Middlemen in English Business 139 



from going to meet dealers coming by land or water with their mer- 

 chandise and victuals towards the city to buy or sell. They were not 

 to go to the Pool of the Thames to meet wines or other merchandise 

 or go on board vessels to buy such. The ideal was to let victuals, 

 etc. " stand for common sale by him who shall have brought the wares, 

 that so the community may be served without regrators."^ Thus the 

 operations of the middlemen in corn were closely hedged about. 

 Sales by sample and in any place out of public view were forbidden; 

 the hours and days of purchase were prescribed. The mixture of 

 good and bad corn "in deceit of the people," agency by way of option 

 buying, regrating between foreign merchants in Graschirche and 

 Newgate, forestalling goods coming by land or river — all these prac- 

 tices were rigidly prohibited. In addition to these direct regulations 

 a system of customs burdened them: on the "small trades" a sort of 

 octroi duties was levied — victuals were taxed, as were coal, timber, 

 pottery, etc. — when they were brought into the city; and if the carrier 

 set them down from his back, his horse's back or his cart an extra 

 stallage fee was imposed.- Under all these burdens it is not surpris- 

 ing that mercantile life made little headway. 



Regrating, however, was not unknown. There is evidence that the 

 laws and regulations were not rigidly enforced against the regrator. 

 After the good folks of the city "had bought as much as they had a 

 necessity for their use" the regrator might buy up victuals.^ 

 Warehousing and selling in gross received some public sanction.'* 

 Aliens were allowed to warehouse their grain for forty days and "sell 

 it in their storehouses and granaries." Regrators bought up grain 

 and held it for higher prices, as modern speculators do.^ 



In provincial parts of the Island ingrossers sometimes found oppor- 

 tunity for business.^ During the sixteenth century "some Ingrossers, 

 who" bought "Wheat of the husbandman — and deliver(ed) it to the 

 transporting Merchant" were operating in Cornwall.'^ The officers 

 of the ports also made use of the public funds left in their hands by 

 ingrossing corn. They were the occasion of grievous complaints by 

 the farmers.* 



1 Lib. Alb. I, 260-271; III, 79-93; for further details, Lib. Alb. LXXXIIL 



2 Lib. Alb. Ill, 65-7. 



3 Lib. Alb. I, 270. 

 * Ibid., 261. 



5 Paris, V, 673; Rymer, 11, pt. L 597. 



« Harrison, II, c. 18; Acts P. C, VIII. 108. 



^ Carew, Cornwall, 54. 



«Cal. S. P. Dom. 1591-4, 362; Hist. MSS. Com. Rep. XIII. App., pt. IV,29. 



