Tock had lain in jail so long awaiting trial, has a decidedly familiar appearance; and so has the tale told by one Richard in the following passage, also dated 1209: "Richard the son of William de Baseville of Ketton was taken in the park of Cliffe, carrying one fresh skin of a buck, by Geoffrey the man of Roger Blund, to whom he confessed, as the same Geoffrey says, that he found that skin. And he was taken to Rockingham and im prisoned. And Richard comes before the justices and says that he bought that skin at Kimbolton from a certain unknown boy. And he is sent to prison at Rockingham for inquiries to be made at the pleas of Rutland on the Monday next before Mid-Lent at Ockham. Afterwards he made fine by twenty shillings that he might be quit of the inquiry whether he bought that skin at Kimbolton, Maurice Daundelay being pledge of his pence." (Page 4.) And lest the apparent justice and mercy of most of these doings of the court may make us forget that the dwellers in and near the forests suffered hardships quite capable of exciting in dignation, even in the narration of them at this late day, the entries of the same year, 1209, contain this passage : — "The head of a hart recently dead was found in the wood of Henry Dawney at Maidford by the king's foresters. And the forester of the aforesaid Henry is dead. And because nothing can be ascertained of that hart, it is ordered that the whole of the aforesaid town of Maidford be seized into the king's hand with the wood belonging to the same town, on the ground that the aforesaid Henry can certify nothing of that hart." (Page 4.) Here is a passage of the same date, giving a lively view of the rights of sanctuary : — "Richard of Holton, Wilkin of Eastlegh, Hulle of Hinton, and Hulle Roebuck, the Ser jeants of the county, found venison in the house of Hugh le Scot. And Hugh fled to the church; and when the foresters and verderers came thither they demanded of Hugh whence that venison came. And he and a certain other person, Roger of Wellington by name, acknowl edged that they had killed a hind from which that venison came. And he refused to leave the church but lingered there for a month; and afterwards escaped in the guise of a woman.
And he is a fugitive; and Roger of Wellington likewise. It is ordered that they be exacted, and unless they come, let them be outlawed." (Page 9.) And now let us close our readings as to 1209 with an extract indicating the restrictions upon the use of one's own property in the forest : — "William of the Ridge gives half a mark in order that his cowhouse which he erected upon his land at Sutton be not removed." (Page 10.) Here is an incidental picture of the contents of a house, given in a forest inquisition dated 1251 : — "It happened on Thursday the vigil of Saints Fabian and Sebastian in the thirty-fifth year that when Geoffrey Hog, and John Ive, the walking foresters of the lord king of the park of Brigstock, were on their way in the same park, they found a. trap set in Aldnatheshawe; and they heard a man cutting wood by night in the park, and on account of the thickness of the wood and the darkness of the night they could not come to him. And on account of the suspicion which they had against Robert le Noble of Sudborough, chaplain, they left the wood for Sudborough to watch in concealment to see if any one left the wood for the town; and so they met the said Robert the chaplain, who came from the wood and carried in his hand a branch of green oak and an axe. And the foresters demanded gage and pledge of him; and he could not find them pledges, and so they took him to the town of Brigstock to the house of Robert le N. . . . "In the morning the foresters and verderers went to his house at Sudborough to make search; and so they found in his house two barbed ar rows without fletches and the woodwork of a certain trap with the string of the trap broken into two parts; and upon the string was hair from deer. "The chattels found there were appraised, to wit, a bushel of wheat, of the price of five pence, a bushel of beans, of the price of three pence; half a bushel of oats, of the price of two pence; a chest with dishes, cups and saucers, of the price of twelve pence, and a mare of the price of eight pence. A pelice was found there of the price of twelve pence; and wood was found in his court of the price of six pence. Total, four shillings.
