THE BANDOG OR MASTIFF. 71 



animals of the royal chase, and even greyhounds might be 

 kept by farmers without being hambled or expeditated as the 

 terms were, (i.c. having three of the toes of the fore feet 

 chopped off) providing they were kept ten miles from the 

 forest, according to the Charter of the Forest Laws of Canutus, 

 the Dane, king of England, granted at Winchester in a 

 parliament held there in A.D. 1062. 



The ball of a dog's foot was termed the " pellota,'' and the 

 claw the "ortellus," and to law a dog, that \\as to cut out 

 the ball, or else to cut off the three claws of the fore foot, w r as 

 termed expedite or expaalto. Rambling or hameling of a 

 dog in the forest laws was the same as expediting or lawing. 

 This was not hamstringing or houghing, i.c. cutting the 

 sinews of the ham, as some have explained incorrectly, but 

 simply meant retarding or abating in speed, from the old 

 obsolete word hameled, abated from the Saxon ham elan, to 

 abate. 



Perhaps to account more satisfactorily for the lack of 

 mention of the mastiff during the Saxon times, it is well to 

 remind my readers of the comparatively few works that existed 

 at that period, paper not being invented until the reign of 

 Edward ist, caused all books to be written on parchment. 

 It lias been written that the foundations of our English 

 literature were laid when St. Agustine converted the Saxons 

 to Christianity. 



Under Alfred the Great learning was encouraged for a short 

 time, but the Anglo-Saxon literature died out with just a 

 flicker during the reign of Canute. Few works are extant in 

 the Anlglo- Saxon tongue, writers of that period principally 

 employing Latin, and the scarcity of books in those times 



