[323] W. J. Ashley, English Economic History and Theory, pp. 81, 83.
[324] Cal. Letter Book C, p. 35.
[325] Madox’s Firma Burgi, p. 286.
[326] Town Life, vol. ii. p. 142.
[327] The reason given for the repeal of the Act of Edward II. excluding victuallers from the office of Mayor is that ‘since the making of the Statute many and the most part of all cities, boroughs and towns corporate be fallen in ruin and decay, and not inhabited with merchants and men of such substance as they were at the time of making the Statute. For at this day the dwellers and inhabitants of the same cities and boroughs be most commonly bakers, brewers, vintners, fishmongers, and other victuallers, and few or none other persons of substance.’
Mr. W. J. Ashley (Introduction to English Economic History and Theory, part ii. 1893, p. 53), observes that, ‘without further proof it were hardly safe to build on the wide language of the preamble of a Statute a conclusion which seems in obvious conflict with what we know of the generic course of events.’
In London, evidently, little or no attention was paid to the original Act of Edward II., but in other places this was not the case. The Statute of Henry VIII. provided that when the Mayor was a victualler, two honest and discreet persons, not being victuallers, should be chosen to assist him in ‘settling prices’ of victuals.
[328] Liber Custumarum, vol i. p. 326-333.
[329] Liber Albus, Introduction by H. T. Riley, 1859, p. ci.
[330] Liber Custumarum, p. lxviii.