From this time forward nothing more is heard of Hervy. The same cloud envelopes his later history, that gathered round the last years of his predecessor and political tutor Thomas Fitz-Thomas. The misfortune of both of these men was that they lived before their age. Their works bore fruit long after they had departed. The trade or craft guilds, as distinguished from the more wealthy and influential mercantile guilds, eventually played an important part in the city. Under Edward II, no stranger could obtain the freedom of the city (without which, he could do little or nothing), unless he became a member of one of these guilds, or sought the suffrages of the commonalty of the city, before admission to the freedom in the Court of Husting.(286) The normal and more expeditious way of obtaining the freedom was thus through a guild. If Hervy or Fitz-Thomas lived till the year 1319, when the Ordinances just cited received the king’s sanction, he must have felt that the struggle he had made to raise the lesser guilds had not been in vain. The mercantile element in the city, which had formerly overcome the aristocratic element,(287) in its turn gave way to the numerical superiority and influence of the craft and manufacturing element. Hence it was that in 1376—when the number of trade or craft guilds in the city compared with the larger mercantile guilds was as forty to eight—the guilds succeeded in wresting for a while from the wards the right of electing members of the city’s council.(288) (M182) In the meantime, King Edward I, arrived in London (18th August, 1274), where he was heartily welcomed by the citizens,(289) and was crowned the following day. He had expected to have returned much earlier, and had addressed a letter to the mayor, sheriffs, and commonalty of the City of London, eighteen months before, informing them of his purposed speedy return, and of his wishes that they should endeavour to preserve the peace of the realm.(290) He was, however, detained in France. (M183) Edward’s right to succeed his father was never disputed. For the first time in the annals of England, a new king commences to reign immediately after the death of his predecessor. _Le Roi est mort, vive le_ _Roi_! Within a week of his father’s decease, a writ was issued, in which the hereditary right of succession was distinctly asserted as forming Edward’s title to the crown.(291) (M184) Before setting sail for England, Edward despatched a letter (3rd April), "to his well-beloved, the mayor, barons, and reputable men of London," thanking them for the preparations he understood they were making for the ceremony of his coronation, and bidding them send a deputation of four of the more discreet of the citizens, to him at Paris, for the purpose of a special conference.(292) (M185)