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Corpus under the great scal of England have gone to Gascoigne, it is no manner of proof; for that the king's writs, which are mandatory and not writs of ordinary justice, may go to his subjects into any foreign parts whatsoever, and under what seal it pleaseth him to use. And as to that, that some acts of Parliament have been cited, wherein the Parliament of England have taken upon them to order matters of Gascoigne; if those statutes be well looked into, nothing doth more plainly convince the contrary; for they intermeddle with nothing but that that concerneth either the English subject personally, or the territories of England locally, and never the subjects of Gascoigne or the territories of Gascoigne. For look upon the statute of 27 E. III. cap. 5. there it is said, that there shall be no forestalling of wines. But by whom? Only by English merchants; not a word of the subjects of Gascoigne, and yet no doubt they might be offenders in the same kind. So in the sixth chapter it is said, that all merchants Gascoignes may safely bring wines into what part it shall please them; here now are the persons of Gascoignes; but then the place whither? Into the realm of England. And in the seventh chapter, that erects the ports of Bordeaux and Bayonne for the staple towns of wine; the statute ordains, "that if any," but who? "English merchant, or his servants, shall buy or bargain other where, his body shall be arrested by the steward of Gascoigne, or the constable of Bordeaux: " truc, for the officers of England could not catch him in Gascoigne; but what shall become of him, shall he be proceeded with within Gascoigne? No, but he shall be sent over into England to the Tower of London.

And this doth notably disclose the reason of that custom which some have sought to wrest the other way: that custom, I say, whereof a form doth yet remain, that in every Parliament the king doth appoint certain committees in the upper house to receive the petitions of Normandy, Guienne, and the rest; which, as by the former statute doth appear, could not be for the ordering of the governments there, but for the liberties and good usage of the subjects of those parts when they came hither, or vice versa, for the restraining of the abuses and misdemeanors of our subjects when they went thither.

Wherefore I am now at an end. For as to speak of the mischiefs, I hold it not fit for this place; lest we should seem to bend the laws to policy, and not to take them in their true and

natural sense. It is enough that every man knows, that it is true of these two kingdoms, which a good father said of the churches of Christ: si inseparabiles insuperabiles. Some things I may have forgot; and some things, perhaps, I may forget willingly; for I will not press any opinion or declaration of late time which may prejudice the liberty of this debate; but ex dictis, et ex non dictis, upon the whole matter, I pray judgment for the plaintiff.

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ARGUMENT ON THE WRIT

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NON PRECEDENDO REGE INCONSULTO.

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