writing, printing, and publishing all Narratives or relacons not exceeding two sheets of Paper and all Advertisements, Mercuries, Diurnals and Books of Publick Intelligence; and likewise of Printing or appointing to bee printed All Ballads, Maps, Charts, Portraictures and Pictures not formerly printed and all Breifs and Collections, Bills of Ladeing, Play-Bills, and Quacksalvers Bills, of Custom and Excise Bills, Post Office Bills, Auditors Bills, Ticquets and all formes or Blanks of Bonds, Bills, Indentures and Warrants, with power to search for and seize all unlicensed Books and Papers and all seditious, treasonable, schismaticall and scandalous Books and Papers and to seize and apprehend all and every the offenders therein and to bring them before one of our Principall Secretaries or the next Justice of Peace, to bee proceeded against according to law, together with all other Priviledges and Powers necessary, or conducting to our Service in ye Premisses, For which this shall bee your warrant, Given at our Court at Whitehall the 15th day of August 1663, in the 15th year of our reigne.
To Our Attorney or Sollicitor Generall.
This document needs no comment. Nor is it necessary to say much about the Act of 1662, except that it was in a large measure a re-enactment of the Star Chamber decree of 1637, and the Act of 1649. York was again expressly mentioned as a place where printing might be carried on, and the printing house of John Streator was exempted from interference. Armed with ample power Sir Roger L'Estrange harassed the printers and booksellers without remorse. One of his unfortunate victims was Elizabeth Calvert, the wife of Giles Calvert, whom he imprisoned several times. Another, was John Twyn, a printer in Cloth Fair, who was tried for high treason and hanged at Tyburn for printing a pamphlet entitled A Treatise of the execution of Justice. That such men as Thomas Roycroft and James Fletcher should have acquiesced in a verdict which they must
