Her Majesty's Mails

On one occasion, Prideaux himself helped to seize the Plymouth mail which had just arrived in London, and was proceeding to the office of the Earl of Warwick near the Royal Exchange. Burlamachy and the Government failed to restore peace. In the Commission on the Post-Office, to which we have already referred, the subject was taken up, but the resolution of the Committee only rendered matters more complicated. The Committee, though Prideaux contrived to be made Chairman of it, declared that the sequestration of two years before "was a grievance and illegal, and ought to be taken off," and Mr. Witherings restored to office. The Commission decided against the Government, both as regards the sequestration and the monopoly of letter-carrying, which the King proclaimed in 1637. Both questions were left in abeyance for two years, when, in 1644, the Parliamentary forces having begun to gain an ascendancy over those of the King, the Lords and Commons by a joint action appointed Edmund Prideaux, the Chairman of the Committee of 1642, "and a barrister of seven years' standing," to the vacant office. It is somewhat amusing to note how the monopolizing tendencies of the Crown, denounced but two years ago by the Parliament, were now openly advocated and confirmed by an almost unanimous vote of both Houses.