COM 
COM 
C O M 
405 
a felon, or take any thing for receiving 
him, he shall be punished for the same 
by the justices of gaol-delivery. 4 Ed. III. 
c. 9. But no person can justify the detain- 
ing a prisoner in custody, out of the common 
gaol, unless there be some particular reason 
for so doing; as if the party should be so dan- 
gerously ill, that it would apparently hazard 
his life to send him to gaol, or that 
there is evident danger of a rescue from 
rebels or the like. 1 Haw. 118. By the 
3 Hen. VII. c. 3 the sheriff or gaoler shall 
certify the commitment to the next gaol-deli- 
very. 
By the habeas-corpus act, the charge of 
fconveying an offender is limited not to ex- 
ceed 12 d. a mile. 
Commitment discharged — A person legally 
committed for a crime, certainly appearing 
to have been done by some person or other, 
cannot be lawfully discharged but by the king, 
till he is acquitted upon his trial, or has an 
ignoramus found by the grand jury, or none 
shall prosecute him, on a proclamation for 
that purpose by the justices of gaol-delivery. 
2 Haw. 121. 
COMMITTEE of parliament, a certain 
inumber of members appointed by the house, 
for the examination of a bill, making report 
of an inquiry, process of the house, &c. 
V hen a parliament is called, and the 
speaker and members have taken the oaths, 
there are committees appointed to sit on cer- 
ftain days, viz. the committee of privileges 
land elections, of religion, of trade, &c. which 
fare standing committees. 
Sometimes the whole house resolves itself 
into a committee, on which occasion each 
person has a right to speak and reply as often 
as he pleases, which is not the case when the 
house is not in a committee. 
COMMODORE, in maritime affairs, an 
officer of the Britislvnavy, commissioned by 
tki lords of the admiralty, or by an admiral, 
toCommand a squadron of men-of-war in chief 
COMMON, is a right or privilege which 
one or more persons claim to take or use, 
in some part or portion of that, which ano- 
ther man's lands, waters, woods, &c. naturally 
produce ; without having an absolute property 
in such lands, woods, waters, foe. 2 Inst. 65. 
The general divisions of common are, into 
common of pasture, which is a right or liberty 
that one or more have to feed or fodder their 
beasts or cattle in another man’s land. Com- 
mon of turbary, or a liberty of cutting turves 
in another man’s land or' soil. Common of 
piscary, or a right and liberty of taking fish in 
another’s fish-pond, pool, or river. Common 
of estovers, which is a right of taking trees or 
loppings, shrubs and underwood, in another’s 
woods, coppices, &c. and lastly, a liberty 
which the tenants have in some manors, of 
digging and taking sand, gravel, stone, &c. in 
the lord’s soil. 1 Bac. Abr. 385. 
But the word common is usually understood 
of common of pasture, of which there are 
four kinds ; common appendant, common 
appurtenant, common in gross, and common 
by reason of vicinage. 
Common appendant, is a right belonging 
to the owners or occupiers of arable land, to 
put commonable beasts upon the lord’s waste, 
and upon the lands of other persons within 
the same manor. Commonable beasts are 
either beasts of the plough, or such as manure 
the land 1 Inst. 122. 
Common appurtenant, can only be claimed 
by prescription, and is a right of commonage 
for beasts, not only commonable, as horses, 
oxen, cows, and sheep, but likewise for beasts 
not commonable, as swine, goats, and geese. 
Co. Lit. 122. 
Common in gross, is a right of commonage 
which must be claimed by deed or prescrip- 
tion, and has no relation to any land belonging 
to the commoner ; it maybe for a certain num- 
ber of cattle, or without number. He that 
has common in gross for a certain number of 
cattle, may put in the cattle of a stranger, and 
use the common with them. 2 Inst. 427. 2 
Rol. Abr. 402. 
Common by reason of vicinage, is a liberty 
that the tenants of one lord, in one town, 
have to common with the tenants of another 
town. Those who challenge this kind of 
common (which is usually called intercom- 
moiling) may not put their cattle in the com- 
mon of the other town, for then they are 
distrainable ; but* turning them into their own 
fields, if they stray into the neighbour com- 
mon, they must be suffered. Cowel. 
A commoner has only a special and li- 
mited interest in the soil, but yet he shall 
have such remedies as are commensurate to 
his right, and therefore may distrain beasts 
damage-feasant, bring an action on the case, 
&c. but not being absolute owner of the soil, 
he cannot bring a general action of trespass, 
for a trespass done upon the common. Nor 
can he do any thing to the- soil 'which 
tends to the melioration or improvement of it, 
as cutting down of hushes, ferns &c. A com- 
moner may abate hedges made on his com- 
mon ; and may drive the beasts of a commoner 
mixed with the beasts of a stranger to a con- 
venient place to sever them, and may drive 
the beasts' of a stranger out of the common, 
without any custom. Godb. 123. 2 Mod. 
65. 3 Lev. 40.x It is a general rule, that a 
commoner cannot distrain or chase out the 
cattle of the lord,' or terre-tenant, damage- 
feasant; and if the lord surcharge the com- 
mon, his proper remedy is an action on the 
.case. Godb. 182. 
Common intendment, is common 
meaning or understanding according to the 
subject matter, and not strained to an extra- 
ordinary or- foreign sense. 
Common law. The common law of 
England, is the common rule for administer- 
ing justice within the kingdom, and asserts 
the king’s royal prerogatives and likewise the 
rights and liberties of the subject. It is ge- 
nerally that law by which the determination 
in the king’s ordinary courts are guided. It 
is distinguished from the statute laws or acts of 
parliament, as having been the law of the land 
before any acts of parliament which are now 
extant were made. Hale’s Hist. 24. 44. 45. 
COMMON-PLACE BOOK is a sort of 
register, or orderly collection of things worthy 
to be noted, and retained in the course of a 
person’s reading ; and so disposed, as that 
among a multiplicity of subjects, any one 
maybe easily found. 
In Mr. Locke’s method, the first page, or 
first two pages that front each other of the 
book, serve as a kind of index to the whole. 
This part is to be divided by parallel lines 
into twenty-five equal parts ; of which every 
fifth line is tp be distinguished by its colour. 
These lines are to be cut perpendicularly by 
others drawn' from top to bottom, and in the 
several spaces of which, the several letters, 
both small and large, oi the alphabet, are to 
he written. The form ol the lines and divi- 
sions, both horizontal and perpendicular, 
with the manner of writing the letters, will 
be readily understood from the following spe- 
cimen ; in which what is to be done in the 
book for all the letters of the alphabet, is 
here shewn in the first four, A, B, C, and D. 
o 
CO 
A 
o 1 
P 
cd 
3 
*«S> 
e 
CO 
The index thus -formed, and the pages 
of the book numbered, everything is reAly 
for taking down any passage that is worthy 
of being registered. We will, for example, 
suppose the reader desirous of inserting in 
his common-place book, a passage of poet- 
ry. He must consider to what particular 
head it may most naturally be referred, 
and under which a person would be led to 
look for such a thing. The prominent idea, 
in this instance, is death. D then is the ini- 
tial letter, and e the first vowel : looking into 
the index for the partition I), and the line e 
(which is the place for all words whose first 
letter is D, and first vowel e, as Death, Deity, 
Dress, &c.) and finding no numbers already 
down, which direct to any page of the book 
where words of this characteristic have been 
entered, he must turn forward to the first blank 
page, suppose number: 4 here the passage 
must be" written, placing the characteristic 
word in the margin, thus 
Death, Thou must expire, my soul, or-'' 
dained to range 
Through unexperienced scenes, 
and mysteries strange, y 
Dark the event, and dismal the 
exchange, 
&c. &c.; 
This being done, the page in which it 
stands must be entered in the space Dr of the 
index, from which time the 4th and 5lh pages 
are.to be devoted to subjects the characteristic 
letters of which are Dr. 
Again if the reader wishes to insert an ar- 
gument against anger, revenge &c. he must 
determine for himself what is the characte- 
ristic of the passage, say anger ; he looks for 
the next vacant page, suppose 6 : there he 
inserts the argument, and in the space Ac he 
writes 6, the number of the page in which the 
