above one half penny nor for a pound of Mutton or Veal above half penny farthing did believe they might be reasonably so afforded And the rates of Victuals and houshold provisions notwithstanding so increasing as in the yeer following It was ordained That Governors of Cities and Market Towns upon complaint to them made of any Butcher refusing to sell victuals by the weight according to the Statute of 24 H. 8. ca. 3. might commit the offenders toward untill he should pay all penalties limitted by the said Statute and were enabled to sell or cause to be sold by weight all such victuals for ready money to be delivered to the owner and if any Grasier Farmer Breeder Drover c. should refuse to sell his fat Cattel to a Butcher upon such reasonable prices as he may retail it at the price assessed by the said Statute The Justices of Peace Maiors or Governors should cause indifferent persons to set the prices of the same which if the owner refused to accept then the Justices c. should binde him to appear the next Term in the Star Chamber to be punished as the Kings Councel should think good And the same Parliament Enacting That upon every complaint made of any enhauncing of prices of Cheese Butter Capons Hens Chickens and other Victuals necessary for mens sustenance without ground or cause reasonable in any part of this Realm or in any other the Kings Dominions the Lord Chancellor of England the Lord President of the Kings most honorable Councel the Lord Privy Seal the Lord Steward the Lord Chamberlaine and all other Lords of the Kings most honorable house the Chancellor of the Dutchy of Lancaster the Kings Justices of either Bench the Chancellor Chamberlains under Treasurer and the Barons of the Kings Exchequer or seven of them at the least whereof the Lord Chancellor Lord Treasurer the Lord President of the Kings Councel or the Lord Privy seal to be one should have power and authority from time to time as the cause should require to set and tax reasonable prices of all such kinde of Victuals how they should be sold in gross or by retail and that after such prices set and taxed Proclamation should be made in the Kings name under the great Seal of the said prices in such parts of this Realm as should be convenient for the same Was not of opâ—nion that the plenty of Gold and Silver were any cause of the enhaunce of the prices or rates of Victuals but did in the preamble of that Act declare That forasmuch as dearth scarcity good cheap and plenty of such kinde of Victuals happeneth riseth and chances of so many and diverse occasions that it is very hard and difficult to put any certain prices to any such things yet nevertheless the prices of such Victuals be many times enhaunced and raised by the greedy covetousness and appetites of the owners of such Victuals by occasion of ingrossing and regrating the same more then upon any reasonable or just ground or cause to the great damage and impovershing of the Kings subjects Siâ— Thomas Chamberlaine qui mores hominum multorum vidit urbes who by his several Embassages fâ—om England into Foraign Countries in the Raigns of Kiâ—g Henry the eighth and King Edward the sixth was not a little acquainted with the customes of other Nations aswell as his own did in the Raign of King Edward the sixth in a Treatise entituled Policies to reduce the Realm of England unto a prosperous wealth and estate dedicated unto the Duke of Somerset then Lord Protector assign the causes of the high prices and dearness of Victuals far less then what is now to be abasing of Coyn and givâ—ng more then Forty pence for the ounce of Silver ingrossing of Commodities the high price of Wooll which caused the Lords and Gentlemen being by the suppressing of the Abbies and liberality of King Henry the eight waxen rich to convert all their grounds into Sheep Pastures which diminished Victuals ten Lordships to the great decay of Husbandry
forgot the mercies and wonders of the Almighty or that they would have been brought to any manner of beliefe that ever they should have been able to bear so great and so intollerable as they would have called it a burden And yet now that time and custome like Milo's Calf carryed untill he be a Bull and being a Bull found to be no heavyer then when he was a Calf the burthen is not so heavy at the last as they would have believed it would have been at the first because the people have hitherto made shift to bear it by cheating or impoverishing one another and by laying the burden one upon another will dispendio reipublicae to the not to be avoyded loss and ruine of the Commonwealth be for some time longer able to endure it if the rich may grinde and devour the poor and the King now his Pourveyance is taken away must bear the greater part of the burden That if the King before he had granted the greatest Act of Pardon Bounty and Indempnity that ever any or all the Kings of England had done before him to a company of Factious and Rebellious people who had out done either Sheba or Shimei or any of the sons of Zeruâ—ah and deserved less then any of their forefathers unless the murder of his Royal Father and all the groundless obloquies and reproaches which they could cast upon him the banishing persecuting of himself his brethren murder and ruine of his loyal subjects and dispossessing him of his Estate Kingdoms and Revenues for twelve years togeâ—her and all things endeavoured which might load him or them with scorn and indignities can by any Fanaticks or Factious people be proved which it never can to have been by dispensations or communication with God and a living and walking in the spirit had taken in again to the Crown all those forfeited Rights Franchises and priviledges which had been heretofore too liberally given or granted from it and reserved a ten times greater Pourveyance then is by any now complained of the people of England would have been so glad with their Quailes as they would have blamed themselves for murmuring without a cause either before or after they had them And that those who could adventure to transgress the Laws which by their Idolized Covenant they bound themselves to observe and buy Places and Offices in the Kings houshold the greatest part of the profits whereof were made by the Kings allowance of Dyet may now that many of those Dyets and Tables are taken away come to a better understanding of the necessity and right use of Pourveyance and Compositions for them That the allowance of fifty thousand pounds per annum proposed as a recompence for his losses in the want of his Pourveyance is not to be found in the moyety of the Excise of Ale and Beer settled upon him and his heirs and successors for that the benefit thereof will not make amends for what he lost by his Tenures in the yearly Revenue thereof for as to the honor regality and right use of it that and Ten times more and all that could be given in money or an yearly rent would not have been enough for the purchase That thrice the sum of fifty thousand pounds per annum cannot ballance so great a loss and damage as the King sustains by his remitting of the Royal Pourveyance or Compositions for them That the splendor and magnificence of the Kings house cannot be so well supported by any certain yearly allowance in money nor the Squeeze and enhance of the Markets be so well escaped as they will be by that most easie laudable and accustomed way and establishment of the Royal Pourveyance or Compositions for them and that it can be no less then an undenyable truth and reason that it is the duty and should be the care of every good subject to further rather then hinder the Royal Pourveyance or Compositions for them That the mischiefs and inconveniences of taking away the Royal Pourveyances or Compositions for them have so visibly and often appeared to every unprejudiced eye or judgement as there is scarce an Englishman unless it be Cornelius Holland one of those that helped to kill the heir for his inheritance and would rather have Pourveyance to be a grievance then that he should fail of getting to him and his heirs Creslow Pâ—stures in Buckinghamshire which were appropriate to the fatting of the Kings lean Cattle for the provision of his houshold as every man may well conclude that it will be more for tâ—e good and ease of the people who can never be rich or happy when their Prince is poor or necessitous and if they love themselves are to love and support him that the King should have his Praeâ—emption and Pourveyance or Compositions for them then that he should be so much dishonored or oppressed as he is already and like to be more and more for want of it Which should be numbred amongst those ancient and legal priviledges and rights belonging to soveraignty puâ—chased by the cares and labors of our many English Kings and Monarchs with the hazard of their lives fortunes and estates in the preservation of the wel-fare of the people and a Monarchy which is of more then one thousand years continuance and being a duty ought to be more cheerfully submitted unto then any Ordinances By Laws or Customes of any Cities Borough Towns or Corporations or those of the Lords of Mannors by Grant Allowance or permission of Royal Indulgences or those of the City of London that great ingrosser of Liberties and priviledges who besides their Court of Wards and Orphans which yeildeth them very great yearly profits and advantages do receive take amongst many other things not here particularly mentioned by a Grant of King Henry the third of his Tolles at Queen Hithe Belines Gate and Downgate and else where in the City of London for a small Fee Farm Rent of fifty pounds per annum if enjoyed by so good a title which were formerly taken for the Kings use For every Tun of Beer carryed from Billingsgate by Merchant Strangers beyond the Seas four pence out of every hundred of Salmons brought to Queen Hithe by foraigners or such as are not free of the City two Salmons for every thousand of Herrings bought in Shops an haâ—f penny twenty six Mackarels out of every Mackarel Boat one Fish out of every Dosser of Fish not having in it Mullet Ray Congre Turbut c. Two Salmons out of every Bark which bringeth Salmons out of Scotland some Sprats out of every Boat or Barke with Sprats two pence of every Oyster Boat out of every Bark or Boat of Haddocks twenty six Haddocks out of every Ship or Bark laden with Herrings from Yarmouth two hundred Herrings for all kind of Fish brought to London after the same rate as was paid to the King at London Bridge for every Ship Bark or Vessel not belonging to London or
understanding and more distempered part of the people should be better and more to be followed and therefore to be taken in and receive as great an entertainment and applause as the Children of Israel did their Golden Calfe with shouts and acclamations whilst Moses as they thought had tarried too long with God Almighty in the Mount for his direction in the making of Laws or as the Romans did the more to be respected twelve Tables of Laws then those of their Mechanick and vulgar Judgements and reasonings which the wiser and more noble not the illiterate and foolisher sort of their Citizens and people had learned well considered and brought home from Athens and other cities of Greece as fit to be observed or imitated When as it might rather be remembred that God in his infinite mercy to the works of his own hands did so early distribute the Beams of his Right Reason and Illumination as the days of old were not without wisdom which being from everlasting and rejoycing afterwards in the habitable parts of the Earth her delights were with the sons of men And therefore Jeremy no Fanatique or man of an Imaginary or self conceited mistaken holiness but inspired by God Almighty and filled with the wisdom from above did not tell us as many of our Novelists and Commonwealth-mongers and the would be wise of the Rota's or Coffee-houses would make us believe that all the succesful experiments which the long lived world had approved to be right reason were either burthensome or oppressive and not to be any longer esteemed or that the paths of wisdom were worne out and not at all to be walked in but with a thus saith the Lord enjoyned us as if there and no where else it were to be found to stand in the ways and see and ask for the old Paths where is the good way and walk therein But that would have been to their loss and rather then faile of their purpose or forsake their beloved ignorant intermedling in Government they could never think any thing to be well until they had made all things ill and like Children would have liberty to do what they list which would do them as much good as the liberties of their misusing the power of the Sword or in medling in matters too high for them did in these last unhappy Twenty years and as little conduce to the publick or their own good and safetie as for Children to be permitted the use of Swords or Pistolâ— whereby to kill and mischief one another or of fire to burn themselves or set their Parents houses on fire or as they are said to do in Gonzaguas new discovered world in the Moon to govern their parents cannot finde the way to obey Laws and reasonable Customs unless their narrow Capaciâ—ies or small Understandings may apprehend the cause of it the reason of it must like the Lesbian rule be made to be as they whyâ—â—sie or fancie it and obedience to Kings or Laws cut out to their Interest and Conveniencies And will not believe that they have Liberties enough unlesse like Swyne got into a Garden they may foule and root up all that is good and beautifull in it And with their cries and gruntings could never be at quiet until they had trampled upon Monarchy and the majesty and loveliness of it digged up the Gardens of Spices and stopped the streams of our Lebanus And the late blessed Martir King Charles the First was no sooner in the defence of our Magna Charta and the Lawes and Liberties of England murdered but they and their Partisans must frame a Commonwealth and pretend a necessity thereof for avoiding the intollerable as they falsely called them burdens and oppressions of the people amongst which is ranked that great and most notorious piece of untruth that the Cart-taking for the King impoverished many of the people and that the Pourveyance cost the Country more in one year then their Assessments to the Army which with other matters contained in that most untrue and malicious Declaration of the Parliament of England as they then called themselves beraing date the 17. day of March 1648. are more against truth or any mans understanding then the tale of Garagantua's mighty mouth and stomach of eating three hundred fat Oxen at a meal and having five or six men to throw mustard into his mouth with shovels And as false as it was must for an edium to the late King and his Monarchicall Government be translated into Latine and sent and dispersed by their Emissaries into all the parts of the Christian world And from thence or some of the other I may not say causes but incentives or delusions the people too many of whom were inticed or made to believe any thing though never so much against truth reason common sense and their own knowledge must be taught for they could of themselves not find any cause to complain of it to believe that Declaration to be true to the end that whilst they did then bear and had long before endured very great assessements and burdens they might be enabled and be the better in breath to sustein for many years more a seaventy and sometimes a ninty and not seldome one hundred and twenty thousand pounds monethly Taxes and Assessments besides many other greater impoverishments and oppressions obedience must be called a burden every thing but ruining honest men and destroying of Loyaltie an oppression and every thing but vice and cheating to maintain it a grievance for the Truths sake therefore which every good and honest man is bound to submit unto and deâ—end and in vindication of his late Sacred Majesty and the Laws and Honor of my Country the too much abused England by such Tricks and Villanies and upon no other motive byasse or concernment but to make that scandal which only becomes the Father of Lyes and the causelesness of that complaint appear in their Deformities and proper colours I shall by an enquiry and search for the Original and Antiquity of Royal Pourveyance as to the furnishing of several sorts of Provision for the Kings House and Stable at a small or lesser rate then the markets and a praeemption for those or the like purposes used in this and most Nations of the World bring before the Reader the Laws and Acts of Parliament in England allowing it the Legality Reason Necessity and right use of it the small charge and burden of it and the consequences which will inevitably follow the takeing of it away which we hope will remove the ill opinion which some worthy men heretofore by reason of an abuse or misusage only and some very learned men of late misled by them have had of it CHAP. I. The Antiquity of Regal Pourveyance and Praeemption for the maintenance of the Kings Houses Navy Castles Garrisons attended by a Jus Gentium and reasonable Customs of the most or better part of other Nations WHich being not here intended or understood
upon any expedition by land or sea he was to have out of that Manor twenty shillings to feed his Buzcarles Mariners or Seamen or took for every five hides of land or that then esteemed honorable quantity of land a man with him But howsoever if that of Canutus discharging Pourveyance were a Law neither altered nor repealed it did but like his Laws touching Ordeal and delivering over the Murderer to the Kindred other of his Laws which proved to be unpracticable rather make the matter worse then better by his renouncing Pourveyance in his own Demeasnes for that Law and Resolution of his did meet with so little observance as in the Reign of King William Rufus and a great part of the Reign of his Brother King Henry the First the Kings Servants and Court for want of their former provisions grew to be so unruly as multitudo eorum qui curiam ejus sequebantur quaeque pessundaâ—ent diriperent nulla eos cohibente disciplina totam terram per quam Rex ibat devastarent and a multitude following the Court took and spoiled every thing in the way which the King went there being no discipline or good order taken Et dum reperta in Hospitiis quae invadebant penitus absumere non valebant ea aut ad forum per eosdem ipsos quoruÌ„ erant pro suo lucro ferre ac vendere aut supposito igne cremare â—ut â—i potus esset lotis exinde equâ—rum suorum pedibus residuum illius per terram effundere aut aliquo alio modo disperdere solebant and when they could not consume that which they found in the houses whereinto they had broken made the owners carry it to the Market and sell it for them or else burnt their provisions or if it were drink washed their horses feet with it or poured it upon the ground in so much as quique preâ—ognito regis advenâ—u sua habitacâ—l a fugithant every one hearing before hand of the Kings coming would run away from their houses which probably bringing in a dearth or scarcity of coâ—n might be the cause of the Tenants of the Kings Demeasne Lands bringing in the later end of the Reign of King Henry the First for then it was and not before as it appears by Edmerus and William of Malmsbury who lived in his time to the King their Plowshares instead of Corn to Court on their backs and making heavy complaints of their poverty and misery procured that King to change their Rents which before were used to be paid for the most part in corn cattle and provisions and were wont abundantly to supply his houshold occasions and with which in primitivo regno statu post conquisitionem the Kings of England from the Conquest untill then did plentifully as Gervasius Tilburienâ—is who lived also in his Reign hath related defray the charges of their Courts and Housholds into money with six pence in the pound overplus left the value of the mony should afterwards diminish but whether Canutâ—â— his Law were then in force or not or could be sufficient to abrogate those Jura Majestatis Rights or Prerogatives of our English Kings we find King Henry the first after those disorders in his greatest compliance with the English and his need of their aid to defend him against the pretensions and better Title of his elder Brother Robert Duke of Normandy and his couâ—ting of them unto it per libertates quas sanctus Rex Edwardus spiritu Dei provide sancivit by the antient Lawes and Liberties of holy King Edward which he had granted them and a promise to grant them any other retaining his Pourveyance and putting it into better order for as William Malmesbury hath recorded it Curialibus suis ubicunque villarum esset quantum a Rusticis gratis accipere quantum quoto praetio emere debuissent edixit transgressores vel gravi pecuniarum mulcta vel vitae dispendio afficiens directing and ordering those of his Court in whatsoever places he should abide what and how much they were to receive from the Country people gratis and without money and at what prices and rates they should buy other things under great penalties of money or punishment by death and was optimatibus venerabilis provincialibus amabilis reverenced by the Nobility and beloved by the common people and in his Charter which was for a gâ—eat part of it the original of our Magna Charta where omnes malas consuetudines quibus regnum Angliae iniuste opprimebatur inde aufert he took away all the evill Customs with which England was oppressed Et quas as the Charter saith in parte hic posuit and which were in part recited and with which the discontented Barons Nobility of England claiming their antient Liberties were so well contented in the 14. year of the Reign of King John when Steven Langton Archbishop of Canterbury produced it unto them as gavisi sunt gaudio magno valdè juraverunt omnes quod pro hiis libertatibus si necesse fuerit decertabunt usque ad mortem they greatly rejoyced and swore that they would if need were contend unto death for those Liberties there is no mention of any evil in Pourveyance nor any order for the taking of them away And might as justly rationally continue in the Raign of King Henry the second his Grandchild as that custome or usage for the Bishops and dignified Clergy to take their provisions of the Inferior Clergy and their Carriages or Carts which Pope Alexander in a Councel or Synod held at Rome where were present the Bishops of Durham Norwich Hereford and Bath and divers Abbots sent from England did notwithstanding many complaints not against the Pourveyance it self but the immoderate use of it onely limit and restrain them secundum tolerantiam in illis locis in quibus amâ—liores fuerint redditus Ecclesiasticae facultates in pauperibus autem mensura tenenda to be moderately taken in such places as had more large possessions and Ecclesiastical Revenues and less of those who were in a poorer condition and then and long before the Domini hundredorum Lords or great men having the command or jurisdiction of Hundreds uti comes aut vicecomes as the Eaâ—l or Sheriff of the County had multa inde auxilia tributa sectas aliasque praestationes cum ad utilitatem tum ad voluptateÌ„ CerereÌ„ nempe frumentuÌ„ receperunt c and received many aids tributes and Pourveyances aswel conducing to their profit as pleasure cujus hodie nomine Annuum penditur tributum pecuniarum for which now there is a certain rent in mony paid Nor could the rights of Pouâ—veyance Prae-emption be any thing less then denizend in Scotland or the Northern parts of our British Isles when as the Civil and universal Law of the World was there so long ago entertained and yet continues the great Director and Guider of their Justice where in
2 R. 2. ca. 1. Upon complaint made in Parliament that Pourveyors and Buyers did take Provisions of the Clergy and enforce them to make carriages against their Liberties It was enacted that the holy Church should have and enjoy her Franchises and Liberties in all points in as ample manner as she had in the time of the Kings noble Progenitors Kings of England and that the great Charter and the Charter of the Forest and the good Laws of the Land be firmly holden and kept and put in due execution saving to the King his Regality which is in the Record but omitted in the Print by which Statute saith Sir Edward Coke there was nothing enacted but what was included in Magna Charta And in the same Parliament it was ordained that the Statutes heretofore made should be kept and that all Clerks should have their Actions against such Pourveyors by Actions of Trespass and thereby recover treble damages And in 7 R. 2. cap. 8. it was ordained that no Subjects Chator shall take any victuals or carriages to the use of their Lords or Ladies without the owners good will and the party endamaged if he will shall have his Suit at the Common Law 2 H. 4. cap. 15. Pourveyance of the value of forty shillings or under for the Kings house shal l be paid for presently upon pain of forfeiture of the Pourveyors Office 23 H. 6. ca. 14. If any Buyer or other Officer of the Duke of Gloucester or of any other Lord or person take any Victuals Corn Hey Carriages or any other thing of the Kings Liege people against their will or without lawfull bargain but only for the King and the Queen and their houses they shall be arrested and if any of the said buyers other then of the King and Queen shall be convicted of such unlawfull taking he shall pay treble damages 28 H. 6. ca. 2. None shall take any persons Horses or Carts without the delivery of the Owner or some Officer nor any money to spare them saving alwayes to the King his Prerogative and his Preheminence of and in the premisses And in the care of our Kings to redress the peoples grievances and satisfie their complaints against the Pourveyors rather then the Royal Pourveyances it may be understood also that they did not altogether lay aside the preservation and care of those antient and most necessary rights and parts of the Kingly Prerogative by their Answers given in divers Parliaments to the Petitions of the People concerning it as 13 Ed. 3. The Commons pray in Parliament that all Pourveyors as well with Commission as without shall be arrested if they make not present pay whereupon it was agreed that the Commissioners of Sir William Heallingford and all other Commissioners for Pourveyance for the King be utterly void 14 Ed 3. Ordered that the Chancellor by Writs doe pay the Merchants of Barton and Lynne for their Pourveyance of corne 17 Ed. 3. The Commons pray that remedies may be had against the outragious taking of Pourveyors The Statutes made shall be kept and better if it may be devised 20 Ed. 3. That payment be made for the last taking of victuals Order shall be taken therein They pray that Pourveyors not taking the Constables with them according to the Statute of Westminster shall be taken as Theeves and the Judges or Justices of Assize or the Peace may inquire of the same The Statutes made shall be observed 21 Ed. 3. Upon a complaint of the Commons That whereas in the Parliament in anno 17. and the next Parliament before it was accorded that Commissions should not issue out of the Chancery for Hoblers and taking of Victuals c. the said Ordinances are not kept If any such Imposition was made the same was made upon great necessity and with consent of the Prelates Counts Barons Autres grandees and some of the Commons then present notwithstanding the King will not that such undue Imposition be drawn into consequence but willeth that the Ordinances in this Petition mentioned be well kept And as touching the taking of victuals alwayes saving the Kings Prerogative his will is that agreement be made with such of whom the same are and shall be taken The Commons alleaging That whereas it was lately ordained and assented by the King and hîs Council that men and horses of the Kings Houshold should not be harbinged in any part of the Country but by Bill of the Marshall of the House delivered to the Constable who should cause them to have good sustenance for themselves and their horses as should be meet and cause their victuals to be prised by the men of the same Towns and before their departures should pay the parties of whom the victuals were taken and if they did not their horses should be arrested and that contrary hereunto they depart without payment pray that in every Bill mention be made of the number of horses and that no more but one Garson be allowed and that payment according to the Statute may be made from day to day The King is pleased that this Article be kept in all points according to the form of the Statute They complain that the Pourveyors of the King Queen and Prince severally doe come yearly assess and Towns severally at ten Quarters of Oates more or less at their pleasure and the same doe cause to be carried away without paying for the same and pray that such Tallages and Pourveyance may be taken away The King will forbid it and that no man take contrary to such prohibition saving to him the Queen his companion and their Children their rightfull takings Eodem Parliamento whereas the horses of the King Queen Prince do wander into divers parts doing much hurt and damage to the people and that hay oats c. are taken contrary to the Ordinances already made the Commons pray That the King will ordain that those horses may abide in some certain place of the Country where they are and that Pourveyance may be had for them in convenient time of the year by the Deputies as may be agreed between them and the owners of those goods The King is well pleased that the Ordinances already made shall be kept and that Pourveyances may be made for his best profit and ease of his People 45 Ed. 3. That no Pourveyance be made for the King but for ready money and that the King be served by common measure The Statutes made before shall be observed They complain of the decay of the Navy by reason tha◠sundry mens ships were stayed for the King long before they served the Masters of the Kings Ships doe take up Masters of the Ships as good as themselves The King will provide Remedy 46 Ed. 3. They complain that Ships arrested have been kept a quarter of a year before they pass out of the Port and in that time the Masters or Marriners have no wages Y
and profit of holy Church and the King and his People Which Rules and Rates being not held to be a publick grievance in all his Reign and the Reigns of King Edward the sixth and Queen Mary some of the Counties in the beginning of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth though the people thereof were most commonly well paid for their provisions by the Queens Pourveyors finding some trouble and attendance in the procuring their monies to be paid for their commodities which were sometimes taken upon credit by reason of so many Offices Cheques Intrada's and Comptrolments which they were to pass through at the Court did about the fourth year of her happy Reign petition her to accept the value in money to be yearly paid by the Countries which she by no means hearkening unto it came afterwards to an agreement what proportion those and severall other Counties should yearly serve in Oxen Calves Muttons Poultry Corn c. In which she was so carefull to preserve her Subjects and People from grievances or just causes of complaints as in Anno 32 of her Reign Nicholls one of her Pourveyors was attainted of Felony and hanged for forcibly taking provisions without money and those compositions and agreements for provision of the Houshold continuing all her glorious and happy Reign and all the Reign of the peaceable King James it was in the eighth year of his Reign in the case betwixt Vaâ—x and Newman resolved by the Judges and allowed for law that it was lawfull for a Pourveyor paying for them to take Cattle for the Kings House by virtue of the Kings Commission and cited the book of 18 H. 6. 19 b. to that purpose And in the third year of the Reign of King Charles the Martyr were none of the grievances then complained of in order to the obtaining of the Petition of Right and confirmation of the Peoples Rights and Liberties or of those which were then alleaged to be infringed Although that in the Reign of King James some of his Pourveyors having taken greater quantities of provision for his House and Stable then ever came or were needfull to his use and caused Timber to be cut down thereupon in Anno 2. of his Reign it was resolved by all the Judges of England and Barons of the Exchequer upon mature deliberation that the Kings Pourveyors could take no Timber growing upon the Inheritances of the Subject because it was parcell of their Inheritances no more then the Inheritance it self of which the King and his Council being informed he did by a Proclamation dated 23 Aprilis anno 4 of his Reign prohibit such their ill dealings and divers Pourveyors were afterwards punished by the Court of Starre-chamber for Pourveying of Timber growing without the consent of the owners Nor had that fatal and ever to be bewailed Remonmonstrance of the House of Commons in Parliament the 15. of December 1641. in which was too industriously amassed and put together all the errors imaginable in the Government and Reign of that pious Prince and more then could be proved any thing to charge upon the Pourveyance or Compositions for the provision of the Kings Houshold but only that the people were vexed and oppressed with Pourveyors and Clerks of the Market neither in their nineteen Propositions in June 1642. sent to the King at Oxford wherein they would have lessened his power all they could and extended their own was there any thing proposed for the taking away of the Royal Pourveyance or Compositions or in other propositions afterwards sent thither or in the Treaties at Uxbridge and the Isle of Wight Nor if causes and circumstances be as they ought to be well weighed in the Ballance of Judgement and all things rightly considered could be any grievance or cause of complaint When as the remote Counties which had less benefit by the constant residence of Q. Elizabeth King James King Charles the First in their Chamber of London the heart of the Kingdome did bear very little and the near adjacent Counties which by heightning their Markets and prices of all sorts of Commodities by a large improvement of their Lands and Rents to above twenty times more then â—t was in the Reign of King Henry the seventh and ten times more then it was in the eighteenth year of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth might better afford it did not pay or bear much in the Pourveyance or Composition which were made by the Justices of the Peace in each County upon consultation and agreement with the Officers of the Green-cloth in the Kings House for serving in a certain quantity of provisions out of every County at such rates and prices as were agreed on betwixt them as by a few instances of many may easily appear by what was yearly charged upon the Counties of Essex and Midlesex neer adjacent to London and the Counties of Derby Worcester and York which were more remote viz.  The Kings price Totall  l. s. d. l. s. d. Wheat 500 quarters at 0 6 8 166 13 4 Oxen fat 20 at 4 0 0 80 0 0 Muttons fat 300 at 0 6 8 100 0 0 Veals 300 at 0 6 8 100 0 0 Porks 100 at 0 6 8 33 6 8 Boars 6 at 0 13 4 4 0 0 Bacon Flitches 30 at 0 2 0 3 0 0 Lambs 1200 at 0 1 0 60 0 0 Geese 5 dozen at 0 4 0 1 0 0 Capons 10 dozen at 0 4 0 2 0 0 Hens 30 dozen at 0 2 0 3 0 0 Chickens 150 dozen at 0 2 0 15 0 0 Pullets 40 dozen at 0 1 6 3 0 0 Hay 134 loads at 0 8 0 53 12 0 Oats 1426 quarters at 0 4 0 285 4 0 Litter 120 loads at 0 4 0 24 0 0 Wood 769 loads at 0 3 0 115 7 0 Coals 250 chalder at 0 13 9 171 17 6 Summe    1201 0 6  Kings price Totall Wheat 200 quarters at 0 6 8 66 13 4 Veals 40 at 0 12 0 24 0 0 Veals 100 at 0 6 8 33 6 8 Green Geese 20 doz at 0 3 0 3 0 0 Capons course 10 doz at 0 4 0 2 0 0 Hens 20 dozen at 0 2 0 2 0 0 Pullets 20 dozen at 0 1 6 1 10 0 Chicken 40 dozen at 0 2 0 4 0 0 Hay 202 loads at 0 4 0 40 8 0 Oats 211 quar 2 bush at 0 4 0 42 5 0 Litter 180 loads at 0 4 0 36 0 0 Wood 200 loads at 0 3 0 30 0 0 Summe    285 3 0 The Market price Totall Difference l. s. d. l. s. d. l. s. d. 1 16 8 916 13 4 640 0 0 10 0 0 200 0 0 120 0 0 1 0 0 300 0 0 200 0 0 1 4 0 360 0 0 260 0 0 1 3 4 116 13 4 83 6 8 4 0 0 24 0 0 20 0 0 0 10 0 15 0 0 12 0 0 0 8 0 480 0 0 420 0 0 0 18 0 4 10 0 3 10 0 0 16
solvat persolvat postea forisfacturam nor to sell or buy any thing for money but within Cities and before three witnesses nor without a Voucher or warranty and if any did otherwise they were to be fined and at last incurre a forfeiture Item nullum mercatum vel forum fieri permittatur nisi in civitatibus regni jus suum commune dignitatis coronae quae constituta sunt a bonis predecessoribus suis deperiri non possunt nec violari sed omnia rite in aperto per judicium â—ieri debent likewise that no Market be kept but in Cities so that the right of the King and the dignity of his Crown as it was constituted in the times of his good predecessors might not be lost defrauded or violated and that all things be rightly and openly done according to right and justice King Henry the 1. his Son saith the Monk of Malmsbury corrected the false Ell or Measure so called of the Merchants brachii sui mensura adhibita omnibusque per Angliam proposita causing one to be made according to the measure or length of his own arm ordered it to be used through all England and in his Laws reckoneth the punishment of false Coiners and prohibiting and punishing of Forestall or forestalling of Markets inter Jura his Rights Royal Prerogatives quae Rex Angliae solus super omnes homines habet in terra sua which belonged to him only as King of England and without an Act of Parliament ordered the rate and value of mony which being the mensura rerum measure guide of all things in commerce and dealings one man with another hath no small influence or power in the heightning or lessening of the price of things and is such a part of Soveraignty as the Parliament in their 19. high and mighty and unreasonable propositions sent unto the late King Charles the Martyr in his troubles in June 1642. never attempted to restrain or take from him In the Reign of King Henry the second when as Ranuphus de Glanvilla Chief Justice of England under him saith in that book which is generally believed to have been written by him the Laws and Customes of England being ratione introductis diu obtentis founded upon reason and long used had arrived to that perfection as pauperes non opprimabantur adversarii potentia nec a limitibus Judiciorum propellabat quenquam amicorum favor gratia the poor were not oppressed by their adversaries power nor did partiality or friendship hinder any from Justice the inquiry and punishment of false measures and all manner of deceipts did appertain Coronae Regis to the King only Justices in Eyre were after the return of King Richard the first from his Captivity sent into all Counties of England to enquire amongst other things de Faeneratoribus vinis venditis contra Assisam de falsis mensuris tam vini quam aliarum rerum of Usurers and of wine sold contrary to the Assize and of false measures as well of wine as other things In Anno quarto of King John being thirteen years before the granting of Magna Charta de Libertatibus Angliae the great Charter of the Liberties of England the King did by his Edict and Proclamation command the Assize of bread to be strictly observed under the pain of standing upon the Pillory and the rates were set the Assise approved per Pistorem as Matthew Paris saith Gaufridi filii Petri Justiciarii Angliae Pistorem R. de Thurnam by the Baker of Jeoffry Fitz Peter Justice of England and the Baker of R. of Thurnam And in the Magna Charta and Liberties granted by him afterwards at Running Munde or Mead near Stanes assented which our Ancestors and Procurers of that Charter believed to be for a publick good that una mensura vini cervisiae sit per totum Regnum una mensura bladi scilicet quarterium Londinense una latitudo pannorum tinctorum russetorum haubergetorum panni genus a kind of Cloth saith Sir Henry Spelman then so called there should be throughout all England one measure of Wine and Beer and the like of Corn and of the breadth of Cloth died and russet or other kinds And was confirmed by King Henry the third his Son in Anno 9. of his Reign who by an Ordinance made by the Kings command and on the behalf of the King howsoever it be stiled a Statute and is placed in our Statute book collected by Mr. Poulton amongst those which he calleth Statutes incerti temporis made in the Reigns of Hen. 3. Ed. 1. or Ed. 2. but cannot assign by whom or in what years or times but in all probability in the Reign of King Henry the third did ordain that no Forestaller which is an open oppresser of poor people and of the Commonalty and an enemy of the whole Shire and Countrey which for greediness of his private gain doth prevent others in buying Grain Fish Herring or any other thing to be sold coming by Land or waters oppressing the poor and deceiving the rich and câ—rrieth away such things intending to sell them more deer should be suffered to dwell in any Town he that shall be convict thereof shall for the first offence be amerced and lose the thing so bought and for the second time have judgement of the Pillory the third time be imprisoned and make Fine and the fourth time abjure the Town And this Judgement to be given upon all manner of Forestallers and likewise upon them that have given them counsel help or favour And providing that his people should not be oppressed with immoderate unreasonable prices in the buying of food and victuals and other necessaries did by his Writ limit the price of Lampreys and had as his Royal Progenitors such a power and just Prerogative of regulating and well ordering of Markets and Fairs as notwithstanding any Charters or Grants of Fairs and Markets to Cities and Towns he did in anno quinto of his Reign upon a complaint of some Merchants of Lynn that when they came to sell their goods and Merchandize at Norwich the Merchants or Tradesmen took away their goods and Merchandise to the value of three hundred marks by his writ give them power to arrest and seize any goods of the Norwich Merchants which should come to any Fairs at Lyn untill that Justice should be done unto them And in anno 49. of his Reign commanded the Barons of the Exchequer that they should inroll and cause to be executed his Letters Patents of a Confirmation to the Citizens of Lincoln of a Charter of King Henry the second his Grandfather that the Sheriff and other the Kings Officers and Ministers of Lincolnschiry should not hinder forraign Merchants to come to Lincoln to trade there ita rationabiliter juste as reasonably and justly as they were wont to do in
for a greater observance is certainly to be tendered unto the King even in that particulâ—r of Praeemption which may well be believed by all that are not Quakers whose Tenants all the people of England are mediately or immediately by some or other Tenure Then that which is usually done to Lords of Manors Justices of Peace or Country Gentlemen by their Tenants or poorer sort of Neighbours who if they chance to catch any Woodcocks or Partridges in any of those Gentlemens Lands will bring them to their â—ouses to sell at such cheap and easie rates as they shall please to give for them and if which seldome happens they should carry them to the Markets and not thither are sure enough to be chid for it and crossed and denied in any greater matter which they shall have to doe with them And is but that or a little more curtesie which Butchers Fishmongers and other Tradesmen selling victualls or provisions in great quantities and all the year or often unto their constant Customers will not for their own ends fail to doe or neglect or to sell unto them at easier rates then unto others and find themselves to be many times no loosers by it insomuch as some have lately well afforded to sell to a constant Customer for great quantities at the same rate it was 40 or 60 years before And the Compositions of the Counties for Pourveyance to serve in Beefe Mutton Poultry Corn Malt and other provisions for the Kings Houshold and the maintenance and support of it at a more cheaper rate then the Markets yeild which when they were first set was but the Market rate or a little under long agoe made and agreed upon by the greater Officers of the Kings Houshold and some Justices of Peace in every County and easily and equally taxed and laid upon the whole and not upon any particular man which was poor or of a small Estate not fit to bear it May be with as much and more reason allowed and chearfully submitted unto as those many now called quit rents or Rent services which the most of our Nobility Gentry and others not for some few of them doe yet hold some of their Tenants to their antient and reasonable Customes doe receive and their Tenants easily and willingly pay for their several sorts of â—apola Gavels or Tributes charged upon their Lands before and since the Conquest in Kent a County recounting with much comfort of their many Priviledges and beneficiall Customes and most parts of England as Gavel Erth to Till some part of their Landlords Ground Gavel Rip to come upon summons to help to reap their Corn Gavel Râ—d to make so many perches of hedge Gavel Swine for pawnage or feeding their Swine in the Lords Woods Gavel werk which was either Manuopera by the person of the Tenant or Carropera by his Carts or Cariages Harth-silver Chimney-money or Peter-pence which some Mesne Lords do yet receive Were Gavel in respect of Wears and Kiddels to catch Fish pitched and placed by the Sea coasts Gavel noht or Fother or Rent Foder which did signifie pabulum or alimentum ut Saxones antiqui dixerunt and comprehended all sorts of victuals or provisions as the old Saxons interpreted it for the Lord probably in his progress or passing by them and was in usage and custome in the time of Charlemaigne the Emperor about the year of our Lord 800. when the people of Italy Regi venienti in Italiam solvere tenebantur pro quo saepe etiam aestimata pecunia pendebatur were to provide Foder or provisions for the King when he came into Italy in liew of which money to the value thereof was sometimes paid and was long after taken to be so reasonable as it was by the Princes and Nobility of Italy acknowledged in an Assembly to be inter Regalia as a Prerogative due to the King And after the Conquest for Aver Land or Ouver Land carriage of the Lords Corn to Markets and Fairs or of his domestick utensils saith the learned and Judicious Mr. Somner or houshold provisions of the Lord or his Steward when they removed from one place to another sometimes by horse Average sometimes by foot Average one while within the Precinct of the Manor thence called In average and at other times without and then called Out Average whereupon such Tenants were known by the name of Avermanni or Bermanni Smiths Land holden by the service of doing the Smiths work the not performing of which several services so annexed to the said several sorts of Lands and their Tenures made them to be forfeited which though not exchanged and turned into Rents Regis ad exemplum in imitation of the indulgence and favour of King Henry the first to the Tenants of his demeasne Lands either then or shortly after but many of them as appeareth by Mr. Somner continuing in Kent to the Reign of Henry the third others to Edward the first and Edward the third and some in other places to the Reign of King Henry the sixth and in all or many of the Abbies and Religious Houses untill their dissolution in the later end of the Reign of King Henry the eighth notwithstanding that the Lords of Manors and Leets receiving those free or quit Rents as they were called of their Freeholders and Tenants belonging unto their several Manors in lieu and recompence of those services did or ought in their Court Leets twice a year holden cause to be presented and punished any unreasonable prises for provisions or victuals sold in Markets Fairs oâ— otherwise or if they have not Leets are when they are Justices of Peace authorised to doe it and by that untill their Interests perswaded them to let their Tenants use all manner of deceipts in their Marketings and get what unreasonable prises they pleased so as they themselves might rack their Rents farre beyond former ages might have had their provisions untill this time at as low and easie rates as the Kings prouisions and Compositions were at when they were rated and set by the Justices of Peace in the severall Counties and all others of their Neighbourhood might also have enjoyed the benefit of the like rates which the Law intended them And the King may as well or better deserve and expect as many Boons or other services as the Nobility and other great men of the Kingdome doe notwithstanding many Priviledges and Indulgences granted by their more liberall Auncestors and better bestowing their bounties to their Tenants And to be furnished with Carts and Carriages at easie rates as well as the Earl of Rutland is at this day for nothing upon any removall from Belvoir Castle in Lincolnshire to Haddon in Darbyshire and elsewhere from one place to another with very many Carts of his Tenants which are there called Boon Carts when as all Lords or Gentlemen of any rank place or quality in the Kingdome doe take it to be no burden or grievance to their
to be charged upon the Revenues of the Holy Church and that of the Clergy but shall claim some priviledges and exemptions therein be pleased to remember that although Simon Islip Archbishop of Canterbury being in many things a man of a severe life and discipline did write his Speculum Regis aforesaid or a book so called sharply inveighing against the Kings Pourveyors and their manner of taking the Pourveyance without money or due payment in some sence and feeling probably of the taking of it from the Clergy complained of by them in the Parliament of 18 of Edward the third they being no longer before exempted from it some only as the Abbot of Battel and others specially priviledged excepted then the first year of the Reign of that King who as Matthew Parker in the life of Walter Reynold Archbishop of Canterbury mentioneth being very well pleased with the Clergy for so freely contributing to his Warres did in Parliament not only restore unto them vetera antiquissima privilegia Ecclesiae Anglicanae the old and antient Rights of the Church of England which by Magna Charta could as to Cartâ— taking claim but the same freedom which those did who held by Knight service viz. that their own Carts used in their Demeasnes should not be taken for the Kings use but de novis auxit i. e. de non exigendis a Clero in regis hospitium esculentis poculentis vecturis similibus gave them new priviledges that is to say to be freed from furnishing of Carts and provisions of victuals for the Kings Houshold Yet he and all other the Bishops of England could at the same time and their Successors after them do unto this day justly and lawfully take receive in their Visitations once every 3 years a certain Rate or Tax set upon every Benefice propter hospitium towards the charge of their expences house keeping and victuals which saith Mr. Stephens in his learned and judicious Treatise of Procurations and Synodals are Perquisites or Profits of their Spiritual Jurisdictions as creation money given to a Duke or Earl for the maintenance of his honour and by reason of the great Trains Attendance of Bishops heretofore with one hundred or two hundred men and horses at a time some of the Visitors carrying Hounds and Hawks with them and sparing not the exempt and priviledged placed it grew to be so excessive as interdum Ecclesiastica ornamenta subditi exponere tenebantur the poor Clergy were enforced to make provision for them by selling their Church plate and ornaments and it was therefore by a Constitution of Boniface the eighth about the year 1295. ordained that the Archbishops should be limited unto 40 or 50 men and horses the Bishops to 20 or 30 the Cardinals unto 25 and the Arch-Deacons unto 5 or 7 and they were prohibited to carry Hounds and Hawks along with them and that also bringing but little ease to the inferiour Clergie saith Mr. Stephens because when victuals were not furnished they being left unlimited in Compositions or summes of money to be taken in lieu or recompence thereof broke down the doors of Monasteries and Churches taking where they were denied what they could lay their hands on which caused the Councell of Vienna in the year 1311. to declaim against and prohibit such doings which being not redressed might have put Simon Istip in mind who was betwixt that and 1349. when he was elected Arch-bishop of Canterbury in almost the zenith and heighth of his preferment as Councellor and Secretary to King Edward the third and Keeper of the Privy Seal to have written as well against the abuse of Visitations and Procurations if the Book which I have not seen and is only to be found in Sir Robert Cottons excellently well furnished library do not as I could never understand it did mention them as against the abuses in the maner of making the Kings Pourveyances But was the cause howsoever that Pope Benedict the twelfth about the year 1337. which was the eleventh year of the Reign of King Ed. 3. did make a Canon or Constitution to settle a proportionable rate of mony to be paid in lieu of victuals or provisions out of all Churches Monasteries and Religious Houses not exempted and where custome and the smalness of the Benefices have not lessened it was as Lindewood saith in the Reign of King Henry the fifth of and out of every Benefice for the Arch-Deacons procuration no less then seven shillings and six pence which was for each man attending him twelve pence towards the defraying of his charges being then a great ordinary and eighteen pence for the Arch-deacon himself as well when they did visit as when they did not And even Simon Islip himself whilest he was so busie about other mens failings was not without some of his own nor was so great a friend to Justice in every part of it or in his own particular as he might have been for when he had been as Matthew Parker Arch-Bishop of Canterbury one of his reverend and worthy Successors in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth recordeth it at some extraordinary charges in repairing of his Manor house at Wrotham in Kent and obtained a Licence from the Pope to tax all the Clergie of his Province at a great in every twenty marks towards his expences therein the Collectors did probably by his privity so order it that they gathered a Tenth which being complained of could never be refunded And if he and his Successors had not continued the custome of their Procurations and other profits raised from the Clergy towards their more honourable and necessary support would have been blamed as much as he was by Matthew Parker and others long before his time with a malè audivit for releasing to the Earl of Arundel for 240 marks the yearly payment of 26 red and fallow Deer in their seasons to the Arcbishops of Canterbury Who as well as other Bishops can take and receive Subsidium Cathedraticum which is a duty of prerogative and superiority Quarta Episcopalis which is given to them for the reparation of Churches which if the Cathedrals be not intended thereby is not bestowed upon the Parochiall Churches which the Rectors and Parishioners are now only charged with Doe continue their taking also of Proxies being an exhibition towards their charges for their visitation of Religious houses since dissolved and not now at all in being and permit their Arch-Deacons in some Dioceses to receive their Pentecostalia or Whitsun farthings for every Family yet used and taken by the Bishops Arch-Deacons of the Diocesses of Worcester and Gloucester be well pleased with some good Benefices many times allowed them in Commendam to make out and help the inequality of the Revenues of some of their Bishopricks with the greater charges and expence of their spirituall dignities And their middle sort of Clergie can be well content to eâ—ke and piece out their Benefices with
Elizabeth if they stood upon equall terms with him and owed him neither gratitude allegiance or subjection That he who is so great a looser by the change alteration of times and his own his Royal Progenitors bounties and indulgences might howsoever be allowed to be a little gainer in that one particular of the Compositions for his Pourveyances for in every thing else he is abundantly a very great looser and ought as well to take an advantage by it as the Clergie and Impropriators of England doe by the rise and encrease of their Tithes and impâ—ovement of their Glebes and are sure to be gainers by the difference in the value and price of commodities when as they sell their corn at the highest rates and make the improvement of their Glebes to follow the rise of money and the Markets And may take it to be no Paradox or stranger to any mans understanding or belief that the King who by his Lawes hath ordered that reasonable prises and rates should be taken for victuals and houshold provisions for himself and all his people and if his Sheriffs Justices of Peace Clerks of the Markets and the Lords and Stewards of Court-leets had but imitated the care of their Predecessors in the execution of the trusts committed unto them by their Soveraign and his Laws or of the Sheriffs in the reign of King Henry the third when as the King by his Writ being petitioned to give the Sheriffe of Bedford a power to dispence with the Vintners in the Town of Bedford for selling wine above the rates assize doth it in these words Rex c. Vic. Bed salutem Quia Villa de Bedeford distat a quolibet portu maris duas dietas tibi praecipimus quod permittas Vinitar Bed Sextarium vini Franc. vendere pro 8. denar sextarium vini Andeg. Wascon de Blanc pro 10 d. non obstante c. Teste R. c. allowing them to take for a pint and a half if the Sextarie was then accompted to be no greater a measure of wine 7 d. and for the like measure of white wine of Anjou and Gascoine 10 d. And had not as they doe daily too much neglected the execution of the Laws and laid by their duties to God their King and Country and by being over wakefull and diligent to improve their estates and private interests taken a Nap or fit of sleeping in point of time farre beyond that of the seven notorious Sleepers might at this day have been out of the reach of the causeless murmur of those who as they were seduced and fooled by Oliver and his Associates in the greatest of iniquities can make a Non causa to be a cause of their Complaints and of a grievance to themselves when as they and many of their fellow Subjects are and have been the only and immediate causes of it and if rightly considered is a reall grievance to the King and to all that buy more then they sell. And that if the King and his Laws had been as they ought to have been better obeyed and observed in such a Land or Kingdome as England is which is justly accompted to be blest with so much peace and plenty and such an over-plus of all things good and pleasant as well as necessary for the sustenance of the People or Inhabitants thereof as a deer year is not heard of above once at the most in ten or twenty years but many very cheap ones The rates or prices agreed upon by the Counties in the fourth year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth would have been enough and sufficient or more then enough if the Acts of Parliament of 25 H. 8. ca. 2. to suppress the enhaunce of the then Market rates which may well be supposed to have been much cheaper then what it was in Anno 4 of Elizabeth and the Statutes of incerti temporis or King Henry the third 3 4 Ed. 6. ca. 19. 5 Ed. 6. ca. 14. against Forestallers had been duly put in execution And that the 12. Counties bordering upon London and adjacent as Middlesex Essex Kent Surrey Sussex Hertford Buckingham Berkshire Bedford Oxford Cambridge and Hâ—ntington Shires making no small gains by the vent and rise of their provisions and commodities and an high improvement of their Lands beyond all other Counties and Parts of England would if the Markets had been regulated and kept down to such just and reasonable prices as might have been well enough afforded have for want of their now great rates for victuals and commodities night and day sent unto London that greatest belly and mouth of the Kingdome and their racking or improving of their Lands been constrained to let fall and diminish their rates and prices and follow the regulating of the Markets and make their prices and rates to be conformable to the Laws and plenty of the Kingdome which would have brought unto them and their Estates a greater or more then supposed damage many times and very far exceeding the pretended losses of serving in their proportions of the Kings provisions as they were agreed upon And if this shall not be believed without experiments or demonstrations they may be quickly brought to assent unto that which will certainly pâ—ove to be a truth that if the King should as King Henry the second keep his Court and Parliament for a time at â—larendon in Wiltshire or as King Edward the first did keep his Court and Parliament in Denbigh-shire at Ruthland too often mistaken and called Rutland or at Carnarvon in Wales or at York where whilest he was busie and imployed in his Warres against the Scots he kept his Terms and Court for seven years together or as many of the former Kings did keep their Christmas and other great yearly Festivals sometimes at Nottingham other times at Worcester Lincoln and other places far remote from London And as the Sun yearly diffuseth his liâ—ht and heat in his journey through the Tropicks some at one time and some at another unto all parts of the world or as the blood in the body naturall daily circulates visits and comforts all the parts of it should enrich comfort most of the parts of his Kingdom with the presence and influence of his Courts and residence Those rates and prises in the Composition for Pourveyances would rather prove to be too high a rate and allowance then too little As it happened to be in Anno 1640. when the late King and Martyr was enforced to be with his Court and Army about Newcastle upon Tine on the borders and confines of Scotland where the cheapness of victualls and other provisions at the Market rates in those parts fell to be very much under the Kings rates or allowance according to the Compositions for his Pourveyance made in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth which the Inhabitants and People thereabouts understood so well as a great store and farre more pâ—ovisions being daily brought in at those rates then
preserve and increase their Husbands estates not to waste or destroy them would if they might injoy their spending humors in the wasteful course of their lives be able to consume the value of all or the greatest part of the Lands and Estates in a County But however such kind of people shall so misuse their estates and Talents our Kings Princes being to guide their Actions by higher more transcendent rules then any of their Subjects did in the better times of vertue and Hospitality are not certainly to be restrained in the magnificence and state of their House-keeping nor to have the means whereby they should do it diverted or diminished when as Alexander the Great answered some that â—ound fault with the greatness of his gift or bounty to a mean man The gifts of Kings are not altogether to be proportioned according to the men who receive it but of the King that giveth it and as the Duke of Savoy said unto King Henry the fourth of France when he found him unwilling to grant or remit unto him the Marquisate of Saluces Kings do wrong the greatness of their courage if they shall not give great things For if there were no necessity of a largeness of heart and expences in Hospitality in the Nobility and Gentry of this Nation they would not be good Subjects to blame it in their King nor honorers of him unless they should as they ought and are enjoyned by their Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy maintain and defend his Honor and Jurisdictions who by the preeminency of his Imperial Dignity is not to want that which should help to support and adorn it when as to that and the preservation of his people who are to subâ—ist and be protected by his welfare honor and happiness there will be a real and very great CHAP. V. Necessity that the King should have and enjoy his Ancient Right of Pourveyance or Compositions for them FOr that there is and should be always a necessity to observe the Laws of God Nature and Nations right reason and the Laws and reasonable Customes of England and of honoring and obeying the King and keeping him from mischiefs and inconveniencies and that the members of the body Politick should as every part of the body natural doth be willing to assist and contribute unto the good and well being of the head and better part of it And although that sin the fruitful parent of all our evils and miseries be not in numero eligibilium or to be put within the pleas of necessity yet goodness vertue and the duties of holy life are propter se expetibilia for their real benefits and excellencies to be desired and thirsted after as the Hart panteth and thirsteth after the water brooks And it would be neither wisdom nor goodness in the people to subject the King to an yeerly loss of seventy three thousand six hundred seven pounds fourteen shillings and seven pence which he did the last year loose in his house-keeping by the want of his Pourveyance or Compositions for them and by the excessive Rates and Prices of Provisions for his houshold which were put upon him by the avarice and ill custome of such as sold or furnished them besides his greater then formerly charge of Carts and other parts of the Royal Pourveyance and drive him thereby into wants of money which may either cause him to be more sparing then he would be otherwise in his Royal favors bounty indulgences and Charity to his people or to seek after and take those many legal and just advantages to support himself in his Kingly Office which the Law affords and cannot be denyed him or give a greater liberty or attention then otherwise he would to his necessities or the designs or invention of those who by finding out ways of supply to an over-burdened and insufficient Royal Revenue may shew the people their errors in the denyal of just rights and duties and by putting him to inconveniencies exceedingly increase and multiply their own and that it would be much better to imitate the prudence of Abigail who to make some recompence to Davids keeping safe all that appertained to her husband Nâ—bal so that nothing was missing whilst he was a wall unto him and his people by night and by day made haste and took two hundred Loaves two Bottles of Wine five Sheep ready dressed five measures of parched Corn an hundred Clusters or Lumpes of Raisins and two hundred Cakes of Figgs and intreated him to accept of the blessing or present which she had brought unto him then the indiscretion ingratitude and folly of her Husband Nabal and consider that even the Beasts of the Forrest would think themselves more happy and safe when the Lyon shall have his Food and Dyet provided for him and his family then that he and the young Lyons should roar for hunger and that it would be better for the Shephard to bring him a Lambe or two of the Flock then to enforce him in the extremity of hunger to come and take away three times as many more and carry to his Den. That the Turks may as they have for many ages past rejoyce in the foolish covetousness of the Citizens of Constantinople whose generations may curse and abominate their selfishness and then supposed wisdom in denying their Emperor money and means to defend them bewail the loss of Greece and weep unpittied for their children when they are by the command of that grand Tyrant of the Mahometan Empire taken from them and driven like heards of Cattle and Flocks of Sheep never more to know or remember their parents or be of the Christian Religion to his Serraglio where the Males are bred up in the service of his wars or civil affairs and many of their daughters made to be his Concubines And the French may lament their ill usage of their King Charles the seventh in his great extremities in refusing necessary Aids to resist the successes of our English Conquering forefathers which brought the Pesantry and lower ranks of that â—ince Gabelled and over Salted people not only to their present miseries and that fertility of Taxes which is since most fatally rivetted and entailed upon them but the loss of all their liberties Experience having told our Progenitors how much the necessities and wants of some of our Kings and Princes have heretofore given way to the excursions of some of their servants and Ministers upon the rights and liberties of the people which made the Lords and Commons in Parliament frequently in sundry Ages and Parliaments past to take a great care for the support and honor of their House-keeping the preserving of the Kings Rights and Revenues and the punishment of such as were any cause of the waste or diminishing of it And that a supply of the Kings wants or for the payment of his debts could never yet nor can be so Arithmetically made or proportioned either as to what was past or to come as
some immunities and priviledges to them their successors and after generations in perpetuity When some families may be forever made happy as one was in a progress of King James when a careful Gentlewoman with her seven young children having too small an estate to educate them being purposely placed in a stand where the King was brought to shoot at a Deer and pleasantly tendred to the King as a Hen with her seven Chicken gave his Princely charity and bounty the opportunity to take them into his care and service when they came to be fit for it and brought either all or most of them to great preferments when poor people or their children being lame or diseased with the sickness called the Kings Evil may be freed from their otherwise tedious journeys and charges in going to London their abode there and returning home which if a Tax were laid upon their Parishes to furnish would come to as much if not more then the charge of Cart taking and Pourveyance did cost them When our Pool of Bethesda shall be Itinerant and the good Angel shall yearly ride his Circuit to bring blessings and cures to those that need it and where a multitude of people shall not be the cause of uncovering the roof of any house to let down the sicke in their beds to be healed All which with many other comforts and benefits which the King by his progress or residence brings to all which are or shall be near it The City of York in the North parts of England and her adjacent and neighbor Provinces would purchase at a greater rate then the Pourveyances or Compositions for them do or did ever yearly amount unto and being like to be gâ—eat and glad gainers by it would be most chearfully willing and ready to carry or remove his travailing goods or utensils from or to any of his Royal houses at his no contemptible or unreasonable rates or Prices Oâ— the City of Worcester or Town of Shrowsbury with their adjacent bordering Shires would in the prospect or certain gain of it be not at all discontented or troubled at the neighboâ—hood of such an enriching staple comfort Which every man may believe when as he must be a great stranger to England as well as to common sense and understanding who cannot apprehend how much relief an old fashioned English Gentlemans house for we must distinguish betwixt rich hospitable good men and those who being weary of Gods long continued mercies and patience do think they are not Gentlemen or well educated if they do not swear as fast as they can God damne me and the devil take me and make themselves and their wives and children their estate and all that they have the prey and business of Taylors Vintners Cooks Pimps Flatterers and all that may consume them is unto two or three Cottages or poor peoples houses near unto it what small Villages and Towns and how mean unfrequented and poor Oxford and Cambridge were before the founding of those famous Universities and the Colledges and Halls in them How many Villages and some Borrough Towns have been founded and built by the warmth and comfort of the Kings Palaces as Woodstock c. how many have been built or much augmented by the neighborhood of Abbies and Monasteries c. as Evesham Reding Bangor St. Albans c. and of Bishops houses as Croydon Lambeth c. though many or most of the Religious Houses in England and Wales were at the first designed intended for solitude How many great Towns and Villages in Middlesex Essex and Kent have been more then in other Counties more remote built or much augmented and increased by the Kings residence at London and the Port Towns and conveniency for Shipping How many Farmers in Berkshire and other Counties near London have more then in those farther distant converted their Barns into Gentlemens Halls or stately houses and began their Gentility with great and plentiful revenues to support it What addresses or suites are often made to Judges in their Circuits to transfer the keeping of the Assizes from some City or Shire Town to some other Town in the County to help or do them some good by the resort and company which comes to the Assizes as to keep it at Maidstone and not at Canterbury in the County of Kent at Woolverhampton not at Stafford in the County of Stafford c. or to keep Terms in a time of Pestilence and adjornment from London to St. Albans Hertford or Reding how like an Antwerp or the Skeleton or ruins of a forsaken City the Suburbs of London now the greatest and beautifullest part of it would be if the residence of the King and his Courts of Justice should be removed from thence or discontinued How many thousand families would be undone and ruined and how those stately buildings would for want of that daily comfort which they received by it moulder and sink down inter rudera under its daily â—uines and give leave to the earth and grass to cover and surmount them and turn the new Troy if that were not a fable into that of the old Which the Citizens of London very well understood when in the raign of King Richard the second and the infancy of those blessings and riches which since have hapned to that City by the Kings of England making it to be their darling or Royal Chamber that King was so much displeased with them as besides a fine of ten thousand pounds imposed upon them for some misdemeanors their liberties seised their Maior committed prisoner to the Castle of Windsor and diverse Aldermen and substantial Citizens arrested he removed his Court from London where not long before at a solemn Justes or Tourney he had kept open house for all comers they most humbly and submissively pacified â—im and procured his return to so great a joy of the Citizens as they received him with four hundred of their Citizens on horseback clad all in one Liveâ—y and pâ—esented the King and Queen with many rich gifts All which and more which may happen by the Kings want of his Pourveyance or Compositions for them and keeping him and his Officers and Servants in want of money or streightning him or them in their necessaries and daily provisions may perswade every man to subscribe to these Axioms that the more which the King hath the more the people have That whosoever cozens and deceives the King cozens and deceives the people that the wants and necessities of the King and common parent which is to be supplyed by the people are and will become their own wants and necessities That it cannot be for the good or honor of the Nation that the King who is not onely Anima Cor Caput Radix Reipublicae the Soul heart head and foundation of the Commonwealth but the defender and preserver of it should either want or languish in his honor and estate when as unusquisque subditorum saith Valdesius Regi ut
cujus effectus est necessarius nisi aliunde impediatur could not be so the sole or proper cause of it as if not otherwise hindered it could not want its necessary effect CHAP. VII That the supposed plenty of money and Gold and Silver in England since the Conquest of the West Indies by the Spaniards hath not been a cause of raising the prices of food and victuals in England BUt will upon a due examination be too light in the Ballanee of Truth and Reason and deserve a place in the Catalogue of vulgar Errors For that the rise of Silver in its value or denomination by certain gradations or parts in several Ages from twenty pence the ounce by King Henry the sixth by his prerogative to thirty pence and between his Raign and that of Queen Elizabeth to forty pence and after to forty five pence and after to sixty pence ours being of a finer standard mixture or Allay then that of France the united Belgicque Provinces or the haâ—se or Imperial Cities of Germany and is now as high as five shillings and a penny the ounce comes far short of the now or then enhaunce of victuals and commodities and makes so large a disproportion as the abundance of that could not be probably the cause of the dearth of victuals and all manner of Commodities for that the plenty of those bewitching and domineering mettals of Gold and Silver supposed to be betwixt the Times of the discovery and subduing of the Indian Mines in the Raign of our King Henry the seventh which was about the year of our Lord one thousand five hundred and five and the middle of the Raign of King Edward the sixth when as those Irritamenta malorum American riches and the alurements of them did not in the time of Charles the fifth Emperor who out-lived our King Henry the eight amount unto for his account any more then five hunddred thousand Crowns of Gold and with that and what came into Europe to the Spanish Merchants Accompts our English havâ—ng not then learnt the way to the West Indies or to search the unknown passages of the unmerciful Ocean could not have so great an influence upon England which was no neer neighbor to the Indies as to cause that dearth of Victuals all commodities which was heavily complained of in the raign of King Edward the sixth and if it had there would not have been any necessity of King Henry the 8. embasing or mixing with Copper so much as he did the Gold and Silver Coin of the Nation or that the price of the ounce of Silver should be raised betwixt the Raign of King Henry the 7. and the middle of the raign of Queen Elizabeth to sixty pence or five shillings the ounce and though it must be granted that the raising of the ounce of Silver by King Henry the 8. or King Edward the 6. to five and forty pence and afterwards by some of his successors to sixty pence and the making of more pence out of an Ounce then was formerly might be some cause of the enhaunce of the price of victuals and commodities And that some of our Gallants or Gentlemen of these times forgetting the laudable fâ—ugality of their ancestors who had otherwise not have been able to have leâ—t them those Lands estates which do now so elevate their Poles â—ay by coiting their mony from them as if they were weary of it many times ignorantly give out of their misused abundance more mony or as much again as a thing is worth or not having money to play the fools withall in the excess of gluttony or apparel or the pursuite of their other vices may sometimes by taking them upon day or trust give three or four timâ—s more then the commoditys would be sold to another for ready money the seller being many times never paid at all and if he should reckon his often attendance and waiting upon such a customer to no other purpose but to tire himself and never get a peny of his money would have been a greater gainer if he had given him his wares or commodityes for nothing and if after many yeers he should by a chance meet with his money looseth more by his interest then the principal amounted unto Yet if Parliaments which have been composed of the collected wisdom of the Nation and their Acts and Statutes which have been as they are understood to be made with the wisdom and universal consent of the people of England tanta solemnitate and with so great solemnity as Fortescue in the Raign of King H. 6. and the Judges in Doctor Fosters Case in 12. Jac. Regis do say they are may be credited the plenty of Gold and Silver was never alleaged or believed to be a cause of the dearness of Victuals and provisions When as the Statute of Herring made in the thirty fifth year of the Raign of King Edward the third when the Trade of Clothing was in a most flourishing condition such a Trade necessarily inducing conferring some plenty of money declares the cause of the dearness of Herring to be because that the Hostes of the Town of great Yarmouth who lodged the Fishers coming there in the time of the Fair would not suffer the Fishers to sell their Herrings nor to meddle with the sale of the same but sell them at their own will as dear as they will and give the Fishers that pleaseth them so that the Fishers did withdraw themselves to come there and the Herring was set at a greater dearth then there was before and that men outvied and overbid each other For if the many accidents concurring to the enhauncing of the price of any thing or commodity beyond its ordinary and intrinsicque worth value shall be rightly considered as famine the unseasonableness of the year or harvest blasts or Mildews of Corn transportation fear of an approaching famine keeping Corn and provisions from Markets and hoarding them up eâ—ther for the people 's own use or to catch an opportunity of the highest rates the scarcity or surpassing excellency of it obstructions which wars policy or controversies of Princes or neighbor Nations one with or against another may put upon it a general Murrain or Mortality of Cattel Inundations of waters great store of provision or foder for Cattle or a gentle Winter the charge and burden of a new Tolle or Taxe a present necessity to have the thing desired to be bought or had which the crafty and covetous seller hath taken notice of the importunity of an affection to have it although it cost a great deal more then the worth of it or the conveniency for one more then another which may recompence the damage in giving too much for it or more then was otherwise needful making it to be a good bargain for that particular person time or place which would not be so for others and the Market people imitating one anothers high demands
subdued and conquered as they were enforced to be shaved and wear their hair shorter their Lands being given away to his Normans the greatest part of the Nobility and Gentry extirped many of the common people glad to be vassals and Tenants to those Lands which before were their own and had nothing to recompence their losses but the retaining of their good old Laws and their Masters and Conquerors having gathered all the money and riches of the Kingdom into their Chests and possessions there was after the harrassed English had gained some peace and that the long languishing Olive branches began again to recover their Sap and Verdure so small an improvement of the rent of Land amongst the Normans plenty of money as in the valuation of Lands in the sixteenth year of the raign of William the Conqueror there was such a wonderful small value put upon Lands fifty or sixty and more to one less then it is now the commodities and Cattel raised thereupoâ— being in all probability proportionable thereunto as in Drayton no unfruitful place in Cambridgeshire the Abbot of Croyland had fourteen or fifteen yard Lands twelve Villaines three Bordmen three Soccage Tenants and two Meadows which in the time of Edward the Confessor were of the value of five pounds per annum and at that time but four pounds and ten shillings In the Raign of King Henry the first which began his Raign in the year of our Lord one thousand one hundred when the Normans had something more improved their Lands and possessions their plenty of money made out of the English miseries did not banish their cheapness of victuals and provisions but left them at those small rates of one shilling for the Carcase of an Ox and four pence for a sheep and no more for the Provender of twenty horses the Denarius or English penny then being probably as the Roman which was but the fourth part of an ounce of Silver which in coyn or money made no more then twenty pence In the latter end of the Raign of King Richard the first who began his Raign in Anno Domini one thousand one hundred eighty nine and after his redemption from his imprisonment by the Emperor of Germany in his return from the Holy Land when money was so scarce in England as to make up the sum of one hundred thousand Marks for his ransome the Church Plate and Chalices were pawned an Oxe or Cow was but of the price of four shillings a Hogg ten pence a sheep of the finer Wooll ten pence and six pence of the courser In the Raign of King Edward the first whose raign commenced in the year of our Lord God one thousand two hundred fifty two when there was as much plenty of mony as peace and an increase of Trade under his â—appy and prudent Government Scotland conquered and subdued and such a plenty of money as some Esterlings or men of Germany from whom our Sterling money is well conjectured by Sir Henry Spelman to receive its denomination were here imployed to coyn our money the Market price of an Oxe was eight shillings and six pence twenty six seames or sums or horse-loads or quarters of Barley was at fourty three shillings a quarter of Oats for fourteen pence and the yearly value of an Acre of Meadow was in Buckinghamshire apud altum firmam at the Rack but eight pence per Acre and so small a power had the plenty of mony then upon the price of victuals as upon the payment of mony agreed to be paid upon a Bond or Deed which was not likely to be for any long time as the Case at Law tempore E. 1. Cited in 9. E. 4. informs us the price of a quarter of Barley which was at the time of the making of the Bond or Deed but three shillings a quarter was before the time of payment for it come to be thirty and two shillings a quarter which might happen from some other causes and not at all by reason of any extraordinary store of money which the Kingdom was then blessed withal In the eighth year of the Raign of King Edward the second which was in the year of our Lord God one thousand three hundred and fifteen a Parliament was assembled at London where all or most of the Prelates and great Lords of England were with the Commons assembled â—aith Thomas Walsingham ad tractandum de statu regni alleviatione rerum venalium a matter now moâ—e then ever necessary to consult of the State of the Kingdom and the taking down the price of victuals which saith Walsingham was then so high ut vix posset vivere plebs communis as the common people could scarce live and would have been in a worse condition if the Landlords had then let their Lands at the Rack or beyond the value as many of them do now and many of the houshold provisions had been sold as they are now more then twenty times and others ten or fifteen times more then they were then where it was ordained that an Ox not fed with grain should be sold for sixteen shillings and if with grain and fat for four and twenty shillings and no more a fat Cow of the best sort for twelve shillings a fat Hogg of two years old three shillings and four pence a Mutton fat and shorn for fourteen pence and for one that was unshorn one shilling eight pence a Goose for two pence half penny a Hen for a penny and four Pigeons for a penny And though immediately after in the same year there followed such a very great famine as Flesh and Corn were scarcely to be had Hens and Geese seldom found Pigs and Swine wanted Food and Sheep dyed of the Rot or Murrain yet a quarter of Malt was sold for a Mark and a quarter of Corn for twenty shillings and upon the great dearth which happened in the next year after making such a famine as Horse-flesh was good Diet for the poor and causing a repeal of the Act of Parliament which was made the year before touching the price of Victuals three quarts of strong Beer was then sold for three pence and of small for two pence which in that sad and horrid famine the Magistrates of London understood to be so unreasonable as they prohibited it to be sold at so high a rate in the City and ordained that no more then three half pence should be taken for three quarts of strong Beer and a penny for small and the King by his Proclamation likewise commanded that in all parts of the Kingdom three quarts of Beer should not be sold for more then a penny In the 21. year of the Raign of King Edward the third notwithstanding any enhaunce of prices made or occasioned by the great famine which was in the eight and ninth years of the Raign of King Edward the second his Father and the continuance of it for four or five years
to those and as many more burdens and payments as should be necessary to keep them their posterities in a perpetual slavery we should when the Kings Revenue real and casual much enlarged since his happy Restoration and yet appearing not to be enough to go thorow with his important and necessary occasions and to amount but to nine hundred and fifty thousand pounds per annum his Revenue in lands being also included take it to be consistent with the duty of subjects to put in dolio perforato a vessel that leaks more then ordinary or wants a bottom the remembrance of all the benefits and â—avors of our King and Soveraign Who hears no body say or do as that great Commander and as much a Gentleman Mounsieur de la Noüe did to his Grandfather the great Henry of France who finding himself much obliged unto him when he was King of Navarre and full of troubles for raising and bringing to his assistance one hundred horse well furnished at his own charges and unfurnished with money to recompence him sent a grant by Letters Patents unto him and his heirs of certain Crown lands lying neer unto his estate which the virtuous and generous la Noüe not thinking fit to receive brought back again to the King with these words Sire ce m'est beauecoup d' honneur de contentment de receuoir ces tesmoignages de la bonne vâ—lonte de votre Majestè je ne les refuserois pas si vos affaires estoient en estat de faire telles liberalites Quand je vous verray Sire au dessus vos Ennemis possedant des biens proportionnees a la grandeur de vostre courage de vostre naissance je receuroy de bon Caeur vous gratifications pour cette heure si vous vouliâ—z recompencer de ceste facon tous ceux qui vous serviront vostre Majeste seroit incontinent ruâ—nee Sir These testimonies oâ— your Majesties good will towards me and the honor which you have done me therein do very much content me and I would not refuse them if your Majesties affaâ—â—s and estate were in a condition to afford such bounties and when I shall see your Majesty to have overcome your enemies and possessing an estate becoming your grandeur and birth I shall be very willing to accept of your gratifications in the meantime if you shall go on in a way of recompencing in this manner all those which shall serve you your Majesty will be suddainly ruined and by no means would receive it but all his life after continued a great Warrior and suffering most heroically in the troubles and affairs of his Soveraign lost his life in them Or imitate Jesurum who like an Heifer waxing fat kicked against the cause of it or do as the Athenians taken by Philip King of Macedon did at the Battel of Chaeroâ—ea who could not remember his favors in releasing of them out of their Captivity unless they might have what they lost also restored unto them Or be guilty of a national Ingratitude the sin whereof being next to blasphemy the most ugly and horrid of all other sins which can be in a particular man was so abhorred by the heathen as Hippocratidas did as some wise Christians have since done wish it were made a crime as punishable as Felony Or so despoil our Land of its ancient vertue and love to their Princes as to have Nabalisme incouraged and our Araunahs and Barzillai's to dye childless and unimitated or suffer our selves to be misled by any Temptations of particular sparing or profits to do as some of the worser sort of the late reforming Traitors did pick out the choicest Jewels of the Crown and put in counterfeits in stead of them or hearken to the Syren songs of those who for an advantage which may before the account be cast up prove a greater disadvantage will suppose it to be for the good of the Nation to disuse and lay by those necessary duties and grateful acknowledgements of Pourveyance and Compositions for them to their King and Soveraign which Renatus Choppinus a learned French Advocate in his Treatise of the Domaines and Revenuâ— of France stiles Dominicum jus primitus sceptris addictum in necessarios Regiae mensae Aulaeque sumptus honorificum ad summi Imperii inclitae decus Majestatis conservandum a paâ—t of the Kings Domaine belonging and annexed to the Royal Scepter and appropriate to the necessary uses and provisions of the Kings Court and houshold for the honor and conservation of the Rights of Majesty And was with us in England in the Case of one Richards a Pourveyor combining with some Constables to charge the Country with more then the Pourveyance amounted unto for which he was grievously fined and punished no longer ago then in Michaelmas Term in 3 Jac. certified by all the Judges of England to be a prerogative of the King at the common Law and â—hat all the Statutes which have been made to correct abuses in Pourveyance took not away Pourveyance but confirmed it for quâ— tollit iniquitatem firmat proprietatem confirmat usum the taking away of the abuse confirmeth the Right and when the Reputation and credit of a Town and City shall be so dear unto the Inhabitants as they will to preserve ancient Customes supply the charges thereof with publike contributions as the Town of Yarmouth doth in entertainments frequently given to strangers of quality comming thither and the Town of Droitwich in Worcestershire can allow the yearly profit of four of their Salt vats or portions of Salt so called for the like purpose shall endeavor all they can to lessen that of the Kings And the Gentry of Cheshire who are above those of many other Counties well known to preserve the ancient honor of the English Hospitalities and are accustomed to send provisions of meat one to another to help to bear out the charges of their entertainments when any of their friends come unto them will not do well to murmur at so small an yeerly contribution for the provision of the Kings houshold as ninety five pounds sixteen shillings eight pence per annum which is all was charged upon that County Nor can all the housekeepers of England who do well understand that the breeding and raising of their own victuals and houshold provisions by and out of the profits of their Lands are a great help to their house-keeping and makes it to be far cheaper and easie unto them then to buy all that they spend at the Markets where every one doth improve their gain and Commodities and put the loss and hardships upon the buyers think it to be their duty to put a necessity of these inconveniences upon the King which they do all they can to avoid themselves Or when the designs of profit or hopes of reciprocations of courtesies one from another do ordinarily invite the people in their commerce or affairs one
The Antiquity Legality Reason Duty and Necessity OF PRAE-EMPTION AND POURVEYANCE FOR THE KING OR Compositions for his Pourveyance As they were used and taken for the Provisions of the KINGS Houshold the small charge and burthen thereof to the PEOPLE and the many great Mischiefs and Inconveniences which will inevitably follow the taking of them away By FABIAN PHILIPPS Manilius 3 Perquè tot Aetates hominum tot tempora Annos Tot Bella varios etiam sub pace labores Virgil Aeneid lib. 8. Sic placida populos in pace regebat Deterior donec paulatìm Decolor Aetas Et Belli Rabies Amor successit habendi London Printed by Richard Hodgkinson for the Author and are to be sold by Henry Marsh at the sign of the Princes Arms in Chancery-Lane 1663. To the Right Learned and truely Noble Lord Christopher Lord Hatton Baron of Kirkby Knight of the Bath Governor of the Isle of Guarnesey and one of the Lords of his Majesties most Honorable Privy Council My Lord THE Holy Evangelist St. Luke in his Gospel and History of the Acts of the blessed Apostles when he inscribed or Dedicated it to his friend Theophilus hath given us to understand that the Dedication of Books unto such as would read and peruse them is no late or Novel usage for it was in those times or shortly after not thought to be unfitting or unnecessary to take the approbation and opinion of Grave and Learned men of such things as were to be made publicke as Plinius Junior in his Epistles informs us so that it may with reason and evidence be concluded that the Dedication of Books was not originally to procure the favor of some great or good Man neither were the Epistles Dedicatory heretofore acquainted with those gross Flatteries untruths or immense and accumulated praises of the Patrons or their Ancestors which some Foraign Printers for their own private gain do use in publishing Books out of some Copies and Manuscripts left by the deceased Authors or as too many German and other Authors have of late stuffed their Dedications withall which Heroick and great Souls do so little relish as the Books themselves would meet with a better entertainment if they came without them but one of the best and most approved usages of Dedications hath certainly and most commonly been derived from no other Source or Fountain then the great desire which the Author had there being before printing most probably but a few Copies sent abroad to receive the friendly censure and approbation of some Learned man who would in those days carefully read and peruse it and not as now too many men do oscitanter and cursorily take a view onely of the Frontispice or Title and lay it in the Parlor or Hall Windows to be idly turned over by such as tarry to speak with them or else crowd it in their better furnished then read or understood Libraries to make a Muster or great shew of such Forces as they have to bring into the Feild of Learning when there shall be any occasion to use them but neither then or before are able to finde or say what is in them But your Lordship being Master of the Learning in Books as well as of an excellent well furnished Library with many choice Manuscripts never yet published and very many Classick Authors and Volums printed and carefully pick't and gathered together out of the Gardens of good letters which an unlearned and reforming Rebellion and the Treachery of a wicked servant hired to discover them did very much diminish And your Eye and Judgement being able before hand to Calculate the Fate of the Author in the good or bad opinion of all that go by any Rules or measure of right Reason Learning or Judgement I have adventured to present unto your Lordship these my Labours in the Vindication of the Legality Antiquity right use and necessity of the Praeemption and Pourveyance of the Kings of England or Compositions for the Provisions of their Royall houshold for that your Lordship is so well able to judge of them and having been Comptroller of the houshold to his Majesties Royal Father the Martyr King CHARLES the First and to the very great dangers of your person and damage of your Estate like one of Davids good servants gone along with him in all his Wars and troubles when as he being first assaulted was inforced to take Arms against a Rebellious and Hypocritical part of his people in the defence of himself and his people their Religion Laws and Liberties and the Priviledges of Parliament and not only remained Faithfull to him during his life but after his death unto his banished and strangely misused Royal Issue when Loyalty and Truth were accompted crimes of the greatest magnitude and like some houses infected with the plague had more then one ✚ set upon them with a Lord have mercy upon us And did whilst that blessed King continued in his Throne and Regalities so instruct your self in those Excellent Orders and Government of his house as you have been able to enlighten and teach others amongst whom I must acknowledge my self to have been one and out of a Manuscript carefully collected by your Lordship concerning the Rules and Orders of the Royal houshold which your Lordship was pleased to communicate unto me to have been very much informed which together with the many favors with which you have been pleased to oblige me the incouragements which you have given me to undertake this work and the great respect and veneration which I bear unto your Lordships grand accomplishments in the Encyclopaidia large extent and traverses of all kinde of learning and your knowledge of Foraign Courts and Customes which being very extraordinary if you were of the ranke of private men must needs be very much more when it shall be added to the eminency of your Birth and qualitie and the Trust and Emploiments which his Majesty hath been pleased deservedly to confer upon you have emboldened me to lay these my endeavors before your Lordship submitting them to an utter oblivion and extinguishment and to be stifled in the Birth or Crâ—dle if they shall not appear unto your Lordship to be worthy the publike view and consideration Wherein although some may feast and highly content their Fancies with censuring me that I have been to prodigal of my labors in proving either at all or so largly the antiquity or legality of the Kings just Rights unto Prae-emption and Pourveyance or Compositions for them when as the Act of Parliament in Anno 12 of his now Majesties raign for taking them away doth give him a Recompence for them yet I may I hope escape the censure or blame of setting up a Giant of Straw and fighting with it when I have done or of being allied to such as fight with their own shadows or trouble themselves when there is neither any cause or necessity for it when as the Act of Parliament for taking away Pourveyance
and the Court of Wards and Liveries and Tenures by Knight Service either of the King or others in Capite or Socage in Capite did not expressely alleage or allow those Tenures and the incidents thereof to be their just rights but onely that the consequences upon the same have been much more burthensom grievous and prejudicial to the Kingdom then they have been beneficial to the King and alleadging also that by like experience it hath been found that notwithstanding divers good strickt and wholsom Laws some extending as far as to life for redress of the grievances and oppressions committed by the persons imployed in making provisions for the Kings houshold and of the Carriages and other provisions for his occasions yet they have been still continued and several Counties have submitted themselves to sundry rates Taxes and Compositions to redeem themselves from such vexations and oppressions and that no other remedy will be so effectual as to take away the occasion thereof especially if satisfaction and recompence shall be therefore made to his Majesty his heirs and Successors so as very many or most of the seduced and factious part of the people of this Nation having in the times of our late confusions been mislead or driven into an ill opinion of it may with the residue of the people be easily carryed along with the croud to a more then imagination that the Pourveyance and Prae-emption was no less then a very great grievance and that his Majesty was thereby induced to accept of a recompence or satisfaction for it and permit the people to purchase the abolition of that which they supposed to have been a grievance which do appear neither to be a grievance nor recompence but a great loss to the King and as much or more in the conclusion consideratis considerandis to the people And that the vulgar and men of prejudice and ignorance are not so easily or with a little to be satisfied as the learned and that in justification of a business from those Obloquies so unjustly and undeservedly cast upon it and so highly concerning the King and his people and in a way nullius ante trita pede altogether untroden wherein I cannot honor and obey the King as I ought if I should not take a care of the rights of his people which is his daily care nor love them or my self if I should not do all that I can to preserve his regalities I can be conscious to my self of many omissions and imperfections in regard of sundry importunities of Clients affairs some troublsome business of mine own which either could not or would not give me any competency of time or leasure but did almost daily and many times hourely take me off as soon as I was on and so interrupt and divert me as I had sometimes much ado when I got to it again to recollect my scattered thoughts and materials and Writing as the Printer called for it with so great a disturbance and a midst so many obstructions may possibly be guilty of some deformities in the method or stile some defects or redundancies impertinent Sallies or digressions or want of coherencies which might have been prevented or amended if I could have enjoyed an Otium or privacy requisite for such an undertaking or have had time to have searched the Archives and too much unknown or uninquired after Records of the Kings just legal Regalias or those multitudes of liberties customs and priviledges which the Lords of Mannors and their Tenants do at this day enjoy by the favour of the King and his royal Progenitors or to have raked amongst the rubbidge of time long ago tripped over and the not every where to be found Abdita rerum or recesses of venerable Antiquity or to have viewed all at once what I had done in its parts and delineations and perused it before it was printed in a compleat Copy with a deliberation necessary to a work of that nature and concernment But howsoever I speed therein I shall like those that brought the Pigeons or Turtle Doves instead of a more noble sacrifice content my self libâsse veritati to have offered upon the Altar of truth what my small abilities and greater affections could procure whereby to have incited such as shall be more happy in their larger Talents to assert those truths which I was so willing to have vindicated and to have rectified that grand and popular groundless mistake and prejudice which multitudes of the common people have by the late Vsurping Powers been cunningly taught to have against it And whether they intended evil or good thereby might be easily misled or mislead themselves to scandalize such an Ancient Legal and reasonable custome and Right of the King when as the great Civilian Paulus saith Rerum imperiti censuram sibi de rebus quibusdam arrogant volentes esse Legis Doctores nesciunt de quibus loquuntur nec de quibus affirmant ambitiosè pervicaciter insolenter ineptè de magnis rebus statuere And it was but a trick of the godless Tyrant and his company of State Gipsies to make the people the more able or willing to covenant and ingage for the maintenance and perpetuity of their Sin and Slaverie and to bear and suffer greater burdens taxes and oppressions then ever Englishmen did before And whatsoever the Fate of these my labors shall appear to be can conclude in magnis voluisse sat est and subscribe my self Your Lordships affectionate servant Fabian Philipps THE CONTENTS OF THE CHAPTERS CHAP. I. THe Antiquity of the Royall Pourveyance and Praeemption for the maintenance of the Kings Houses Navy Castles and Garrisons attended by a Jus Gentium and reasonable Customes of the most or better part of other Nations page 9. CHAP. II. Of the Vse and Allowance of Pourveyance in England and our British Isles p. 44. CHAP. III. The reason of Praeemption and Regall Pourveyance or Compositions for the Provision of the Kings Houshold p. 97. CHAP. IV. The right use of the Prae-emption and Pourveyance or Compositions for them p. 234 CHAP. V. Necessity that the King should have and enjoy his ancient rights of Prae-emption Pourveyance or Compositions for them p. 268 CHAP. VI. The small charge of the Pourveyance or Compositions for it to or upon such of the people as were chargeable with it p. 329 CHAP. VII That the supposed plenty of money and Gold and Silver in England since the Conquest of the West-Indies by the Spaniards hath not been a cause of raising the prices of food and victuals in England p. 341 CHAP. VIII That it is the interest of the people of England to revive again the Ancient and legal usage of his Majesties just rights of Praeemption and Pourveyance or Compositions for them p. 400 The Antiquity Legality Reason Duty and Necessity of Prae-emption and Pourveyance for the King Or Compositions for his Pourveyance as they were used and taken for the Provisions of the Kings Houshold the small