keep the remainder of
the money for their own private use; and this trade king Edward understood
very well, and often practised it."

[24] At that time the parliament first granted the number of 20,000
archers, which was afterwards reduced to 13,000. Rot. Parl. v. 230, 231.

[25] Rotuli Parl. vi. 4.

[26] Ibid. p. 6.

[27] Ibid. p. 39.

[28] The parliament re-assembled accordingly on the 9th of May 1474: and
during that session, on the 18th of July, the commons again granted to the
king a quinsisme and a disme (a fifteenth and a tenth), and the further sum
of 51,147l. 4s. 73/4d. in full payment of the wages of the 13,000 archers,
who, notwithstanding the condition of the former grants, were still
maintained in readiness for the proposed expedition. In making these votes,
the commons recited, as before, the king's intention to set outward a
mighty army, "as dyvers tymes by the mouth of your chancellors for the tyme
beyng hath to us been declared and shewed;" and it was now ordained "that,
if the said viage roiall hold not afore the feste of seynt John Baptist the
year of our Lord M cccclxvj. that then aswell the graunte of the forsaid
xiij M. men as of all the sommes severally graunted for the wages of the
same," should be utterly void and of none effect, (Rot. Parl. vi. 111,
118.) On the re-assembling of parliament in January 1474-5 a further act
was passed to hasten the payment of the disme first voted (Ibid. p. 120);
and again, on the 14th of March, immediately before the dissolution of the
parliament, the commons granted another fifteenth and tenth, and three
parts of a fifteenth and tenth, to provide for the before-mentioned sum of
51,147l. 4s. 73/4d. (Ibid. pp. 149, 153.)

[29] They are printed in Rymer's Foedera, &c. vol. xi. pp. 804 et seq.

[30] An account of the payment of these wages for the first quarter, is
preserved on the pell records of the Exchequer, and an abstract printed in
Rymer's Foedera, vol. xi. p. 844. It includes the names of the dukes of
Clarence, Norfolk, and Suffolk, the earls of Ormonde and Northumberland,
the lords Grey, Scrope, Ferrers, Stanley, Fitzwarren, Hastynges, Lisle, and
Cobham, and as bannerets sir Ralph Hastings, sir Thomas Mountgomery, and
sir John Astley; besides the earl of Douglas and the lord Boyd, noblemen of
Scotland; with many knights, esquires, and officers of the king's
household.

The item to the duke of Clarence will afford a specimen of these payments:
"Geo