thereof is not now extant. And indeed this is in expreſs words confeſſed by ſtatute 25 Edw. I. c. 7. wherein the king promiſes to take no cuſtoms from merchants, without the common aſſent of the realm, "ſaving to us and our heirs, the cuſtoms on wools, ſkins, and leather, formerly granted to us by the commonalty aforeſaid." Theſe were formerly called the hereditary cuſtoms of the crown; and were due on the exportation only of the ſaid three commodities, and of none other: which were ſtiled the ſtaple commodities of the kingdom, becauſe they were obliged to be brought to thoſe ports where the king's ſtaple was eſtabliſhed, in order to be there firſt rated, and then exported[1]. They were denominated in the barbarous Latin of our antient records, cuſtuma[2]; not conſuetudines, which is the language of our law whenever it means merely uſages. The duties on wool, ſheep-ſkins or woolfells, and leather, exported, were called cuſtuma antiqua ſive magna; and were payable by every merchant, as well native as ſtranger; with this difference, that merchant ſtrangers paid an additional toll, viz. half as much again as was paid by natives. The cuſtuma parva et nova were an impoſt of 3d. in the pound, due from merchant-ſtrangers only, for all commodities as well imported as exported; which was uſually called the alien's duty, and was firſt granted in 31 Edw. I[3]. But theſe antient hereditary cuſtoms, eſpecially thoſe on wool and woolfells, came to be of little account when the nation became ſenſible of the advantages of a home manufacture, and prohibited the exportation of wool by ſtatute 11 Edw. III. c. 1.
There is alſo another very antient hereditary duty belonging to the crown, called the priſage or butlerage of wines; which is conſiderably older than the cuſtoms, being taken notice of in the great roll of the exchequer, 8 Ric. I. ſtill extant[4]. Priſage was a right of taking two tons of vine from every ſhip importing into
