But the trading enterprise of these inland-dwelling townsfolk was not confined to their native country merely. Another family, the Onleys, whereof one John Onley, the founder, was mayor of the Calais Staple,[577] had dealings with merchants beyond the sea. This foreign intercourse was often beset with danger to life and limb. John Onley, son of the above, was apprenticed to one Thomas Aleyn, a London mercer. When travelling to Bruges in 1413, where the chief staple for cloth then was, on his master's errand, this apprentice fell into the hands of a goldsmith of that place, who, because he could not obtain redress for the treatment he and his goods had received from an English "roberdesman" in the neighbourhood of Dover, kidnapped and kept John Onley as hostage. At last the good folk of Bruges, fearing the anger of the English, forced him to let the apprentice go.[578] Our sympathies are divided between the innocent lad and the outraged goldsmith, for in the wilder parts of England "roberdesmen" were a veritable scourge to the foreign trader. Did not Henry III. hang more than sixty of the brigands of Alton, who had plundered certain merchants of Brabant, though the whole county of Hants conspired to ensure the acquittal of the accused?[579] Occasionally the highwaymen also attacked English folk. In the days of the third Edward, there was a pretty gang, composed chiefly of "gentlemen born," who beneath the shelter of Cannock Chase did much harm to the merchants of Lichfield, and apportioned what spoil they took "to each according to his rank."[580]