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
of the County and enter into Recognizances not to forestall or ingross provided that all Cities and Towns Corporate may assigne and licence Pourveyors for their provisions Which power of regulating weights and measures and reduction of victuals to reasonable prices and rates was no stranger in Ireland whither many if not all of our then Laws were transmitted by King John by exemplification undeâ— his great Seal of England and all our Laws reasonable Customes and Acts of Parliament both before and afterwards were by Act of Parliament called Poynings Act or Law allowed and enacted to be Laws in that Kingdome in the Reign of our King Henry the seventh Nor in Scotland where the assises of weights and measures were ordained by King James the first in Parliament in Anno Domini 1426. And it was also ordained by King James the second in Parliament that Schireffes Bayllies and uther officiars baith to burgh and to land take and inquire at ilk Court that they haldquhat persons within their boundes by is victuall and haldis it till a dearth and punish them which sall be found to offend therein and besides their uther punishment the victuall that they have be escheated to the King All which may declare and give us to understand how unreasonable it would be that the King who by his Oath and Kingly Office is to keep all his people from oppression which being one of the great sins of Sodom as the Prophet Ezekiel tells us in that she strengthened not the hand of the poor and needy caused God to say he would come down nd see the oppressions of his people should take no order to preserve himself from the more then formerly deceipts of his own people and their enhaunce of prises King Edward the second therefore and his Councell after that the Commons of England had in the second year of his Reign granted him in Parliament an aid of the five and twentieth part of their goods upon condition that he would answer and redress their grievances which they in eleven Articles had then presented unto him in some of which they complained that their Corn Victuals Poultrie and Fish as well fresh as salt were taken by those which called themselves the Kings Mâ—nisters and paid nothing for it nor gave them any manner of satisfaction by which they were greatly impoverished And he had answered that there was an Ordinance made of those prises in the time of his Father King Edward which was for the good of the King and his people and willed that it should be kept and observed in all parts did in the fifteenth year of his Reign upon occasion of his being at Cirencester in the County of Gloucester with divers of the Nobility and great men of the Kingdome not think it to be any violation of the Laws formerly made for the regulation of Pourveyance to command and ordain by his Letters Paâ—ents directed to the Sheriffs of Gloucester Worcester and Wiltshire in the words following viz. Rex vic al. ministris de Com. Glouc. Wigorn. Wilts salutem cum sumus in partibus Cirencestr cum pluribus magnatibus pro negotiis c. pro nostra ipsorum sustentatione plura victualia oportet providere plures frumentum habâ—ntes ea penes se retinent non curantes illa vendic expâ—nere nisi excessiva Caristia nos volentes sustentac â—orum providere prout decet assignavimuus Johan Hampton al. ad supervidendum blada in Com. praedict ad emend ubi blada invenerint pro pretio rationabili jam currente de quo ipsi respondeant illa quo pretio emptâ—â—runt ad liberand pistoribus braciatoribus furnend braciand vend dictis magnatibus c. that a reasonable price should according to the ordinary Market rate beset upon Corn. Noâ—â—ere the Writs or Commissions de providentiis pro Rege faciendis to buy and make provisions for the Kings houshold in 7 E. 2. 37 E. 3. 3 R. 2. 1 H. 4. and other Kings Reigns directed to the Sheriffs of several Counties to whose oaths and Offices it belonged by the just and antient Laws and Customes of England to cause men to sell victuals and necessary provisions at reasonable rates and prices or Writs sent to the Sheriffes to make provisions for some of the Kings of Scotland and their Trains in their passage as they came to London to do their homage unto some of our Kings esteemed to be any breach of the peoples Liberties Neither did Queen Elizabeth that delight and love of her people enriching as well as easing and filling them with peace and plenty who was never of the opinion of Oliver Cromwel that grand Master of Iniquity who as carefull as he would seem to be of the peoples ease and liberties in his afterwards counterfeit kindness of taking away the Royal Pourveyance could when he was Lievtenant Generall of an Army of a distempered and disobedient part of the Parliament being moved by a Gentleman of Bedfordshire for some ease of their great Assessements and Burdens answere that he could never believe that the Country-men were poor or not able to bear them as long as they could whistle at the Plow and Cart but so contented them in her happy Government as the 20. day of November the beginning of her Reign is yet though above one hundred years agoe gratefully remembred with the ringing of Bells in many of the Churches of England conceive or understand it to be any grievance to the people for the Soveraign or Lex viva the maker Protector and Preserver of many of those good Laws which they enjoyed to ordain and publish by the advice of her Privy Councel who by the happy and sage conduct of all her affairs were well known by the effects as well as the causes the Mediums as well as the success to be as wise and prudent a Councel as any Prince of Christendome had to attend them That the Clerk of the Market in avoiding of the danger of the loss of his Office and further punishment at her pleasure should duly and substantially put in execution all such things as to his charge appertaineth as well for vittails to be had seasonable good and wholsome in the Towns and places near unto the Court as for the just observing of Weights and Measures assigned and assessed and likewise for setling of convenient and reasonable prises as well upon Meat and Drink Horse-meat Lodging Bedding and other things in such cases accustomed so as the Noblemen attending in the Court and all Suitors others following the same be not compelled in default of the said Clerk to be put unto excessive charges for their expences but such indifferency to be used therein as the plenty or sterility considered should accord with equity And straightly charged that no person of what estate or degree soever should in any wise pay mâ—re for Vittail Horsemeat Lodging or otherways then after the prises that
his Plate for religious uses for his Chappel and Devotion sell the Coats of the Yeomen of his Guard break in scorn his great Seal of England by the hand and hammer of a common Blacksmith which shewed what they intended to the life of the owner drive and engage all men into a monstrous Rebellion a slavery which proved to be the consequence and just reward of it and deprive him as much as they could of the loyalty duty love and obedience of his people and having abundantly enriched themselves and their Godless praying party by the Crown Lands and Revenues of the Church most of the Nobility and Gentry and many other good men and their Families did not think it reasonable to serve their Master for a little but as a further reward and recompence for their care and diligence to oppress and ruine their King and his better Subjects would be sure to make for themselves as good a Pourveyance and Provision as they could upon pretences of some little losses in their own small and necessitous Estates and allow one another besides their gaine of plundering and traiterous and sacrilegious purchases out of the improvements of the Common misery and washing as well as wasting three Kingdomes over in blood some fifty pounds some ten some four pounds a week towards theiâ— support and maintenance and to make their proportions the more plausible and to seem something reasonable would not leave out of the account the well stretched Items of the losses and charges of their Grandchildren married Sons and Daughters and when they had finished their ungodly work murdered the King Monarchy Magna Charta Petition of right and the Lawes and Liberties of the People and converted their own sins into the bloody and unsure foundation of a Common-wealth founded upon the blood and murther of their Soveraign and many thousands of his loyal and religious Subjects and the perjury of themselves and as many as they could perswade or constrain unto it and the greatest of iniquities and made the people who got as much ease by it as the Asse in the Fable who thought to make his burden of Sponges the lighter by lying down in the water with them believe that when two parts in three of the Kingdome were undone to enrich a third and brought under a slavery and arbitrary power of the mechanick and ruder sort of them that their freedome from Pourveyance and Cart-taking was an especial deliverance which amongst other wonderfull things as they called them pretended to be done for them being only to buy Sadles for their reforming Legislators to ride upon their backs and a favour much of kin to that of Pharoahs kind usage of the Children of Israel when he set Task-masters over them to afflict them with burdens made their lives bitter with hard bondage caused them to make bricâ— and double the Taâ—e thereof and gather the straw was recompence sufficient for all their money and sins laid out in that wicked and detestable cause and for all that which they were to endure in this life and the next and in that seeming holy but assured cheating a miserable and strangely deluded Nation continued like the Egyptians in their way to the Red sea and oppressing of Gods people untill their Oliver and grand Impostor and Instrument had out-witted and undermined them and insâ—ead of many Tyrants had set up his single Tyranny and having from an indebted and small Estate made much less by a former drunken and debauched conversation by which he was so streightned as not to be able to buy some oats or pease to sow a small parcel of ground but to borrow some of a friend upon his promise of a Repayment upon his hoped for increase at Harvest did notwithstanding neither then nor after a more plentifull crop of his wicked doings and that great Estate which the sinnes of a factious and wicked part of the people had made him Master of ever find the way to satisfie or repay And having largely pourveyed for himself better then he could do in his Brewhouse put an Excise upon Ale Beer and intoxicated as many as he could seduce with an opinion that Rebellion was Religion and gotten an Arbitrary power with a large Revenue in Lands which was the Kings and other mens an Army of twenty thousand Foot and ten thousand Horse and a formidable Navy to be maintained at the peoples charge to continue their misery and three hundred thousand pounds per annum to defray the charges of his tyrannical Government took himself to be a Child of Providence and something more then one of the smallest Branches of Cromwell alias Williams King Henry the eights Barber and therefore in order to a Kingship or something by another name amounting to as much made it his work to disguise and metamorphose the antient Government decry our fundamentall Lawes and every antient constitution dig up by the roots all that was not novel or assistant to his designs fit to make a head out of the Heels and after he had taken an oath to maintain and preserve the Laws and Liberties of the people imprisoned Serjeant Maynard Serjeant Twisden and Mr. Wadham Windam who pleaded in the behalf of a Client for them thought it to be conscience Law and Latin good enough to call our Magna Charta magna Farta and did so order his Convention or thing called a Parliament of England compounded and made up of time-servers and a Medly of Irish and Scottish of the like complexion as they were brought in Anno 1656. by one of their Tooles called an Act of Parliament to ordain that pourveyance or Composition for the Kings house which they were taught to alleage to be a grievance to the people and very chargeable when there was none at all at that time in being in England nor was ever intended by many of the worshipfull Mushrooms to be thereafter should no more be taken under pain of Felony And was as great a kindness and ease to the people as if they had ordained that no more Subsidies which seldome amounted to more then a tenth part of the late yearly Taxes should be imposed by Parliament but Assessments at 70 thousand pounds or one hundred and twenty thousand pounds per mensem as often as long as that which they called the supreme Authority should have or feign a necessity for it or that offenders should be no more sent for by the Kings messengers or tried by Juries and the known Laws of the Land but at Cromwells High Court of Justice or Shambles lined with red or bloody Bayes or that there should be no more use or trouble of the Train Bands but an Army of 30000 domineering Redcoats or Fanaticks with their Bashaws or Major-Generals maintained at the peoples charge to keep or make them quiet under their vassalage or slavery or that there should be no more Coat and Conduct money long agoe remitted by King Charles the Martyr
and prices of Barley and what they made it with and confirmed by Inspeximus of the Ordinances of divers Kings of England the Kings Progenitors which set the assise of Bread and Ale and the making of measures and howsoever stiled a Statute appears not to have been an Act of Parliament but an Exemplification only made of those Ordinances and Orders by King Henry the third at the request of the Bakers of Coventry mentioning that by an Act of Parliament made in the first year of his Reign he had granted that all good Statutes and Ordinances made in the times of his Progenitors aforesaid and not revoked should be still holden in which the rates and assise of bread are said to have been approved by the Kings Bakers and contained in a Writing of the Marshalsey of the Kings House where the Chief Justice and other Ministers of Justice then resided and by an Ordinance or Statute made in the same year for the punishment of the offending Bakers by the Pillory and the Brewers by the Tumbrel or some other correction The Bayliffs were to enquire of the price of Wheat Barley and Oats at the Markets and after how the Bakers bread in the Court did agree that is to wit waistel which name a sort of bread of the Court or Kings House doth yet retain and other bread after Wheat of the best of the second or of the third price also upon how much increase or decrease in the price of wheat a Baker ought to change the assize and weight of his bread and how much the wastel of a farthing ought to weigh and all other manner of bread after the price of a quarter of Wheat which shewes that the Tryal Test Assay or Assize of the true weight of bread to be sold in all the Kingdome was to be by the Kings Baker of his House or Court and that there was the Rule or Standard and that the prices should increase or decrease after the rate of six pence And Fleta an Author planè incognitus as to his name saith Mr. Selden altogether unknown who writ about the later end of the Reign of King Ed. 1. tells us that amongst the Capitula coronae itineris the Articles in the Eyre concerning the Pleas of the Crown which were not then novel or of any late institution enquiries were made de vinorum contra rectam assisam venditoribus de mensuris item de Forstallariis victualibus â—â—nalibus mercatum obviâ—ntibus per quod carior sit inde venditio de non virtuosis cibariis of wine sold contrary to the assize of Measures and Forestallers of the Market to make victualls dearer and of such as sold corrupt food or victuals An. 31 Ed. 1. it was found by inquisition that Bakers and Brewers and others buying their corn at Queen-Hithe were to pay for measuring portage and carriage for every quarter of corn whatsoever from thence to Westcheap St. Anthonies Church Horshoo Bridge to Wolsey street in the Parish of Alhallowes the less and such like distances one ob q to Fleetstreet Newgate Cripplegate Birchoners Lane East-cheap and Billingsgate one penny 17 Ed. 2. By command of the King by his Letters Patents a Decree was made by Hamond Chicwel Maior That none should sel Fish or Flesh out of the Markets appointed to wit Bridge-streat East-cheap Old-Fishstreet St. Michaels Shambles and the Stocks upon pain to forfeit such Fish or Flesh as were sold for the first time and for the second offence to lose their Freedome And so inherent in Monarchy and the royall Praerogative was the power and ordering of the Markets and the rates of provision of victuals and communicable by grant or allowance to the inferior Magistrates as the King who alwayes reserves to himself the supreme power and authority in case of male administration of his delegated power or necessity for the good and benefit of the publick is not thereby denuded or disabled to resort unto that soveraign and just authority which was alwayes his own and Jure coronae doth by right of his Crown and Regal Government belong unto him as may appear by the forfeiture and seising of Liberties and Franchises and many other the like instances to be found every age And therefore 41 King E. 3. without an Act of Parliament certain Impositions were set upon Ships other Vessels coming thither with Corn Salt and other things towards the charge of cleansing Romeland And 3 Ed. 4. the Market of Queen Hithe being hindred by the slackness of drawing up London Bridge it was ordered that all manner of Vessels Ships or Boats great or small resorting to the City with victuals should be sold by retail and that if there came but one Vessel at a time were it Salt Wheat Rye or other Corn from beyond the Seas or other Grains Garlick Onions Herrings Sprats Eels Whitings Place Codds Mackarel c. it should come to Queen-Hithe and there make sale but if two Vessels came the one should come to Queen-Hithe the other to Billingsgate if three two of them should come to Queen-Hithe and if the Vessels coming with Salt from the Bay were so great as it could not come to these Keyes then the same to be conveyed to the Port by Lighters Queen Elizabeth by advice and order of her Privy Councell in a time of dearth and scarcity of corn commanded the Justices of Peace in every County to enforce men to bring their Corn to the Markets limited them what proportions to sell to particular persons and ordered them to cause reasonable prices and punish the Refusers And the like or more hath been legally done by the Kings authority in the Reign of King James and King Charles the Martyr in the beginning of whose Reign by the advice of all the Judges of England and the eminently learned Mr. Noy the then Attorny Generall rates and prices were set by the Kings Edict and Proclamation upon Flesh Fish Poultry and most sort of victuals Hay Oats c. commanded to be observed All which reasonable laws constitutions customes were made confirm'd continued by our Kings of England by the advice sometimes of their lesser and at other times of their greater Councels the later whereof were in those early dayes composed of Bishops Earles and Barons and great and wise men of the Kingdome not by the Commons or universall consent and representation of the people by their Knights of the Shires or Burgesses sent as their Procurators ad faciendum consentiendum to consent unto those Acts of Parliament which should be made and ordained by the King and the Barons and Peers of England for they were neither summoned for that purpose nor represented in Parliament untill Anno 49 H. 3. and in Anno 26 or 31 Ed. 1. were called thither only ad faciendum quod de communi consilio per Comites Barones ceteros Proceres to do those things which by the King and the Barons and
Nobiltiy by their Common Council should be ordained and the Procuratores Cleri Proctors or Representers of the Clergy not Bishops who sate in Parliament and were summoned unto it as a third Estate and Barons inter Proceres Regni amongst the Nobility of the Kingdome ad consentiendum to consent only to such things as should be ordained in Parliament as hath been learnedly and accurately proved by examination of antient Records and Parliament Writs by Mr. William Prynne in his second part of a Register and Survey of severall kinds and forms of Parliament Writs And may well be deemed to be no less then Law and right Reason when as divers Acts of Parliament made by the advice of the Lords Spiritual Temporall and the assent of the Commons summoned called unto Parliament by the Kings Writ to consent only unto such Laws as should be made therein with the Royal assent and breath of life given by the King unto such Acts without which those Petitions and Bills which were intended and desired by the people to be Acts of Parliament are but as the matter to the form presented unto the King in his great Councill and Parliament and amount unto no more in the best of value and constructions which can be put upon them then Petitions and Requests or as bodies without souls or pieces of Silver or Gold uncoyned having not the power or effect of money without Caesars Image and Superscription and the Royal Stamp and Authority given them have enacted and ordained the same or the like cares and provisions as that without date made in the Reign of King H. 3. or Ed. 1. or Ed. 2. and to be found amongst the Statutes of 17 Ed. 2. if all or some of them were not made by the Kings Royal Authority and power only that the Toll of a Milne shall be taken according to the custome of the Land strength of the water-course either to the twentieth or four and twentieth corn and the measure whereby the Toll must be taken was to be agreeable to the Kings measure and taken by the rate and not by the heap or cantell The Assise of Ale to be according to the price of Corn. Butchers to be punished which sell unwholsome flesh â—ushels Gallons and Ells shall be kept by Mayors Bayliffs c. signed with the Kings Seal and he that buyeth or selleth with any other shall be amerced No grain shall be sold by the Heap or Cantell but Oats Malt and Meal Wines by the Act of Parliament of 4 Ed. 3. shall be assaied twice a year and be sold at reasonable prices and a Cry or Proclamation made that none should be so hardy as to sell wines but at a reasonable price regarding the price that is at the Ports from whence the Wines came and the expences as in carriage of the same from the Ports to the places where they be sold. No man may sell Ware at a Fair after iâ— is ended Victuals shalâ— be sold at reasonable prices and Butchers Fishmongers Regrators Hostelers Brewers Bakers Poulters and all other sellers of all manner of victuals shall be bound to sell the same victuall for a reasonable price having respect to the price that such victuals be sold at in the places adjoyning so that the said Sellers have moderate gains and not excessive reasonably to be required according to the distance of the place from whence the said victuals be carried None shall Forestall Wines and Victuals Wares and Merchandizes coming to the good Towns of England by land or by water to be sold. Auncel weight shall be put out weighing shall be by equall ballances every measure shall be according to the Kings Standard and be striked without heap It shall be Felony to forestall or ingross Gascoine wine Red and white wine shall be gauged Ballances and Weights shall be sent to all the Sheriffs of England and all persons are to make their Weights and Ballances by them And in anno 31 Ed. 3. because saith the Statute the Fishers Butchers Poulters and other sellers of Victualls in the City of London by colour of some Charters and by evil intepretation of Statutes made in advantage of the people that every man may freely sell victuals without disturbance and that no Maior Bailiffe or other Minister ought to meddle with the sale It was accorded assented That every man that bringeth victuals whatsoever they be to the City by land or by water may freely sell the same to whom shall please him without being interrupted or impeached by Fisher Butcher Poulter or any other and that the Maior and Aldermen of the said City may rule and redress the defaults of Fishers Butchers and Poulters as they doe of those which sell Bread Ale or Wine In the same year upon the complaint of the Commons that the people of great Yarmouth did encounter the Fishers bringing Herrings to the said Town in the time of the Fair and buy and forestall the Herrings before they come to the Town And also the Hostlers of the same Town which lodge the Fishers coming thither with Herrings would not suffer the said Fishers to sell their Herrings nor meddle with the sale thereof but sell them at their own will as dear as they will and give to the Fishers what pleaseth them whereby the Fishers did withdraw themselves from coming thither It was enacted that Herrings should not be bought or sold upon the sea That Fishers be free to sell their Herrings without disturbance of the Hostelers that when the Fishers will sel their Merchandises in the Port they shall have their Hostelers with them if there they will be and in their presence openly sell their Merchandises and that every man claim his part for the taking after the rate for the same Merchandises so sold. That no Hosteler or other buy any for to hang in their houses by Covin nor in other manner at a higher price the last then forty shillings but less in as much as he may That no Hosteler nor any of their Servants nor any other shall by land or Sea forestall the said Herrings No vessel called Piker of London nor of no other place shall enter into the said Haven to abate the Fair in damage of the people That all the Hostelers be sworn before the Wardens of the Fair and enjoyned upon a great forfeiture to the King to receive their Guests well and conveniently and to aid and ease them reasonably taking of every Last that shall be sold to other Merchants then the said Hostelers 40 d. That of Herrings sold to the same Hostelers to take in their houses the same Hostelers shall take nothing and that because of the profits which they shall have of victuals sold to their said Guests and of the advantage which they have more then other of carriage of Herrings so by them bought and hanging in their houses and for the advantage of 40 d. the
benefits received which highly pleasing the Almighty and being lovely in the eyes of all men which are not only enjoyed but held fast and enforced by all the Nobility Gentry and richer sort of men in England when it happens to be denied as the services and customes of all their Tenants to grind their corn at their Lords Mill or baking their bread at his common Oven in some Borough or Market Town The Reliefs in Tenures by Knight Service or Chivalry fixed and appropriate unto those Fewds and Tenures and paid at the death of every Tenant dying seised being at the first never condescended unto by the Tenants by any paction or stipulation betwixt them and their Lords But although there was antiently and originally betwixt the Lord and the Tenant mutua fides tuendae salutis dignitatis utriusque saith Bodin a mutual obligation betwixt the Tenant and the Lord to defend one anothers Estate and Dignity or as Craig saith pactionibus interpositis de mutua Tutela upon certain agreements to defend one another were lately notwithstanding received and taken by the Nobility and Gentry as a gratitude and in that and no other respect were by the Tenants willingly paid unto them The Reliefs paid by the Heirs of Freeholders in Socage after the death of their Ancestors which being not paid by Tenants for years by a rack Rent do appear to have no other commencement but in signum subjectionis gratitudinis a thankfull acknowledgement for benefits received Or those duties payments which many Lords and Gentry doe enjoy in Cumberland Westmerland and many of the other Northern Counties which were not at the first by any original contract or agreement as to their Tenants particular services for so it could not be a custome but the Tenants at the first upon the only reason of gratitude untill it had by length of time and usage uninterrupted gained the force of a custome and that the succeeding Heirs and Tenants were admitted according to those customes did as willingly observe and acknowledge them The Fines incertain at the will of severall Lords which the Nobility and Gentry of other parts of England do receive and take of their Copihold Tenants under the penalty of a forfeiture if not paid in a reasonable time after they were assessed and the priviledges which they retain of seising their Tenants Copihold Lands as forfeit whether the Fines were certain or incertain if they sued Replevins against them distraining for their Rents or Services and had no other parents or originall untill custome had settled it then the Tenants gratefull acknowledgements of the Lords or his Ancestors former kindess and benefits bestowed upon them or their Progenitors And the Socage Lands and Freeholders might be Tallied or have a Tax laid upon them by their Lords at their will and pleasure as their necessities or occasions required as well before as after the Statute de Tallagio non concedendo made betwixt the years 25 34 Ed. 1. and if it had been an Act of Parliament and not a Charter could bind only the King as to his extraordinary but not to his legall Tallages untill custome by the kindness or favour of time and the curtesie and good will of their Lords did permit them by a desuetude of imposing and a well rellished custome of the Tenants not paying to enjoy their easie and cheap bargains and freedome of their Lands for which they should doe well to remember better then they doe their Benefactors and be more mannerly and gratefull then of late they have been and were before those indulgencies held to be so accustomed and usual as it was not seldome found by Inquisitions and Juries upon oath that such or such land was holden Et Talliari potest c. And might have Taxes or a greater Rent laid upon them by the Lord of the Manor in so much as the Kings demeasne Lands were not free from Tallage which will be evident enough by a presentment of a Jury of Nottinghamshire before the Justices in Eyre in anno 8 E. 1. or King Edward the first when the Kings Letters Patents of a Grant of the Town of Retford to the Burgesses thereof and their Heirs in Fee Farm was found and mentioned in these words viz. Edwardus Dei gratia c. Sciatis nos concessisse c. Burgensibus nostris de Retford quod ipsi eorum haeredes de cetero habeant teneant ad feodi firmam de nobis haeredibus nostris in perpetuum villam nostram de Retford cum pertnen reddendo inde nobis haeredibus nostris per manus suas proprias decem libras per annum ad Scaccarium nostrum ad festum Sancti Michaelis pro omnibus serviciis c. Salvo inde nobis haeredibus nostris Tallagio nostro cum nos haeredes nostris Dominica nostra per Angliam fecimus Talliari c. reserving to himself and his Heirs a Fee Farme Rent of ten pounds per annum and the power of Tax or Tallage or improving what he had granted unto them when he should have occasion to make a Taxe or Tallage upon all his Demesne Lands in England And untill Rents were racked of which the Kings of England and the Officers of their Revenue in land were seldom or never yet much guilty that Rents were improved as high as the profits of Lands all the Lands of England except the Copihold Customary lands by Fines certain the curtesie of time and their Landlords suffering their good will and charity to be reduced into thankless customs escaped it were liable to be made contributaries to many of the necessities or occasions of the Lords of Manors who formerly did not make Leases and take Fines to lessen the rents as they doe now by a high rate or rule of interest and disadvantages procuring their rents to be advanced as it were in the name of a Fine before hand nor if the Lands were holden in Capite by Knight service untill time and their Princes favours had disused it could make a Lease unto any Tenant of such Lands but by licence and then also for no longer a term then 3. or 7. years And their Lands and Rents except Capite and Knight-service and Copihold land and lands in Frank Almoigne being capable of no higher Rents or improvement cannot now be any more by them Tallied which in effect is but a calling for more rent or raising it which every Landlord may do where his Tenants are at Will or when their Leases are expired when they are now all but those Lands before excepted as to the King and the mesne Lords and the Lands of the Freeholders and Cop holders at the utmost or a very high rent And such Tallage is at this day not laid aside by our Neighbours of France in very many places were les Tailles se paient par ceuz du Tiers estat c'est a dire par les habitans
Henry the third his Sonne by their Magna Charta Agreement or Accord made with their then powerfull Barons and Church men and a discontented and seditious Commonalty since reduced into Lawes and confirmed by thirty Acts of Parliament wherein the people having many liberties granted them by those Kings the great Lords Prelates and superior part of the Clergy of whom they held which they could not then claim as rights but were to be received as favours and as much to be valued as their pardon and indemnity which was granted unto them by the same Charter King John therein promising them that all those Customes and Liberties quantum ad se pertinet erga suos omnes homines de regno suo tam Laici quam Clerici observent quantum ad se pertinet erga suos as much as belonged to him he would observe towards all men and that all as well Laick as spiritual should as much as belonged to them observe them towards such as held of them And by the late King Charles the Martyr who took but one hundred pounds for the Relief of an Earldome which was antiently accompted to be but of the yearly value of four hundred pounds per annum the least of which are now three or four thousand pounds per annum very many double as much and some sixteen or twenty thousand pounds per annum when as the hundred pounds was then according to the now value of silver above three hundred pounds And to disburse in houshold provisions according to the difference betwixt the rates and prises of victuals as they were in the Reign of King Edward the second which was above 80 years after the granting and confirming of Magna Charta by King Henry the third when a Capon was sold for two pence and what they are now will not be the fourth part as to some sort of provisions and victuals and as to others not the sixteenth of that hundred pounds for the Relief of an Earldome and so proportionably in other reliefs and the summe of five pounds for the relief of a Knights Fee which is but the fourteenth part according to the difference betwixt the antient and then value of the lands belonging unto a Knights Fee now estimated but at three hundred pounds per annum many of which are four or five hundred pounds per annum and others of a greater yearly value as the lands are lesser or more improved nearer or farther distant from London the grand Emporium of the Trade and Commerce of the Nation and the residence of the King and his superior Courts of Justice And are but the Antiqua Relevia antient Reliefs which King Henry the first in his Charter of Liberties granted to the people did not reduce unto any certain sums but ordered to be justa legitima And but two hundred Marks for the Relief of a Marques and two hundred pounds of a Duke although there were at the time of the making of those great Charters neither Dukes nor Marquesses in England or any such Titles in being and one hundred pounds for the relief of a Baron And if the warres had not hindred him from those and other his dues but 20 s. for every Knights fee according to the Statute in anno 3 E. 1. towards the marriage of his eldest Daughter and making his eldest Son a Knight and no more of every twenty pounds per annum in Socage Did not according to the Equity and Preamble of the Act of Parliament de anno quinto Eliz. cap. 4. which in regard that the wages and allowances limited and rated in former Statutes were in divers places too small and not answerable to that time respecting the advancement of prices of all things belonging unto Servants and Labourers and that the Law could not conveniently without the great grief and burden of the poor Laborers and hired men be put in execution and to the end that there might be a convenient proportion of wages in the times of scarcity and plenty did repeal so much of the said former Statutes as concerning the working and wages of Servants and Labourers and enacted that the wages of Artificers Labourers and Servants should be yearly assessed by the Justices of the Peace and Magistrates in every County City and Town Corporate with respect to the plenty and scarcity of the time and other circumstances necessary to be considered endeavour to raise them to any higher sums or make them proportionable to the present values of lands and money rates and prices of victuals And by the favour of his now Royal Majesty who delighting in the vestigiis and pathes of his many indulgent and Royall Progenitors though his own very great wants and necessities and their daily importunities might have advised him not to have kept the road of his Ancestors liberality and bounty but to reserve some kindness for himself and his more urgent occasions did not as King Henry the third and several other Kings of England his Successors cause his Taxes Assessements by Parliament to be assessed upon oath according to the full and true value of the peoples Estates or as was done by King Edward the sixth since the Statute of 6 Ed. 3. for restraining the Parliament aids to the old Taxation upon the assistance or relief then so called given unto him by Parliament and make enquiries upon oath of the best values of the substance of such as were to pay that Relief Dismes and Subsidies and by the oaths also of those who were to pay them and caused some to be sworn to value clothes to the end that the King might receive payment of Relief for every cloth or as Queen Mary did cause an enquiry to be made upon oath of the value of the goods and lands of such as were lyable to the payment of Fifteens Dismes and Subsidies in the 2 3 4 and 5 years of her Reign But in his Assessments Aids or Subsidies granted by Parliament did imitate his Royal Father King Charles the first who took and received all his Subsidies at two shillings eight pence in the pound for goods and moveables and four shillings for lands and immoveables with defalcation of debts and consideration of a greater then ordinary charge of children assessed by an express exception without oath and the Commissioners left at liberty to assesse themselves and the Assessors according to the old and easie Taxations Takes and receives his First-fruits or the first years value of Bishopricks Spiritual Promotions and of Benefices not under ten marks per annum and Vicarages not under ten pounds per annum since treble those values as they are said to be in the Kings books and for the Tenths of their Spirituall Promotions after no greater a rate or yearly value which no Act of Parliament ever obliged him to doe then they were long agoe valued with some very small encrease or raising long since in a very few of the Bishopricks but
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
promises of gratitude and thankfulness after they are had and received to have given him in perpetuity as much or a great deal more than ever the Pâ—aeemption Pourveyance or Composition for it would have amounted unto and imprecated curses and woes as many or more then the plagues of Egypt to have fallen upon them and their after generations neglecting it for it is ever to be understood that the Subsidies Assessements and other Ayds given to the Kings and Princes of England by their Subjects and People in Parliament or at any time taken or otherwise received by them have been more with respect unto their own particular Estates included in the safety of his greater and his granting them free and general pardons not only for offences criminal committed one against another but for offences committed against the King and incroachments and intrusions upon the royal Revenves and for his Royal protection and defending of them and preserving them in their peace and plenty then as for any retributions or acknowledgements of their favours shewed to any or many in particular There being as much reason for the King to expect and receive the presents or acknowledgements of his people as it was for King Solomon to take his presents sine quibus saith the great and excellently learned Grotius Reges Orientis adire non solebant without which the people were accustomed not to come unto their Kings and continued long after to be a custome as may be understood by the Kings or Wise men coming out of the East to worship and adore our blessed Saviour at his birth and is at this day not disused in the Africk and Asiatick Countries And did not nor ought to dull or lessen the alacrity and payment of other necessary duties and tributes when as Solomon besides the provisions of his Houshold brought and served in every year by a rate and what he had of the Governors of the Countrey which if they were not provisions or conducing thereunto might be some other Tributes and did receive Gold and Tributes or Customs of the Merchant men of the Trafâ—ick of the Spice Merchants For if it hath been reason every where and amongst all Nations where either subjection and duty to superiors or humane prudence had any entertainment or abode to take as much care as may be of general and publick safeties when the safeties of particulars are included and comprehended in them and to be willing in the common or publick calamities of a Warre already fastned upon them or hope to prevent them readily to contribute to their Princes or permit them to take provisions sometimes without any price at all and at other times but at reasonable prises in order to their preservation or repelling of evils or inconveniences which would a great deal more molest or trouble them or to give him or his Army free quarter as the men of Israel Juda did unto David their King or bring or send victuals and provisions to his Camp or marching Army and can think it no ill husbandry though they have but the day before paid contribution to the Enemy had much of their Cattel and Provisions taken away by the Enemy a Husband Brother or Sonne killed women and children slain and butchered and the bloody and dreadfull Scenes or Pageants of Warre every where to be seen heard of or lamented or to do as the Danes did lately to the unjustly invading Swedes give money to keep their houses from spoiling or burning It can be no less then reason to contribute something yearly to a King who not only keeps us from those and many other woes and miseries by land and by Sea but daily heapes and multiplies his blessings upon us in protecting and defending us and not only gave many of us our Vineyards but procureth us all to sit quietly under the shadow pleasure content and fruitfulness of our owâ— vines and by his care at home and abroad preserves us and our Estates in an envied peace and plenty And be the more willing to allow him his Praeemption and Compositions for Pourveyance which amounts not unto the two hundreth or five hundreth part and sometimes not the one thousand part or more of the expence and losses which warre and the many times not to be avoided unruliness and spoil thereof may bring upon them Unless like Ulisses Companions transformed into Swine by the accursed charms of a Cirâ—e or inticements of selfish or foolish interests for the maintenance of our vices and luxuries we should think it to be either Religion Duty Conscience Reason or Prudence to take all we can from a King who is the Guardian of all his people and a nursing Father to the Church which his Royal Progenitors Kings of England were so long agoe accustomed to rank amongst their principall cares as in the 23. year of the Reign of King Edward the first it was alledged in a pleading and allowed for law right reason that Ecclesia est infra aetatem in custodia Regis qui tenetur jura haereditates ejusdem manu tenere defendere the Church is as an Infant under age and in the custody of the King who is bound to defend and maintain its rights estates and hereditaments who governs by no Arbitrary will or power but by our known Lawes which are so excellent beyond all the Laws of other Nations so rational so binding and transcendent so carefully watching over the peoples liberties and proprieties such a Buckler Guard and strong Tower of defence unto them and poenal to all that shall but execute any unjust or illegall commands tending to the violation of them not to be denied by the most seditious and undutifull Subjects when they shall but be pleased to be friends and at peace with their reason and understanding as if by any divine punishment proceeding from an iratum Numen an angry and just God after ages should find England to be governed by a King or Prince as cruel as Nero or Commodus and as arbitrary and unruly as some of the Roman or Eastern Emperors have been there cannot untill the sword shall have cut the strings of our Magna Charta and silenced or banished the Laws be any oppression or evil happen to the people without the Balm of Gilead and remedies as quickly brought and found out by our Lawes as there can be any necessities or occasions of them Wherefore we should not like people altogether transported and carried out of humanity into a Lycanthropia or woolfish nature think it to be rationall honest or becoming us instead of every mans saying Domine quid retribuam Lord what shall I render thee for all thy benefits to make it the greatest of our care imployment and business not only to take from the King but keep all we can from him And if they would or could tell how to doe it without the just reproach of disloyalty dishonesty and villany should not do it in his
all their Customers and Inhabitants of London who paying for it in the smalness of their Ale and Beer and of the measure were notwithstanding no loosers by it when as the damage that the poorest sort of house-keepers received thereby came not when their gains were least unto the twentieth penny nor of the richer to the hundreth or two hundreth peny of what they gained by the Kings residence by trade letting of lodgings or the greater rent of their houses and if the Brewer had paid it himself and not laid it upon his Customers might for his priviledge in Brewing in the Cities of London and Westâ—minster and not being removed or punished for the Nuisance have very well afforded so small a sum as four pence in every quarter of Mault containing Berkshire Cheshire Cornewall Devonshire Gloucestershire Hertfordshire Herefordshire Kent Northampton Norfolk Somersetshire Surrey Sussex and London may give the prospect of the rest and how small the proportions were which were charged upon such as were to bear or pay them may make it appear that that so much now of late complained of charge of Pourveyance or Compositions for them will be so little as there will be no cause at all for it when as the yearly charge of buying Babies Hobby horses and Toys for children to spoil as well as play with which costs England as hath been computed near one hundred thousand pounds per annum or of amending the High ways yearly Treatments given to Harvest Folk or the expences of an Harvest Goose and a Seed Cake given yearly to their Plow-men keeping a Wake or Parish Feast every year or the monyes which the good Women in every Parish and County do expend in their Gosshippings at the birth of their Neighbours Children or many other such like trivial and most cheerful and pleasing expences will make the foot of the accompt as to the several kinds of those particulars to be a great deal more then the charge of that necessary duty of Pourveyance or Compositions for them which was so â—asy and petit as in most of the Counties of England it was many times not singly rated or assessed by it self but was joyned with some other Assessements and in Kent where more was paid then in any one County near London it was so little felt and regarded as a Tenant paying one hundred pounds rent per annum for his Land did not think it to be of any concernment for him to reckon it to his Landlord and demand an allowance for it Which caused the people of Oxfordshire Barkshire Wiltshire and Hampshire upon his now Majesties most happy restoration receiving his gracious letters offering them the Election of suffering him to take his Prae-emption and Pourveyance or to pay the Compositions to return answer by their letters which were read before the King in his Compting-house in White-Hall that they humbly desired him to accept of the Compositions And all the other Counties and the generality of the people of the smaller as well as greater Intellectuals to understand it to be so much for the good of the King his People as many of them are troubled and discontented that he hath them not And they who causing the Markets and the prices of things to be so unreasonably dear and excessive by their own raising of prices for their own advantages may when they please make the difference betwixt the Kings rates and theirs to be none at all or much lesser if they would but sell as cheap as they might afford their commodities according to the plenty of Victuals or provisions which is in England The high prices and rates which are now put upon Victuals and Provisions for Food and House-keeping being neither enforced nor occasioned by any plenty of Gold or Silver in England and if there were any such store or abundance of it non causatur effective 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 Berkshire Cheshire Cornewall Devonshire Gloucestershire Hertfordshire Herefordshire Kent Northampton Norfolk Somersetshire Surrey Sussex and London may gâ—ve the prospect of the rest and how small the proportions were which were charged upon such as were to bear or pay them That so much now of late complained of charge of Pourveyance or Compositions foâ— them will be so little as there will be no cause at all for it when as the yearly charge of buying Babies Hobby-horses and Toys for children to spoil aswell as play with which costes England as hath been computed near one hundred thousand pounds per annum or of amending the High ways yeerly Treatments given to Harvest Folk or the expences of an Harvest Goose and a Seed Cake given yearly to their Plowmen keeping a Wake or Parish Feast every year or many other such like trivial and most cheerful and pleasing expences will make the foot of the accompt as to the several kinds of those particulars to be a great deal more then the charge of that necessary duty of Pourveyance or Compositions for them which was so easie and petit as in most of the Counties of England it was many times not singly rated or assessed by it self but was joyned with some other Assessements and in Kent where more was paid then in any one County near London it was so little felt and regarded as a Tenant paying one hundred pounds rent per annum for his Land did not think it to be of any concernment for him to reckon it to his Landlord and demand an allowance for it And the people of Oxfordshire Barkshire Wiltshire and Hampshire upon his now Majesties most happy restoration receiving his gracious letters offering them the Election of suffering him to take his Prae-emption and Pourveyance or to pay the Compositions returned answer by their letters which were read before the King in his Compting house in Whitehall that they humbly desired him to accept of the Compositions And all the other Counties and the generality of the people of the smaller as well as greater Intellectuals do understand it to be so much for the good of the King and the people as many of them are troubled and discontented that he hath them not And they who causing the Markets and the prices of things to be so unreasonably dear and excessive by their own raising of prices for their own advantages may when they please make the difference betwixt the Kings rates and theirs to be none at all or much lesser if they would but sell as cheap as they might afford their commodities according to the plenty of Victuals or provisions which is in England The high prices and rates which are now put upon Victuals and Provisions for Food and house-keeping being neither enforced nor occasioned by any plenty of Gold or Silver in England and if there were any such store or abundance of it non causatur effective
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
great Talbots or as the Prior of Canterbury did of his Tenants who in every Manor were bound ex antiqua consuetudine providere Priori ibidem de quodam Palifrido competenti tempore novae creations suoe by ancient custome to present the Prior at his election or first admittance a Palfrey fitting for him Or which the Prior of Rochester did of his Tenants of the Mannor of Haddenham in the County of Buckingham who by ancient custome in the eighteenth yeer of the raign of King Edward the third were to Mow and make the Lords Hey Weed his grain in his demesnes pay certain Rent Corn called Booting Corn and five hundred threescore and three Eggs at Easter which in Anno 18 H. 6. were by an agreement made with the Prior of Rochester released for the sum of three pounds and an increase of Rent from thence forward viz. for every Yard land twelve pence every half yard land six pence every Cotland eight pence and every worthy some Tenants so called four pence which is to this day paid and continued And being besides obliged by their customes to the works and services following viz. That every Tenant holding a yard land and the Tenants of two half yard lands ought to plough the Demeasne lands of the Lord two days in the year viz. in Winter and in Lent for which they were to have their dinner allowed by the Lord every Tenant holding a yard land ought in harvest upon a flesh day as also upon a Fish day to be assigned by the Reeve or Bailiff to find two able persons every holder of a half yard every Cotland or Cottogea and every worthy ought to finde the same day one able and lawful person with Hooks or Sickles to reap the Lords Grain in his Demeasnes for which they were to have their dinner allowed them at the charge of the Lord or his Farmer every yard land ought to carry half a quarter of the Lords grain to Oxford being about twelve miles distant to Wallingford neer as much or to Wickham being about ten miles distant being Market Towns near adjoyning to Haddenham and all the Carriers were to have one penny in common to drink the morrow they ought not to work every yard land ought to carry to Marlow eleven quarter of Grain of antient measure at three tearms of the year to be quit from all things by six weeks after and to carry the Lords grain from his demeasnes into his Barn from the furthest field four loads from Dillicot field six loads and if they carry nearer then all the day if it please the Lord also if the Lord shall buy Wood every Yard land ought to carry two loads of Wood from the place into the Lords Yard so it be ready to carry before the Feast of St. Michael otherwise each Yard land should onely carry a horse load so as they may in one day go and return and all that week they should remain quiet likewise if the Lord should build houses he ought to buy Tymber and the men viz. his Coppyholders ought to bring it home viz. each hide every day one Load untill the whole be carryed so as they may in one day go and return also if it please the Lord to send for fish four hides ought to be summoned and two shall go for fish to Gloucester which is about six and thirty miles from thence and other two shall carry it to Rochester upon their own cost and they should remain quiet until they return all the Cotterels and worthy Tenants ought to wash the Sheep of the Lord and to sheer them and fully to perform all thereunto belonging and have nothing therefore and if a theif should be taken in the liberty of the Lord the Cotterel Tenants should keep him And were so due and of so long a continuance as though the Tenants some few onely excepted which would not pertake of the Composition and are still contented to do their work and carriage services did upon a reference made by King James to Henry Earl of Manchester Lord President of his Councel in Anno 1624. to hear and determine the differences betwixt Sir Henry Spiller then Lord of the said Mannor and the Tenants concerning that and other matters within a short time after viz. in the first year of the raign of King Charles the Martyr agree for a Release of the said services not acquitted in Anno 18 H. 6. to pay yeerly unto the Lord of the Mannor and his heirs after the rate of three pence for every Acre and a penny for every Messuage or Cotage which had no land belonging unto it Or as many the like beneficial customes and priviledges at this day enjoyed by the Lords of some thousands or more of Mannors in England which beloned unto the Abbies and Religious houses for which they have quit Rents or other payments not unlike the Compositions for the Royal Pourveyance Or that the Steward of the Kings house should not if the Kings Pourveyance and Prae-emption had not been remitted by Act of Parliament have authority to do as much as the Steward of the Kings house did about the eighteenth year of the Raign of King Edward the second notwithstanding so great priviledges immunities and exemptions granted and confirmed to the City of London command that no Fishmonger upon pain of imprisonment and forfeiture of his goods and chattels should go out of the City to forestall any Sea or fresh fish or send them to any great Lord or Religious house or any person whatsoever nor keep from coming to Town untill the hour appointed for selling be past untill the Kings Achators or Pourveyers should have made their Pourveyance to the use of the King Or that the King of England whose Royal Ancestor King Richard the first did not onely give to many Religious houses as to the Priory of Royston in Cambridgeshire divers exemptions and priviledges to be free from Carriages c. but de Regalium domorum aedificatione ac omnimoda operatione of works towards the repair or building of the Kings houses Ac ut silvae eorum ad praedicta opera aut ad aliqua alia nullo modo capiantur that their Woods or Timber should not be cut or taken for that or any other purpose and whose other Royal Progenitors have abundantly furnished diverse Abbies Religious houses with priviledges to be free of Carriage by Carts Summage upon horses de Thesauro ducendo Convoy of the Kings Treasure de operationibus Castellorum Pontium Parcorum Murorum work to be done in the building or repairs of Castles Bridges or Walls de vaccarum solutione quae dari solebant pro Capitibus utlagatorum and the payment of certain Cows or Cattel to redeem the forfeitures of Outlaws and exemptions from payment of Fumage or Chimny money Lestage or licence to carry away from Markets what they had bought or in release or discharge of customes such as at Beleshale in
of money raised by Taxes have but enforced a Conquest of less then a sixâ—eenth part of those great and rich Territories which might once have been had at a cheaper rate And if we would but regard the honor of the English Nation and the gratitude which like the blood was wont to circulate and attend their hearts should blush to take a lesser care of the Kings rights and preheminences then our ancestors were accustomed to do who in a Parliament of King Edward the third in the 42. year of his Raign declared That they could not assent to any thing which tended to the dishâ—rison of the King and his Crown to which they were sworn And in a Parliament in the fourteenth yeer of the Raign of King Richard the second did pray the King That the prerogative of him and his Crown might be kept that all things done or attempted to the contrary might be redressed and that the King might be as free as any of his progenitors were Or to deny those ancient rights of Prae-emption and Pourveyance or the former Compositions for them to a King who hath rescued us from a slavery from which we could not redeem our selves and restored all the Factious and Rebellious parties to their forfeited Laws and Liberties Or that he should meet with no better acknowledgements then that those who professed that their lives estates and fortunes should be at his dispose in order to his service and that they would be Tenants in Corde should by denying hâ—s Prae-emption and Pourveyance or Compositions for them but be Tenants in Ore and by their high rates and impositions upon his houshold provisions make it their business to take ex Ore suo that which should maintain him his houshold And that the King who publickly professed that he was much troubled that his people should come flocking as they did to Whitehal to see him where he had nothing to â—eed them should now be so much necessitated or imposed upon as he is by his want of Pourveyance and the former way of Compositions for them or that the maligners of our English honor and prosperity should publish it in Gath or Askelon or have cause to upbraid us with Hic clarae virtutis honos haec gloria sceptri Hoc magni Decus Imperii tales ve Triumphâ—s Are these the promises This the high renown Great Empires Honor Glory of a Crown Or that our Returns should be no more to a King who doth not as the Commonwealths of Greece the spawn and Nursery of Republikes fill their Treasuries with Taxes impose ten Drachmas upon every house Assessements upon every payment of Silver mony and Taxes upon Beggars Whores and such as were made Free upon Cattle Dung Horses Mules Asses Oxen and 3. pence upon every Dog or the Fumaria Tributa Chimney money leavyed by Nicephorus the Emperor the Chimney money which is now taken in England being of late onely granted by Act of Parliament and consent of the people to supply the decayed revenues of the Crown with a Tax likewise upon every man that grew suddainly rich upon a presumption that he had found some Treasure which by Prerogative belonged to the Emperor a Canon or Canonicum Tributum ordinary or constant yeerly Tribute amounting in the whole to as much as 17 s. six pence besides a Sheep six Bushels of Barley six Bushels of Bran six measures of Wine and thirty Hens imposed upon every village having thirty Chimneys imposed by â—saacus Commenius the Emperor or a Tax upon the rich to excuse the poor Nor as the Romans did whilst they were a Common-wealth impose a Tax or Imposition but in case of present great necessity and by the peoples consent in Parliament de agris Pascuis or a Land Assessement to make an Aerarium or Treasury to supply future emergencies or Collect Aurum vicesimarium a twentieth peuy of every mans estate ad ultimos Casus to support the Commonwealth when it should happen to be â—istressed or a Tax before hand to defray the charge of a war in Gaule when there should be any or Poll-money without common assent and an imposition or Tax upon salt nor raise Taxes and Tributes as they did Tributim a singulis ad Tributum solvendum aerario bellis exinanito to fill again their Treasuries exhausted by War a Tax or rate upon Wine a tenth of all Corn Oyl and fruits of the earth and a twentieth penny of the estates of such as were made free a vectigal or tribute for Fish in Lakes and Fish ponds a yeerly pension for every house in Rome their Aedilitia vectigalia a tribute to maintain their Theaters or Play-houses Siliquaticum a certain Toll in Markets and Fairs Vectigal macelli an Excise upon all flesh and Victuals a Tenth of Legacies the Decumae or Tenths of the profits of Lands given by a Husband to a Wife or a Wife to a Husband if they had no children and a Portorium or custom for exportation or importation of Commodities Did not make his Census or Assessements so poenal in the not due discovery of the peoples estates as the Romans those great pretenders to love and liberty did in theirs wherein wives servants and children were not exempted sub poena publicationis inflicta his qui nollent bona sua aestimari vâ—l mala fide minoris quam valerent aestimari paterentur under the penalty of a forftiture of their goods if they should refuse to have their estates Assessed or suffer them to be under valued and exact a rate to be paid for the burial of such as died extra patriam and were brought home to be buried or such taxes as were afterwards imposed by the Emperors of Rome when that grand and universal Commonwealth revolved into its first constitution and a Monarchy as a third part of the revenues of all men made Free in Italy and a fourth of the Natives or Free-holders imposed by Lepidus and Antonius in their Tâ—iumvirate with Augustus or as Augustus Caesar the best of their Emperors or Monarches did who exacted the fourth part of every mans revenue and the eighth of every mans goods which were made free to furnish an Aerarium militare or Magazin of money for the souldery a Centesima pars or hundred penny of all things sold a twentieth part or penny of all Legacies and grants of inheritance the Vicesima quinta or twenty fifth part of all things sold in the Country Market Towns the Quinquagesima or fiftieth part of wild Beasts brought to be sold and fifteen pence sterling for the peice of money taken out of the Fishes mouth which paid the Poll-money for our Saviour Christ and Peter is by good authors reckoned to be two shillings and six pence sterling for Poll money the hundred part of all things bought or sold within the Empire taxed before the Civil Waâ—s and continued by Tiberius
licencia an unbounded licence in the Magistrate to Tax the people and a licence to the people in stead of a liberty to Trade and cozâ—n one another makes them so patient to undergo those vectigaliâ— ac Collationes aliaque servilâ—a onera Taxes payments and servil burdens which otherwise they would be unwilling to endure All or most of which being continued and lying heavy upon them upon pretences of debts incurred for the publike to be paid or otherwise have made such a dearth of all houshold provisions as that notwithstanding that their huge Granaries at Amsterdam are always stored with abundance of Corn to transport and sell to all other Nations and Kingdoms where they finde any scarcity or want of it a family of ten persons more then one half whereof have been young children have this last Winter amongst other Victuals as Flesh Fish Roots c. been inforced to spend 17 s. sterling in a week in ordinary and common bread and twelve shillings sterling within the same Circle of time for Turfe or Firing and the generality of the Nation are sinking so fast into a poverty as by an exact account taken thereof there have been this last year more then in any of the former years above eighty thousand Pawns brought into the publike Lumbard at Amsterdam and may teach them and all the world at last how great the difference will be betwixt a natural and hereditary Prince governing by the known Laws of a Nation and with less charges and that which is onely upheld by the power of money and Taxes to make and preserve an interest for those who are the only gainers by it Did not in any of his necessities as some of his predecessors Kings of England have done in theirs both before and since the Conquest continue and take the Tax of Dane gelt laid to expel that Nation out of England after they were quieted and returned home nor as many of the English Lords of divers Mannors have done and do to this day require and take of their Tenants Peter pence or Chimney money amounting in some Mannors to considerable summes though it was long since abolished by Act of Parliament and was not to be taken in that kind or for that purpose nor doth by wars or impositions impoverish his people as some of his neighbors have done or made them to complain as the common people of Normandy did not long ago that they were une uraye Anatomy de corps humain auquel ne reste plus que les os le Peau encore foulez like an Anatomy of a mans body which had nothing but bones and skin left upon it and that also foul enough but hath made them in the generality richer then himself and more abounding in plenty and riches then any Nation of Christendom And being the son and heir of the Crowns and Kingdoms as well as afflictions of his Royal Father King Charles the Martyr who in the Halcion and peaceable days of the former part of his Raign did so much abhor the mode or manner of an Arbitary Government as he did imprison in the Tower of London that Monarch of Letters and Learning the great Selden together with Mr. Oliver St. John for but having in their custody or divulging a Manuscript or discourse written by Sir Robert Dudley a titular Duke of Tuscany and an English Fugitive of the way and means how to make the King a great Revenue according to the manner of Gabels or Taxes in Italy borrowed by Mr. St. John out of Sr. Robert Cottons famous library where it had otherwise slept and caused his Attorney General to exhibit a Bill in the Star Chamber against the now Earl of Clare the said Mr. Selden and Mr. St. John for the publishing of it though but in Manuscript and was so far from any action desire or intention of a Tyrant as when he might like the Dairo or Emperor of Japan have wallowed in riches and pleasures and as a Minotaur have fed upon the liberties of the people if he would have but delivered up the Church of England and his subjects and their after generations as slaves to the Arbitrary will Government of a Rebellious part of the people calling themselves a Parliament he did on the contrary not only most constantly endure all the miseries dangers ignominies which they could cast upon him but rather then he would betray or give up their Religion Laws or liberties laid down his life as a sacrifice to preserve them and havâ—ng before his death established our excellent Laws of Magna â—harta and made them stronger and more binding then ever they were before by confirming them and other their liberties and customs under the name and notion of their petition of Right and at the signing or ratification thereof used a saying or sentence deserving to be written in Letters of Gold which he called his Maxime and declared to be his own That the peoples liberty strengthens the Kings prerogative and that the Kings prerogative is to defend the peoples liberty did not for all those unparalelled sufferings and great Misusage of his Father and himself take any advantage of those that forfeited their interest in those excellent laws and liberties but pardoning all their transgressions restored them to all that they could but so much as pretend unto And notwithstanding that he and his Royal predecessors had quamplurimisdonis largitionibus by their very many favors and bounties to such as deserved well of the Commonwealth and had been instrumental in the preservation or promoting the good of it given away the most part of the Crown Lands and many of their Regalities doth not make an Aeraâ—ium or Treasury of mony for himself or his own particular use out of his own revenues separate from that of the publike as Lewis the 12. of France did but doth with that very small part of his Lands which remaineth and his legal and undenyable rights and prerogatives without any Taxes or Impositions laid upon the people other then what is assented unto by themselves and their representatives in Parliament bear and support the burden and continual charges of the Government and affaires thereof Which should rouze and stir up the hearts and affections of his people of England and perswade them who have now and had before the Taxes raised to improve Rebellion fewer Taxes and impositions laid upon them then any Nation within the walk or perambulation of the Sun and are the freest and do enjoy more liberties immunities and priviledges then any people of the world not to deny or withhold from him and of his just Regalities rights and preheminences but think it to be more necessary for their good and well-being to permit him to enjoy his Prae-emption and Pourveyance or Compositions for them then that which many of our Acts of Parliament have done to enjoyn the repairs of Havens and Peers as was in the last Session of Parliament for the Peer
exemption by an Assessement to be made for that purpose Or by the West Indians in Guaxara who by order of the high Justice do deliver unto Fryers travailing that way if they have no money Horses to ride on or to carry their carriages or provision without money so that at their departure they write it down in the Town book what they had spent and not abide above four and twenty hours in the Town where by a contribution their expences are defrayed Or by the old Irish one of which being a Tenant of Termonland or Land belonging to the Church and unwilling to change his old customes for new said to the Bishop of Dermot of whom he held his Lands non debet dominus mutare censum antiquum sed si careat rebus necessariis vaccis pinguibus c. debet ad nos miâ—tere Et nos debemus subministrare nam quaecunque nos habemus Domini sunt nos etiam ipsi illius sumus My Lord ought not to change his ancient Customes Rents or services due out of the Land but if he wanteth necessary provisions for his house and family as fat Cows c. we ought to furnish them for whatsoever we have are his and we our selves are the Lords Or by the modern Irish or inhabitants of Ireland who notwithstanding the Pourveyance or Compositions for Pourveyance and Prae-emption allowed to the Kings Lord Lieutenant of that kingdom could since the abolition of that most useful necessary custome in England offer if Fame did not mistake her self an yeerly supply of 3000. Irish Oxen or Cattel towards the support of the King and his Family and have besides in their Act of Parliament lately made for the execution of his Majesties Declaration for the setlement of that kingdom consented That the Lord Chief Justice of his Majesties Court of Kings Bench the Lord Chief Baron of his Majesties Court of Exchequer and the Master of the Rolles or any other his Majesties Officers of that Kingdom for the time being shall and may have and receive such Port Corn of the Rectories Impropriations or Appropriate Tythes forfeited unto or vested in his Majesty his heirs â—nd successors which have been formerly paid or reserved Or by the Scots a people never as yet exceeding or so much as keeping even pace with their neighbors of England in civilities kindness and gratitudes who when their King Malcolme who raigned in Scotland in Anno Dom. 1004. had given and distributed all the Lands of the Realm of Scotland amongst his men and reserved na thing as the Act of Parliament of 22 Jac. 3. beareth in property to himself but the Royal dignity and the Mute hill in the Town of Scone could give and grant to him the ward and relief of the heir of ilke Baron quhan he sold happen to deceis for the Kings sustentation And did notwithstanding so well esteem and allow of those ancient rights of Pourveyance or Compositions for them as in the Raign of their King James the 4. in the year of our Lord 1489. The Lords spiritual and temporal and uthers his Leiges did declare in Parliament that it was the Kings property for the honorable sustentation of his house according to his Estait and honor quhilk may not be failized without great derogation of his noble Estaite and that his true lieges suld above all singular and particular profit desire to prefer the noble Estaite of his Excellence like as it was done in the time of his maist noble progenitors of gud minde And did therefore think it neidful expedient and reasonable And did statute and ordain that full derogation cassation and annullation be maid of all Gifts Donations Infeftments Fewes life Rents given by his Hieness to quhat sumever person or persons sen the day of his Coronation swa that all Lands Rents Customes Burrow Mailles Fermeâ— Martes Mutton Poultery avarage carriage and uther Dewties that were in the hands of his Progenitors and Father the day of his decease notwithstanding quhat sumeuer assignation or gift be maid thereupon under the Great Seal Privy Seal or uthers be all utterly cassed and annulled so that the haill profits and Rents thereof may cum to the King to the honorable sustentation of his house and noble Estaite Or so much degenerate from the Brittaines our Ancestors and predecessors who were heretofore so glad of any occasions to express their love and honor of their Princes as when they made their progress or had any occasion to visit any of their houses they flung the doors off the Hinges and gave them open hearted and free entertainment Nor deny those respects and duties to our Kings which no other Nations do refuse to their Kings or Princes which may make us to be an hissing and reproach to other Nations and by using our head so ill to be esteemed as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 people without an head or the Sciopedes who are reported to have such large feet as they can when they please cover their head with it and never let it be said that when a factious and rebellious part of our people could in the year 1656. suppose it to be their Interest to exchange with Cromwell their Antichrist or Mahomet their Religion Laws and liberties for his Tyrannical and Arbitrary will and pleasure and petition him in their Conventicle or pretended Assembly of Parliament that he would besides the remainder of the Kings Queens and Princes Revenues not disposed of except Forrests and Chaces and the Mannors thereunto belonging and of all the Lands of Delinquents in the Counties of Dublin Kildare Clare and Katerlaugh the forfeited Lands in Scotland which were great and considerable two parts of the Recusants Lands in England not compounded for and all Debts Fines Penalties Issues and casual profits belonging to the Keepers of the liberties of England so miscalled which was by them and their fellow Usurpers setled upon him and was of it self a Revenue too great for all the Brewers of England to accept of ten hundred thousand pounds sterling per annum to be leavyed upon the people with such other supplies as should be needful to be raised from time to time by consent of that which they Nick named a Parliament and three hundred thousand pounds per annum to be raised for the charge of the Administration of Justice and support of Government which he thinking not enough to serve his wicked occasions designes or desires to â—lay or keep in exile the heir of the Kingdoms tells his dutiful Parliament at a conference in April 1657. that the charge of the Government would yearly amount unto ninteen hundred thousand pounds sterling and therefore though the war with Spain should cease desired that the thirteen hundred thousand pounds per annum might have six hundred thousand pounds per annum more added thereunto and that that could be willingly assented unto and all the Loyal party enforced and driven to submit
the times of his great Grandfather Henry the first his Uncle King Richard and his Father King John or at any time in his own Reign untill his first going over the Seas into Britain for the Kings of England saith the learned Sir John Davies have always â—ad a special Prerogative in the ordering and government of all Trade and Traffique in Corporations Markets and Fairs within the Kingdom which the Common Law of England doth acknowledge and submit unto as amongst many other things may appear by the Charter granted to the Abbot of Westminster mentioned in the Register of Writs wherein the King doth grant to the Abbot his Successors to hold a Fair at Westminster for two and thirty dayes together with a Prohibition that no man within seven miles thereof should during that time buy or sell but at that Fair. Whence for the freedome of Markets and Fairs protection in going and retorning and other immunities had their extraction and original and no less just and reasonable then antient foundation those duties of Toll or Tribute for all things sold in them the Exemptions of the Kings own Tenants or in Auntient demeasn by writs de quietos esse de Theloneo to be Toll-free à regale and power not denied to any forreign Prince or King in Christendome or the States of Holland in their free as they would be called Common-wealth the benefit and authority whereof most of the Nobility and Gentry of this Nation tanquam Reguli as little Kings do by the Charters and Grants of the Kings of England or a Prescription or time immemoriall which supposeth it now injoy in their Manors under that part only of his Prerogative and many Cities Boroughs and Towns Corporate by their Charters have likewise not only before the 49 of Henry third but in almost every Kings Reign since their Liberties Customes and Franchises concerning their Markets and Fairs and the assise and correction of victuals Whence also were deduced the Standard kept in the Exchequer for all weights and measures the Kings power of the Mynt coyning enhauncing or decrying the value of moneys and his publick Beam or Weigh-house in London where all Merchandise brought from beyond the Seas are or should be justly weighed And whence it came that King Henry the 3. in the ninth year of his Reign caused the Constable of the Tower of London to arrest the Ships of the Cinque-Ports on the Thames and compel them to bring their Corn to no other place but only to the Queens Hithe charged in anno undecimo of his Reign the said Constable to distrain all Fish offered to be sold in any place but at Queen Hithe and that Tolls and payments were then and formerly made and paid to the Kings use for Corn Fish and all other provisions brought thither or to Down or Dowgate the rent and profit whereof were afterwards in anno 31. of his Reign granted and confirmed to the Maior and Commonalty of London at 50 l. per annum Fee-farme And in Anno 14 H. 3. forraign Ships laden with Fish were ordered to unlade only at Queen Hithe and if any did contrary thereunto he should be amerced forty shillings Whence also proceeded that well known and antient Office of the Clerk of the Markets in the later end of the Reign of King Edward the first who was not to be a stranger in the prices or rates of the Markets for his Office extended something further then the care of just weights and measures and as Sir John Davies saith was to oversee and correct all abuses in Markets and Fairs it being said in Fleta that ipse in notitia assisarum panis vini mensurarum cervisiae debet experiri ut inde notitiam habeat pleniorem he ought well to inform himself of the assises of Bread Measures Beer and Wine the later of which was not assised or rated by the assisa panis cervisiae in anno 51 of Henry the third and no man could be fitter to watch and hinder for the Justices in Eyre came but twice a year or seldome into every County Forestallers or such as made the Markets dearer or informe or give evidence thereof to the Justices in Eyre or Juries impanelled by them then the Clerk of the Markets who was probably attendant in all the Iters or Eyres for otherwise the Juries who had it then in charge to inquire of false weights and measures or such as buy by one measure and sell by another would have wanted or not so well have had their evidence and the Justices in Eyre could not so well inquire in their Eyres or Circuits de custodibus mensurarum of the Guardians of the measures or Clerks of the Market for so they may be understood to be which took bribes or gifts to permit false Measures if there had been but one Clerk of the Market infra villatas virgam hospitii Regis within the Townships or Virge of the Kings House or if as Sir Edward Coke supposeth the Clerks of the Market had been penned within the narrow compass of the Kings House and the Virge thereof or that the cares of the Fairs and Markets and the Justice of the Kingdome as to that concernment had been but only calculated for the Kings Houshold and confined unto it When as Bracton a learned Judge sub ultima tempora Henrici Tertii in the later end of the Reign of King Henry the third hath recorded in his book de Legibus consuetudinibus Angliae of the Lawes and Customes of England the Justices in Eyre did enquire de mensuris factis juratis per Regnum si servatae sint sicut praevisum fuit de vinis venditis contra Assisam c. of the Measures sworn to be observed whether they were kept as it was ordained and of Wines sold contrary thereunto And was of opinion that it was gravis praesumptio contra Regem coronam dignitatem suam si assisae statutae juratae in regno suo ad commuem Regni sui utilitatem non fuerint observatae a great offence against the King his Crown and Dignity if the assizes or rates which were appointed and sworn to be kept in the Kingdome to the common profit or weal publick thereof should not be kept Which do fully evidence that those antient Rights of the Crown were inquirable in the Eyres and Leets long before that which is called a Statute of view of Frank pledge in anno 18 Ed. 2. was made which at the best was but declaratory of what was before the Common Law some other antient Customes of England And anno 51 H. 3. in the assisa panis cervisae being as Decrees or Rates ordained which as to Ale and Drink the Judicious and right-learned Sir Henry Spelman believeth was altioris originis and as antient as 18 R. 1. mutatis ratione seculi mutandae to be altered and changed according to the rates