BANSTEAD COMMONS. 193 
from the demesne lands, and the purchaser acquired 
only the soil of the waste of the Manor, subject to the 
rights of common over it, and the quit rents, heriots, 
and fines of the freehold and copyhold tenants of the 
Manor. Sir John Hartopp, having bought these 
manorial wastes and rights for a comparatively small 
sum, endeavoured to turn his purchase into a land 
building speculation, by getting rid of the Commoners 
and inclosing the Commons. In spite of the lessons 
which Lords of the Manors must or should have drawn 
from the experience of the recent litigation in respect 
of Berkhamsted, Plumstead, and Coulsdon Commons, 
and still more of Epping Forest, his legal advisers 
appear to have persuaded him that he could without 
difficulty convert the Commons into private property, 
free from common rights. The prize would have been 
a great one, for the land would have been most valuable 
for villa residences. The difficulty hitherto in such 
cases had been the uncertainty as to who were the 
owners of land within the Manor entitled to common 
rights, and whose assent it was necessary to obtain by 
agreement or purchase, before attempting inclosure 
under the Statute of Merton. 
In the Banstead case, the course of approvement, 
under the Statute, had apparently been buoyed out by 
recent proceedings, under the authority of Parliament. 
In 1866, the London and Brighton Railway Company 
had obtained power to construct a branch to Epsom, 
and to carry this line through Banstead Down. Not 
only was this a great disfigurement and injury to the 
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