John Browne, surgeon in ordinary to his majesty and to St. Thomas's Hospital, and author of many learned works on surgery and anatomy, published accounts of sixty cures due to this monarch. He says a surgeon attested the reality of the disease before the miracle was performed, to exclude impostors who were seeking the gold, for, in addition to the regular formula, the king hung about the neck of the person touched a ribbon to which was attached a gold coin. Notwithstanding these stringent measures, some were able to impose on the king, for the coins were often found in the shops, having been sold by the recipients. Says Brand: "Barrington tells us of an old man who was a witness in a cause, and averred that when Queen Anne was at Oxford, she touched him whilst a child for the evil. Barrington, when he had finished his evidence, 'asked him whether he was really cured? upon which he answered with a significant smile, that he believed himself never to have had a complaint that deserved to be considered as the Evil, but that his parents were poor, and had no objection to the bit of gold.'"[174] While it was not unknown before, the presentation of a piece of gold was first generally introduced in the reign of Henry VII. It probably descended from a practice common in the time of Edward III, whose coin, the rose-noble, is said to have been worn as an amulet to preserve from danger in battle. The angel-noble of Henry VII, valued at ten shillings, appears to have been the coin given; it was in common use and not made especially for this purpose. It had the figure of the Archangel Michael on one side and a ship in full sail on the other. Before hanging it on the patient's neck the monarch always crossed the sore with it. The outlay for gold coins presented to the afflicted on these occasions rose in some years as high as L10,000. So great was the expense that after the reign of Elizabeth the size of the coin was reduced. Touching pieces of the time of Charles II are not rare even now.