As exemplified in the Manor of Castle Combe. 157 
present day we have at length happily discovered to be far more 
effectually attained through the influence of free competition in an 
unfettered market, than by any compulsory process of law. It is 
well-known how obstinate was the struggle, protracted almost up 
to the present day, and, I may add, how vain and unsuccessful, to 
effect this object by statutes, regulating what was called the Assize 
of Beer and Wine, and of Bread, and prohibiting under penalties 
certain offences styled Forestalling and Regrating. Of these 
endeavours, and of their complete failure, the records of the Court 
Leet of Castle Combe present abundant instances. 
The regulations respecting the brewing and selling of ale and 
beer, were especially various and perplexing. Firstly, no one was 
permitted to brew any for sale, so long as there remained unsold 
any Church-ale, (that is, ale made at the Church-house, by the 
Church-wardens, and sold there for the benefit of the common fund 
for the relief of the poor), or so long as the keeper of the park, or 
any of the Tenants of the Manor, had any to sell. Nor could any 
one sell liquors at any time, without license from the Lord or the 
Court ; nor without a sign, or at fair-time an Alestake, hung out; 
nor refuse to sell so long as the sign was hung out; nor ask a 
higher price for each quality than that fixed by the Jury of Assize; 
nor lower the quality below what the Ale-tasters approved of; nor 
sell at all without entering into a bond for ten pounds, with a 
surety for five pounds to keep order in his house, and in particular 
to close at nine o’clock in the summer, and eight in the winter 
months. 
The enforcing the Assize of Beer and Ale, was ever a matter of 
endless difficulty. From the beginning of the fifteenth, to the 
middle of the sixteenth century, the price at which malt liquors 
were ordered to be sold, was two pence the gallon for the best ale, 
(optimam et saluberimam Cervisiam), one penny for the second sort, 
and one half penny for the third, “and no more.” In 1557 I find 
the following order of the Court, “that the sellers of ale do sell 
their beste ale under the herseve (hair-sieve, that is, freshly brewed) 
for three pence a gallon; there stalle ale for four pence a gallon; 
their second ale under the herseve for three half pence a gallon, 
