ust. Though parliaments met
almost every year, and there could be no mistake in so notorious a fact,
it was the continual practice of sheriffs to omit boroughs that had been
in recent habit of electing members, and to return upon the writ that
there were no more within their county. Thus in the 12th of Edward III.
the sheriff of Wiltshire, after returning two citizens for Salisbury,
and burgesses for two boroughs, concludes with these words:--"There are
no other cities or boroughs within my bailiwick." Yet in fact eight
other towns had sent members to preceding parliaments. So in the 6th of
Edward II. the sheriff of Bucks declared that he had no borough within
his county except Wycomb; though Wendover, Agmondesham, and Marlow had
twice made returns since that king's accession.[262] And from this
cause alone it has happened that many towns called boroughs, and having
a charter and constitution as such, have never returned members to
parliament; some of which are now among the most considerable in
England, as Leeds, Birmingham, and Macclesfield.[263]

It has been suggested, indeed, by Brady,[264] that these returns may not
appear so false and collusive if we suppose the sheriff to mean only
that there were no resident burgesses within these boroughs fit to be
returned, or that the expense of their wages would be too heavy for the
place to support. And no doubt the latter plea, whether implied or not
in the return, was very frequently an inducement to the sheriffs to
spare the smaller boroughs. The wages of knights were four shillings a
day, levied on all freeholders, or at least on all holding by
knight-service, within the county.[265] Those of burgesses were half
that sum;[266] but even this pittance was raised with reluctance and
difficulty from miserable burghers, little solicitous about political
franchises. Poverty, indeed, seems to have been accepted as a legal
excuse. In the 6th of E. II. the sheriff of Northumberland returns to
the writ of summons that all his knights are not sufficient to protect
the county; and in the 1st of E. III. that they were too much ravaged by
their enemies to send any members to parliament.[267] The sheriffs of
Lancashire, after several returns that they had no boroughs within their
county, though Wigan, Liverpool, and Preston were such, alleged at
length that none ought to be called upon on account of their poverty.
This return was constantly made, from 36 E. III. to the reign of Henry