Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 4.djvu/272

252 equal quantity of alloy. The gain to the Crown from this dangerous source had been 50,000l. The duty of the executors was to call in the impure coin. The estates which they divided among themselves to support their new honours might have been sold for five times the amount which in this early stage of the disease would have been required.

But Henry himself had been, perhaps, unaware of the peril of meddling with the currency. It seems not to have occurred to the council—perhaps it did not occur to him—that where a small quantity of debased coin is thrown into the midst of a circulation generally pure, the good will inevitably sink to the level of the bad. The money of the State could not be wasted in the payment of debts either to the Fuggers or to the Mint. In the large schemes which the Protector was meditating, the currency might prove a convenient resource. With the appropriation of the estates followed the distribution of honours and dignities. On the 16th of February it was ordered in council that Hertford should be Duke of Somerset, and that his brother should be Lord Seymour of Sudleye; Lord Parr was to be Marquis of Northampton, Lisle and Wriothesley Earls of Warwick and Southampton. The patents were made out the next day at the Tower, and the will of Henry was thus disposed of.

The next step was to show the bishops that the change of rulers had not restored their liberty. They