rliament, affirms, that they never appear to have been united
till the sixteenth of Edward III. See Hist. vol. ii. p,451. But it is
certain that this union was not even then final: in 1372, the burgesses
acted by themselves, and voted a tax after the knights were dismissed.
See Tyrrel, Hist, vol. iii. p. 754, from Rot. Claus. 46 Edward III.
n. 9. In 1376, they were the knights alone who passed a vote for
the removal of Alice Pierce from the king's person, if we may credit
Walsingham, p. 189. There is an instance of a like kind in the reign
of Richard II. Cotton, p.193. The different taxes voted by those two
branches of the lower house, naturally kept them separate; but as their
petitions had mostly the same object, namely, the redress of grievances,
and the support of law and justice both against the crown and the
barons, this cause as naturally united them, and was the reason why they
at last joined in one house for the despatch of business. The barons had
few petitions. Their privileges were of more ancient date. Grievances
seldom affected them: they were themselves the chief oppressors. In
1333, the knights by themselves concurred with the bishops and barons in
advising the king to stay his journey into Ireland. Here was a petition
which regarded a matter of state, and was supposed to be above the
capacity of the burgesses. The knights, therefore, acted apart in this
petition. See Cotton, Abridg. p. 13. Chief baron Gilbert thinks, that
the reason why taxes always began with the commons or burgesses was,
that they were limited by the instructions of their boroughs. See Hist,
of the Exchequer, p. 37.]

[Footnote 5: NOTE F, p. 105. The chief argument from ancient authority,
for the opinion that the representatives of boroughs preceded the
forty-ninth of Henry in., is the famous petition of the borough of
St. Albans, first taken notice of by Selden, and then by Petyt, Brady,
Tyrrel, and others. In this petition, presented to the parliament in the
reign of Edward II., take town of St. Albans asserts, that though they
held "in capite" of the crown, and owed only, for all other service,
their attendance in parliament, yet the sheriff had omitted them in
his writs; whereas, both in the reign of the king's father, and all his
predecessors, they had always sent members. Now, say the defenders of
this opinion, if the commencement of the house of commons were in Henry
III.' reign, this expression could not have been used. But Had