Page:The statutes of Wales (1908).djvu/67

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INTRODUCTION
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of legislation is shown by sections 26 and 27. Section 26 provided that after the prorogation or dissolution of that Parliament, the Lord Chancellor was to appoint a Commission to inquire into and view the shires of Carmarthen, Pembroke, Cardigan, Monmouth, Brecknock, Montgomery, Radnor, Glamorgan, and Denbigh, for the purpose of dividing them into hundreds, as in the English shires. There appears to be no record of this commission or its report. Rowland, in his Mona Antiqua, states that copies of the proceedings of these Commissioners were deposited in the office of the Chamberlain and Auditors of North Wales, and that Sir William Gryffydd caused them to be translated by one Jenkin Gwyr, and that they were entitled "the extent of North Wales," and section 3 of the later Act of 1542 also indicates that the Commission did its work. Section 27 provided also for a Commission to inquire and search out by all ways and means all the laws, usages, and customs used within the Dominion and Country of Wales, and to report to and advise the King in Council within a specified time, so that all such laws, if considered expedient and necessary, should be preserved and observed. No record of this Commission is to be found.

The great power of Henry, with the subservience of his Parliament to his strong will and capacity, is exhibited by the 36th section. This enacted that his Majesty could suspend or revoke any part of this Statute at any time within the next three years, provided that the suspension or revocation was made under the Great Seal and proclaimed in every shire of Wales. His Majesty was also empowered to erect courts in Wales within five years after the end of the Parliament then sitting,

A.D. 1536.—In 1536, the King received parliamentary authority (28 Henry 8, c. 3) to allot the townships of Wales at any time within the next three years, and to name and assign the shire towns. In the same year a statute (28 Henry 8, c. 6) was passed continuing the Act