compelled to add to the price of these commodities, to compensate for
the tax they must pay into the King's Treasury.

[Sidenote: Monoplies. Ship Money.]

"Ship Money" was a tax supposably for the building of a Navy, for which
there was no accounting to the people, the amount and frequency of the
levy being discretionary with the King. It was always possible and
imminent, and was the most odious of all the methods adopted for
wringing money from the nation, while resistance to it, as to all other
such measures, was punished by the Star Chamber in such pleasant
fashion as would please Strafford and Laud, whose creatures the judges
were.

Hampden, as before, championed the rights of the people in his own
person, going to prison and facing death, if it were necessary, rather
than pay the amount of 20 shillings. But that the taxes were paid by
the people is evident, for so successful was this scheme of revenue
that many predicted the King would never again call a Parliament. What
would be the need of a Parliament, if he did not require money? The
Royalists were pleased, and the people were wisely patient, knowing
that such a financial fabric must fall at the first breath of a storm,
and then their time would come.




CHAPTER IX.