DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.22140#0311
MOVEMENTS OF LABOUR.
295
who strove to avoid their liability as bailees under an implied or
special contract. But it is certain that very effectual means were
taken for discovering, presenting, and chastising these ossences.
The manor courts did not, as a rule, take cognisance of other
than petty misconduct. But the inhabitants were interested in
the peace being kept. The lord, who acted through his steward,
was willing to improve his income by the fines levied on ill-doers.
But if the fine were excessive, its object would be defeated ; and
it does not seem that the police of the manor court would or
could lend itself to private spite. Moreover in the many
thousands of accounts which I have read for my researches, it
has been very rarely the case that I have noted thefts of farm
produce, though the bailisfs' rolls register and account for every
gallon of corn, every chicken, every egg.
But the case was quite disferent outside the boundaries of
parish and manor, and on the king's highway. Laws, as any
student of the historical life of Englishmen knows, were enacted
indeed, but very imperfectly enforced. Even the great jurist
Coke, as late as the seventeenth century, affirms that statute law
is of no significance, unless it expound, enforce, or supplement
the common law. Statutes were broken or neglected, and there
was no adequate security for chastising osfenders, no police
organization1 whatever beyond that of the parish. Then there
were men and women, too, who were made outlaws. The natural
resource of such persons was brigandage, and as long as they
preyed on the high-road, and did not harry the villagers, their
depredations excited no anger in the minds of the villagers, if
indeed they did not evoke active sympathy. Travelling mer-
chants, especially foreigners, were plundered occasionally, and
little heed was taken of their losses. When the monasteries
became unpopular, the fact that a rich abbot or prior was
captured, and held to ransom, excited no indignation. Robin
Hood and his followers were objects of popular admiration, the
heroes of ballads which, though modernized in their present
shape, are of old tradition. But I conceive that if these free-
booters had quitted the king's forest and highway, and made
raids on the farmers, every one's hand would have been against
them.
295
who strove to avoid their liability as bailees under an implied or
special contract. But it is certain that very effectual means were
taken for discovering, presenting, and chastising these ossences.
The manor courts did not, as a rule, take cognisance of other
than petty misconduct. But the inhabitants were interested in
the peace being kept. The lord, who acted through his steward,
was willing to improve his income by the fines levied on ill-doers.
But if the fine were excessive, its object would be defeated ; and
it does not seem that the police of the manor court would or
could lend itself to private spite. Moreover in the many
thousands of accounts which I have read for my researches, it
has been very rarely the case that I have noted thefts of farm
produce, though the bailisfs' rolls register and account for every
gallon of corn, every chicken, every egg.
But the case was quite disferent outside the boundaries of
parish and manor, and on the king's highway. Laws, as any
student of the historical life of Englishmen knows, were enacted
indeed, but very imperfectly enforced. Even the great jurist
Coke, as late as the seventeenth century, affirms that statute law
is of no significance, unless it expound, enforce, or supplement
the common law. Statutes were broken or neglected, and there
was no adequate security for chastising osfenders, no police
organization1 whatever beyond that of the parish. Then there
were men and women, too, who were made outlaws. The natural
resource of such persons was brigandage, and as long as they
preyed on the high-road, and did not harry the villagers, their
depredations excited no anger in the minds of the villagers, if
indeed they did not evoke active sympathy. Travelling mer-
chants, especially foreigners, were plundered occasionally, and
little heed was taken of their losses. When the monasteries
became unpopular, the fact that a rich abbot or prior was
captured, and held to ransom, excited no indignation. Robin
Hood and his followers were objects of popular admiration, the
heroes of ballads which, though modernized in their present
shape, are of old tradition. But I conceive that if these free-
booters had quitted the king's forest and highway, and made
raids on the farmers, every one's hand would have been against
them.