So long as the Royal Posts did not give satisfaction, competition was inevitable. Under Witherings they had improved so much that what competition there was, received no support from the London merchants. In 1633 they addressed a petition to the King, praying that he would protect Witherings from some strangers in London, who had set up posts of their own. They pointed out how he, acting with some foreign postmasters, had set up packet posts, travelling day and night. By means of these, letters were conveyed between London and Antwerp in three days, while the messengers needed from eight to fourteen days to travel the same distance.[744] The common carriers were giving trouble in the despatch of inland letters at the same time that competition in the foreign posts was attracting attention.[745] It was their custom to send their carts on ahead while they lingered to collect letters. After the collection they hastened on, leaving their carts behind, and delivered the letters on the way. It was provided that no carrier should stay longer than eight hours in a place after his cart had left it, or arrive in any place eight hours ahead of it.[746] As long as their speed was governed by that of their lumbering carts over the wretched roads, no fear was felt that their competition would prove troublesome. [744] _Cal. S. P. D._, 1633-34, p. 39. [745] _Ibid._, 1637-38, pp. 22, 171, 177, 183. [746] _Ibid._, 1637-38, p. 193; _Rep. Com._, 1844, xiv, 601, app., p. 58 (37). With the growing strength of Parliament, more and more opposition was made to the grants of monopoly and their enforcement. In 1642 the House of Commons passed a resolution "affirming that the taking of the letters from the several carriers and the several restraints and imprisonments of Grover, Chapman, Cotton, and Mackerill are against the law." The House proceeded to state that these several persons should have reparation and damages from Coke, Windebank, and Witherings.[747] Four years later a report was made by Justices Pheasant and Rolls on Witherings' patent.[748] They held that the clause of restraint in the grant to Witherings was void.[749] This decision was quite in accordance with the views of Parliament when they opposed the King and all his works. But after Parliament had obtained control of the Posts, "the President and Governors of the Poor of the City of London" proposed to the Common Council that the City should establish a postal system in order to raise money for the relief of the poor in London. A committee was appointed to inform Warwick, Prideaux, and Witherings of their intention. At the same time an attempt to lay a petition before Parliament on the question failed. Counsel's advice was sought and obtained in favour of the undertaking and in 1650 the Committee received orders to settle the stages. At the end of six weeks they had established postal communications with Scotland and other places.