The Customs of Old England Part 16

"_Gosefield_ (being obliged to accept the averment) said: 'Sir, they were never seised of common for more beasts than could be wintered and fed and supported on the growth of the said land.'"

There is appended to this report a note which lays down the law in a different sense from that before stated. It is as follows:

"It is not sufficient for anyone who avows distress to say that he avows the taking, &c., for that he found the beasts in his chace of such a place, or in the common of such a place, where he had no right of common; for it may be that neither party had a right of common; and thus it is not sufficient but he must say that he found them in his several pasture, or must say some other thing that touches himself and gives him a right to impound what he found. For no man can avow a distress in a common pasture save the lord of the soil of the common pasture. For if any of the commoners were to make avowry for beasts taken in the common pasture it would then follow that if the Inquest were to pa.s.s against the plaintiff, he who avowed the taking in the common pasture would have the return of the beasts and the amends, and not the lord of the pasture, and that would be improper. But this does not hold good where the King is the lord of the common pasture, and several persons holding of him in socage have common, because in that case anyone having common may avow a good distress. The reason is because the King will not be a party in such case or distrein anyone."

In mediaeval country life, then, commons might be either manorial or forestal. Bishop Stubbs in his "Const.i.tutional History" affirms that "neither the hundreds of England nor the shires appear ever to have had common lands." As regards hundreds, on the enclosure of a common, allotments were made to several townships of Knaresborough, and Stubbs himself allows that "it seems a fair instance of common lands of a hundred." Similarly, there is in the hundred of Coleness in Suffolk a pasture common to all the inhabitants. But in each instance we have probably to distinguish between use and ownership; and the same distinction applies to counties, otherwise the case of the Devonshire Commons might seem to refute the dictum.

The Devonshire Commons are not to be confused with the Forest of Dartmoor. They const.i.tute rather the purlieus, and, in general, afford better pasturage than the forest itself. Neither are they identical with the commons of the separate vills--the manorial or parochial commons. The whole of the inhabitants of the county may be regarded as possessing an interest in the Devonshire Commons, with the exception of the people of Barnstaple and Totnes, the reason being that those districts not having been afforested with the rest of the county, the residents acquired no new privileges when Devonshire was disafforested.

The other inhabitants retained whatever rights they had previously enjoyed not only in respect of the Devonshire Commons, but of the Forest of Dartmoor, of which, at some early period--before the era of perambulations, in which they were not included--those commons had no doubt formed part. One effect of the wide extent of the right of common was that the rule of _levant and couchant_ did not obtain here.

Naturally, when all Devonshire men were ent.i.tled to the use of the land, it was impossible to fix a limit to the number of the beasts that might be turned out throughout the length and breadth of the county.

Mention was made above of royal forests as occupying, in some respects, a different position from other lands in which a right of common was exercised. Dartmoor, although the property of the Prince of Wales as Duke of Cornwall, may be taken as, to all intents and purposes, answering to that description; and thus peculiar interest attaches to the usages which prevailed, and still prevail, within its bounds.

The question of "Venville Rights on Dartmoor" is one that engaged the attention of a very capable writer as well as an accomplished antiquary, the late Mr. W. F. Collier; and although the subject has been handled by other investigators, it is from him that we have derived the bulk of our information on this very remarkable aspect of commonage. First, as to the name. "Venville" is a provincial corruption of _fines villarum_, each vill paying a larger or smaller sum for the right of pasturage; and certain parishes or manors on the outskirts of the forest were said to be "in venville." "The perambulation [of 1224]," says Mr. Birkett, "establishes three important facts: viz., that the moor was originally part of a royal forest; that the Commons of Devon, and surrounding parishes were once part of the forest; and that the moor is not waste of a manor." The townships were grouped into four bailiwicks--North, South, East, and West; and the fines payable compose too long a list to be given entire. The following, however, are specimens: The township of Trulegh (Throwleigh), 2_s._ 6_d._; the parish of South Tawton, 7_s._ 4 1/2_d._; the township of Sele (South Zeal), 6 1/2_d._; the hamlet of Lowyngton, in the parish of Meavy, 2_d._; the township of Gadamewe (G.o.dameavy), in the same parish, 2_d._; the township of Chagford, 12_d._; the hamlet of Teigncombeham, with [within?] the parish of Chagford, 4_s._ This was in 1506-7. In return for these payments the commoners have certain "venville" rights, which extend over the forest proper and the Devonshire Commons, and include the taking of stone and sand for their own use. But the most valued is that of agistment or pasturage, especially of ponies. The Duchy, on its part, claims and exercises the right of "drift"--a picturesque survival on which we may well bestow some regard.

The division of the forest into four quarters still continues, each being in charge of a moorman; and over these wide tracts and the adjacent Commons sheep, bullocks, and ponies are turned out by the tenants to graze at will. In the autumn the animals are driven to a traditional spot, in order that they may be claimed by their owners.

There is a bullock drift, and a pony drift, of which the former is the earlier; and each quarter has its own drift days, which are usually different. In any case, no notice is given, but about two o'clock in the morning the moorman is apprised by a messenger that he must "drive" his quarter for bullocks or ponies. Thereupon, according to the regular procedure, he ascends the tors and blows his horn as an intimation to the tenants to a.s.sist in the drift. In the western quarter there was formerly a stone, through a hole in which it was the custom to blow the horn, but this stone now graces a wall in a hedge.

The drift to Merrivale Bridge is accomplished by men on horseback and men on foot, and dogs, to the accompaniment of horns and halloos; and when all the animals have been gathered, an official of the Duchy takes his stand on an ancient stone and reads a proclamation, which done the owners are summoned to claim, let us say, their ponies. The venville tenants identify their beasts, making no payment; but other persons--and in no case, apparently, is the right of pasturage disputed, nearly the whole of Devonshire having been forest--have to render a fine for each animal. They have also to meet a trivial charge for night rest, which is supposed to have arisen from an old custom that debarred anyone from remaining on the forest by night, with the consequent temptation to deer-poaching. An unclaimed animal is driven to Dunnebridge Pound and there kept for some weeks, at the expiration of which, if he is still unclaimed, or if the owner refuses to pay for poundage, etc., he is sold for the benefit of the Duchy.

Each quarter of the moor has its peculiar earmark for ponies, consisting of a round hole at the base or the tip on the near or off ear, through which a piece of string is tied, there being thus four distinct marks.

Some of these ancient usages have fallen into desuetude. The last occasion on which the horn was sounded was in 1843; and the four quarters are now let to as many "moormen," who endeavour to make as much profit as possible out of them. To this day, however, neither on Dartmoor nor on the Devonshire Commons, is any man denied pasturage for his ponies or cattle.

BONDMEN

From vills we may naturally turn to those who in ancient days--the word has another meaning now--were named after them _villeins_. More than once in the course of this work we have had occasion to refer to the existence of an unfree cla.s.s in England, on which prouder and more happily circ.u.mstanced persons looked with considerable disdain, and therefore our account would fail of a necessary element of completeness if it omitted to deal, in some measure, with this striking phenomenon of mediaeval English life. The subject is too wide and complex to be discussed with any approach to thoroughness, but some aspects of it may be introduced, and indeed _must be_ introduced, being, as we have said, complementary to statements of social relationships already set down.

The position of those who rested under the stigma of servitude is brought home to us pretty forcibly by a report of proceedings in the Middles.e.x Iter of 1294:

"One A. brought a writ of imprisonment against B.

"_Heilham_ (for B.): 'He ought not to be answered, for he is our villein.'

"_A._: 'A free man and of free condition, ready, etc.'

"_Heilham_ said as before.

"_Metingham_ [the judge]: 'He cannot give a higher answer in a writ of Neifty.'

"_Heilham_: 'We will tell you the truth; his father was our villein, and held of us in villeinage land in the vill mentioned in his count, and where he was taken; and he begot this A., and also one B., his brother, of whom we are now seised, as of our villein; and this A. went out of the limits of the villeinage, and afterwards returned, and we found him at his hearth in his own nest, and we took him as our villein, as every lord may well do; and we pray judgment.'

"_Metingham_: 'If my villein beget a child on my land which is in villeinage, and the child so begotten go out of the limits of my land, and six or seven or more years after return to the same land, and I find him in his own nest and at his own hearth, I can take him and tax him as my villein for the reason that his return brings him to the same condition as he was when he went.'

"_Heilham_: 'He fell into the pit which he hath digged.'"

We must beware of attributing this doctrine of Neifty to the Norman Conquest, which merely supplied names; in definiteness and cruelty nothing could exceed the practice of serf.a.ge under the Saxons. "The slave," says Green, "became part of the live stock of the estate, to be willed away at death with the horse or the a.s.s, whose pedigree was kept as carefully as his own. His children were bondmen, like himself; even the freeman's children by a slave-mother inherited the mother's taint.

'Mine is the calf that is born of my cow,' ran the English proverb." In the same pa.s.sage he points out that the number of the serfs was being continually augmented from various concurrent causes--war, crime, debt, and poverty all a.s.sisting to drive men into a condition of perpetual bondage.[16] Degradation of freemen into serfs remained a disagreeable possibility as long as the system endured.

The agricultural population actually consisted of three elements. First there was the lord; secondly, his free tenants; and thirdly, the villeins or serfs. The main difference between the two latter cla.s.ses was that the free tenants had proprietary rights in their holdings and chattels. They could buy, sell, or exchange without the lord's intervention; and, in the event of a dispute, they could sue him or anyone in the courts. Nevertheless, they stood in some degree of subjection to the lord, since the geld due to the State was paid through the lord as responsible to the sheriff for all who held land within the manor.

Another very important distinction between the free tenants and the villeins was the payment of _merchet_ on the marriage of daughters, which signified that the offspring of such marriages would be the lawful property of the lord. From this payment, and all that it implied, the free tenants were exempt.

Predial services, on the other hand, might be rendered as well by free tenants as by villeins. This is shown by an entry in Domesday:

"De hac terra [Longedune] tempore Regis Edwardi tenebant ix liberi homines xviii hidas et secabant uno die in pratis domini sui et faciebant servitium sicut eis precipiebatur."

Much would depend on the capital possessed by the free tenant, who might elect to make good any deficiency by corporal labour. The villein had no capital, and was simply an instrument, like the cattle of which he had charge, in the working of the estate. He was bound to the soil with which all his interests were linked; and he was regarded in the light of an investment, in which the lord had a perpetual stake. It was the lord who furnished him with the means of gaining a livelihood, and, in return for this accommodation, the lord demanded from him, and his children after him, lifelong service.

From the "Rect.i.tudines Singularum Personarum," an eleventh-century doc.u.ment, we learn that the _cotsetle_, for his holding of about five acres, was required to labour for his lord on one day a week all through the year,[17] and this was known as _week-work_. He had also to give what was called _boon-work_--namely, three days a week in harvest.

Another type of unfree tenant was the _gebur_, who held a yardland of some thirty or forty acres, which, upon his entrance, was stocked with two oxen, one cow, six sheep, tools and household utensils. His week-work amounted to two or three days a week, as the season required; in winter, he had "to lie at his lord's fold," when bidden; and he had to contribute his quota of boon-work. Certain payments also had to be made.

The first attempt to regulate wages was made in the statute of 12 Richard II., cc. 3-7, the preamble of which affirms that "the servants and labourers will not, nor by a long season would, serve and labour without outrageous and excessive hire, and much more hath been given to such servants and labourers than in any time past, so that for scarcity of the said servants and labourers the husbands and land tenants may not pay their rents nor unnethes live upon their lands, to the great damage and loss as well of their lords as of all the commons; also the hires of the said servants in husbandry have not been put in certainty before this time."

The "hires" were now defined, and this act penalized masters who paid labourers at a higher rate than was allowed under it. The scale of wages varied in different reigns. Here we may confine ourselves to the provisions of the statute of 11 Henry VII., which not only determined the maximum payments, but sanctioned reductions on legitimate grounds.

Thus regard was had to the current wages in the locality, which the employer was under no obligation to exceed. Less was to be paid at holiday than at other times; and if a man were lazy in the morning or lingered over his meals, he might be mulcted at his master's discretion.

Premising that the purchasing power of a penny in the fifteenth century was about twelve times as much as it is now, we are able to form some idea of the economic position of the different cla.s.ses which were the subjects of this legislation. The bailiff, it appears, might have a salary of 26_s._ 8_d._; the common servant in husbandry cost 16_s._ 8_d._ and 4_s._ for clothes; and the artisan received per day 5_d._ in the summer and 6_d._ in the winter. This brings us to the hours of labour, which depended on the season, and were also regulated by statute. These were from 5 a.m. till between 7 and 8 p.m. from the middle of March to the middle of September, half an hour being allowed for breakfast, and an hour and a half for dinner and a siesta--an indulgence countenanced from May to August. During the winter, the rule was that work was to be carried on whilst there was daylight.

Mention has been made of holidays. These, though inevitable, were evidently regarded as seasons of danger, since the favourite recreations of labourers, if left to their own devices, were poaching and politics.

Against these twin evils the King's counsellors took precautions in an act (13 Rich. II., st. I., c. 13), of which the preamble ran:

"Forasmuch as divers artificers, labourers, servants, and grooms, keep greyhounds and other dogs, and on the holy days, when Christian people be at church hearing Divine service, they go a-hunting in parks, warrens, and coningries of lords and others to the very great destruction of the same, and sometimes under such colour they make their a.s.semblies, conferences, and conspiracies for to rise and disobey their allegiance, &c."

Hence none but laymen with 40_s._ and clerks with 10 were suffered to keep dogs or use ferrets, nets, harepipes, cords, or other engines to destroy deer. Instead of engaging in such perilous diversions, servants and labourers were ordered to "have bows and arrows and to use the same on Sundays and holy days, and leave all playing at tennis or football and other games called quoits, dice, casting of the stone, kailes (skittles) and other importune games." Swords and daggers were prohibited "but in time of war for the defence of the realm of England"--a wise measure when the country was infested with vagrants and there were so many liveried retainers prompt to resent a real or imaginary affront.

DOMESTIC

CHAPTER XIX

RETINUES

At the conclusion of the previous section allusion was made to retinues as const.i.tuting a danger to the industrious members of the body politic.

In this, our final section, we turn, or rather return, from the life of the fields to that of the hall. Some notice of the interior order of great houses has appeared in earlier chapters--e.g., that on "Children of the Chapel"--but such special reference, involving no more than the religious side of domestic arrangements, leaves a sense of incompleteness, and this void we must now proceed to fill.

Starting with the peril and annoyance involved in the maintenance of retinues, the proposition may be easily demonstrated. Alike in town and country the presence of armed and idle ruffians was a source of well-grounded apprehension. Thus, when the Bishop of Durham attended parliament, he had to obtain a licence before his retainers could be quartered at Stratford-at-Bow; and the manifold inconveniences produced by these satellites in country districts during the reign of Edward I.

form the subject of a versified complaint, to be found in Wright's 'Political Songs'. One of the causes of the grievous scarcity of labour is believed to have been that n.o.bles and others, under the pretence of husbandry, kept in their pay able-bodied dependants who, rather than eke out a miserable existence on the land, preferred to follow some warlike lord.

BILLETING

As usual, the trouble began at the fountain-head. Everybody knows the term "billeting" as applied to soldiers on the march, who are compulsorily quartered on licensed victuallers and others at fixed rates. This is really a very ancient custom, which is closely, and indeed lineally, connected with the topic under discussion.

In the early days of royal progresses it was the duty of the Marshal of the King's Household to secure lodgings for the members of the retinue which accompanied him; and this he did by means of a billet, by virtue of which he appropriated for the occasion the best of the houses in the vicinity, marking them with chalk and ruthlessly ejecting the occupiers.

The Marshal, it may be observed, did not do the chalking himself--a task which seems to have been delegated to the Sergeant Chamberlain of the Household.