articles besides those mentioned were, at least occasionally, exported. A demand for the tin of Britain, for instance, appears to have always existed on the Continent. A Cornish miner, indeed, who had been banished from his native country, is said to have, in the year 1241, discovered some mines of tin in Germany, the produce of which was so abundant that the metal was even imported into England, by which the price in this country was considerably reduced; but this competition certainly did not permanently destroy either the domestic or the export trade in British tin. In 1338 we find Edward III. ordering all the tin in Cornwall and Devonshire, including even what might have been already sold to foreign merchants, to be seized and sent to the Continent, there to be sold on his account, the owners being obliged to accept of a promise of payment in two years. In 1348, it is recorded that the merchants and others complained to the parliament that all the tin of Cornwall was bought and exported by Tidman of Limburgh, so that no Englishman could get any of it; they therefore prayed that it might be freely sold to all merchants; but they received for answer that it was a profit belonging to the prince, and that every lord might make his profit of his own. Cornwall had in 1337 been erected into a duchy in favour of the Black Prince, and settled by act of parliament on the eldest son of the king, as it still remains. The export of tin is mentioned, in 1390, in the statute 14 Rich. II. c. 7, which declares Dartmouth the only port at which it shall be shipped; and also in the following year, in the 15th Rich. II. c. 8, which repeals the last-mentioned act, and allows the exportation of the commodity from any port, but provides that it shall be carried only to Calais, so long as wool shall be carried to that place. Lead, butter, and cheese are likewise as we have seen, enumerated among the "commodities of the land," in which foreign merchants were compelled, by the 14th Rich. II. c. 1, to invest half the money which they should receive for the commodities they imported. The exportation of lead in particular is repeatedly alluded to in the regulations respecting the staple, and other acts
