Claufes Govern i 3. Government by Prerogative: from Third Parliament to Pacification of Berwick. THE long and terrible interval which fuc17-60. ceeded, and which only Laud's mad refolve to impose the service-book on Scotland at laft abruptly closed, during which no parliament met, and the people were forbidden even to fpeak of parliaments,*-forbidden merely to look back to their ancient liberty,-fills fortyfour clauses, up to the fixtieth inclufive. Then paffed over the land a net-work of tyranny fo Preroga elaborate and comprehenfive, that, excepting only its agents and projectors, not a fingle clafs of the community escaped it. Nearly all men fuffered alike, in lands, goods, or perfon; nor was there left to any one that which fafely he could call his, except the wrong, and the too patient endurance. ment by tive. Claufes and 49. Obfolete laws and fervices which it was 17,21,22, hoped had been extinguished for ever, con31,44, 45, fronted fuddenly all families of reasonable condition, Old laws of knighthood were revived; and fuch fums exacted for default, as, whether in refpect of the perfons charged, the fines demanded, or the modes of exaction, were entirely monftrous. By fines and comof feudal pofitions for wardships alone,† eftates were Revival ftatutes. During the first difcuffion of the Remonftrance, Mr. Wingate, member for St. Alban's, moved that there should be named therein "The Proclamation fet forth, forbidding people fo much "as to talk of a parliament." + Some notion of the advantage taken, for purposes of extortion, of those obsolete feudal statutes, may be derived broken. weakened past help. Coat and conduct money,* and other military charges, were either preffed as due, or, failing that claim of right, were required as loans. Without aAncient fhadow of pretence, either in fact or law, the charters ancient securities and charters of real property were everywhere violated; and from forefts where never any deer fed, from depopulations where never any farm was decayed, and from enclosures where never any hedges were fet, charges unceafing and infatiable were drawn against the land. When flaws in title were from the documents in the Verney Papers relating to Mrs. Wardship Mary Blacknall, who had the misfortune, on her father's extordeath, to become a ward of the Crown, and four of whose tions. maternal relations, "Anthony Blagrove the elder, Anthony Blagrove the younger, both of Bulmarth, Richard Libb "efquire of Hardwick in the county of Oxford, and Charles "Wifeman efquire of Steventon in Berks," are obliged to purchase from the Court of Wards (that is, the Government) freedom from oppreffion, and mere ordinary rights of citizenfhip, by payment to the Crown of a fine of 2000l, half of which is paid down, and a bond given for the remainder. money. * This oppreffive tax was affeffed on the feveral hundreds Coat and separately, each being obliged to fupply its quota of men by conduct preffing or enliftment, in proportion to its fize and the number demanded; one fhilling being paid to each man, fourteen fhillings levied for the coft of his "coat," and two other payments made feverally, as remuneration to the constable who took him to the place of embarkation, and as fine or charge for his "conduct," or expenfes on the way, From a Schedule of Grievances largely circulated through the country before April 1640, I felect one or two items: "The new taxe of Coate and Conduct Mony, with undue Schedule "meanes used to inforce the payment of it, by messengers of Griev"from the counfell table." ances. "The infinite number of Monopolies upon everything the April, "countryman must buy." "The rigid execution of the Forrest laws in theire extremity." "The exaction of immoderate fees by fome officers under "the Lord Chief Justice in Eyre." 1640. Packed juries and robberies by law. Claufes and 24. alleged, they were judged by packed juries; and when commiffions of inquiry into exceffes of fees or fines were iffued, they were made but additional means of increafing and confirming the grievance. They ended, for the most part, in compofitions with the delinquents themfelves; fo that offences to come were compromised as well as the offences paft, and a complete impunity established for future wrongs. To these matters were devoted the 17th, 21st, 22nd, 31ft, 44th, 45th, and 49th clauses. Nor was the lot of the merchant and trader, 18, 19, 20, in this difaftrous interval, more to be envied than that of any owner of a moderate estate. In the very teeth of the Petition of Right, tonnage and poundage were again levied, with many other fimilar impofitions, of which fome were in a difproportion fo monftrous, that the amount of the charge exceeded the entire Monftrous value of the goods. The book of rates genetaxation rally was alfo enhanced to fuch an extent that the ordinary tranfactions of commerce became impoffible. And though, for these violent affeffments, there was fet up the notable pretence of duly guarding the feas; and though Pretence there was fuddenly added thereto that new and of guard- unheard of tax of fhip-money,* by which, for of commerce. ing feas. The tax leaft Finch was at this time Chief Juftice of the Common Pleas, and no part of his conduct in the circuit in Eyre more exafperated the people than his extending the boundaries of the forefts in Effex, and annihilating the ancient perambulations. * In the above-named "Schedule of fuch Grievances as "moft oppreffe this country," largely circulated in the early fupport part of 1640, ftands firft "The illegall and infupportable charge of fhip-money, now the fifth yeere imposed as high 66 as ever, though the subject was not able to pay the last able. many years, with the help of the book of Shiprates, near upon 700,000l. was yearly taken money. by the Crown; the feas meanwhile were left 66 yeer, beeing a third." The Lord Deputy Wentworth's newfwriter gives us curious notices of this memorable tax, "word of lafting found in the memory of this kingdom;' but even his goffiping letters lofe fomething of their careless tone in talking of it, and show that he alfo winces and fmarts Hardships under the preffure no one can escape. In one year, Mr. of shipGarrard fays, "it will coft the city at least 35,000l." He money names particular assessments to the amount of 360l. and 300l: affeffment. great fums to pay at one tax, and we know not how often "it may come. It reaches us in the Strand, being within "liberties of Westminster, which furnisheth out one fhip— nay lodgers, for I am fet at 40s; but I had rather give and 66 pay ten fubfidies in parliament than 10s. this new-old way "of dead Noy's.' And as in the cities, fo in the country. "Mr. Speaker," faid Sir John Culpeper, "this tax of fhip money is the grievance which makes the farmers faint, and Prifons "the plough to go heavy." So intolerable was it everywhere, filled. indeed, that the prifons were literally filled with those who had refused and refifted payment, before the Crown (which, through the judges on circuit, had refifted every former attempt to bring the queftion into the courts as refusing even to admit a doubt of its legality) confented to appear to Hampden's plea. The Court lawyers had felected Hampden Hampden as a better man to fight it out with, than the less affable and one of apparently more obdurate Lord Saye; but here, as everywhere, many rethey were fated to discover their mistake. I give a curious cufants. note (not otherwife reported) as to Lord Saye's fubfequent proceedings: "March 19, 1638-9. Shipmoney, determined for the "king by his prerogative, argued Eafter and Trinity Term. "In Michaelmas term, the lord Saye brought his action Lord "about it to the King's Bench barre. Mr. Holborne, plead- Saye's "ing ftrongly for him, was rebuked by Judge Bartlet refiftance: "[Berkeley], because it was determined as before. He alleged a prefident when fuch determinings have been againe queftioned. Judge Crooke alledged prefidents. 66 Judge Joanes faid they were not like. Sir Jo. Brampton [Bramfton] alledged that they had no prefident like this, "viz. to call the thing in question the next terme, and before "the judges' faces that did determine it. The lord Saye "affirmed, that if their Lordships wold fay it were lawe, then decifion "he wold yeeld; but otherwife not, to the wronging of his in his 66 country. He hath time to consider until the next terme.' Pym, in his great speech in the little parliament, ftruck at cafe. Seas wholly un fo utterly unguarded that the Turkish pirates guarded. ranged through them uncontrolled, repeatedly taking great ships of value, and configning to flavery many thousands of English fubjects.* Pym on fhip money. Not a light tax. in the the root of the extraordinary and universal resistance provoked by this tax when he pointed out, that it extended to all perfons and to all times, that it fubjected goods to distress and the perfon to imprisonment, that, the King being fole judge of the occafion, there was no poffibility of exception or relief, and that there were no rules or limits for the proportion, fo that no man, under it, knew what eftate he had, or how to order his courfe or expenfes. It is quite a mistake to suppose, as fome have reprefented, that it was a light tax; and that Hampden, well able to afford it, oppofed it only on principle. No man, not the wealthiest in that day, was able to afford it. It muft, fooner or later, have broken him down. "About the end of March, 1627, Sir William Courtenay "his houfe of Ilton, near Salcomb, in Devon, was robbed; "and much of his pewter plate and household stuff carried 66 away. It was done by certain pirates, which came up in "boats from Salcomb, and fled the fame way they came "without apprehenfion"-Diary of Walter Yonge: to which paffage a valuable note is appended by the editor. The fovereignty of the fea was as yet but the emptieft of claims. Pirates of all lands fwept our coafts during the whole of this Piracies period of government by the fole will of the King. Piracy had become indeed fo much more profitable than honeft Channel, trading that many Englishmen turned Turks and lived at Tunis. Sir Francis Verney is fuppofed to have been among them; and Mr. Bruce (in his most interesting collection of Verney Papers, printed for the Camden Society, 95-102) does not effectually rebut the fuppofition. "Affifted by Englishmen," fays the editor of Yonge's Diary, "the Barbary "corfairs not only fcoured the English and St. George's "Channels, but even difembarked, pillaged the villages, and "carried the inhabitants into slavery, to the number of several "thousands.... One veffel the Algerines captured was worth "260,000l. The Dutch refumed their fifhing without a "licence, and captured two rich Eaft Indiamen. France, "Spain, and Holland violated the neutrality, and infulted "the English flag. The French fcoured the Severn in "1628... So late as the year 1633, Lord Wentworth, ap"pointed lord-deputy of Ireland, names noted pirate veffels "off the coast of Ireland, and their captures. The Turks "carried off a hundred captives from Baltimore in Ireland, "in 1631. They landed their poor captives at Rochelle and "marched them in chains to Marfeilles. And in 1645, the Infults to English flag. 66 |