It has been suggested, indeed, by Brady,[264] that these returns may not appear so false and collusive if we suppose the sheriff to mean only that there were no resident burgesses within these boroughs fit to be returned, or that the expense of their wages would be too heavy for the place to support. And no doubt the latter plea, whether implied or not in the return, was very frequently an inducement to the sheriffs to spare the smaller boroughs. The wages of knights were four shillings a day, levied on all freeholders, or at least on all holding by knight-service, within the county.[265] Those of burgesses were half that sum;[266] but even this pittance was raised with reluctance and difficulty from miserable burghers, little solicitous about political franchises. Poverty, indeed, seems to have been accepted as a legal excuse. In the 6th of E. II. the sheriff of Northumberland returns to the writ of summons that all his knights are not sufficient to protect the county; and in the 1st of E. III. that they were too much ravaged by their enemies to send any members to parliament.[267] The sheriffs of Lancashire, after several returns that they had no boroughs within their county, though Wigan, Liverpool, and Preston were such, alleged at length that none ought to be called upon on account of their poverty. This return was constantly made, from 36 E. III. to the reign of Henry VI.[268] [Sidenote: Reluctance of boroughs to send members.] The elective franchise was deemed by the boroughs no privilege or blessing, but rather, during the chief part of this period, an intolerable grievance. Where they could not persuade the sheriff to omit sending his writ to them, they set it at defiance by sending no return. And this seldom failed to succeed, so that, after one or two refusals to comply, which brought no punishment upon them, they were left in quiet enjoyment of their insignificance. The town of Torrington, in Devonshire, went further, and obtained a charter of exemption from sending burgesses, grounded upon what the charter asserts to appear on the rolls of chancery, that it had never been represented before the 21st of E. III. This is absolutely false, and is a proof how little we can rely upon the veracity of records, Torrington having made not less than twenty-two returns before that time. It is curious that in spite of this charter the town sent members to the two ensuing parliaments, and then ceased for ever.[269] Richard II. gave the inhabitants of Colchester a dispensation from returning burgesses for five years, in consideration of the expenses they had incurred in fortifying the town.[270] But this immunity, from whatever reason, was not regarded, Colchester having continued to make returns as before.