cil have sat thrice at Guildhall about
the subsidies." The lord keeper, in his endeavours to persuade the
citizens to loosen their purse-strings, went so far as to declare that
anyone disguising his wealth was committing the sin against the Holy
Ghost, and was as Ananias and Saphira! So great was the general decay,
both in the city and the country, that there was some talk of putting in
force the penal laws against recusants, notwithstanding the negotiations
that were going on for a French marriage, in order to make up the expected
deficit.(267) The civic authorities were again pressing the king for the
repayment of the loan (L100,000) made in 1617. Time had wrought
alterations in the condition of the lenders; some were dead and their
widows and orphans were crying out for repayment; some were decayed and
imprisoned, and others likely to undergo the same calamity if steps were
not taken for their speedy relief. They complained that the city's seal,
which had by his majesty's command been given as security to the tenders,
suffered as never it had done before, and several suits had been commenced
against the Chamber of London in the courts at Westminster, to which they
knew not how to give satisfactory answer. They therefore prayed him to
give order for such payment to be made to them as might give relief to the
distressed and comfort to them all. The result was that the king directed
(July, 1624) his two principal secretaries and the chancellor of the
exchequer to devise means for satisfying the debt.(268)
(M110)
In September Mansfield was again in England asking for men and money for
the recovery of the Palatinate, in which he had been assured of the
co-operation of France. This assurance, however, was only a verbal one,
and nothing would induce Louis to reduce it to writing. James on his part
was willing to make every concession, provided that the matrimonial
alliance on which he had set his heart could be brought to a happy
conclusion. But as these concessions involved broken pledges, he feared to
face the Commons, and thus the parliament, which should have re-assembled
this autumn, was further prorogued and never met again until James was no
more.
(M111)
It was to James's last parliament that the City was indebted for a
statute,(269) which at length insured it quiet enjoyment of its lands free
from that inquisitorial system which had prevailed since 1547, under
pretext that it had concealed lands charged with
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