The news of the riot was not long in reaching the ears of the King. He wrote in great wrath, straitly charging the mayor and his brethren, as they would avoid "his high displesur" and "entende to enjoye the fraunches and liberties of the seid cite," to show no favour to the rioters, and to inform "our derrest son," the prince, of the whole proceeding. The mayor and his brethren were in an extremity of terror, remembering the King's high actions and the confiscation of ten years back after Barnet Field. They sent a letter to the prince at Woodstock by the hand of their steward, beseeching him to be a "gracious mean" for them with his royal father, promising speedily to punish the offenders already "endited for riot and trespass." Meanwhile, they laid the cause of the riot at the door of the real offender. "The common peopull her in gret noumbre," they alleged, "thynken that all the defalt is caused be William Bristowe," who had not kept his promise made to the lords of the prince's council with regard to the meadow, nor removed "the bestes of estraunge persones occupeyng in his name the seid common."[412] Of Bristowe and his lengthy suit they were well weary. "The people understondon," the mayor writes hopelessly, "that be his longe defferyngs, cautels, vexacions and troubles, he wold never have conclucion, but find measne of trouble and vexacion to hurt and disheryte the pore commons her of their rightfull common," which he will do, except the prince aid.
Edward IV. was not altogether satisfied with this humble submission. He complained of conventicles that were not suppressed, and evil-doers unpunished, "diuers of yowe in maner supposyng them to be supported and fauored be persones hauying rule in our seid cite."[413] Two of the rioters were ordered to be sent to the King at Woodstock, to be delivered up to Lord Rivers for imprisonment at Ludlow.[414] One of the two was immediately arrested; another "withdrew himself," but afterwards, as it seems, of his own free will, went off to Ludlow to share the imprisonment of his companion. They were released on the following Easter, and returned to the city.
But this rising had at least the effect of precipitating matters with regard to Bristowe. He appears to have desired the whole affair to be settled according to common law; but as the community had no evidence to support their claims, save the testimony of the aged men of the place, they were most anxious to have the affair arranged "according to composition."[415] For five weeks the master of the Trinity guild and John Boteler, the steward,[416] lingered in London about the business, and even undertook a journey to Southampton, where the King, being informed of Bristowe's "wilfulness," seems to have inclined favourably towards the cause of the citizens. In the August of the following year their stubborn antagonist gave way and consented to abide by the arbitration of the Prince of Wales. Boteler accordingly hurried off to Ludlow, and a final decision was arrived at in favour, we suppose, of the community; but although such ample details concerning this thirteen-year old dispute are laid before us, nothing is said of the final result.
But although this matter was decided, nothing was done with regard to the other enclosures, and Laurence Saunders became unquiet. He drew up a second list of the meadows that were withheld from the community, and laid it before the mayor and council.[417] It is noteworthy that "Mr" Onley, a member of one of the oldest merchant families within the city, figures in the list as the holder of a "field called Ashmore." The council condescended to explain how and when the enclosures had been made. The Leet Book says "they made him privy to the evidence of the city in that behalf." But when Laurence desired a copy of these records to show to "certain people of the city"—old men of his party, no doubt, whose memories reached to bygone times—it was indignantly refused him. The mayor and council would never stoop so low as to furnish all chance comers with the means of cavilling at their proceedings! Then Laurence Saunders burst forth into "untoward" speech, asking to be released from his bond (the £500?), and showing he would not "otherwise be ruled than after his own will." The matter was shown to the lords of the prince's council, then tarrying in Coventry. By their advice Laurence was committed to the "porter's ward" the Saturday before All-Hallows'; and when, after a week had passed, and he was released "at the great instance" of his friends, it was not without an admonition. The lords told him this was the second time "he had ben in warde for his disobeysaunce and for commocions made among the pepull; they bad hym be war, for yf he cam the IIIde tyme in warde for such matiers, hit shulde cost hym his hedde." The warning was not without its effect. Laurence, for the second time, made a full submission, and also signed a "statute merchant," this time in £200, undertaking that he would be "of good bearing to the mayor and his successors ... for ever"; and four craftsmen, who dwelt near him in Spon Street,[418] were responsible for his conduct in half this sum. Of the fine of £10, which they exacted from him, half was in course of time to be given back, if his submissive temper showed signs of lasting. It might well be thought he would not again question the high ways of the corporation, for by so doing he might involve his friends in ruin.[419]
For twelve years there is no record that Saunders ever troubled the peace of men in high places. During this interval death removed his great enemy, the old recorder; and royal favour—for Henry VII. was ever prudent in such matters—gained the vacant post for Richard Empson. In 1484, three years before his death, Boteler was overtaken by a great disgrace. He magnified his own office at the mayor's expense;[420] and, as a punishment, the Forty-eight—with Laurence for the first time on record sitting among the number—decreed that on all public occasions he should not immediately follow the mayor, but should give precedence to the master of the Trinity guild.[421] It may be that this blow broke the old man's proud spirit. He became "of so gret febulness" that the men of the city, fearing that "any casualte of disease by God's visitation [might] come unto him," began to take into consideration the claims of possible recorders. Boteler, however, kept the post until his death, when the King, hearing how "it had pleased our blessed Creatur to calle late from this vncertain and transorite lif unto his great and inestimable mercy"[422] the old recorder, wrote to inquire concerning the candidates for the vacant post.
There are signs that about this time Laurence was looked upon with more favour by those in power.[423] In 1494, however, a change of policy, owing perhaps to the influence of the mayor, a grocer, named Robert Green, caused him to take up his old position. In those days the matter of enclosures was but one among many sources of trouble. In the first place, in that same year, the corporation, perhaps suddenly roused to the doings of the various crafts, thought that they had enjoyed in the past few years more liberty than they were disposed to allow. They turned their attention to the pewterers' and tanners' fellowships.[424] Complaint being made concerning "discevable" pewterers' ware, the leet ordained,—that all such as "maken and medle metailles within this cite, as vessels of brasse, peauter and laten," should sell true goods, "medled be due proporcion," and to such merchants as had served an apprenticeship to the craft. Furthermore, the master of the fellowship received orders to seize any faulty vessels and bring them before the mayor and council; the maker, in the event of the charge being proved, was condemned to forfeit the sum of twenty shillings. Then the tanners felt the effects of the energy of the leet. Certain of the craft were wont to buy raw hides "in grete," with the intention, no doubt of selling them at a profit. This practice the court forbade, under pain of a forty-shilling fine, to be taken from buyer and seller alike. The irritation these ordinances called forth among certain members of these fellowships can be illustrated from the records of the leet held the following year. It was then enacted that John Duddesbury, a tanner,[425] and John Smith, a pewterer, for their repeated ill-behaviour to "men of worship," were to be put "under surety from session to session,"[426] until their submissive behaviour should content the justices of the peace.
A highly unpopular measure was the work of the mayor himself. This ordinance looks simple enough, but there is possibly a deeper meaning underlying it. Before his indentures were made, every apprentice was ordered to pay twelve pence towards the common funds, have his name entered in a book prepared for the purpose by the town clerk, and "swear to the franchises" of the city.[427] The apprentices' friends might feel aggrieved at this new exaction; it is less easy to understand why the masters were inclined to resist the measure. That they were so inclined is shown by an order made some six months afterwards to the effect that those who still received apprentices contrary to the ordinance, and continued stubborn, were to be committed to ward and find surety that they would in future obey all ordinances of leet.[428] The corporation had some motive in binding the apprentices by a solemn oath and enrolling them in this methodical fashion; they evidently wished to keep a tight hold on them for some particular purpose. For a hundred years Coventry had been celebrated for clothmaking, and the sellers of cloth had been the richest men in the city, and members of their fellowship more frequently in office than those of any other occupation.[429] It was important that the merchants and drapers—and of these the corporation was chiefly composed—should be able to keep the makers of cloth, weavers and fullers, well under control; and in attempting this, quarrels may well have arisen. The merchants, thinking they would again arise, determined to weaken the master-makers of cloth by keeping this tight hold over the apprentices, and making them responsible to the corporation.
Certain practices, in all probability lately revived under this mayor or his successor, were particularly detested by the citizens concerned in clothmaking. Coventry was a great centre for the weaver's industry. For a long time past, in accordance with orders of leet, cloth had been sold on market days in the "Drapery," in S. Michael's churchyard, a house of which the Trinity guild had been possessed for the last 130 years.[430] There was a second selling place, the porch of S. Michael's church, which lay a few yards from the Drapery door. This had been in all probability the traditional sale ground for cloth before the Drapery was fixed on and passed into the possession of the guild. In the church porch the payment of stallage might be avoided, and it may be the makers did not fear for their workmanship the strict supervision of the craft of drapers. In 1455 the sale of cloth in the porch was forbidden by the leet;[431] yet no doubt, in spite of pains and penalties, the weavers or makers still drove their bargains, whenever it was possible, outside the walls of the Drapery. But the municipality resolved that the orders of leet should no longer be set at nought; cloth must henceforward be sold in the Drapery,[432] and not elsewhere.
There was also a fixed place for the weighing and sale of wool, called the Wool-hall, adjoining the Drapery, and likewise the property of the guild.[433] The trade in wool was, no doubt, chiefly in the hands of the wealthy merchants, many of whom were "of the Staple of Calais." The wardens also overlooked the weighing, and took from the owners certain dues "for the profit of the town."[434] These dues must have increased the price of wool, so that the weavers or clothmakers—or whatever body of men purchased the wool for manufacture in the first instance[435]—suffered by reason of such a regulation, and poor householders who bought the wool to weave for their own use were in like case. The enforcement of this order[436] and the consequent collection of dues were bitterly resented, and the citizens, reminded of the traditional "toll freedom" of their market, cried that the city that had been free was now in bondage.
"Dame goode Eve[437] made hit fre,
& now the custom for wol & the draperie."