THE JUSTICES OF LABOURERS 



55 



in print, where they appear as justices of oyer and ter- 

 miner, collectors of the subsidy,' escheators etc., give a 

 fairly clear picture of the general character of the men 

 who were doing the work of enforcing the labour stat- 

 utes. Apart from a score or more of judges, afterwards 

 famous on the bench, and from a still smaller proportion 

 of noblemen, the large majority of these justices seem to 

 belong to that class of landed gentry to whom at this 

 period the business of local administration of all kinds 

 was entrusted, and into whose hands the task of the pre- 

 servation of the peace eventually fell.^ 



There is no record at this period of any general indict- 

 ment against the honesty and straight dealing of the 

 justices of labourers, and further evidence will show that 

 the actual instances of their conviction for misdoings are 

 not many. At any rate it is evident that the king's 

 council and the commons were at one in their belief in 

 the superior merits of local justices for enforcing the 

 labour legislation, and were shrewd enough to see that 

 as employers of labour in the very district in which they 

 were acting, perhaps even of the very offenders sum- 

 moned before them for trial,^ the justices would have 

 every incentive to show laudable zeal as to frequent ses- 

 sions and numerous convictions, and would thus prove 

 the most efficient of administrators. 



This account of the 671 justices of labourers affords 



^ E. g., de la Mare is acting as collector in the same county in which 

 he had recently served on a joint commission; see Mem. L. T. R., 29, 

 Mich., Presentaciones, rot. 7, Roteland'. 



'■'See Beard, op. cit., 71. 



'" While Gilbert de Berewyk was on the commission for labourers in 

 Wiltshire, his own servant was indicted in sessions for departure from 

 Berewyk's service and for receipt of illegal wages; Pat., 27, pt. 2, m. 

 14, 8 Aug., " De pardonacione utlagarie {Cal., ix, 485). 



