[Sidenote: _in opposition to Oswestry, Chester,_]
There arose considerable competition for the lucrative market which the expansion of Welsh industry was every day rendering more profitable. The inhabitants of Chester made a vigorous attempt to obtain the erection in their city of "a staple for the cottons and friezes of North Wales." Shrewsbury was however enabled to prevent the completion of the scheme[146].
[Sidenote: _London; especially the last._]
The attempt of London to obtain a share in the trade seemed fraught with so much danger that the two rivals, Shrewsbury and Oswestry, made common cause against the intruder. The complaint was a general one that the merchants of London and their factors forestalled and engrossed productions before they came to market. These obnoxious practices seem to have been carried to a particularly distasteful length on the borders of Wales. The transactions of a London dealer named Thomas Davies in 1619 appear to have brought matters to a crisis.
There had been complaints about the same man, with others, previously. He had, by craft, obtained admission to the freedom of Oswestry, by which means he could the better purchase the Welsh cloths. These he then carried to London where he sold them "privately"[147]--that is, not in the proper and public market. The Drapers of the two towns petitioned that the matter might be settled before the Council[148]. Being foiled in his attempt to plead his freedom of Oswestry[148] Davies appealed to the Lord Mayor and Corporation of the Metropolis to support his claims to trade throughout England in right of his citizenship of London[149]. The order of the Council depriving the Londoners of what they called their "ancient privilege" evoked strenuous opposition in the Metropolis, and petitions numerously signed[150] were sent in asserting that the Drapers of Shrewsbury and Oswestry had obtained the order by misrepresentation[151]. It does not appear that these petitions were successful, as Thomas Davies in his examination before the Council a little later, expressed his willingness to resign his London freedom and to confine his dealings to Oswestry. The fear of creating a precedent which would be largely followed, and with probable detriment to the trade of Shrewsbury and Oswestry, restrained the Council from allowing him to do this[152].