Of this also, we had occasion to discourse at large in a former volume. We there observed that by statute 37 Hen. VIII. c. 9. the rate of interest was fixed at 10l. per cent. per annum, which the statute 13 Eliz. c. 8. confirms: and ordains that all brokers shall be guilty of a praemunire that transact any contracts for more, and the securities themselves shall be [157] void. The statute 21 Jac. I. c.17. reduced interest to eight per cent.; and, it having been lowered in 1650, during the usurpation, to six per cent. (5), the same reduction was re-enacted after the restoration by statute 12 Car. II. c.13.; and lastly, the statute 12 Ann. st. 2. c.16. has reduced it to five per cent. Wherefore not only all contracts for taking more are in themselves totally void, but also the lender shall forfeit treble the money borrowed. Also, if any scrivener or broker takes more than five shillings per cent. procuration-money, or more than twelvepence for making a bond, he shall forfeit 207. with costs, and shall suffer imprisonment for half a year. And by statute 17 Geo. III. c. 26. to take more than ten shillings per cent. for procuring any money to be advanced on any life-annuity, is made an indictable misdemesnor, and punishable with fine and imprisonment: as is also the offence of procuring or soliciting any infant to grant any life-annuity; or to promise, or otherwise engage, to ratify it when he comes of age. (6) 5. CHEATING is another offence, more immediately against public trade; as that cannot be carried on without a punctilious regard to common honesty, and faith between man and man. Hither therefore may be referred that prodigious multitude of statutes, which are made to restrain and punish deceits in particular trades, and which are enumerated by Hawkins and Burn, but are chiefly of use among the traders themselves. The offence also of breaking the assise of bread, See Vol. II. pag 455, &c. (5) The reduction took place in 1651. See Scobell, 174. The preamble of the ordinance attributes the necessity of it to the decreased value of land and merchandize, and the general want of money felt by the landed and trading interest. (6) This statute was repealed by the 53 G. 3. c.141.; but the repealing statute contains clauses in the same terms with those abstracted in the text. or the rules laid down by the law, and particularly by the statutes 31 Geo. II. c. 29. 3 Geo. III. c.11. and 13 Geo. III. c. 62. for ascertaining it's price in every given quantity, is reducible to this head of cheating (7): as is likewise in a peculiar manner the offence of selling by false weights and measures; the standard of which fell under our consideration in a former volume". The punishment of bakers' breaking the assise, was antiently to stand in the pillory, by statute 51 Hen. III. st. 6., and for brewers (by the same act) to stand in the tumbrel or dungcart; which, as we learn from domesday book, was the punishment for knavish brewers in the city of Chester so early as the reign of Edward the confessor. "Malam cerevisiam "faciens, in cathedra ponebatur stercoris." (8) But now the [158] general punishment for all frauds of this kind, if indicted (as they may be) at common law, is by fine and imprisonment : though the easier and more usual way is by levying on a summary conviction, by distress and sale, the forfeitures imposed by the several acts of parliament. Lastly, any deceitful practice, in cozening another by artful means, whether in matters of trade, or otherwise, as by playing with false dice, or the like, is punishable with fine, imprisonment, and pillory *. And by the statutes 33 Hen. VIII. c. 1. and 30 Geo. II. c. 24. if any man defrauds another of any valuable chattels by colour of any false token, counterfeit letter, or false pretence, or pawns or disposes of another's goods without the consent of the owner, he shall suffer such punishment by imprisonment, fine, pillory, transportation, whipping, or other corporal pain, as the court shall direct. (9) h See Vol. I. pag. 274. i3 Inst. 219. i Seld. tit. of hon. b. 2. c. 5. § 3. (7) See Burn's Justice, v.i. pp. 301.363. ed. 23. The important statutes on this subject now are the 1 & 2 G. 4. c. 50. for the kingdom at large; and the 55 G. 5. c.xcix. (Local Act), as altered and amended by the 59 G. 3. c.cxxvii. (Local Act), for the city of London, and within ten miles of the Royal Exchange. The weight and materials of bread are by these acts put under very strict regulations. (8) Aut quatuor solidos dabat præpositis. (9) The clauses of the 30 G. 2. c. 24., which relate to the pawning of another's goods without the consent of the owner, are virtually repealed by the general pawnbroker's act, 39 & 40 G. 3. c.99. (see Vol. II. p. 452.) which punishes the offence summarily by forfeitures and imprisonment in case of non-payment; the same statute also punishes summarily the forgN 3 ing 6. THE offence of forestalling the market is also an offence against public trade. This, which (as well as the two following) is also an offence at common law', was described i 1 Hawk. P. C. c.80. s.1. ing any pawnbroker's memorandum or ticket. The statutes of Hen. 8. and G. 2., extended as the latter is by the 52G.3. c.64., form a very important head of our criminal law, upon which numerous decisions have taken place. The first of these provides for the offence of deceitfully getting possession of other persons' money, goods, chattels, jewels, or other things, by means of any false token, or counterfeit letter made in any other man's name. The necessity for this and the succeeding statutes arose from a principle in the law as to larceny, which will be noticed more fully hereafter, that wherever the owner of goods delivered them to another, and intended by the delivery to part not merely with the possession but the property of them, no larceny was committed by the person so receiving them, whatever fraudulent means he had used to prevail on the owner so to do. It should therefore be always borne in mind, that these statutes apply only to cases of such delivery; for without this caution we shall be apt to confound cases under them with cases of larceny at common law. The words of the statute of Hen. 8. are confined to goods, &c. obtained by means of a token, which must be some real visible mark or thing (as a key, or ring), calculated to gain the party using it some additional credit beyond his own assertions; or a letter, which must also be made in the name of a third person. This statute, thus expounded, was a very inadequate security against fraud; the statute of G. 2., therefore, extends to goods, &c. obtained by any false pretence with intent to cheat. These words are very general, and there has been some doubt as to the extent in which they are to be understood; but it seems now to be determined that they are not to be restrained in their operation, but that wherever the pretence is false, and the money or other thing obtained by that pretence, the case is within the statute. Thus, where a Count V. told Sir T. B. that he was entrusted by the Duc de Lauzun to take some horses from Ireland to London, and that he had been detained so long by contrary winds that his money was spent, by which representation (being entirely fictitious) Sir T. B. was induced to advance him money; the case was held to be within the statute, and the defendant was sentenced to hard labour (3 T. R. 104.). And this case would have been equally so, if the story had been only false in part, supposing the false part had been the material inducement to part with the money. For it most commonly happens, that a false pretence is a matter made up of some truth as well as some falsehood, the former used as the vehicle of the latter. The object of the 52 G. 3. c. 64. was to extend the protection of the statute of G. 2. to corporate bodies, and to cases where not merely money, goods, &c. were obtained, but bonds, bills, bank notes, or any other security, or warrant for the payment of money, or delivery of goods. On this subject, generally, I cannot do better than refer the student to the case of the King v. Young and others, 3 T. R. 98., and 2 East's P. C. c. xviii. s. 8., or 2 Russ. P. C. 1335. by statute 5 & 6 Edw. VI. c.14. to be the buying or contracting for any merchandize or victual coming in the way to market; or dissuading persons from bringing their goods or provisions there; or persuading them to enhance the price, when there any of which practices make the market dearer to the fair trader. 7. REGRATING was described by the same statute to be the buying of corn, or other dead victual, in any market, and selling it again in the same market, or within four miles of the place. For this also enhances the price of the provisions, as every successive seller must have a successive profit. 8. ENGROSSING was also described to be the getting into one's possession, or buying up, large quantities of corn, or other dead victuals, with intent to sell them again. This must of course be injurious to the public, by putting it in the power of one or two rich men to raise the price of provisions at their own discretion. And so the total engrossing of any [159] other commodity, with intent to sell it at an unreasonable price, is an offence indictable and finable at the common law. And the general penalty for these three offences by the common law (for all the statutes concerning them were repealed by 12 Geo. III. c.71.) is, as in other minute misdemesnors, discretionary fine and imprisonment". Among the Romans these offences and other mal-practices to raise the price of provisions, were punished by a pecuniary mulct. "Poena viginti aureorum statuitur adversus eum, qui contra annonam fecerit, societatemve coierit quo annona carior "fiat"." 66 9. MONOPOLIES are much the same offence in other branches of trade, that engrossing is in provisions (10): being a licence or privilege allowed by the king for the sole buying and selling, making, working, or using of any thing °Ff. 48. 12. 2. m Cro. Car. 232. n 1 Hawk. P. C. c. 80. s. 5. (10) Hawkins states the difference to be only in this, that monopoly is by patent from the king, and engrossing by the act of the subject between party and party. Pl. C. 1. c. 79. whatsoever; whereby the subject in general is restrained from that liberty of manufacturing or trading which he had before. These had been carried to an enormous height during the reign of queen Elizabeth; and were heavily complained of by sir Edward Coke, in the beginning of the reign of king James the first: but were in great measure remedied by statute 21 Jac. I. c. 3. which declares such monopolies to be contrary to law and void; (except as to patents, not exceeding the grant of fourteen years, to the authors of new inventions; and except also patents concerning printing, saltpetre, gunpowder, great ordnance, and shot;) and monopolists are punished with the forfeiture of treble damages and double costs, to those whom they attempt to disturb; and if they procure any action, brought against them for these damages, to be stayed by any extra-judicial order, other than of the court wherein it is brought, they incur the penalties of praemunire. Combinations also among victuallers or artificers, to raise the price of provisions, or any commodities, or the rate of labour, are in many cases severely punished by particular statutes; and in general by statute 2 & 3 Edw. VI. c.15. with the forfeiture of 10l. or twenty-one days' imprisonment, with an allowance of only bread and water, for the first offence; 201. or the pillory, for the second; and 40l. for the third, or [160] else the pillory, loss of one ear, and perpetual infamy. (11) In the same manner, by a constitution of the emperor Zeno', all monopolies and combinations to keep up the price of merchandize, provisions, or workmanship, were prohibited upon pain of forfeiture of goods and perpetual banishment. 10. To exercise a trade in any town, without having previously served as an apprentice for seven years, is looked upon to be detrimental to public trade, upon the supposed want of sufficient skill in the trader: and therefore is punished by statute 5 Eliz. c. 4. with the forfeiture of forty shillings by the month. (12) P1 Hawk. P. C. c.79. 93 Inst. 181. Cod. 4. 59.1. (11) This statute is repealed by 5 G. 4. c. 95. See ante, p. 137. n. |