Wiltshire Quarter Sessions. 77 



of one hundred men, in the province of Munster, and Thomas 

 Willis, of Bushton, who had served under Captain Edward North, 

 commanding a similar company, had to be content with pensions on 

 fifty shillings. Andrew Symes, of Cannings, gentleman of a com- 

 pany, in the low countries, under Captain Vavasour, was assisted with 

 ten shillings, to enable him " to return to his Captain." 



A jealous eye was evidently kept on these pensions. 



At the Trinity Sessions, 41st Elizabeth : — 



" It is ordered by the Courte that Eohert Lyde shall from henceforth be dis- 

 charged from his yearlie pencyoa allowed uato him for his mayme in the warres, 

 and that the treasurers for the maymed soldiers shall not delyver him anie more 

 money." 



If the clerk of the peace was a trustworthy chronicler the justices 

 relented from their severity. " Notwithstanding this order " so 

 writes the officer of the court : " he is at the next Sessions allowed 

 his former pencyon." But at the Trinity Sessions, 1600, Robert 

 Lyde is finally noted as " from henceforth discharged receiving anie 

 more pencion." 



If a grateful country, even under stress of statutory compulsion^ 

 were comforting by such gratuities the declining days of the retired 

 warrior, — it was a thing not to be tolerated that he should attempt 

 to supplement his income by professional mendicancy. This abuse 

 was expressly forbidden by the Act under which these men drew 

 their annuities, and this wholesome law was vindicated at the 

 Easter Sessions, 44th Elizabeth, in the person of Henry What- 

 kyns : he was indicted and found guilty, {^' pro felonice vagarant 

 ianquam miles ei soldarius/') but was leniently set at liberty without 

 judgment. 



X. — ^Vagrancy. 



Vagrancy, chronic and ineradicable ailment of the body politic, 

 sorely vexed the social physicians of the day, and defied treat- 

 ment then, as stoutly as it still defies. And their regimen was 

 trenchant. The penalties imposed on vagabonds by the statutes of 

 Henry VIII. and Edward VI., were of savage severity — burning 

 through the gristle of the right ear with a hot iron of the compass 



