A. D. 1308. 475 



come td England with money and merchandize ; and, after tranfudling 

 their bufinefs, to return with their goods, horfes, and even money, 

 notwithftanding his father's law againfl: carrying money or bullion out of 

 the kingdom. {Fadera, V. iii,/. 70.] 



March 22'' — The ftatute of merchants, and the charter granted to the 

 foreign merchants, feem both to have been infufficient to procure jullice 

 for them : for we find that, on a complaint of the merchants of Brabant, 

 the king iffued general orders to do them juftice in all their jull claims. 

 {Fasdcra^ V. iii, /•. 71.] 



Some Caftilian pirates, under Portuguefe colours, had taken fevcral 

 Englifh veflels, whereupon the commercial harmony, which had fub- 

 fifted for fome time between the merchants of England and Portugal, 

 "was interrupted, till the affair was explained by a letter from the king 

 of Portugal, who alfo requciled letters of fafe conduft for the merch- 

 ants of his kingdom to trade in the dominions of King Edward, which 

 were granted (Odober 3''), on condition that they fhould trade fairly, 

 pay the ufual cuftoms, and give obedience to the laws of the land while 

 refiding in it. \Fcedera, V. iii, p. 107.] 



1309 — The merchants, or rather the feamen, often took it upon them 

 to carry on hoftilities againfl thofe of other countries or cities, and to 

 enter into treaties of peace or truce with them (as has already been 

 partly obferved) without the fovereigus on either fide being concerned 

 in the quarrel, unlefs fometimes as mediators, or umpires, between the 

 belligerent feamen. Many complaints having been made of piracies and 

 {laughters, committed during a truce of two years between King Edward's 

 fubjeds of Bayonne and the fubjeds of Caftile, the kings on both fides, 

 after a negotiation of confiderable length, commillioned two judges out 

 of each country to fettle the damages, do juftice, and punifh fome of 

 the firft movers. {FGedera, V. ni, pp. 112, 122, 131, 132, 153, 169, 170, 

 178, 181.] 



. Other feamen, called Efterfings (people of the Baltic fea), taking ad- 

 vantage of the troubled fi:ate of Scotland, committed fome depredations 

 there; whereupon Edward, who confidered himfelf the fovereign of that 

 kingdom, having heard that the pirates had failed for the Swyn, wrote 

 to the earls of Namur and Flanders, and the magiftrates of Bruges, re- 

 quefling them to do juftice upon them. There were alfo com- 

 plaints about this time of Englifta fubjeds being maltreated in Norway. 

 [Fcedera,V. ni, pp. 131, 154, 215.] But the reader, I dare fay, will 

 gladly excufe me from entering into a tedious and difgufting recital of 

 the atrocities perpetrated upon the fea and the fliores in thofe ages of 

 ferocity and rapine, and alio from narrating many of the fhort-lived 

 and unimportant treaties, which were made, almoft every year, profeffed- 

 ly for the purpofe of guarding the interefts of commerce. 



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