THE BEGINNING OF TRADE 



arrest the ships of private owners all round the coast and at the same 

 time could impress the necessary number of seamen, although this was 

 only regularising ancient practice. The King also could and did arrest 

 friendly foreign ships in British ports. The agreement with the Cinque 

 Ports was beside this right and definitely gave the King the services of 

 fifty-seven ships for fifteen days without payment, each with twenty 

 soldiers. The conversion for many years was quite simple and only 

 consisted of fitting temporary and rather shaky castles forward and aft 

 and a fighting top on the mast-head which had to be strong enough to 

 support not only its crew but also a heavy weight of stones and missiles 

 that would be flung down on the enemy's deck. This was by far the 

 cheapest way of organising a fleet, but it can be well understood that it 

 injured trade very seriously and in the Middle Ages Parliament was 

 constantly complaining that ships were taken up by the King long before 

 it was necessary and often their owners had to pay their keep for months 

 in port before the regular charter started. All this time the crews had 

 to be paid and fed by the luckless shipowners. 



The Control of Armed Merchant Ships. 



Early in the fifteenth century it was agreed between England and 

 France that armed merchant ships, which meant practically every ship 

 afloat, should be prohibited from sailing without the granting of a special 

 licence by the Crown. This was intended to check piracy but the 

 efficiency of the idea is doubtful and there is little record of it ever hav- 

 ing been enforced. When Henry V made the misbehaviour of armed 

 merchant ships a capital offence it was different. 



The Terms of Hire. 



Although the owners often found it very difficult to get their money 

 from the Crown the terms of hire were quite definitely established. In 

 1380 the charter rate was three shillings and fourpence per ton for every 

 three months, commencing from the day the fleet assembled. Five 

 years later it was reduced to two shillings and remained there a long 

 time, in spite of the efforts of the owners. The earlier rate is referred 

 to in the Act as being long established but there is no record of when it 

 started. Another form of payment was the occasional diversion of 

 tunnage and poundage, already mentioned, which was first levied 

 in 1347 and renewed annually. Early in the fifteenth century this 

 impost, together with a quarter of the wool subsidy, was granted to a 

 special committee of merchants who policed the seas with ships specially 

 commissioned. 



Their Prizes. 



The question of how the prizes made by armed merchant ships 

 should be divided was always a very thorny one and a source of constant 

 argument. King John granted the owners of the ship half the spoil and 

 this was done on other occasions, but only when it became necessary in 

 order to get any ships at all. More generally it was twenty-five per 

 cent. In early days the owner divided his portion equally with the 



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