The internal trade was not only oppressed by the arbitrary appointment of such fairs, and simultaneous closing of others, but by a host of greater and lesser impositions, called lastage, payage; passage, frontage, stallage, and others, now become unintelligible, though far too intelligible to those who were fleeced by them. Some of these taxes were demanded at every fair, and by every baron through whose domain they were compelled to pass. But if the internal trade of the country was thus oppressed, how much more the foreign. In 1275 Edward I. issued an order compelling all foreign merchants to sell their goods within forty days after their arrival. No foreign merchants were allowed to remain in the country longer than that time, except by special licence from the king. It was not till 1303 that Edward permitted foreign merchants to come and go freely, and to reside under the protection of the English laws; and it was not till fifty years afterwards that they were freed from the oppressive law of being obliged to answer for the debts and offences of every other foreign resident. In 1306 a number of foreign merchants were imprisoned in the Tower, and detained there till they gave security that none of them would leave the kingdom or export anything without the king's licence.
In 1307 Edward prohibited any coin being taken out of the country. In 1335 Edward III. made a like law, prohibiting either money or plate being taken out, on pain of forfeiture of all such property. Sworn searchers were appointed at all the ports; and in 1343 these regulations were repeated, and the searchers were to receive one-third of all the money or plate seized. All foreign cloths were to be reduced to the English measure; all were to be measured by the king's aldnagers, and whatever cloth was found of a less measure in length or breadth was to be forfeited.
How commerce could exist under such absurd restrictions is marvellous. Yet the advantages of trade with this country must, under all these obstacles, have been greater than with most others, for foreign merchants flocked hither in great numbers. They were called "merchant-strangers"; and forming themselves into companies, they soon managed to engross nearly all the foreign trade of the country. The Merchants of the Steel Yard were a most flourishing company of German merchants, who were settled here before the Conquest, but at this period were become much more opulent and powerful. This was owing to their connection with the celebrated confederation of the Hanse Towns, and to the privileges conferred on them by successive monarchs in consequence of that connection.
Then there were the Merchants of the Staple, who were established about this time. Their business was to collect the staple articles, wool, sheep-skins, leather, lead, and tin, and convey them to the staple towns. Englishmen, Irish, or Welsh might do this to the staple towns within the kingdom, but no native could be concerned in exporting them to the staple towns abroad. The great object was to enable the king to collect his customs easily, and that foreign merchants might know where to go for these articles. There were six moderators—two Germans, two Lombards, and two English—appointed to settle all disputes in the presence of the mayor and constable of the staple, for their affairs were not subject to the ordinary magistrates.
The Jews, who had been so fleeced in John's reign, were, for their wealth and usurious habits, banished from the realm in 1290.
According to Macpherson's "Annals of Commerce," the total exports of England in 1384 were £212,338 5s., and the imports £38,383 16s. 10d., leaving a balance in our favour of £173,954. But Anderson, in his "Annals," makes the balance more considerable, namely, £255,370.
During this period coals began to be used in England, and were brought by sea to London. The monks of Dunfermline, in Scotland, also obtained leave of a neighbouring baron to dig coals for their own use in his lands at Pittencrief.
Bills of exchange were now much in use, being much encouraged by the Government, under the idea that they prevented money going out of the kingdom, and in 1381 a law was passed recommending, and, in fact, commanding, their use in foreign transactions.
One of the most useful and creditable transactions of the reign of Edward III. was the issue of a gold coinage. The coinage of England had till this period consisted of silver, and chiefly in the form of marks and pennies; a mark being two-thirds of a tower-pound, the pound not being a real coin, but a pound weight of silver coins. The shilling also was a nominal coin at this time, being the twentieth part of a pound. The penny was the two hundred and fortieth part of a pound, and there were also silver halfpence and farthings; but the people often made these by cutting the pence into halves and quarters—a practice against which various ordinances were issued. At this time a penny was called an esterling, or sterling, whence our word sterling coin.
The gold coins circulated before this period were foreign, and called bezants, or byzantines. Henry I. issued a gold coin of the weight of two silver pennies, which was ordered to pass for twenty silver pennies. The people, however, refused it, as gold being only reckoned nine times the value of silver, the king had thus made it ten times the value, which was one-tenth more than the real value. So completely did this coin disappear, that no specimen, we believe, is now known of it.