ENGLISH FORESTRY IN THE PAST 7 



a right to appropriate or alter its character without the 

 consent of the former. The boundaries of each tract of 

 waste, or " mark " as it was called in those days, were 

 clearly defined, and the usual boundary marks appear to 

 have been trees which were specifically mentioned in the 

 Anglo-Saxon charters, such as the oak, ash, beech, thorn, 

 elder, lime, and birch. It was expressly forbidden to cut or 

 destroy these trees, many of which are said to have been 

 of peculiar size or beauty, and carved with the figures of 

 birds and beasts. As time went on, these village communities 

 were increased in number and the originals in size, until 

 they assumed the proportion of towns, and gradually led to 

 the appropriation of larger tracts of waste or forest for 

 purposes of cultivation or building. Still the Saxons appear 

 to have paid great attention to the preservation of the main 

 characters of the forests, and even in their time no great 

 process of clearing went on, so far as we know. They paid 

 special attention to the preservation of the oak on account 

 of its value for providing food for swine and deer, and they 

 probably laid the foundations of those forest laws which 

 assumed such importance in later times. 



Although Canute is generally credited with having drawn 

 up the first comprehensive code of forest laws, it was not 

 until the arrival of the Normans that these laws assumed 

 that objectionable character which we know to have been 

 the case during that period. The highest existing authority 

 on these laws is Manwood, who gives us a very clear idea 

 of their far-reaching and comprehensive nature. According 

 to him, the king could seize upon any tract of country by 

 issuing a Commission under the Great Seal, instructing certain 

 persons to make a forest in such a place as he might choose 

 and lay out the boundaries. This forest had to be stocked 

 with deer in order to bring it within the provisions of the 

 forest laws, and it was in the maintenance and preservation 

 of these animals that the greatest injustice and tyranny 

 appears to have been exercised upon the inhabitants in and 

 around the royal forests. Freeholders were entitled to 

 occupy and retain their lands after, as before, the formation 

 of the forest, but they were prohibited from erecting fences 

 high enough to keep out the deer from feeding upon their 



