The first specific mention of Paul's Cross was in 1241, when King Henry III. met an assemblage of the citizens of London there before he set out for Gascony in connection with the French war. From that time onward there occur very numerous references to Paul's Cross, "the earlier ones, for the most part, recording meetings of the citizens there." The earliest notice of the cross as a place of proclamation was in 1256-57, when Justice Mansell read a document of the king's, assuring the citizens of his purpose to preserve their rights and liberties. In 1257 the king, having called a folk-moot at the cross, was present in person; and again met his subjects there in 1258. In 1259-60 another folk-moot was held at the cross by Henry III., on which occasion proclamation was made, requiring every stripling to take the oath of allegiance to the crown. In October 1261 a bull of Pope Urban was read at the cross by the king's order. In 1266 the king made Alan la Zouche constable and warden of the City in the presence of the people at Paul's Cross. On 13th May 1269 a bull of Pope Innocent was read; and in 1274-75 the Mayor of London was elected in a folk-moot at the cross. [Illustration: 141. LONDON PAUL'S CROSS] "In 1311 the new statutes, made in the Parliament of that year, were published and proclaimed ... _super crucem lapideam_"; whence it has been inferred by Mr Paley Baildon, F.S.A., that Paul's Cross, or the High Cross, as it was also called, must have comprised a raised platform surrounded by a parapet, with a lofty shaft in the middle, somewhat after the fashion of the Mercat Cross at Edinburgh, the cross at Aberdeen, and other Scottish examples. [Illustration: 142. LONDON PAUL'S CROSS] On 7th March 1378, during the time when the Bishop of Carlisle was preaching at the cross, he was disturbed by a tumult arising out of a quarrel between certain trade corporations hard by in West Cheap. From that date onward, down to 1633, sermons at Paul's Cross were of very frequent occurrence. In 1378 also, the Bishop of London excommunicated at Paul's Cross the murderers of Robert Hawle and two other victims, who had been sacrilegiously slain in the quire of Westminster Abbey during the solemnisation of High Mass on 11th August. On 12th July 1382 the Archbishop issued an order that the preacher at the cross, whoever he might be, on the following Sunday was to take advantage of the occasion, when the fullest number of persons should be gathered together for the sermon, to denounce publicly and solemnly two contumacious heretics, Nicholas Hereford and Philip Reppyingdon, "holding up the cross and lighting of candles, and throwing the same down upon the ground, to have been, and still to be so excommunicated by us."