Between the year 1371 and the return of James I from exile we have no information regarding Parliament. There are references to the three Estates in 1384, and again in 1398; but we are without any hint of the method of conducting business, and almost the only records that have come down to us are charters. In 1424 the old phraseology reappears: Certain persons were elected to decide upon the articles submitted by the king ("Electi fuerunt certi personae ad articulos datos per dominum regem determinandos"). This is the first recorded instance of the term "Articles," by which the committee was to be known. In March 1425-26, there is no record of any such committee. In March 1425-26, in May 1426, and in September 1426, we find committees which are said to be elected by the whole counsel of the three Estates. In July 1427, in March 1427-28, in July 1428, in April 1429, in March 1429-30, and in April 1432, we have again no record of their existence. At a parliament held at Perth in October 1431, a committee was appointed for special police and judicial purposes, and it met in May 1432 and passed certain acts. In March 1433, we read of no committee; in October 1434, only of a committee for justice, which included burgess members; and in 1436, of no committee. From the second year of the active reign of James I to his death we have, then, no trace of the General Committee of the Articles. Between the murder of James I, in February 1436-37, and the fall of the house of Douglas, in February 1451-52, there are records of several meetings of Parliament, but there is rarely any evidence of the presence of burgesses at all. In connection with the coronation of James II, there is a formal document, of uncertain date, which revokes grants of land made by James I without consent of the three Estates, and commissioners of burghs are mentioned as being present at this "general council." The revocation is of political importance, and has no real constitutional significance. When Parliament met, in March 1437-38, the three Estates are mentioned, but only nobles and barons and freeholders went to Holyrood to crown the young king.[56] These are just the formal occasions on which it was desirable to have the unquestionable legal authority of the "three Estates," and burgesses may have been really there, though it is strange that they were not present at the ceremony in the Abbey. There is no trace of their presence till 1449, and, in their absence (if absent they were), we find no hint of the existence of committees. They were present at the Parliament which met in January 1449-50,[57] when the young James II first asserted himself by procuring the forfeiture of the Livingstones. It is equally significant that committees were not elected on this occasion; it is becoming evident that the device of the Articles was employed, not in every case when burgesses were present, but only when their aid was not desired by the predominant party in Parliament.