Alexander Dyce, A General Glossary to Shakespeare's Works

blanks “benevolences, and I wot not what—As,” RICHARD II., ii. 1. 250. “Blanks. A mode of extortion, by which blank papers were given to the agents of the crown, which they were to fill up as they pleased, to authorize the demands they chose to make.” Nares's Gloss. “Stow records, that Richard II. ‘compelled all the Religious, Gentlemen, and Commons, to set their scales to blankes, to the end he might, if it pleased him, oppresse them severally, or all at once: some of the Commons paid 1000 markes, some 1000 pounds,’ etc. Chronicle, p. 319, fol. 1639” (HOLT WHITE).