of the Plantagenets and Tudors.  The expenses of the court under Henry VII. were a little over L14,000 a year, out of which were defrayed the whole cost of the king’s establishment, the expenses of entertaining foreign ambassadors, the wages and maintenance of the yeomen of the guard, the retinues of servants, and all necessary outlay not incurred for public business.  Under Henry VIII., of whose extravagance we have heard so much, and whose court was the most magnificent in the world, these expenses were L19,894 16s. 8d.,[44] a small sum when compared with the present cost of the royal establishment, even if we adopt the relative estimate of twelve to one, and suppose it equal to L240,000 a year of our money.  But indeed it was not equal to L240,000; for, although the proportion held in articles of common consumption, articles of luxury were very dear indeed.[45]

Passing down from the king and his nobles, to the body of the people, we find that the income qualifying a country gentleman to be justice of the peace was L20 a year, [46] and if he did his duty, his office was no sinecure.  We remember Justice Shallow and his clerk Davy, with his novel theory of magisterial law; and Shallow’s broad features have so English a cast about them, that we may believe there were many such, and that the duty was not always very excellently done.  But the Justice Shallows were not allowed to repose upon their dignity.  The justice of the peace was required not only to take cognisance of open offences, but to keep surveillance over all persons within his district, and over himself in his own turn there was a surveillance no less sharp, and penalties for neglect prompt and peremptory.[47] Four times a year he was to make proclamation of his duty, and exhort all persons to complain against him who had occasion.

Twenty pounds a year, and heavy duties to do for it, represented the condition of the squire of the parish.[48] By the 2nd of the 2nd of Henry V., “the wages” of a parish priest were limited to L5 6s. 8d., except in cases where there was special licence from the bishop, when they might be raised as high as L6.  Priests were probably something better off under Henry VIII., but the statute remained in force, and marks an approach at least to their ordinary salary.[49] The priest had enough, being unmarried, to supply him in comfort with the necessaries of life.  The squire had enough to provide moderate abundance for himself and his family.  Neither priest nor squire was able to establish any steep difference in outward advantages between himself and the commons among whom he lived.