from us, as everything will go where it is most esteemed? And therefore our treasure goeth over in ships.... I hear say that in France and Flanders, there goeth abroad such [brass and billon] coin at these days, but that doth not exile all other good coin, but they be current withal, and plenty thereof, howsoever they use it. Therefore I think it wisdom we did learn of them how we might use the one and the other keeping either of them of like rate as they do so, that they should never desire any of our coin for any greater value than they be esteemed at with them nor we theirs for any greater estimate with us than with them, and then we should be sure to keep our treasure at a stay. And as for recovering of old treasure that Page 128 is already gone, there might be order that some commodity of ours were so restrained from them that it should not be sold but for silver or gold, or for the third-part or half in such coins as is universally current, and thus chiefly our treasure might be recovered by the use of means."
When pressed by the knight to show how this merchandise in coins was actually initiated and worked the doctor thus replies: "Well, then, when goldsmiths, merchants, and other skilled persons in metal, perceived that the one