ON THE LOCAL MANUFACTURE OF LEAD, ETC. 719 
grows. For a period of about 50 years following the appointment of this 
commissioner in the reign of Henry VIL., little of moment appears to have 
been done; and in the third year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth a society 
was appointed, entitled the Society for the Mines Royal, to whom a grant 
of gold, silver, and copper was given within the counties of York, Lancaster, 
Cumberland, Westmoreland, Cornwall, Devon, Gloucester, and Worcester, 
as also in Wales, with liberty to grant and assign parts and portions. The 
various laws and regulations of this and similar societies do not throw any 
light on the local details of mining, and the general rate of duties and con- 
ditions of the North of England lead-mines in the above periods can only be 
inferred from the probability of their having been included in some of the 
grants already recited. 
In other lead-mine districts we find more minute details of local customs ; 
such, for example, are the laws of the lead-mines of Derbyshire, and Mendip, 
in Somersetshire; but we find no trace of any of these peculiar customs 
having prevailed in Alston or the adjacent districts. One of the Derbyshire 
customs or regulations is curious enough :—“ If any blood be shed upon the 
mine, the author shall pay 5s. 4d. the same day, or else shall double the same 
every day till it comes to 100s.” 5s. 4d. was also the apparently moderate 
penalty in case of underground trespass. The laws and customs are described 
as being those of the mine used in the highest peak, and in all other places 
through England and Wales. The miners sued that the king “ would 
confirm them by charter, under his great seal, by way of charity, and for 
his profit, forasmuch as the aforesaid miners be at all times in peril of their 
death, and that they have nothing in certain but that which God of his 
grace will send them.” The information to be thus gleaned is scanty 
enough, and admits not of being woven into a connected narrative, yet it 
indicates the scale of payment to the several parties concerned, the shortness 
of the term for which grants were made, the absolute rights of the Crown, 
and the participation in a portion of the revenues by the Church. The 
mines of Alderston, or Alston, had royal protection granted in 1233, again 
in 1236, and again in 1237; in 1282 the manor of Alderston was granted 
by Edward I. to hold in fee of that King of Scotland, reserving to himself 
and to the miners various privileges, especially such as belonged to the 
Franchise of Tindale, within which Alston was then comprised. ‘The details 
of grants and charters more immediately relating to Alston appear to cor- 
respond in general terms with those more general grants which we have 
specified as elucidating the early progress of mining in this kingdom 
generally. In 1333, several of the privileges above alluded to were con- 
firmed to Robert, son of Nicholas de Veleripont, and in the following year 
some further liberties were confirmed, from which it appears that Alston 
at that period had not only mines, but a mint. These and some other details 
are contained in.a brief account of the mining districts which one of the 
writers drew up more than 30 years ago, when residing in Alston Moor. 
The ancient names of Park and Forests which occur in these northern 
mining districts, as applied to extensive tracts of land which are now treeless, 
are worthy of mention, as they indicate in a striking manner the abundance 
of forest timber which once adorned the now nearly treeless districts under 
consideration. In 1290, Patric of the Gilt and 26 other miners were im- 
pleaded by Henry de Whitby, and Joan, his wife, for cutting down their 
trees at Alderston, by force and arms, and carrying them away to the value 
of £40. The miners claimed that they held the mine of the king, and were 
privileged to cut wood. The context sufficiently indicated that there had in 
