Page:Craik History of British Commerce Vol 1.djvu/198

196 was directed to be tried only for two years; and if, at the end of that time, it should be found against the profit of the king and his realm, then to cease. It must, in fact, even then have been plain to all the world that the measure, the evil effects of which had already been repeatedly experienced, was nothing else than a robbery of the public for the benefit of the royal exchequer. Even to the crown, indeed, the benefit was only temporary; but this deeper truth may not have been so clearly perceived. In the first instance, of course, and for the moment, the base coinage was profitable to the utterer. The different pieces coined by Henry IV. were halfpennies, pennies, and groats of silver, and nobles, half nobles, and quarter nobles of gold. In the last year of his reign he reduced the quantity of gold in the noble from its original amount of 120 grains to 108 grains; in other words, he diminished its intrinsic value by one-tenth. Henry's gold coins exactly resemble those of his predecessor, the only difference being the substitution of the name for. His silver coins are also principally distinguished by the name.

The values of the several denominations of English money continued without further reduction during the two next reigns. The silver coins of Henry V. are supposed to be distinguished from those of his father by two little circles on each side of the head, which are thought to have been intended for eylet-holes,—"from an odd stratagem," says Leake, "when he was prince, whereby he recovered his father's favour, being then dressed in a suit full of eylet-holes: from that time may likewise be dated his extraordinary change of manners, which proved so much to the honour of himself and the kingdom, and therefore not an improper distinction of the money of this prince from the others of the same name." The story in question, which is told at great length by Holinshed, Speed, Stow, and other chroniclers of that age, is, briefly, that, when the worst suspicions of the conduct of his son had been infused into the mind of Henry IV., the prince