306 The Period of Constitution Making
greatness was a different greatness from that of its Lan-*
castrian predecessor.
3, The Organs of Administration: Exchequer, Chan-
cery, Wardrobe, and Chamber.—As already stated,1 the
Council was the king's general advisory body retaining
its early governmental competence even after courts and
Parliament had differentiated and become fundamental
features of government. The Council was not a special-
ised executive body. A measure determined on by the
Mng alone or by king and Council
might be embodied in a writ of great seal, and so become an
act of Chancery. It might be translated into a writ of privy
seal and thus become a function of the Wardrobe. If it
mainly concerned finance, it was very likely to result in a
writ tinder the seal of the Exchequer, and accordingly the
executive agent was the Exchequer.2
Exchequer, Chancery, and Wardrobe were all specialisa-
tions out of the earlier counselling and governing group
that has been referred to as the king's household or
court; and all of course—the Exchequer especially—did
much routine administrative work which could in no im-
mediate sense be considered an execution of the meas-
ures or orders of either king or Council. The Exchequer
was the first of these specialisations, and it has been
shown that even under the Conqueror financial organi-
sation was growing most rapidly and already had rather
special administrative and even judicial features.3 Per-
haps the Conqueror's chief care in government was to
increase his revenue and to develop and organise every-
thing which had to do with its collection. These traits
were prominent in his sons' reigns, and it is easy to under-
stand that the first highly developed department of ad-
ministration had to do with finance.
About the middle of Henry LJs reign, a new method of
1 See above, p. 293.
9 Tout, Chapters in Mediesml Administrative History, Si, 147.
* See above, pp. 125, 124,