STATUTE OF MERTON. 345 



four other cases there was practical surrender by the 

 Lords of Manors without coming to a decision in the 

 Courts. This was doubtless due to successes which had 

 been achieved in the other and principal cases. 



The only two cases in which the results were 

 unsatisfactory, those of Tollard Farnharn and Rowley 

 Green, were not inclosures under the Statute of Merton. 

 The Tollard Farnharn case turned upon the right of the 

 inhabitants to provide themselves with fuel under a 

 local custom. In the Rowley Green case, the inclosure 

 was justified under a special custom of the Manor, not 

 under the Statute of Merton. 



Although these decisions in the Courts of Law 

 completely bore out the contentions of the Committee 

 of 1865, that the Statute of Merton was practically 

 obsolete, aud that inclosures under it, if resisted, would 

 be defeated, yet there remained a constant danger of the 

 Act being used for arbitrary inclosures, owing to the 

 unwillingness or inability of the Commoners to oppose 

 them in the Law Courts. The spirit of encroachment 

 may slumber for a time, but is always on the watch 

 for opportunities. The fear of resistance may deter the 

 inclosure of open spaces in populous districts, but it is 

 not of much avail to prevent the niching of bits of rural 

 Commons. It was scarcely less important a year ago, 

 as a measure of precaution, than it was thirty years 

 ago, to repeal the Statute, or to deprive it of its danger. 



As the Commons suits were decided in the Law 

 Courts, it appeared that the arguments in favour of 

 the repeal of this Statute, under which such wrongs 



