350 STATUTE OF MERTON. 



were granted for considerable sums of money, or arrange- 

 ments were made by which the lord bimself obtained 

 the benefit of the grant, and consequent inclosnre. 



In Epping Forest, to quote a striking case, no less 

 than 1,8S3 acres were inclosed under the assumed 

 sanction of customs to create copyholds out of the waste ; 

 and part of this area was granted to trustees for the 

 Lords, and thus passed into the Lords' hands. At the 

 same time the consent of the tenants was reduced to a 

 mere form. The homage-jury of tenants attending at the 

 Court was selected by the Steward ; no public notice of 

 any proposal to grant such was given ; and in many 

 cases the grant became a simple matter of arrangement 

 between the grantee and the Steward, confirmed by the 

 verdict of two or three copyholders, who had themselves 

 obtained land on easy terms by the same means, or 

 hoped to do so in the future. 



These facts had long been known to the advisers of 

 the Commons Society, and the usage of creating new 

 Copyholds, at the expense of Commoners, was # looked 

 upon as one of the most dangerous weapons of inclosure 

 which the Society had to encounter. But it was not 

 easy to devise a means to protect Commons from a 

 danger to which the general public were hardly alive. 

 In 1887, however, a Bill was introduced to bring about 

 the speedy enfranchisement of Copyholds and the total 

 abolition of the tenure. It occurred to Mr. Robert 

 Hunter, who had seen the dangers attending the course 

 of the custom, in prosecuting the litigation relating to 

 Epping Forest and other Commons, that this Bill 



