event. The thieves certainly did discover a considerable amount of treasure located in the house, but not more than a wrealthy burgess of the period might be expected to hoard out of savings acquired in the ordinary course of business. And Thomas Clarke was a man of exceptional ability. He belonged to the little band of shrewd and enlightened men who governed the destinies of Elizabethan Leicester with singular prudence and foresight. Something of his character may be gathered from the following slight sketch of his municipal career. There were in his time several other persons of the same name who became of some note, especially James Clarke, who was Mayor in 1585-86, and another Thomas Clarke, a shoemaker, who distinguished himself by his philanthropic work; but the landlord of the Blue Boar was a far more important personality than either of these. He was prominently concerned in dealings with land and other property on behalf of the town, and in several negotiations and affairs of great moment. He held the highest municipal offices. His name appears first in the Town Records in the year 1568, when he was elected one of the Borough Chamberlains, and for the next thirty-five years his activity is constantly in evidence. In the following year he was appointed one of the three Meat Testers, and towards the end of his life he became one of the Leather Testers. He was a Collector of Subsidy in 1576, and a Surveyor of Town Lands in 1584. In 1576-77 he was Coroner. He was Steward of the Fair in five years between 1571 and 1600, Mayor in 1583-84, and again in 1598-99, and Alderman between 1574 and 1600 in ten separate years. He was one of four prominent burgesses chosen in 1598 to ride over to Ashby-de-la-Zouch and confer with the Earl of Huntingdon in respect of his demand for soldiers, a matter that required tactful handling; and two years later he was among the six leading townsmen who were charged by the Earl, as Lieutenant of the County, with the furnishing of a good armed man out of Leicester for the Queen's service, "who should be no vagrant or suspected person or likely to run away." On a Subsidy Roll of the year 1590 only four persons living in Leicester were assessed at a higher sum than the landlord of the Blue Boar.
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