I turn next to the department of finance. Here in place of the old treasurers at war there was created a new officer called the paymaster-general. Parliament, I must remind the reader, never recognised the existence of the Army under the Stuarts, nor voted a sixpence expressly for its service. The force was paid out of the King's privy purse, or, in the case of James, out of sums intended for the payment of the militia. Thus the House of Commons through sheer perversity lost its hold upon the paymaster-general, and when it came to examine his office a whole century later, found, as shall be told in place, a system of corruption and waste which is almost incredible. The first paymaster-general, Sir Stephen Fox, received a salary of four hundred pounds a year, but this he soon supplemented by becoming practically a farmer of a part of the revenue. Knowing that Charles was chronically deficient in cash, he undertook to advance funds on his own private credit for the weekly pay of the Army, in consideration of a commission of one shilling in the pound. At the end of every four months he applied to the Treasury for reimbursement, and if his claims were not immediately satisfied, he received eight per cent on the debt owing to him, thus making a very handsome profit. This system was discontinued in 1684, but the deduction, or poundage as it was called, was still levied on the Army, for no reason whatever, for a full century and a half. For the care of all other military expenses there was an office called by the old title of Treasurer of the Armies.