24 DORSET ASSIZES IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 



that were flying about the country. " Hampshire," he 

 related, " is upp in armes for the Duke of Monmouth. I saw 

 both horse and foote souldiers on the hill neere Christchurch. 

 Argile is much increased in strength and is on his marche in 

 England and within Ix miles of London." Sedition of this 

 petty type was in most cases expiated by a whipping and a 

 fine of five marks, but for some reason a few speakers of 

 sedition were subjected to the pillory. William Dowell w r as 

 sentenced to remain an hour in this instrument of torture in 

 each of the towns of Dorchester, Sherborne, and Cerne Abbas, 

 and a member of a notable Weymouth family, Henry Cuttance, 

 suffered similarly at Melcombe Regis. Hugh Green, a gentle- 

 man of Nether Compton, was fined 3 for reading the Duke's 

 Declaration in public, and compelled to find bail for good 

 behaviour during the rest of his life. In the year following 

 the rebellion, two men, who cut down rebels' quarters, were 

 pilloried for an hour on a Saturday at Dorchester. At the 

 accession of William and Mary there were still a few of the 

 rebels in Dorchester Gaol, and these were at once released, the 

 flight of King James coming in the nick of time to save at 

 least one of them from transportation. Later than the 

 Monmouth Rebellion there was little inducement for Dorset 

 folk to join in treasonable or seditious practices, but in 1689 

 one William Clarke was so out-of -fashion as to announce his 

 love for the expelled James in these words : " King James, 

 a poore innocent harmless King was wrongfully driven out of 

 his Kingdom by a company of Rogues and Traytors that did 

 endeavour to destroy King and Kingdom. I will list men to 

 fight for King James and restore him againe. A health to 

 the late King James and Prince of Wales, and confusion to 

 he other. King William is a rebell and have noe right to 

 the Crowne." The Court could afford to treat the Jacobite 

 with leniency. He had to pay five marks, and was kept in 

 prison for a short time. 



Before leaving the subject of crime, it will be well to men- 

 tion that, although it is impossible to gauge the amount of 

 crime that went unpunished, it was undoubtedly very large. 



