THE MOVEMENT OF GOLD IN GERMANY, 1495-1621, ILLUSTRATED BY THE MOVEMENT OF THE GOLD GULDEN (RHENISCHE GULDEN), ACCORDING TO IMPERIAL AND OTHER MINT REGULATIONS.(See preceding Table on p.31.)Date.Cologne Mark coined into Pieces.Alloy.Equivalent Value in Convention Money.Treaty or Ordinance.24 Crts.12 Grains.Flrns.Krtzs.Pfnge.1506711⁄3186 gold360132⁄7597Treaty between Bamberg, Würzburg, and Brandenburg.36 silver1509711⁄3186 gold3613185⁄7597Frankfort Mint ordinance.40 silver15248922...25435019⁄6369Imperial Mint edict of CharlesV.at Esslingen.1551711⁄3186 gold3603682⁄7597Imperial Mint edict of CharlesV.at Augsburg.38 silver155972186 gold3412267⁄3834Imperial Mint ordinance of FerdinandI.38 silver
Treaty between Bamberg, Würzburg, and Brandenburg.
Frankfort Mint ordinance.
Imperial Mint edict of CharlesV.at Esslingen.
Imperial Mint edict of CharlesV.at Augsburg.
Imperial Mint ordinance of FerdinandI.
GERMANY: THE THREE IMPERIAL EDICTS
In 1530 the Reichstag of Augsburg demanded the holding of a council, in order to enforce the late edict, and for a due consideration of the monetary situation. Several attempts were made with this object, but fruitlessly, and the princes of the empire fell back on the only feasible but fatal plan of smaller Mint conventions between contiguous states. There is an endless series of these, and they render the history of German currency a perfect jungle of intricacies. Nine years later (1539), a monetary convention was summoned tomeet at Augsburg by Ferdinand, heir to the empire. It proved fruitless. Again, in 1548, after the expiry of a similar period, the Reichstag at Augsburg declared for another monetary convention to relieve the disorder. The opinions of certain deputies to this convention, which met on the 8th October 1550, were as follows: "For fifty or even eighty years and more the ratio between gold and silver has been between 12 and 13. But in a gulden of those days there was an equivalence of more silver than in seventy-six of our kreutzers. Since then we apprise the Rhenish gold gulden and kreutzers less than foreign nations. Therefore France and England seek them."[12]
A thorough inquest into the subject, or evaluation, was therefore ordered, and it was in accordance with the advice of the convention and with the report of the evaluation that the second imperial Mint edict was issued at Augsburg, 1551. This edict was drawn up on a ratio of 10.83 as a basis, and, as might be reasonably expected from the different ratios ruling abroad at the time, it proved as inoperative as its predecessor. The succeeding ten years witnessed a rise in the relative value of gold, or depreciation in that of silver, and the third and last of these imperial Mint edicts, that of the Emperor Ferdinand, issued at Augsburg, 19th August 1559, fixed a higher ratio, viz. 11.44. The Rhenishguldenwas raised from 72 to 75 kreutzers. The increasing production of silver indicated by this change is stillmore clearly marked in the resumption of the coining of the imperial thalers, at the instigation of the Reichstag at Augsburg, 30th May 1566. The advice of this Reichstag was the outcome of the monetary convention held at Nördlingen two years earlier, at which strong complaints were appointed to be made before the Reichstag of the weak state of the coin, and of its under-valuation.
In matter of fact, the Mint edict of 1559 remained a dead letter; nominally, however, it continued in force up to 1600, although no less than seven attempts were made at succeeding diets, from 1566 to 1596, to enforce it and bring it up to date. In the Reichstag of Speyer, 1570, complaints were made of the universal loss arising from the non-observance of the edict. In place of an imperial coinage, nothing circulated but foreign and counterfeit coins, and the necessaries of life had risen to a prohibitive height. Similar were the complaints at the succeeding diets at Frankfort, 1571, and at Regensburg, 12th October 1576, at which last Ferdinand's edict was again re-enacted, with a command that the Burgundian circle and the Swiss should conform themselves to it. Bitter complaints were made of the bad state of the gold and silver coinage, and of the enrichment of the exchangers on the Rhine. The circulation of Dutch and Swiss thalers was forbidden because of the loss by exchange, and the export of all gold and silver again forbidden. As an instance of the depreciation prevalent in the coinage, it was noted that the silveralbushad lost one-third of itsweight, so that thirty-six were needed to purchase one gold gulden, whereas formerly twenty-six were equivalent.
GERMANY: DISORDERS OF 1580
Four years later, 1580, Ferdinand, as Archduke of Austria, issued a fresh tariff, with the object of checking exports, and in 1582 the states, having consulted as to the condition of the coinage, strongly advised a renewal of the prohibition of the export of coin, especially by the Italians. This advice was adopted in the Reichstag of Augsburg, which met seventeen days later, 20th September 1582. The preamble of the Act then and there passed speaks of the export of a good portion of the native currency, and of the unmeasured rise of prices, coupled with the circulation of forbidden foreign specie, large and small.
This resolution of the Reichstag was followed by the enacting of the Mint edict of 10th December 1582. It proved as futile as any of the others; and two years later, July 1584, the deputies of the three circles of Franconia, Swabia, and Bavaria complained that within the four years immediately preceding several millions had left the country by way of the Rhine provinces for the Netherlands, very little going to Italy by comparison.
On this representation another useless edict was issued by the Emperor RudolphII., and in the following year the merchants at Frankfort Fair found themselves obliged to agree upon a tariff ofducatsandReichs-thalers. ThePhilipps-thalerwas put at eighty-two kreutzers, and theReichs-thaler, which, bythe Imperial Mint edict still nominally in force, should have been at sixty-eight kreutzers, was put at seventy-four. This arrangement of the merchants established a ratio between gold and silver of 11.4.
Certain of these same merchants, examined as to their opinion of the method of the export in January 1586, explained that it went by way of Nürnberg, and that the arbitrage was attended with 9 or 10 per cent. profit.
GERMANY: THE KIPPER UND WIPPER ZEIT
Nominally, however—or in theory—the arrangement of 1559 continued the unenforced law of the land up to 1600, underneath all these attempts at revision and underneath the different regulations of the various monetary unions of contiguous circles or states. With the latter date commences that extraordinary movement of monetary depreciation and panic which is known as the "Kipper und Wipper" period. In great part the extraordinary acuteness of the panic which ensued was due to internal monetary confusion of Germany, but that internal confusion simply ministered to the export of all good specie and metal, and in the end it became simply a money corner. The movement began by a coining of the lower denominations of monies on a different and depreciated footing or basis. Thespeciethaler began to part company from the current thaler, and to rise to more than the 24 silver groschen or 36 Marien groschen, to which by the Mint edict of 1559 it was declared equivalent. By 1618 it had risen to 1 thaler 6 silver groschen (= 48 Marien groschen), by 1620 to 2 current thaler, by1621 to between 7 and 8 current thaler, while the ducat had risen to 13 florins 30 kreutzers.
Tabularly the statement of the movement of theReichs-thaleris this:—
Date.Florin.Krtzers.Date.Florin.Krtzers.1582181621Jan.220158719Feb.2241590110March2301594111April2361596112May 252481603114May 313151604114June361605115July3151607116Aug.401608120Aug. 10315[A]1609June 15122Sept.430[A]July 7Oct.50[A]Dec. 19124Nov.530[A]1610124Dec.630[A]1613Sept.126Dec. 203151614Aug.1281622Jan. 18730[B]1615March128Jan. 27430Nov. 1124Feb. 10100[C]Nov. 17130Mar.100[C]1616130Mar. 12601617130June 16315[A]1618132Oct.50[B]1619Oct.148Nov.60[B]Dec.241623April1301620June28And at this last figure standing up to 1669.Nov. 9220
[A]Nürnberg.
[A]Nürnberg.
[B]Augsburg.
[B]Augsburg.
[C]Vienna.
[C]Vienna.
The course of thegold guldenwhich could be given is exactly parallel.
This table speaks volumes. It marks the acuteness of the monetary panic and crisis of 1621-22—the central time of the commercial ruin induced by the disorder of theKipper und Wipper Zeit. The pamphleteer and polemic literature of this crisis is asrich and instructive as any which has accompanied the bimetallic agitation and silver question of our later days.
At Hamburg thethaler, which had gradually risen from an equivalence of 24 schillingen to 33 schillingen in 1609, had a correspondingly excited course during these years.
Schillingen.Pfennige.Schillingen.Pfennige.Oct. 1609360July 16184261610-13370Sept.430Dec. 1614376Nov.440Aug. 1615389Sept. 1619466Jan. 1616400Oct.480Aug.410Aug. 1620520April 1617406Feb. 1621530Aug.410Mar.546Sept.416May540Nov.420May 1622480
It was in anticipation of the approaching disorder that on the 3rd of March 1609 a Mint treaty had been made between Mecklenburg, Schleswig-Holstein, Lübeck, and Hamburg, "for protection against the Mint disorder, which is most disastrous to land and people, and to take precaution against the advance of the larger silver specie." Seven years later, on the 10th January 1616, the merchants and financiers of Hamburg drew up a petition complaining that, through the monetary disorder, trade and exchange was being driven from the city, as within a short period the exchange with Frankfort had fallen from 74 kreutzer (=32 schillingen Lübeck) to 62kreutzer (=32 schillingen Lübeck), and the exchange with Amsterdam from 46 stivers (=32 schillingen Lübeck) to 39 stivers. To the Senate's proposal for the erection of an exchange bank, the merchants would, however, have nothing to say, considering it unnecessary and dangerous, and called for the suppression of the notes which the merchants had brought into use to facilitate their settlements.
Three years later, however, the Senate declared more strongly for the establishment of a bank, premising in the preamble of their resolution that "it is many ways known and plain how disastrous a disorder has hitherto been in the currency, both from the rise of the larger silver species and from the excessive importation of smaller depreciated specie, whereby not only private individuals but also common interests, as churches, hospitals, widows, and orphans are greatly pinched in their incomes."
GERMANY: HAMBURG IN 1619
It was as the outcome of this resolution that the celebrated Hamburg bank was instituted in 1619, the later life of which was to become of so much importance for the monetary and commercial history of North Germany.
The curious point to observe is the short time—a few months merely—by which the crisis in Germany preceded that in England, and the analogy of some of the manifestations, although there were no such Mint and coinage disorders in England as had aggravated and in the first place partly induced the movement in Germany.
In 1623 a great Mint deputation from all the circles was held, and in accordance with its representations the new imperial basis was established, which remained in force until the conclusion of the period of which we here treat. By that basis the mark of silver was coined into 9Reichs thalers2groschen. Thethalerwas fixed at 90 kreutzers, the goldguldenat 1 florin 44 kreutzers, and theducatat 2 florins 20 kreutzers. This disposition remained the Mint law over all the weary, disastrous period of the Thirty Years' War, which is practically a blank for the monetary history of Germany. It is not until 1665—the opening of a fresh period—that complaints of the state of the lower denominations of the coinage are again heard. But how far this quiescence is to be attributed to the economic wisdom of the settlement of 1623, or to the mute, dumb, inarticulate agony of Germany during that strife when her commerce, much more even than her national life, was suspended, is hidden from us in almost complete darkness.
SPAIN: FUNCTION IN SEVENTEENTH CENTURY
During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the function of Spain was a very simple one in the European system. She was the receiver and distributor of the metallic wealth and finds of the New World, and accomplished her task perfectly naturally and efficiently. But it was at the cost of her political and commercial future and greatness. If Spain had been a commercially independent nation, growing forherself and supplying herself with her own manufactures, the metallic wealth of the New World would have stayed much longer in her lap, and Europe would have starved. But she was not. She produced little, and manufactured less, and the ill-gotten, blood-stained gain, which flowed to her shores from America, served only to feed an impractical vanity and to further unfit the nation for manufacturing and commercial life. The, to her, disastrous influence of Spain's shortlived empire endure to-day, for she is still as unfitted as ever by temperament and natural training for mercantile life. Such is the penalty her dower of New World gold and silver brought her. Finding she could purchase anything and everything with this gold and silver, she threw herself into her work of conquest, and let commerce go. Her manufactures came to her from England and the Netherlands—countries she sought to conquer and enslave; and thither her gold went in exchange, and before the century was out those countries had risen exulting over her. But the point to notice is this. Assuming this distributing function as her own and proper one, the only condition essential to its proper fulfilment was the maintaining of an absolutely unimpeachable coinage. The rapidity with which the precious metals left her possession was simply due to the fact that Spain did so maintain her coinage and for a sufficiently lengthened period. The goodness of her coins exalted them above the prevailing rates in France and the Netherlands, and they were eagerlysought in consequence. The monies that did not, and could not, normally leave her possession by ordinary way of trade left her by means of arbitrages working on the system of bimetallism, which existed unacknowledged.[13]It was this commanding quality of the Spanish coins that led to the adoption of their system by France in 1641. That in the case of Spain we hear no complaints of depletion of coinage and commercial disturbance resulting therefrom, such as mark the history of the other countries of Europe, is simply due to the fact that her stock of metals was continually being replenished, and that she had no commerce to be disturbed. The gold and silver of America came to her in a steady stream and left her for the Netherlands and elsewhere in a stream as steady; and so long as that flow was turned through her dominion, so long as the main sources of precious metal-mining were American, and the product a monopoly-possession of Spain, shestood above, and felt no immediate harm from, the bimetallic law which insatiably sucked away her wealth. Until the time came, therefore, when she lost her monopolist position in this matter the monetary history of Spain is free from those features of disturbance, commercial agitation, monetary conferences and edicts, which are common to the rest of Europe, and consist merely of a record of Mint ordinances regulating the fineness of her coins and slowly adjusting them to the general movements of the century. Only in the case of the first of these—the edict of Juan and Don Carlos, 1537, by which the standard ofcoronasandescudoswas fixed at 22 quilates, "which is the standard of the greater escudos of France and Italy"—has the enactment any comparative or international bearing.
For sixty-one years after the settlement of 1497 there had been no alteration of the monetary system. In 1523 the Cortes of Valladolid had petitioned the King, CharlesI., to lower the standard and content of the gold coin, "so that in weight and value they may pass equal with thecrowns of the sunwhich are made in France, so that by these means they will no longer draw our gold from the kingdom." In its ignorance this Cortes also demanded that the silver monies should be reduced and issued on a relatively depreciated footing. It was a matter of thirteen years before Charles yielded and adopted the measure suggested, in the edict of 1537, already referred to, and it may be safely said that by the time of itsadoption the need for the measure had passed away. Any disturbance and loss of her stock of precious metals caused by the general movement which marks itself in European history about 1519-20, and which shows itself in Spain in the petition of the Cortes of 1523, was quickly redressed by the inrush of metals from America. Finding gold and silver come to her easily, Spain cared little how they went. After the edict of 1537 there is only one complaint of the export of coin recorded in the legislative enactments of the country, viz. in 1552, when it was decided to alter the alloy of the billon money in order to avoid its exportation, "as we are given to understand that its intrinsic value is greater in other countries than here."
SPAIN: PASSIVE ATTITUDE
The Mint edicts of Spain during the years 1500-1660 simply follow in the wake of the general movements of prices in Europe generally. The authorities were perfectly passive to the export of the precious metals, and no attempt was made to manipulate the ratio in such a way as to arrest the outflow. The conduct of PhilipII., in 1566, in still further raising the denomination of the gold coins by one-seventh has the same passive aspect, although it has been attributed to a mere base desire on the part of Philip to fill his depleted treasury by a partial debasement. A comparison of the movements of metals and prices in France and Spain will show that the advance was only normal and general, and the further changes which were made in 1609 and 1612have this same normal character, and call for no comment. At the points enumerated it is quite evident that Spain merely and mechanically followed the general trend of the precious metals and prices through the century. There is no expression of aggrievement, either slight or acute, at the precious metals leaving her. While every other country was occupied seriously, sometimes desperately, with the question of how to guard their stocks of them, the eyes of the Spanish Government and the nation's mind were fixed only on conquest and imperial growth. The cost of her empire was such that at the accession of PhilipIII., 1598, the national debt was over a hundred million ducats, an absolutely unparalleled sum for the time. When, therefore, the Spanish Government began the enormous issues of base billon money which mark the reign of PhilipIV., it is to be looked upon as a financial, or treasury, or budget expedient, and totally unconnected with any currency movement, pure and simple. These issues were so great that, in 1625, the premium on gold and silver, as compared with billon monies, was fixed at 10 per cent.; in 1636, at 25 and 28 per cent.; and, in September 1641, at 50 per cent. (See account of Spanish monies, Appendix III.)
Such base monies always tend to become the onlyvisiblecurrency of a land. But, save as thereby facilitating the denudation of Spain's store of precious metals, this matter of the depreciation of her billonmoney has practically little or no relation to the general movements of the two precious metals which we are investigating. It has more resemblance to an over-issued and depreciated paper currency.
Of that ebb and flow, that oscillation and instability in the metals, which make the study of the other currency histories of Europe during this period so instructive an object-lesson of the effect and influence of a bimetallic law and system, Spain shows not a trace. She received the metals in a steady stream, and emitted them in a steady stream. They pouredthroughher. Her function was that of distributor, and she performed it. When the time came that her monopoly of the metals ceased, her remedy against the ruin of a bimetallic law was removed, and she became as signal an instance of its malignant operation as any—France, England, or Germany. Until that time came she had her remedy against immediate ruin in her yearly argosy, with its blood- and toil-stained tribute.
To come to England.
ENGLAND, 1500-1660
The following tables give a succinct synopsis of the general course of her gold and silver coinage during this period:—
TABLE OF ENGLISH SILVER COINS, 1500-1660.Date.Denomination.Weight in Troy Grains.Date.Denomination.Weight in Troy Grains.1504Penny,121552Penny,8Groat,48Shilling,96Shilling,1441553Penny,81527Penny,101⁄2Groat,32Groat,421⁄2Shilling,961543Penny,101560Penny,8Groat,40Groat,32Shilling,1201601Penny,73⁄41549Shilling,80Shilling,923⁄4
TABLE OF THE ENGLISH GOLD COINS, 1500-1660.Date.Denomination.Weight in Troy Grains.Fineness.Equivalents.Carats.Grains.Henry VII.,1489Sovereign,2402331⁄2£100Henry VIII.,1527Rose Nobel or Rial,1202331⁄20113Sovereign,2402331⁄21261544Angel,80220080Crown,5721⁄67220050Pound,2002201001545Crown,48200050Pound,192200100Edward VI.,1549Pound,1697⁄172001001550Angel,802331⁄2080Sovereign,2402331⁄21401551Pound,1788⁄11220100Mary,1553Angel,802331⁄2068Elizabeth,1558Angel,802331⁄20100Sovereign,2402331⁄21100Pound,1748⁄112201001601Angel,7866⁄732200100Pound,17161⁄67220100James I.,1603Pound,17161⁄6722011001604Unit and its fractions, the Double Cr., British Crown, and Thistle Crown,1542⁄32201001605Angel,711⁄92331⁄201001610Angel,711⁄92331⁄20110Gold raised 10 p. ct.Unit,15426⁄312201201619Angel,6411⁄152331⁄20110Charles I.1625Angel,6411⁄152331⁄20100Unit,14020⁄41220100
TABLE OF THE VALUE IN PENCE OF THE GRAIN OF GOLD(23 c. 31⁄2gr. Fine)IN THE VARIOUS GOLD COINAGES OF ENGLAND, 1500-1660.Date.Pence per Grain.Date.Pence per Grain.15271.12516011.6261544 (22 carats)1.2811603 (22 carats)2.2361545 (20 carats)1.47016041.6551549 (22 carats)1.51816051.2715501.216101.8561551 (22 carats)1.42516192.05215531.016251.85115581.51625 (22 carats)1.8381558 (22 carats)1.425
TABLE OF THE MOVEMENT OF GOLD & SILVER IN ENGLAND 1500-1680TABLE OF THE MOVEMENT OF GOLD & SILVER IN ENGLAND 1500-1680
The testimony of these tables is perfectly general. They establish, roughly speaking, just such an advance of price as befell the whole of Europe. They do not witness the oscillation in the coinage, and the commercial disaster due to the action of bimetallic law. For the evidence of this latter, however, there is ample store of material in the State papers of England throughout the period.
The moment prices began to rise on the Continent good English gold tended to disappear and flow away, being replaced by continental coins of lower contents (or higher denomination). The stress of this practical diminution of the currency was made all the greater by the simple fact that the increasing trade which accompanied such rise of prices demanded an expanding rather than a contracting currency.
WOLSEY'S ADMINISTRATION OF THE MINT
The very year, therefore, 1519, which marks thecommencement of the rise for the Continent generally, marks the commencement also of agitation in England with regard to the supply of the precious metals. There is preserved among the State papers at the English Record Office a paper of advice from a German of the name of Herman King to Wolsey, dating in June 1519, "How to provide bullion from Germany for this realm with the greatest profit." He advises contracting for a fixed supply of metal at a certain price, which he puts down, and adds: "If Wolsey will appoint a person to receive the money, I will engage to deliver 2000 or 4000 marks weight yearly at this price, but it must be secretly, as, if the purveyor were discovered, he would be in great danger, and the (German) princes would not suffer any silver to depart because of their own Mints."
Four years later the effects of the exchange had made themselves so felt that Henry was obliged to make a treaty with the Emperor, CharlesV., "for the reformation of old and new money," 1523. An attempt was made to tie down the chief coins in exchange—the goldrealof Flanders, the goldcarolusand thedouble carolusof Spain—and it was further agreed (ArticleIV.) that no new money of Germany, Italy, Spain, France, or elsewhere, should be given in payment to English merchants, unless it had a fixed value in sterling money by consent of both princes.
In December of the following year Wolsey was meditating sending commissioners to the Low Countriesto require that all monies valued too high should be reduced to their normal rate, but he was informed by Knight, resident at Mechlyn, that, "having spoken with several who hear daily the council's opinion, they think it is not likely to be done while the war continues, as the chief merchandise now is finances; and, besides, as their 'goldes' are highly esteemed in France, if they lower them they will all be carried thither."
Any such method of procedure as this of Wolsey's was bound to be futile, and Henry's Government fell back on the much wiser plan of altering the denomination of the coins. On the 24th July 1526, a commission was issued to Wolsey "for increasing the sterling value of the coinage to an equality with the rates of foreign currency." The reciting information contained in the commission itself is perfectly succinct and clear in its bearing—"one pound weight of angel gold (i.e.23 carats 31⁄2grs. fine) is worth, in current money, £27; by alloy of1⁄11it is worth £29, 6s., of which 11s. is allowed the Mint master for coining. In return he gives the merchants 108 crowns of the rose, at 5s., really worth but 4s. 101⁄2d., which makes £26, 6s. 8d. So that there is a clear gain of 48s. 4d."
The investigations of the commission were followed by a proclamation on the 22nd August 1526, fixing an altered tariff of exchange.Crowns of the sunwere put at 4s. 6d., which only four years before had been at 4s. 4d., while theducatwas raised from 4s. 6d. to 4s. 8d.
Finding the enhancing of the gold and the export of specie still continue, an inquest was held, on the 30th October 1526, into the fineness and value of the coins. As a result of the verdict of the jury, a second proclamation was issued in the same year, dated November 5th, "to check the exportation of specie arising from the increased value of currency on the Continent." The sovereign was put at 22s. 6d. (having previously been rated at 20s. 6d.), and other gold coins in proportion. Silver coinage was to pass at previous rates, but a new issue was to be made, in which the ounce Troy was to be coined into 3s. 9d. Finally, foreignducatswere to be taken as bullion, no rate of exchange being even fixed.
At the same time Wolsey was attempting to negotiate for a supply of gold from Antwerp to replenish the currency. On this subject there exists a curious letter from his agent in Antwerp, dated 21st November 1526. "These two days," says Hacket, "I have been trying to agree with the principal merchants about the exchange, but none would make any bargain, as you (Wolsey) have limited me to 4s. 6d. for theducat, and as a ducat of such gold as they would be bound to pay would be worth 4s. 10d. in the Mint. They must receive eitherducats, or acrown of the sunand agroat, for every ducat, or the same inangellets. The best thing would be for one or two of their factors to see you (Wolsey). The gold can be kept at home for2 or 3 more per cent., for they would be glad to give that to take it out of the realm."
The new coinage of 1527 was in complete accordance with the proclamation of the preceding November. As far as the tariff or absolute exchange was concerned, it served to redress the balance, and thus to bring the English coin abreast of the continental. In the matter of the ratio, however, hardly any change was made. In the coins of the old standard (i.e.23 carats 31⁄2grs.) the ratio remained as before, 1:11151⁄755; in those of the new standard (i.e.22 carats) it was raised slightly (to 1:1159⁄220). Neither in the appointment of the exchange, however, nor in the matter of the ratio, could the measure be more than temporarily successful under the conditions. The necessity remained as constantly as ever to watch the changing continental tariff, and to accommodate the English system to it. One State paper, dating apparently in 1529, thus pictures the situation at the time:—
"Disputes in London between English, Italian, Flemish, and Spanish merchants, as to the exchange, because of the last edict about gold. The writer knows of the importation of 100,000crownsand £10,000 in gold, which will be exported again unless care is taken. In Flanders, directly after this proclamation, gold was publicly put at a higher price than before—a noble at 24groats," and so on. The writer, therefore, recommends that the searchers at the various ports should be warned to attend to theirduty and see that no gold was carried away from the realm.