In this reign the Earls of Warenne and Surrey possessed the privilege of licensing ale-houses. Mention has already been made of the ‘Crown,’ in Cheapside. In 1467 this house was kept by one Walter Walters, who in harmless pleasantry gave it out that he would make his son ‘heir to the “Crown.”’ This so displeased his Majesty Edward IV. that he ordered the man to be put to death for high treason. One piece of legislation remains to be told before closing the period. In the first year of Richard III. (c. 13), it was enacted that malmsey should in future be imported only in butts of 126 gallons. This measure was for the prevention of frauds on the revenue. It was repealed by an Act of George IV. FOOTNOTES: [77] Massinger: _A New Way to Pay Old Debts_. [78] Allen, _History of Lambeth_. [79] Roberts: _Social History of the Southern Counties_. [80] Dodsworth’s MSS., Bibl. Bod., vol. 148, p. 97. [81] Speechly: _Treatise on Culture of Wine_, 2nd ed. p. 270. [82] Richard III., act i. scene 4. [83] _Researches in Greece_, p. 197. [84] Jeaffreson: _A Book about the Table_. [85] For a terrible account of the _glutton-masses_ of the secular clergy, see Henry, _Hist. Great Britain_, book v. ch. 7. [86] Warton (_Hist. Poetry_, iii. 414) cites the above from Archbishop Tanner’s manuscript _Additions to Cowell’s Law Glossary_. CHAPTER IX. TUDOR PERIOD. The legislative enactments of the reign of Henry VII. demand minute attention. With a certain modification, it is true that the direct legislative sanction of the liquor traffic dates from this reign. The revival of the trade of England was a great object with this monarch. The greater part of the foreign trade of England had hitherto been carried on by foreigners in foreign vessels of burden. Henry was sensible that this prevented the increase of English ships and sailors; so, to remedy this in part, he got a law passed in his first Parliament, that no Gascony or Guienne wines should be imported into any part of his dominions, except in English, Irish, or Welsh ships, navigated by English, Irish, or Welsh sailors, which obliged them to build ships and go to sea, or to lack their favourite liquor. This law was enforced and enlarged by an Act made in his third Parliament (1487), when it was enacted that no wines of Gascony or Guienne, or woads of Tholouse, should be imported into England, except in ships belonging to the king or some of his subjects; and that all such wines and woads imported in foreign bottoms should be forfeited. By 7 Henry VII., c. 7, it was enacted (in order to counteract the duty of four ducats a tun lately imposed by the Venetians) that ‘every merchant stranger (except Englishmen born) bringing malmseys into this realm, should pay 18_s._ custom for each butt, over and above the custom aforetime used to be paid.’ The price of the butt was fixed at 4_l._