184 ENFORCEMENT OF THE STATUTES OF LABOURERS 



soil receives strong confirmation. The application of the 

 contract clause to members of the victualling trade, to house- 

 hold servants, and to agricultural labourers, raises no legal 

 questions, except in regard to the last-named class in those 

 actions in which the plea of villeinage is urged. The dis- 

 cussion of this subject is reserved for a future section ; ^ 

 here it is sufficient to say that there is, of course, no instance 

 of an action against a villein as such for breach of the 

 statutory contract ; - the lord's court already had remedies 

 against fugitive bondmen. In the case, however, of arti- 

 sans, of apprentices, of minors, and of men above the la- 

 bouring class, during the course of Edward's reign, several 

 interesting problems arose as to the application of the new 

 law. 



Artisans. For a time the contract clause was enforced 

 without question against artisans; ^ but in 1364, in the court 

 of common pleas in an action brought against a carpenter 

 for departure,* as learned a lawyer as Bealknap urges on 

 behalf of the defendant that only the excess wages clause 

 applied to a cai-penter; the plea is not allowed by the court 

 and the defendant is forced to deny the covenant. Ap- 

 parently this precedent was not held sufficient ; for, nine 

 years later, in a similar action in the same court against a 

 " breoderer," counsel puts in a still more general plea that 

 the clause applied only to servants and labourers, not to 

 artificers ; the ruling of the court that the clause applied 

 equally to artificers must have settled the matter.^ 



'S. 6. 



*The one possible exception to this statement is an action for the re- 

 tention of a natiiinm et seriiientem; see p. 205, note 4. 



' E. g., De Banco, 30, Pasch., 183 d, Sussex; 33, Pasch., 2320!, Lend. 

 In 30 actions against artisans the question is raised only twice. Cf. 

 Fitzherbert, supra, p. 180, note 2, and Reeves, op. cit., ii, 247. The 

 latter merely quotes the argument in case 40, list in app. 



*Case 44, app., F, 4. ^Case 40, list in app. 



