DISPOSITION OF THE PENALTIES loi 



sworn inquest and are to have the assistance of the sheriff 

 in enforcing- obedience. With the cessation of this tenth 

 and fifteenth, the said "' excess " is to be levied in aid of the 

 king per illos qitos ad hoc duxerimus assignandos. In- 

 ternal evidence shows that these instructions were drawn 

 up by the king's council ' and that they can properly be 

 described as secunda ordinacio.' It is clear that by this 

 renunciation of what would normally be a source of profit 

 to the crown, the council hoped to conciliate the discon- 

 tented taxpayers; the sequel shows, however, that it had 

 determined to interpret the concession in its narrowest and 

 most literal sense. 



The writs of July, 1350, for the collection of the third 

 year of the subsidy,^' were followed by a repetition of the 

 provisions as to the " excess," addressed as before to the 

 collectors throughout England.* It is, therefore, somewhat 



' Since there appears in the beginning of the writ, " cum .... de 

 consilio prelatorum, nobilium, aliorumque peritorum nobis assistencmm 

 ordinauerimus," followed by a clause of the ordinance of 18 June, and 

 then "ex deliberacione dicti consilii nostri, adiciendo duximus ordi- 

 nandum," followed by the provisions for the application of the excess, 

 it is evident that the same council was responsible for both measures, 

 and it has already been said (p. 2) that the ordinance of labourers was 

 the work of the king's council. 



^"Dictam primam ordinacionem " is the phrase in the above writ 

 applied to the June ordinance; " second ordinance" is therefore prefer- 

 able for the writ, rather than the "conclusion of the ordinance, the 

 title used in the Siafntes of the Realm, i. 309. icr an undated document, 

 printed from MS. Reg. 19 A, xiv, British Museum, and almost iden- 

 tical with the writ under consideration. The former is in the third per- 

 son while the writ is, of course, in the first, and has a longer preamble 

 as well as some additional paragraphs at the end, important for pro- 

 cedure In the Museum manuscript the " conclusion follows con- 

 secutively after the last clause of the June ordinance and includes the 

 instructions to the bishops etc.. which really belong only to the earlier 

 measure. 

 ^ Supra, p. 100, note 3. ^^ 



*Orig., 24, m. 13, I Oct.; " Dedecima et quintadecima de operanis. 



