142 LATER STEWARTS AND THE REVOLUTION 



carried by a resolution of both Houses of Parliament in 1645 ; it 

 was one of the terms of the Treaty of Newport in 1648, when Charles 

 I. agreed to surrender the dues for the payment of 100,000 a year ; 

 it had been demanded by Puritan agriculturists like Hartlib and 

 Blith ; finally, in 1656 the abolition had been passed into law with 

 the consent of Cromwell. Technically speaking, the legislation of 

 the Commonwealth was annulled by the Restoration ; practically, 

 however, the question was not whether the abolished dues should 

 be continued, but whether they should be revived. Against this 

 revival it was argued in 1660 that much land had changed hands 

 in the previous fifteen years without any provision for the possible 

 revival of the liability. The income voted for Charles II. had to 

 be provided, the problem of ways and means to be solved. The 

 Restoration Parliament might have abandoned the excise duty, or 

 revived the feudal dues, or substituted for them a land tax. They 

 retained the excise introduced by Republican financiers, but reduced 

 it by a half ; they confirmed Cromwell's abolition of the emolu- 

 ments which the Crown had derived from lands held in chivalry ; 1 

 they declined by a majority of two votes to impose a land tax. At 

 the same time the Crown surrendered its oppressive prerogatives 

 of purveyance and pre-emption. No doubt the immediate result 

 of these fiscal changes was that the landed aristocracy continued 

 to be relieved from a burden, and that, from motives of self-interest, 

 they refused to revive, either in its original or in a substituted form, 

 a system of taxation which, before the Commonwealth, had once 

 attached to land held in chivalry. 



The abolition of military tenures reduced to some extent the 

 necessary outgoings of many of the landed gentry. At the same 

 time the commercial policy adopted by the Restoration Government 

 maintained, if it did not swell, their incomes. The steady rise in 

 the price of wool during the past century had begun to hamper the 

 clothing trade. In order to lower prices for home manufacturers, 

 an Act passed in 1647, and re-enacted in 1660, prohibited its 

 exportation. Still further to stimulate the clothing industry, a 

 series of Acts, 2 from 1666 onwards, ordered the burial of the dead 

 in woollen fabrics. Partly for revenue, partly in compensation for 

 these concessions to manufacturing industries, partly to meet the 

 claims of impoverished adherents, partly to maintain the balance 

 between pasture and tillage, partly, no doubt, to make England 

 1 12 Car. II. c. 24. 2 18 and 19 Car. II. c. 4. 



