A. D. 1285. 443 



Each of the [even Cinque ports received a copy of this letter or law. 

 {Fcedera, V. ii, p. 298.] 



The few inanufadures tlien carried on not being fufficient to find 

 employment for the men, who were not engaged in war, agricuhure, 

 or pafturage, and the great body of the people having neither capacity 

 nor opportunity to polilh and humanize themfelves by reading or other 

 rational amufements, robbery was the ufual refource of vaft multitudes 

 of people in every part of Europe for fubfiftence and employment: and 

 the plunderers were often affifted, and proteded againfl the purfuits of 

 juflice, by fome lawlefs baron, whofe caflle was their refuge and the re- 

 ceptacle of their plunder. In Germany their powerful combinations 

 obliged the friends of order and juftice to enter into confederacies 

 againft them, which proved more effeftual than the reliques of the 

 faints and the anathemas of the clergy * : and in England their bands 

 were frequently ftrong enough to fet law and government at defiance. 

 In order to- reprefs fuch enormities, laws were enacted, whereby the 

 magiftrates of walled towns were ordered to keep their gates fhut from 

 the fetting till the rifing of the fun, and to keep a fufficient watch, as 

 in former times, at the gates from Afcenfion day to Michaelmas f . 

 Thofe, who received lodgers in their houfes, were made anfwerable for 

 their conduct ; and the magiftrates of towns were dire6ted to make fre- 

 quent inquiry in the fuburbs for fufpicious perfons lodged in them. A 

 particular Ilatute was enaded for London, which, becaufe many mur- 

 ders, homicides, afHiults, and robberies, had been committed in the city, 

 both in the day and in the night, ordered, that all perfons found in the 

 flreets with fword and buckler or other arms after the curfeu was rung 

 at S'. Martin's le Grand, except great lords and men of good reputation, 

 fhould be committed to the Tun J, and next day carried before the ma- 

 giflrates. And becaufe fuch malefadors generally concerted their plans 

 in taverns, and continued in them till the appointed time of putting 

 their plots in execution, the mafters of all taverns for the fale of wine 

 or ale were ordered to (hut them up as foon as the curfeu bell rang. 

 The aldermen were moreover required to make diligent inquiry in their 

 wards for all malefadors, and for people who had no property or vifible 

 means of fupport. No buflies nor trees (except detached trees clear of 

 underwood) nor ditches, wherein robbers could be concealed, were al- 

 lowed to be within 200 feet of either fide of the roads : the whole peo- 

 ple of the hundred, wherein a robbery was committed, were bound to 



* Some account of the laws and anathemas cenfion day, as the long dark nights required the 

 againft robbers may be feen in Roberlfan's Hi/l. of greatcft vigilance ? 



Charles V, Vol. \, p. 397, ed. 1792. See alfo above, J The Tun was a prifon built in Cornhill in the 



pp. 393, 404. year 1282 by Henry Waleys, then mayor, for con- 



■f- Quere, if not rather from Michaelmas to Af- lining night-walkers. [.y/owV Survey of London, 



/>• 357-] 



3K2 



