. In great need of money, he
demanded a large sum from the clergy, and seized a quantity of wool in
the hands of the merchants. The barons, alarmed at these arbitrary
measures, insisted on the King's confirming all previous charters of
liberties, including the Great Charter (SS135, 160, 199). This
confirmation expressly forbade that the Crown should take the people's
money or goods except by the consent of Parliament. Thus out of the
war England gained the one thing it needed to give the finishing touch
to the building up of Parliamentary power (SS213, 217); namely, a
solemn acknowledgement by the King that the nation alone had the right
to levy taxes.[1] (See Summary of Constitutional History in the
Appendix, p. xi, S12.)

[1] Professor Stubbs says in his works (i.e. "Constitutional History
of England," and "Select Charters"), that the Confirmation of the
Charters "established the principle that for all taxation, direct and
indirect, the consent of the nation must be asked, and made it clear
that all transgressions of that principle, whether within the latter
of the law or beyond it, were evasions of the spirit of the
Constitution." See also J. Rowley's "Rise of the English People."

221. Revolt and Death of Wallace (1303).

A new revolt now broke out in Scotland (S219). The patriot, William
Wallace, rose and led his countrymen against the English,--led them
with that impetuous valor which breathes in Burns's lines:

"Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled."

Fate, however, was against him. After eight years of desperate
fighting, the valiant soldier was captured, executed on Tower Hill in
London as a traitor, and his head, crowned in mockery with a wreath of
laurel, was set on a pike on London Bridge.

But though the hero who perished on the scaffold could not prevent his
country from becoming one day a part of England, he did hinder its
becoming so on unfair and tyrannical terms. "Scotland," says Carlyle,
"is not Ireland. No; because brave men arose there, and said,
`Behold, ye must not tread us down like slaves,--and ye shall
not,--and ye cannot!'" But Ireland failed, not for any lack of brave
men, but for lack of unity among them.

222. Expulsion of the Jews, 1290.

The darkest stain on Edward's reign was his treatment of the Jews
(S119). Up to this period that unfortunate race had been protected by
the Kings of England as men protect the cattle which they fatten for
slaughter. So lo