Page:A Collection of Charters and Statutes relating to the East India Company.pdf/15

Rh 1. The Company may Licence their own Commanders and Mariners (but none other) to trade on their own private Account, in such Commodities, and to such Value, as a General Court shall direct.

2. To the Intent that the Company's annual Exports of English Goods to India To the Value of One hundred thousand Pounds, may be proved, a true Account thereof in writing, signed by the Governor or Deputy, shall be annually laid before the King and Council, attested on the Oaths of the proper Officers; And no Part of such Goods shall be relanded, or carried any where out of the Company's Limits.

3. Neither the Governor, Deputy, nor Committee, shall lend out the Company's Money.without the Authority of a General Court.

4. If this and the Two last Charters shall not appear to be profitable to the Crown and Realm, then, after Three Years warning ail the said Three. Charters shall be determined and void and the said Governor and Company shall no longer continue a Corporation.

3. Lastly, The Company shall, by a Writing under Their Common; Seal, declare their Acceptance of and Submission to this and the said Two last Charters or, in their Default, they shall no longer act as a Corporation.

Eighth Charter, dated 13th April, 1698.

the Request of the Company, the King, by His Letters Patent, made some further Alterations in the foregoing Orders in respect to the Qualification of Voters in General Courts, by admitting any Proprietor to give One Vote for Five hundred Pounds Stock,—Two Votes for One thousand Pounds, Three Votes for Two thousand Pounds,—Four Votes for Three thousand Pounds,—and Five Votes for Four thousand Pounds; and the Qualification for a Director fixed at Two thousand Pounds Stock.

The Company were also impowered, by this Charter, to trade in and import from the East Indies. Diamonds, Pearls, &c. which they had been before prohibited from importing without The King's Licence. .

CHARTERS GRANTED TO THE SECOND EAST INDIA COMPANY.

Charter granted the Tenth Year of King William III. to the East India Company of England, dated the 5th of September, 1698,

ILLIAM the Third, by the Grace of God, King of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, &c. To all to whom these Presents shall come, greeting. Whereas in. and by an Act lately made and passed in Parliament, intituled, "An Act for raising a Sum, not exceeding Two Millions, upon a Fund for Payment of Annuities after the Rate of Eight Pounds per Centum per Annum, and for settling a Trade to the East Indies," it is amongst other Things enacted. That all the Monies arising by the Several Duties upon Salt and Rock Salt, and upon Stampt Vellum, Parchment, and Paper, in the said Act mentioned, shall be brought and paid in the Receipt of Exchequer of us, our Heirs and Successors, in Manner and Form as in the said Act is prescribed, under certain Penalties therein mentioned; and that yearly and every Year, reckoning the First Year to begin from the Twenty-ninth Day of September, 1698, the full Sum of £160,000 by or out of the Monies to arise by the said several Duties, and to be brought into the Receipt of the Exchequer by weekly or other Payments (in case the same Payments shall extend thereunto) shall be the whole and entire yearly Fund: And in case the said weekly or other Pay­-