THE OLD LOCAL COURTS 157 



prohibition of departure in summer from tl>e residence of 

 winter, and partly in the implication of the compulsory ser- 

 vice clause, which insisted on the acceptance by a labourer 

 of work, if offered at the legal rate, and thus forbade h,s 

 going forth in search of higher wages. Of the practtca 

 results of villein status none is more obvious than the fact 

 that a villein is adscriptus glebae and has no right to eave 

 the manor.' The enforcement of the lord's authority m 

 this matter was within the competence of the manona 

 courts, and their rolls are full of instances of the fl.ght o 

 villeins of orders to attach the fugitives, a..d of record, 

 of payment of chivage for license to live outside the manor. 

 It is worthy of note that previous to .349, restrictions on 

 the mobility of the free labourer, whether working in agri- 

 culture or in handicraft, or on his right to be an idle vagrant 

 if he chose had not been imposed in any court; m tac. 

 ne of his most essential privileges had been that he could 

 .0 whither he liked.= provided of course that he was not 

 breaking a contract. This brings up at once the question 

 of the provision of the ordinance for the enforcement o 

 contracts between employer and employee, a provision that 

 has been strangely neglected by commentators. 



At this date unwritten contracts co.ild not be enforced 



■Vinogradoff, ratoVwjr^ i« England. 77- .43, .57-58; Page, £«d 

 of Villainags, ^o-.2. „. also Vinogra- 



. Vinogradoff op. at.. ^^r.^f'^^-^^^'Zll^,,,. NoHolkManor. 

 doff's review of Page in E. H. jV., x\ , ana ij^ 



"^Vinogradoff, op. «.'., 77. 79, especially ..ote i and .43. It is^°' 

 „i,L the scope o. this monograph '"/'=-- *=^J,ttX°<i'= '"^ 

 .e„t to which the process ot -.■7"7'°";' ^;;:" ,lu labourer; 

 Tl' "' V j;r"*:«° ' oVrwholelnt^cT xte^ovisions o. the 

 ::dfn"«tnd'-oMhr:ia.u.e cenainly i^p.y a widespread sy.,.e,n o, 

 money wages. 



