Page:Craik History of British Commerce Vol 2.djvu/29

"Every poor man," said he, "that taketh in but a horse on a market-day, is presently sent for up to Westminster and sued, unless he compound with these patentees; and all ancient inn-keepers, if they will not compound, are presently sued at Westminster for enlargement of their house, if they but set up a new post or a little hovel more than of ancient was there. And, instead of reformation of abuses, this patent doth but raise reckonings on the poor traveller; and, instead of restraining the number of inn-keepers, at Bath, where there were wont to be but six, and the town desired Sir Giles Mompesson there might not be more, yet he increased them gradatim from six to twenty innkeepers." When he found that the storm could not be resisted, James himself was as ready with his virtuous indignation against all these abuses as any one else: in his speech to the Lords, to which we have already referred, he told them that nothing would be a greater ease to him, and to all about him at court, than some measure that would put an end for ever to the annoyance and pest of applications for the said patents. Even the stir that had already been made, he intimated, had materially contributed to his and their repose; "for I remember," said his majesty, "that, since the beginning of this parliament, Buckingham hath told me he never found such quiet and rest as in this time of parliament from projectors and informers, who at other times miserably vexed him at all hours." And then he launched out in the following characteristic strain:—"And now I confess that, when I looked before upon the face of the government, I thought, as every man would have done, that the people were never so happy as in my time. For, even as at divers times I have looked upon many of my coppices, riding about them, and they appeared on the outside very thick and well grown unto me; but when I turned unto the midst of them, I found them all bitter within, and full of plains and bare spots,—like an apple or pear, fair and smooth without, but, when ye cleave it asunder, you find it rotten at the heart; even so this kingdom, the external government being as good as ever it was, and, I am sure, as