340 The Ancient Styles and Designations of Persons. 
In the dinner bill of the Earl of Leicester in 1570, before cited, 
are the following items :— 
‘« To iiij doz of waferne bread for the bottoms of the marche to Goodman 
Ricksone . : . xyjt 
For iij Pewetes [Pewits] to Goodman Cortyse of Staddoine ; anxs 
For v Quayles which Goodman Welles gatte of one besides Fostell . 1j8 
For xviij lb and a 4 of Sugere to Goodmande Rowe at xiij4 the pounde xix* 
For Goodman Richardsone’s paynes of St. Thomas Parrish to go to 
Garvarde to Goodman Aldrege for partreges and such lyke . xijd 
For James Stevenes paynes of St. Peters of the Baylye to go to Staddome 
to Goodman Curtyss for phesantes or the lyke . = ayy 
In St. Matthew xxiv, 43; “Ifthe good man of the house had 
known in what hour the thief would come,” &c., the word good-man is 
now commonly printed in two words, as if the first was an adjective 
and the second a substantive. But in the Greek there is but one 
word signifying the “ master of the house.” And in Proverbs vii. 19, 
“The goodman is not at home, he is gone,” &c., the original is 
but a single word, signifying “my husband.” 
Holinshed in his Chronicle (vol 1. p. 276, 4to ed.) says— ° 
‘The third and last sort is named the yeomanrie of whom and their sequele 
the labourers and artificers, I have said somewhat even now. Whereto I ad 
that they be not called Masters and Gentlemen but Goodmen, as Goodman 
Smith, Goodman Coot, Goodman Cornell, Goodman Maseall, & in matters of law 
these and the like are called thus, Giles Iewd, yeoman, Edward Mountford, 
yeoman, Iames Cocke, yeoman, Henry Butcher, yeoman, &c.” 
Lord Coke! says, “Yeoman or Yemen. This is a Saxon word 
‘gemen,’ the G being turned in common speech, as is usual in like 
cases, intoa Y. In legal understanding a yeoman is a freeholder 
that may dispend 40s., anciently 5 nobles, per annum, and he is 
called probus et legalis homo” [ good and lawful man ]. 
But the question what legally constituted a yeoman was consi- 
dered by the Judges of Ireland in the year 1795. 
In the case of James Weldon, who was tried in Dublin for High Treason 
under a Special Commission, on the 21st and 22nd of December, 1795, before 
Baron George, Mr. Justice Chamberlain, and Mr. Justice Finucane,? the 
prisoner was described as ‘‘ James Weldon of the city of Dublin, Yeoman,” he 
pleaded in abatement (a mode of objecting to the form of the indictment) “ that 
1 2 Institutes, p. 668. 
2 State Trials, vol 26, p. 225. 
