ORIGIN OF COMMONS. 15 
nature; that such a right can only attach to property ; 
and that, if conceded, there would be no person 
or persons in a position to extinguish or release the 
right. The case was of supreme importance, for it 
laid down the law for the first time, and has ever since 
been regarded as decisive. It finally extinguished 
the nght of inhabitants, as such, and independently of 
any land they might own, to claim, by custom or pre- 
scription, the user of pasture, or of turbary upon the 
waste lands of a Manor. It will be seen later in this 
work how often this legal doctrine of the Courts that 
the inhabitants of a district are too vague a body to 
enjoy a custom or user of a profitable nature, or to 
prescribe for it, turns up to make difficulties and to 
defeat claims, which otherwise would appear to be just. 
As often happens, however, when the Judges have 
laid down a broad proposition of a questionable char- 
acter, their successors endeavour to whittle it down, or 
to set it aside by some ingenious quibble, so in this case 
it was later held by other Judges that the rule does not 
apply where the inhabitants of a district have been 
incorporated, for in such case there is existing a body, 
in whom the rights of common enjoyed by the in- 
habitants generally may be vested, and who can deal 
with them so as to satisfy the technical objections. 
It was afterwards decided by other Judges, that a 
grant from the Crown to the inhabitants of a district, is a 
sufficient incorporation of them to satisfy the technical 
rule, and to enable them to claim the right so granted. 
Later still the Judges, in some cases, where the evidence 
