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 A HISTORY OF STAFFORDSHIRE emergencies till the Parliament which was summoned should meet at Coventry and writs were issued to the sheriffs to summon the forces. Henry was perpetually in want of money, and at this juncture the Bishop of Lichfield, John Burghill, lent him the not very munificent sum of 100 marks. 162 Loans of this kind were of very little use, and the council issued an order from Lichfield suspending all payments of pensions and annuities from the Exchequer until the next meeting of Parliament, or until further orders. 163 After this important council was dismissed Henry still remained in the north, and on i September left Lichfield for Tutbury, where he received two commissioners from Robert III, king of Scotland, and took an oath to observe the truce with him. 16 * To the Parliament which had been summoned to meet at Coventry in October, 1404, Staffordshire, like most of the other counties in England, sent no borough representatives ; the members for the county were Sir Robert Fraunceys and Sir John Bagot. 165 In 1407 we have a harrowing tale of the disorder wrought by war in the county. Constant attacks were made on the king's estates, the houses of his tenants broken into, the roads about Lichfield and Stafford were swarming with marauders, women and old men were waylaid and beaten, and one of the king's officers was attacked while collecting the taxes and stabbed to the heart. 166 The chief leaders of these riots were said to be Hugh de Erdeswyk, Thomas de Swynerton, John Myners and his two brothers Thomas and William. In the second year of his reign the lawlessness of the county brought Henry V in person to Lichfield, where he remained two months hearing every kind of plaint. The number of assaults, woundings, robberies, and murders committed by gentle and simple is almost incredible. Occasionally the county was in a state of civil war owing to these private feuds, which were aggravated by the political dissension of the day, as shown by such presentments as the following : Hugh Erdeswyk of Sandon and Robert his brother, with many other malefactors to the number of 1,000 men, had congregated to kill Sir John Blount and other liegemen at Newcastle under Lyme, and they kept the field arrayed as for war three days ; and on another occasion, members of the same family with a large body of men beat and wounded several of their neighbours, and would have killed them, but were prevented by a great posse of the county. In another case they entered the town of Newcastle and attacked the house of Sir John Boghay, and intended to kill him, because he had merely done his duty and presented them in the court leet, but he fortunately took refuge in a church and escaped them. 167 About the same time we find Edmund Ferrers of Chartley and others presented for giving liveries of cloth to various squires and yeomen contrary to the statute. The question of livery 168 was one of the most important of the later Middle Ages, and the Statute Book is full of Acts on the subject. Livery 16> Cat. of Pat. 1401-5, p. 407. I63 Wylie, Engl. under Hen. IY, i, 462. 1M Rymer, FoeJera (orig. ed.), viii, 371. I6i Par!. Accts. and Papers, Ixii (i), 267. IM Rot. Par!. (Rec. Com.), Hi, 630. m Ibid. 168 Livery (flberatlo) originally meant the allowance in food and clothes given to the servants and officers of great households, but became restricted to the allowance of clothing only. 240