14 MARSH AND FOREST PERIODS. 



forests, it was also agreed that tlieir limits should 

 be defined by perambulations ; but as a cbeck upon 

 tbe boldness of ofienders in forests and cbaces, and 

 warrens, and upon tbe disposition of juries to find 

 against tbose wbo were appointed to keep sucb 

 places, it was deemed necessary on tbe other hand 

 to give protection to the keepers. 



Large sums were lavished by kings and nobles 

 on the kennels and appliances necessary for their 

 diversions. Nor were these costly establishments 

 confined to the laity. Bishops, abbots, and high dig- 

 nitaries of the Church, could match their hounds and 

 hawks against those of the nobles, and they equally 

 prided themselves upon their skill in woodcraft. 



That the clergy were as much in favour of these 

 amusements as the laity, appears from an old Shrop- 

 shire author, Piers Plowman (Langland), who satiri- 

 cally gave it as his opinion that they thought more of 

 sport than of their flocks, excepting at shearing time ; 

 and likewise from Chaucer, who says, ''in hunting 

 and riding they are more skilled than in divinity." 

 That Eichard de Castillon, an early rector of Made- 

 ley, was a sportsman appears from the fact that when 

 Henry III. was in Shrewsbury in September, 1267, 

 concluding a treaty with Llewellyn, and settKng 



