156 On the Self-Government of Small Manorial Communities. 
drunkenness, “alehouse-haunting, and idling.” Surely it may be 
regretted, that proceedings of this kind have fallen into disuse in 
our days. Gambling was often the subject of presentment and 
punishment, and ordinances frequently issued and enforced against 
the playing of illegal games. Those mentioned are card-playing, 
at a game called kuffes and tables, shifte-groate, thimble-rigging, 
dicing, playing at bowls, (g/obi), at hand-ball, foot-ball, and stave- 
ball or “stobball;” (pilwm manualem, pedalem, sive baculinam), 
“nine-holes” and “ kittles.”” Workmen not having forty shillings a 
year of income, are specially prohibited from playing at these games, 
which seem to have been considered fit only for their betters. On 
the other hand, many of the lieges were fined 6s. 8d. each, for not 
practising with bows and arrows at /es buttes, in obedience to the 
statutes thereunto provided. The Butts themselves were repeatedly 
repaired by order of the Court. The keeping of dangerous dogs, 
accustomed mordere homines, to bite the king’s subjects, or any 
hound or grey-hound, if the owner was not possessed of 40s. a year, 
was treated as a punishable offence. So also the opening of shops 
or public-houses on the Sabbath day, or during Mattins; the not 
attending Church on Sundays, (even the Lady of the Manor was 
fined for this on one occasion) ; the carrying of lighted candles in any 
barn, stable, or other out-house, or any fire without a proper cover- 
ing, in the street. Fines were levied on all inhabitants who left 
dung or any other nuisance in the street, or who defiled the water 
of the river by washing skins in it, or throwing in filth, &e. The 
unlicensed harbouring of strangers, or persons liable to become a 
burthen on the community, was an offence punishable by penalty, 
if the stranger was not removed upon notice from the Constable. 
The keeping of “‘Quernes” for the grinding of corn at home, instead 
of sending it to the Lords’ mill, where it would be subject, of 
course, to toll, was prohibited under penalty. Of all the proceed- 
ings at the Court Leet, however, those which, perhaps, most 
repeatedly occur, related to the sale of beer, bread, and other 
necessaries, or articles of general consumption, and had for their 
chief object to secure the amplest supply of such articles, of the 
best quality, and at the lowest prices;—a matter which at the 
