222 TOLLARD FARNHAM. 
heavy vost of taking it there. The expenses of the in- 
vestigation into the history of the Manor, and of the pro- 
ceedings before the arbitrator and the Court, had been 
already very serious. It was only by the forbearance of 
the professional men engaged in the case that the cost 
was able to be met, and it was found impossible to raise 
funds for further litigation. Lord Rivers therefore 
maintained his victory. He had whatever satisfaction 
was to be derived from wresting from the labouring 
people of one of his many parishes an user and custom 
which had undoubtedly existed from time immemorial, 
and the deprivation of which rankled in their minds, 
and created grave discontent. This was part of his 
scheme for concentrating in his own hands all the 
property in the parish, and for turning the Common into 
a game preserve. 
How many other similar cases may there not have 
been in rural districts where no one has been fortunate 
enough to find assistance from outside to fight the 
great owner of the district, and where ancient and 
established customs have been arbitrarily set aside, 
and the labouring people still further depressed by 
their being deprived of the last vestige of a sense of 
property in the land on which they were born and 
bred! It cannot be doubted that such acts are to 
some extent responsible for the exodus of population 
from the country to the towns, which landowners (as 
well as others) are at last beginning to deplore. 
The case, thus described, was decided before the 
judgment of Lord Hobhouse in the Loughton Lopping 
