almost every valuable possession of the
crown had been granted away for ever, or else upon very long leases;
but may be of benefit to posterity, when those leases come to expire.

[Footnote o: 1 Ann. st. 1. c. 7.]

[Footnote p: In like manner, by the civil law, the inheritances or
_fundi patrimoniales_ of the imperial crown could not be alienated,
but only let to farm. _Cod._ _l._ 11. _t._ 61.]

VI. HITHER might have been referred the advantages which were used to
arise to the king from the profits of his military tenures, to which
most lands in the kingdom were subject, till the statute 12 Car. II.
c. 24. which in great measure abolished them all: the explication of
the nature of which tenures, must be referred to the second book of
these commentaries. Hither also might have been referred the
profitable prerogative of purveyance and pre-emption: which was a
right enjoyed by the crown of buying up provisions and other
necessaries, by the intervention of the king's purveyors, for the use
of his royal houshold, at an appraised valuation, in preference to all
others, and even without consent of the owner; and also of forcibly
impressing the carriages and horses of the subject, to do the king's
business on the publick roads, in the conveyance of timber, baggage,
and the like, however inconvenient to the proprietor, upon paying him
a settled price. A prerogative, which prevailed pretty generally
throughout Europe, during the scarcity of gold and silver, and the
high valuation of money consequential thereupon. In those early times
the king's houshold (as well as those of inferior lords) were
supported by specific renders of corn, and other victuals, from the
tenants of the respective demesnes; and there was also a continual
market kept at the palace gate to furnish viands for the royal use[q].
And this answered all purposes, in those ages of simplicity, so long
as the king's court continued in any certain place. But when it
removed from one part of the kingdom to another (as was formerly very
frequently done) it was found necessary to send purveyors beforehand,
to get together a sufficient quantity of provisions and other
necessaries for the houshold: and, lest the unusual demand should
raise them to an exorbitant price, the powers beforementioned were
vested in these purveyors; who in process of time very greatly abused
their authority, and became a great oppression to the subject though
of little advantage to the crown;