ANECDOTES OF FEUDAL TIMES IN ENGLAND. 161 



facto excommunicate ;' the king granted the abbot's petition in its 

 full extent, and the shoemaker was immediately sent back, to the 

 great joy and edification of all the good people of England. Mean- 

 while the sergeant and his party, who had done no other than their 

 duty, in executing the lawful orders of the government, came off 

 but poorly, being condemned to ask pardon of God and the monks 

 at the gate of the convent, and afterwards to be publicly whipped, 

 which sentence having been fully executed upon them by the dean 

 of the house and the vicar of Farnham, they were absolved in form, 

 and, having a sufficient penance enjoined them besides, they were 

 dismissed.* 



The numerous obstructions which the privileges possessed by the 

 barons, and other feudal proprietaries, opposed to the course of 

 justice in the due administration of the laws, at length became a 

 national grievance; and as early as 1277 a parliament, held at 

 Gloucester, passed, it is supposed, the statute of Quo Warranto, by 

 which all who held any liberties, or franchises, were required to 

 produce their charters, or otherwise forfeit these liberties to the crown. 

 This statute was most extensively put in force in the twentieth year 

 of Edward I., 1291, and the proceedings, published by the Record 

 Commissioners, exhibit a vast mass of curious particulars relating 

 to the state of England in the thirteenth century. The result seems 

 to have been rather unsatisfactory at the time ; for, says the com- 

 piler of the Annals of Waverley, all the bishops, barons, and other 

 free tenants of the crown were grievously oppressed with various 

 expenses and vexations ; though the king did not derive much emo- 

 lument from the measure. A remarkable case of the exercise of 

 capital jurisdiction by a corporation was developed by the proceed- 

 ings against Master Adam de Walton, parson of Wiggan, and ex- 

 officio mayor of the borough. Among the privileges claimed by 

 the corporators was that of infangthef, in those pleadings called 

 infangenthef, or the liberty of trying a thief within the manor, 

 barony, or borough to which it was annexed, f It appears that 

 Roger de Assheton, finding William le Procurateur, or Proctor, with 

 the mainour, or stolen goods in his possession, caused him to be 

 attached by the bailiffs of the mayor of Wiggan, for goods, which 

 he alleged Proctor had stolen near Hasphulle, in the wapentake of 

 Salfordes ; and therefore completely out of the jurisdiction of that 

 mayor, so far as the privilege of infangthef was concerned. A de- 

 claration of the felony having been filed against William le Proctor, 

 he thereupon called to his warranty, Henry Crowe, who came to 

 the court next following, and warranted for him, saying that he 

 would have good warranty at the next court. On this, the bur- 

 gesses, and other persons, who constituted the court, adjudged 

 Proctor to be discharged sine die ; and detained Henry Crowe in 



* Hist. Surrey, vol. III. p. 150. Dugd. Monast Anglic. Tom. V. p. 239. 

 Ann. WaverL p. 201. On verifying this citation, I find that the annalist 

 styles the " sergeant" a knight. 



t LI. Edw. Conf. cap. 26. The term is compounded of infangen, to take 

 or catch, and theof, a thief. 



M.M.No. 8. X 



