ere able to break the Italian banking houses, and disorganise the
European money market, for on the Continent all this energy in trade was
already old. The house of Anjou, for example, had made the kingdom of
Naples a great trading centre. Its corn and cattle were famous the world
over. But in Naples it was the sovereigns (like Edward III and Edward IV
in England) who patronised the commercial instincts of their people. By
the indefatigable genius of the royal house, industry was stimulated,
and private enterprise encouraged. By wise legislation the interests of
the merchants were safeguarded; and by the personal supervision of
Government, fiscal duties were moderated, the currency kept pure and
stable, weights and measures reduced to uniformity, the ease and
security of communications secured.

No doubt trade not seldom, even in that age, led to much evil.
Parliament in England raised its voice against the trickery and deceit
practised by the greater merchants towards the small shopkeepers, and
complained bitterly of the growing custom of the King to farm out to the
wealthier among them the subsidies and port-duties of the kingdom. For
the whole force of the break-up of feudal conditions was to turn the
direction of power into the hands of a small, but moneyed class. Under
Edward III there is a distinct appearance of a set of _nouveaux riches_,
who rise to great prominence and take their places beside the old landed
nobility. De la Pole, the man who did most to establish the prosperity
of Hull, is an excellent example of what is often thought to be a
decidedly modern type. He introduced bricks from the Low Countries, and
apparently by this means and some curious banking speculations of very
doubtful honesty achieved a great fortune. The King paid a visit to his
country house, and made him Chief Baron of the Exchequer, in which
office he was strongly suspected of not always passing to the right
quarter some of the royal moneys. His son became Earl of Suffolk and
Lord Chancellor; and a marriage with royalty made descendants of the
family on more than one occasion heirs-at-law of the Crown.

Even the peasant was beginning to feel the amelioration of his lot,
found life easy, and work something to be shirked. In his food, he was
starting to be delicate. Says Langland in his "Vision of Piers Plowman":

"Then labourers landless that lived by their hands,
Would deign not to dine upon worts a day old.
No pen