[161] Again: in the same scene there is a reference to
the exportation of broad cloth:--"I, an't please your honour, have a
commoditie of good broad cloth, not past two hundred; may I shippe them
over? and theres a hundred poundes." When we turn to the State Papers we
discover that numerous complaints were made in 1613 about the
exportation of undressed broadcloth. On 3rd March, 1612-13, the King
forwarded to the Lords of the Council a petition from the clothworkers
and dyers that the statutes against the exportation of undressed and
undyed goods should be strictly enforced. I am inclined to think that
these passages, taken collectively, afford strong proof that _The
Costlie Whore_ was written in 1613--twenty years before the date of
publication.
In I. 2, we have the story of Bishop Hatto and the Rats told briefly but
effectively. Mr. Baring-Gould in his _Curious Myths of the Middle Ages_
has investigated the sources of the legend with much fulness. He refers
us specially to Wolfius's _Lect. Memorab_., Lavingae, 1600, tom. i. p.
343. From the Stationers' Registers it appears that a ballad of _The
Wrathfull Judgement of God upon Bishop Hatto_ was licensed to H.
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