The darkest stain on Edward's reign was his treatment of the Jews
(S119). Up to this period that unfortunate race had been protected by
the Kings of England as men protect the cattle which they fatten for
slaughter. So long as they accumulated money, and so long as the
sovereign could extort from them whatever portion of their
accumulations he saw fit to demand, they were worth guarding. A time
had now come when the populace clamored for their expulsion from the
island, on the ground that their usury and rapacity was ruining the
country.
Edward yielded to the clamor, and first stripping the Jews of their
possessions, he prepared to drive them into exile. It is said that
even their books were taken from them and given to the libraries of
Oxford. Thus pillaged, they were forced to leave the realm,--a
miserable procession, numbering some sixteen thousand. Many perished
on the way, and so few ventured to return that for three centuries and
a half, until Cromwell came to power, they disappear from English
history (S458).