This money was paid into the royal exchequer. In the autumn of 1305 Scotland was again subdued and Wallace was hanged at Tyburn. Meanwhile the quarrel between Philip of France and the papacy had been strengthening Edward's position. In 1302 the Sicilian vespers were repeated in the matins of Bruges. Philip invaded Flanders to avenge the massacre of Frenchmen, and suffered a crushing defeat at Courtrai Although this defeat was partially redeemed at Mons en Puelle in the following year, Philip was obliged to acquiesce in the practical autonomy of Flanders whilst he waged war with the Pope. To free his hands for his great struggle Philip restored Gascony to Edward in 1303; and the Anglo-French peace became an entente cordiale. In 1305 a Gascon became Pope Clement V. For seventy years Popes ruled Christendom from Avignon, where they became the servants of the King of France. At first the entente cordiale gave Edward almost as much influence over Pope Clement as King Philip possessed.

The relations between England and Scotland had become so embittered that the union could only be maintained by force of arms. In 1306, and again in 1307, the Scotch were in arms under Robert Bruce, who was crowned King of Scotland. In the latter year Edward I. died whilst fighting the Scotch. One of his last instructions was to urge his son, soon to be Edward II., to continue the war until Scotland was subdued. In 1306 Edward had obtained a papal bull absolving him from his oath confirming the Forest Charter. About the same time Edward obtained from the Pope letters suspending Archbishop Winchelsey

and summoning him to the papal Court. In 1305 Edward had received petitions from the poorer folk complaining that they had lost their ancient rights when the forests passed into private hands. He then issued an ordinance reforming the administration of the forests and decreeing that "if any of them that be disafforested by the purlieu would rather be within the forest as they were before, than to be out of the forest, as they be now, it pleaseth the King very well that they shall be received thereunto, so that they may remain in their ancient estate, and shall have common and other easement, as well as they had before." This ordinance might have been framed by de Montfort.

Edward would probably have regained his forest rights after the Pope had absolved him from his oath but for his death in 1307. Weakened by the loss of their leader, Archbishop Winchelsey, the magnates were unable for the moment to resist the King. Edward II., however, inherited an unfinished war with Scotland, a quarrel with English merchants over the Carta Mercatoria, and one with his barons over the revocation of the Forest Charter. There was peace with France until 1323, when a dispute arose over the question of homage for Aquitaine. But in the fighting the English were little involved, and the dispute was settled in 1325 when Edward's eldest son did homage. Nevertheless, the twenty years of Edward's reign were filled with strife. The King failed to recover his forests and the merchants continued to protect their trade, but the victory of the magnates and merchants was won at a great cost. The loss of Scotland and the murder of the King formed part of the price England paid.

X

CARTA MERCATORIA AND ITS INFLUENCE

1307-1340

ONE body of foreign merchants in London, the Germans, had little need of the treaty called Carta Mercatoria. They had enjoyed special privileges from the time of Ethelred. These privileges were confirmed by Henry II. and his successors. Their concession in London was the Steelyard. In 1254, when the imperial power decayed after the death of Frederic II., an ancient confederation of Rhine towns, under the headship of Cologne, renewed their union. This confederation ultimately joined a northern federation and became the Hanseatic League, an almost independent State within the Empire of Germany. Lübeck became the centre of the League, and it included the river and coast towns, both German and Dutch, from the Vistula to the Rhine. The Hanse merchants, or Easterlings, as the English called them, missed no opportunity of increasing their privileges, but they were wise enough to remain on friendly terms with the citizens of London. They were responsible for the repair of Bishopsgate and for the payment of one-third of the expense of maintaining its guard. The Easterlings carried to England from the Baltic corn in time of

dearth, and naval stores, such as masts, tar, and hemp. England came to rely upon the Germans for her navy. As late as Elizabeth's reign the Jesus of Lübeck was one of England's fighting ships.

Edward II. commenced his reign by reversing his father's policy and disobeying his father's last instructions. The Scotch war was abandoned before the country was completely subdued. Gaveston, a Gascon, who had been banished by Edward I., was recalled, loaded with gifts, and made the King's chief adviser. In one particular Edward II. obeyed his father. He married the French King's daughter Isabella in 1308 at Boulogne. On his return the magnates insisted on the exile of Gaveston. The King's favourite was then sent to Ireland as Regent. Archbishop Winchelsey returned to England, once again to lead the magnates in their contest with the King. Parliament in 1309 gave the King a small grant of money and a long list of grievances, which included Carta Mercatoria.

Carta Mercatoria was disliked not because customs were levied on foreigners, but because in return for these payments to the King foreigners were excused from the payment of local dues, murage, pontage, and pavage, and the cities lost the power of preventing them from competing in the internal trade of England by harassing regulations. After the new customs were suspended at the commencement of Edward's reign the King sanctioned a decree which, among other restrictions, forbade foreign merchants to engage in retail trade or to remain more than forty days at a time in England. One of the first acts of Edward III.

after the abdication of his father was to grant a charter to London which confirmed these privileges. For centuries this drastic method of protection kept the internal trade of England in English hands, thus continuing the work once done by the merchant gilds. External trade was beyond the slender means of the English. They cheerfully recognised the rights of the powerful Hanseatic merchants, and in English commercial legislation the privileges of the Easterlings, which had been granted long before Magna Carta, were always safeguarded. In return the Easterlings did not interfere in the retail trade, nor did they leave the seaports in order to deal directly with the monkish wool growers or the inland wool merchants.

In defiance of the wish of the barons, Gaveston returned to England in July 1309. But when Gaveston's return was followed by the King's promise to redress grievances many of the barons sullenly acquiesced. About this time an attempt was made to increase the King's revenue by letting the waste lands in the royal forests. This promising scheme was dropped when the quarrel between King and magnates developed and the storm broke. The King had farmed the Customs to Italians in order to raise money. With the gates of the island in foreign control, the danger which threatened England can only be compared with that which menaced the country when John acknowledged the suzerainty of the Pope.

In March 1310 there was held a great council of bishops and barons. In spite of the King's order the barons presented themselves in full military array. Edward II. was forced to submit to be controlled by