 Cromwell had intended that the bulk of this wealth should serve as regular income of government.However, after Cromwell's fall in 1540, Henry needed money quickly to fund his military ambitions in France and Scotland; and so monastic property was sold off, representing by 1547 an annual value of £90,000 ().Lands and endowments were not offered for sale, let alone auctioned; instead the government responded to applications for purchase, of which had indeed been a continual flood ever since the process of dissolution got under way.