"_Dick_. The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers. "_Cade_. Nay, that I mean to do. Is not this a lamentable thing, that of the skin of an innocent lamb should be made parchment? that parchment, being scribbled o'er, should undo a man? . . . . . . . . . . . . "_Enter some, bringing in the Clerk of Chatham_. "_Smith_. The clerk of Chatham: he can write and read, and cast accompt. "_Cade_. O monstrous! "_Smith_. We took him setting of boys' copies. "_Cade_. Here's a villain! "_Smith_. Has a book in his pocket, with red letters in't. . . . . . . . . . . . "_Cade_. Let me alone.--Dost thou use to write thy name, or hast thou a mark to thyself, like an honest plain-dealing man? "_Clerk_. Sir, I thank God, I have been so well brought up, that I can write my name. "_All_. He hath confessed: away with him! he's a villain and a traitor. "_Cade_. Away with him, I say: hang him with his pen and ink-horn about his neck." What is so remarkable and instructive in these brilliant scenes is that Shakespeare here, quite against his custom, departs from his authority. In Holinshed, Jack Cade and his followers do not appear at all as the crazy Calibans whom Shakespeare depicts. The chief of their grievances, in fact, was that the King alienated the crown revenues and lived on the taxes; and, moreover, they complained of abuses of all sorts in the execution of the laws and the raising of revenue. The third article of their memorial stands in striking contrast to their action in the play; for it points out that nobles of royal blood (probably meaning York) are excluded from the King's "dailie presence," while he gives advancement to "other meane persons of lower nature," who close the King's ears to the complaints of the country, and distribute favours, not according to law, but for gifts and bribes. Moreover, they complain of interferences with freedom of election, and, in short, express themselves quite temperately and constitutionally. Finally, in more than one passage of the complaint, they give utterance to a thoroughly English and patriotic resentment of the loss of Normandy, Gascony, Aquitaine, Anjou, and Maine.