At first the thing was that they came with authority to bind their communities to the taxes to be imposed. Somewhat later they began to be used by the communities as a way of presenting grievances to the king, and there were attempts to insist on redress of grievances before consenting to taxes. With this development began a gradual recognition that the member could further the interest of his community, in addition to committing it to taxation (Cam 1944: chap. 15; Pollard 1926: 158-9). Knights and burgesses who went to parliament began to be thought of as servants or agents of their They were paid by the communities and, when they returned, might be required to give an account of what they had done in parliament (Cam 1944, chaps. 15 and 16, esp. pp. McKisack 1932: 82-99; Brown 1939: 23-4; and Emden 1956: 12).