[Sidenote:  Burgesses in Parliament]

The same financial reasons therefore existed for desiring the presence of borough representatives in the Great Council as existed in the case of the shires; but it was the genius of Earl Simon which first broke through the older constitutional tradition and summoned two burgesses from each town to the Parliament of 1265.  Time had indeed to pass before the large and statesmanlike conception of the great patriot could meet with full acceptance.  Through the earlier part of Edward’s reign we find a few instances of the presence of representatives from the towns, but their scanty numbers and the irregularity of their attendance show that they were summoned rather to afford financial information to the Great Council than as representatives in it of an Estate of the Realm.  But every year pleaded stronger and stronger for their inclusion, and in the Parliament of 1295 that of 1265 found itself at last reproduced.  “It was from me that he learnt it,” Earl Simon had cried, as he recognized the military skill of Edward’s onset at Evesham; “it was from me that he learnt it,” his spirit might have exclaimed as he saw the king gathering at last two burgesses “from every city, borough, and leading town” within his realm to sit side by side with the knights, nobles, and barons of the Great Council.  To the Crown the change was from the first an advantageous one.  The grants of subsidies by the burgesses in Parliament proved more profitable than the previous extortions of the Exchequer.  The proportions of their grant generally exceeded that of the other estates.  Their representatives too proved far more compliant with the royal will than the barons or knights of the shire; only on one occasion during Edward’s reign did the burgesses waver from their general support of the Crown.

[Sidenote:  Reluctance to attend]

It was easy indeed to control them, for the selection of boroughs to be represented remained wholly in the king’s hands, and their numbers could be increased or diminished at the king’s pleasure.  The determination was left to the sheriff, and at a hint from the royal Council a sheriff of Wilts would cut down the number of represented boroughs in his shire from eleven to three, or a sheriff of Bucks declare he could find but a single borough, that of Wycombe, within the bounds of his county.  Nor was this exercise of the prerogative hampered by any anxiety on the part of the towns to claim representative privileges.  It was hard to suspect that a power before which the Crown would have to bow lay in the ranks of soberly-clad traders, summoned only to assess the contributions of their boroughs, and whose attendance was as difficult to secure as it seemed burthensome to themselves and the towns who sent them.  The mass of citizens took little or no part in their choice, for they were elected in the county court by a few of the principal burghers deputed for the purpose; but the cost of their