74 



Some Western Circuit Assize Records 



We remember that Somerset wsa Admiral Blake's county. Can 

 timber for the navy be wanted ? If so, some two months after this 

 there would be further interest in the matter; when news came of 

 his capturing- the Spanish treasure-fleet off Cadiz on the 9th of 

 September, and the arrival of the Spanish plate at Portsmouth on 

 its way to London. The Justices might fear that the whole county 

 would be denuded in those days of Puritan simplicity. However 

 that may be, the order does not relate to what we would have 

 described as timber-trees, but only to pollards. 



Then there is an order to enable " the nowe-waymen " of War- 

 minster to be reimbursed for monies expended by them in repairing 

 their highways. 



At Dorchester, March 18th, 1657, it appears that Thomas 

 Erlebridge and William Ogle " nowe remaininge in the gaole were 

 very dangerous and suspicious people, this Cort [Mr. Justice Hugh 

 Wyndham] orders that they be by the Sheriffe of this County 

 carried from hence to Shaston [Shaftesbury] and there be whipt 

 on their naked backes untill they bleede and from thence be sent from 

 tything to tything by passes to the severall places of their birthes." 



At Chard (Somerset Assize) the Grand Jury present to John, Lord 

 Glynne (Penruddock's judge), " a great scarcity of corn, that there 

 are so many maltsters that the barley in the market is so soon 

 bought up, that the poor cannot but at extraordinary prices have 

 any to serve their occasions, by reason whereof they are much 

 damnified. The Cort refers the matter to the justices of peace of 

 this County, and desires them to meet with all convenient speed ; 

 and take such course for the suppressinge the multiplicity of those 

 malsters and supplying the occasions of the poor as shall be agreeable 

 to law and justice." This old and widespread grievance, was aggra- 

 vated much by the Civil War, bad seasons, and perhaps now again 

 by increase in population in certain districts where land transport 

 was difficult. I find from Mr. Hamilton's book on Devon Quarter 

 Sessions, that in Devon in 1630 malting was altogether prohibited 

 by their Quarter Sessions, and I mentioned in my previous paper 

 that this occurred also in Cornwall A.D. 1648. And at Easter 

 Devon Sessions, 1649, a similar order was made which mentions a 



