Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	great_a	king_n	scotland_n	13,096	5	8.4515	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A44990	An Hvmble petition and remonstrance presented unto both the High and Honourable Houses of Parliament concerning the insupportable grievance of the farthing tokens.		1642 (1642)	Wing H3439A; ESTC R26811	4,491	14

the Petitioners must either take them or leave off trading then are forced to bring them weekly to the Office and lose twelve pence per pound five pound per centum at the least The second occasion is the altering of the stampe which hath been done five severall times and at each alteration tokens have beene left upon the Petitioners hands And many of the Petitioners have yet great quantities of old tokens unrechanged some forty shillings five pound some tenne pound fifteene twenty thirty forty fifty pound more which the Office refuse to rechange although they have beene often required thereunto and although the patentees have covenanted with his Majesty to rechange them as by their severall Patents and the Kings Proclamations may appear The third occasion is the abuse of the Office causing the Petitioners daily attendance before they could get their tokens rechanged For all the weeke they take to deliver out tokens and appointed but three dayes a weeke to rechange and but six houres in a day viz. from eight to eleven in the fore noone and from one till foure in the after noone and the greatest part of that little time was spent in delivering out tokens and the rest in a trifling rechange of a small quantity whereby the Petitioners have waited day after day weeke after weeke to have their tokens rechanged and in the interim want money to manage their trades for those with whom they have to deale will not be paid in tokens besides the Office hath cut and defaced many of those tokens which themselves have issued forth pretending them to be naught The third thing to remonstrate is the great profit which the Patentees doe make by Tokens The greatnesse of the profit will appeare upon examination of the quantities of the Farthings issued forth upon each severall stampe and of the small summes received in For instance the last stampe of single ringed tokens it is conceived there was a hundred and twenty thousand pounds made and issued forth and when the stampe was altered there was not forty thousand pounds received in againe so that there must be still in the hands of the subject fourescore thousand pounds at the least which they could never get to be rechanged Now the charge of copper and making of the tokens is not above five shillings per pound so that the Office gaines fifteene shillings in twenty which amounts to threescore thousand pounds de claro that they have gotten by one sort of tokens a farre greater profit then all the Kings Mints of England Scotland c. can make For the coinage of fourscore thousand pounds in silver is but eleven hundred and eleven pounds three shillings foure pence which properly belongs to the King out of which he defrayes all the charges of the Mint except the workmanship which charges being deducted the King gaines not de claro five hundred pounds but in fourescore thousand pounds of Tokens the Office gaines threescore thousand pounds at the least which shewes that the Office of Farthings is more then a hundred times as good as the Mint quantity for quantity out of all this great profit the King hath but fourescore pounds per annum rent an inconsiderable summe for so inconceiveable a gaine The fourth thing to remonstrate is the remedy or prevention of this evil for future times For to lay downe the Office will not be convenient then all retailing trades will want small monies and the poore reliefe therefore it is requisite 1. That the Office bee setled in the power of the Crowne and not in any subject 2. That there bee some neerer proportion betwixt the extrinseck denomination and the intrinseck value 3. That it may be felony either to import or counterfeit them 4. That no advantage may be allowed upon issuing forth any Tokens and the Office to receive them in upon the like termes It may be alledged Alleg. 1. If the oppression were so great and of such continuance as is pretended it would long since have beene complained of Ans The Petitioners have not beene wanting to their great charge to complaine and seeke reliefe both to King JAMES and to the Kings Majesty that now is and they graciously inclined to releeve them have severall times referred the same to the Lords of the Councell and by their Lordships to some Lords Committees but the Petitioners could never procure any thing to be done therein And the Office hath been made acquainted with the Petitioners complaints and hath given in their answers of defence the chiefe heads whereof wee doe here humbly present First pretence of the Office That the issuing forth of one and twenty shillings in Tokens for twenty shillings in money and the rechange of one and twenty shillings in Tokens for twenty shillings in money is warranted by the Kings Patents and Proclamation so that the Office is no way faulty Answ The King by his severall Patents and Proclamations doth declare that it is his intent and pleasure that the Farthing Tokens should be an ease and benefit to the Subject and not otherwise but it is an insufferable oppression and so against the Kings minde Second pretence That to rechange upon the same termes as is delivered out is no damage to any Ans It is true if the same parties that fetch them out did bring them in but it is otherwise for the rich fetch them out and gaine five pounds per cent and the Petitioners bring them in and lose five pounds per cent and never fetch out any Third pretence That the Petitioners knowing the losse by rechange proportion the prizes of their wares accordingly and so are no losers Answ It is not so for the Petitioners deliver out their commodities either by weight or measure neither doe they know what money people bring and when their commodities are cut or weighed out they must take Tokens or else lose more by taking the commodity againe and lose their customers too Besides if the Petitioners should proportion their wares according to the losse by rechange then the oppression of the subject would bee the greater for that would inhance the prizes of provision which is the beggering of a Kingdome FINIS