3. The trade, being much used in the country, will revert into the city, to the benefit of the city and all that live by the trade.
4. The haberdasher shall buy good wares more generally than now and at as cheap rates as he now usually buyeth (the times of the year and prices of wool considered), and be sorted with much more ease and content than now he is.
5. The haberdasher of mean estate shall be in much better case than now, for that every man shall have good wares without culling according to their sorts.
6. The commonwealth shall be better served in that now they shall have good wares for their money.
7. The stock cannot but be gainful to the stockers, in that the hats, according to their goodness, shall come in at 2s. in the pound profit upon the sale, merely out of the feltmaker's labour, who is equally benefited by the certain stock. Besides, the often return of the stock at 2s. in the pound cannot but give content to the stockers.
8. The stock shall be sufficiently secured were it never so much, in that they shall deliver no money without a sufficient value of wares. Their sale will be certain in that without buying the haberdashers cannot uphold their trade. Besides, no man shall have benefit of the stock except he will bring all the ware he makes to it (except it be a hat or two specially made, and that with the privilege of the stockers). Besides, if at any time the stock shall be full of ware and want money, the company by a general consent can forbear bringing in or slack their making for a time. But so it is that once in a year all felts will off, of what nature soever.
9. The wares being of necessity to be bought, the stockers will need not trust except they will but upon good security, which will make men more wary in buying.
[271] Unwin, Industrial Organization in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, pp. 240-42,
18. The Case of the Tailors of Ipswich[272] [Coke's Reports, Part XI, pp. 53-55], 1615.
Trin. II, Jac. Reg. King's Bench.