492 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



excited by this action, and it became a question up to what 

 point the Pope had the right to make use of censures and 

 excommunications in order to ensure his personal temporal 

 interests. The Archduchess Margaret requested her Council 

 to consider this question, and whether, according to precedent, 

 it was necessary to recognise the legality of these censures, 

 or, on the contrary, to refuse to act upon them as infringing 

 the liberty and the security of commerce in the provinces under 

 her government. The Council refrained from expressing their 

 own views ; they gave the opinion that an affair of this 

 importance, during the minority of the Archduke Charles, 

 King of Castile, should be referred to his grandfather, the 

 Emperor Maximilian. Einally, as a result of arbitration, it was 

 agreed that the Papal monopoly in Flanders should continue 

 for the space of two years, but that the price was not to exceed 

 a specified maximum. 



The present writer has found no indication that the Bulls 

 referred to were promulgated in England, so that it would 

 appear doubtful whether the independent spirit credited to the 

 English kings by M. Finot is really merited. It is to be borne 

 in mind that the consumption here in the fifteenth century was 

 quite small in comparison to that of Flanders, and that it 

 was relatively of little importance what we did. There is 

 evidence however that Henry VII., in a dispute brought before 

 him in i486, took no cognisance of the Papal claim to monopoly. 

 Apparently the manufacture of alum was being carried on at 

 Piombino in opposition to the Papal injunctions. A ship laden 

 with alum of this manufacture was captured and brought into 

 an English port by English mariners in the employ of the Pope's 

 agent in London. A Florentine merchant possessing some 

 interest in the cargo petitioned the king for redress. The 

 Pope's agent urged that the Florentine was excommunicated 

 and ought not to be heard, and that the alum was forfeited to 

 the Apostolic Treasury ; but the king, remarking that there was 

 no prohibition against bringing alum into England, held that 

 the capture of the ship without his consent was an act which 

 could not be tolerated and ought not to remain unpunished. 



But whether there was a free importation of alum from all 

 parts or not, the price in England rose considerably. In 1504 it 

 was 53s. 4d. the hundred, instead of 6s. which had been the 

 standard price for many years. 



