G08 THE NATURE AND CAUSES OF
the statutes that declared them to be crimes, had always beenunderstood to be innocent. But the cruellest of our revenuelaws, I will venture to affirm, are mild and gentle, in com-parison of some of those which the clamour of our merchantsand manufacturers has extorted from the legislature for thesupport of their own absurd and oppressive monopolies.Like the laws of Draco, these laws may be said to be allwritten in blood.
By the 8th of Elizabeth, chap. 3., the exporter of sheep,lambs, or rams, was for the first offence to forf eit all his goodsfor ever, to suffer a year’s imprisonment, and then to have hisleft hand cut off in a market town upon a market day, to bethere nailed up; and for the second offence to be adjudgeda felon, and to suffer death accordingly. To prevent the breedof our sheep from being propagated in foreign countries,seems to have been the object of this law. By the 13th and14th of Charles II . chap. 18., the exportation of wool wasmade felony, and the exporter subjected to the same penaltiesand forfeitures as a felon.
For the honour of the national humanity, it is to be hopedthat neither of these statutes were ever executed. The firstof them, however, so far as I know, has never been directlyrepealed, and Sergeant Hawkins seems to consider it as stillin force. It may however, perhaps, be considered as virtuallyrepealed by the 12th of Charles II . chap. 32. sect. 3., which,without expressly taking away the penalties imposed byformer statutes, imposes a new penalty, viz. That of twentyshillings for every sheep exported, or attempted to be ex-ported, together with the forfeiture of the sheep and of theowner’s share of the sheep. The second of them was ex-pressly repealed by the 7th and 8th of William III . chap. 28.sect. 4., by which it is declared that, “ Whereas the statuteof the I3tli and 14th of King Charles 11 . made against theexportation of wool, among other things in the said act men-tioned, doth enact the same to be deemed felony; by theseverity of which penalty the prosecution of offenders hathnot been so effectually put in execution: Be it, therefore,enacted by the authority aforesaid, that so much of the saidact, which relates to the making the said offence felony, berepealed and made void.”
The penalties, however, which are either imposed by thismilder statute, or which, though imposed by former statutes,are not repealed by this one, are still sufficiently severe.