Apart from these changes towns and gilds pursued in the sixteenth century much the same economic policy as in earlier ages. They imposed inter-municipal tariffs (No. 2), and regulated markets (Nos. 4 and 12), wages (Nos. 3, 5, and 13), apprenticeship and the entry into trades (Nos. 1, 9, 10, 11, 15) on high moral grounds (No. 10), but sometimes with consequences unpleasant to those who were excluded (Nos. 1 and 15). Indeed their anxiety to preserve their monopoly occasionally brought them into conflict with the law, which "abhors all monopolies" (No. 18). Inside the gilds, however, a momentous change was going on. The fifteenth century had seen the rise within gilds of "yeomanry" organizations consisting of journeymen, of which an example is given below (No. 14, and Part I, Section V, No. 16). In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the gilds, at least in the larger towns, represented a wide range of interests, from the mercantile capitalist to the industrial small master, and it was often of such small masters, whose numbers appear to have increased in the sixteenth century, that the "yeomanry" then consisted (No. 16). They tended, however, to be at the mercy of the large capitalists, and occasionally under the first two Stuarts, who favoured them, they endeavoured to protect themselves by joint-stock enterprise (No. 17). In the middle of the seventeenth century a reverse movement was taking place. Small masters were becoming journeymen, and in London journeymen were engaged under the Commonwealth in active agitation. Their organization was that of an embryo trade union; their doctrine the application to industrial affairs of the theory of the social contract (No. 19). AUTHORITIES The more accessible of the modern writers dealing with the subject of this section are Cunningham, _English Industry and Commerce, Modern Times_, Vol. I; Ashley, _Economic History_, Vol. I, Part II, Chap. I and II; Gross, _The Gild Merchant_; Abram, _Social England in the Fifteenth Century_; Mrs. Green, _English Town Life in the Fifteenth Century_; Dunlop and Denman, _English Apprenticeship and Child Labour_; Unwin, _Industrial Organization in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries_, and _The Gilds and Companies of London_; Webb, _English Local Government, The Manor and Borough_; Brentano, _Gilds and Trade Unions_; Toulmin Smith, _English Gilds_; Rogers, _Six Centuries of Work and Wages_. Bibliographies are given in Gross, _op. cit._ (the most complete); Cunningham _op. cit._, Vol. II, pp. 943-998; Ashley, _op. cit._, pp. 3-5 and 66-68; Abram, _op. cit._, pp. 229-238; Dunlop and Denman, _op. cit._, pp. 355-363; Unwin, _Industrial Organization in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries_, pp. 263-270. * * * * * The student may also consult the following:--