

PREFACE. 



I had some time ago collected the materials for, and 

 had written, the greater part of this work, with the 

 object of giving an account of the battle, since 

 1864, for the preservation of the Common lands and 

 Forests of England and Wales. I delayed, however, 

 completing and publishing it in the hope that a 

 more favourable occasion might arise for claiming 

 that the main object of the movement had been 

 accomplished, either b}^ the completion of the long 

 series of lawsuits, which had for so many years been 

 running their course in the law courts for the preven- 

 tion of inclosures under the Statute of Merton, or by 

 the adoption of legislation, which would render such 

 litigation unnecessary in the future. 



That occasion has now offered itself. During the 

 past year, 1893, two most important results have been 

 achieved. In the first place, Parliament has passed a 

 measure for the virtual repeal of the Statute of Merton, 

 under the assumed sanction of which, all the attempted 

 inclosures of Commons, during the period referred to, 

 were made. In the second place, after a struggle in 

 the law courts of thirteen years, for the saving of 

 Banstead Commons, in what it is hoped will be the last 

 of the great Commons suits, Parliament, in spite of most 



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