704 A. D. 1484. 



flicks, grates, horns for lanterns, or any article pertaining to any of the 

 crafts above mentioned, [cc. 10, 12.] 



The bowyers alfo complained of a ' feditious confederacy of the Lom- 

 ' bards,' who had raifed bow-ftaves from 40/" to ^S a hundred, and 

 obliged them to take the good and bad together without garbling. It 

 was therefor enacted, that no Venetian or other merchant fliould be per- 

 mitted to import merchandize without bringing ten good bow-flaves for 

 every butt of mahnfey or tyre, and that bow-ftaves fliould be garbled, 

 and fold only to natives of the king's dominions, [r. 11.] 



It was reprefented in parliament, that till about the year 1450 malm- 

 fey wine (apparently in confequence of a glutted importation) ufed to 

 be fold from 50/to 53_/4 per butt, running from 126 to 140 gallons, the 

 payment being made, two thirds in cloth, and one third in money ; but 

 now, by thefidtiliy of the fellers who were r. ade denizens, the importa- 

 tion was fo proportioned to the demand, that the butt, running only 

 •about io8 gallons, fold for £^ : 6 : 8, paid all in money. The parliament 

 (without interfering with the price) enaded, that no malmfey fhould be 

 imported in butts fmaller than 1 26 gallons, nor any wine or oil in cafks 

 fmaller than the ftandard meafures * ; and in cafe of defedive meafure 

 they only obliged the feller to allow for it to the buyer. They alfo re- 

 newed the law for gauging all calks of wine or oil imported, before they 

 fhould be fold. [c. 13.] 



Of fifteen adls, paffed in the only parliament alTembled in the reign 

 of Richard III, there were feven f for the regulation of commerce and 

 manufadlures, of the condition of which they exhibit a pretty good 

 view, and alfo of the fituation of foreigners trading to, or refiding in, 

 England, which, though to us it appears hampered with ungenerous, 

 impolitic, or unavailing, reftridions, was much ameliorated in compari- 

 fon of what it had formerly been. 



All the laws of England prior to this fellion of parliament were writ- 

 ten in barbarous Latin or French, and laterly moft of them in a jargon 

 compounded of Englifh and French, but all unintelligible to the great 

 bulk of the people, whofe lives and properties were to be difpofed of by 

 them. This parliament firft gave the people of England laws in their 

 own language ; and ever fince mongrel Latin and French have been dif- 

 carded from the acts of parliament. Richard's ads were alfo the firft 

 that were printed. 



February 21" — King Richard gave the magiftrates of Kingfton upon 

 Hull permiflion to export and import all kinds of goods, wool and wool- 

 fells excepted, and out of the cuftoms of them to retain £60 annually 

 for twenty years, to be applied for the fupport of the harbour and other 

 public expenditure of the town. [Fadcra, V. xii, p. 213.] 



* They arc particularized in the aiS^, and are already inferted from the aiV 2 Ilcn. VI, c. 1 1. 



•^ One of ih«m \c. 6J was a perpetuation of the law of Edward IV refpefting courts of piepoudre. 



