THE CORN LAWS. 9

Thefe exactions were fo grievous, and levied in fo licen-

tious a manner, that the farmers, when they heard of the 9# 2. s.

court’s approach, often deferted their houles, as if the country

had been invaded by an enemy*.

Purveyance came to be a prodigious diftrefs upon the fab je@s in both kingdoms, and was perhaps, for many centuries, the chief obftruction to the agriculture and improvement of Great Britain.

The abufe was extended fo far, that hoftlers, brewers, and vituallers, purchafed the King’s letters-patent, of the office of purveyor.‘The exactions were fo grievous, and the office came to be fo odious,‘that the heinous name of purveyor,

€ was ordered by law to be changed into that of buyer à

Many laws were made for the reformation and regulation of purveyance, without effet. The diftrefles of the people of England, arifing from this mode of oppreflion, are well painted in one of thofe reforming laws, 28 Hen. 6, entituled‘ The & penalty for taking any perfons horfes or cart, without the ‘ delivery of the owner, or fome officer, or for taking money

“+9 iDate them.”

An higher legal diftrefs cannot well be imagined, than this old and ordinary method of purveyance; nor a meafure more

‘piurious to the beît interefts of the kingdom.

Hume’s Hift. vol. 1. p. 242.+ 26 Ed HEC,>

B\

‘CHAP. I. Ca yn)