Willis : Anglo-American Law 
93 
to record judgments, but sometimes the chancellor delegated 
to him the hearing of causes in the absence of his superior. 
Because of this notion that he could sit only in the absence 
of the chancellor, when Lord Nottingham (Charles II) sat 
every day all day, the master of the rolls sat only from six 
to ten in the evening. A statute of 1833 enabled him to sit 
all day. Other clerks were called masters in the time of 
Edward III. Cardinal Wolsey (Henry VIII) used to refer 
demurrers to masters. Lord Badon (James I) stopped this 
practice, but inaugurated the practice of referring the taking 
of accounts to a master. 
The social interest in general security, which was em- 
phasized in this period, was protected under the egis of the 
common law lawyers by the old law developed in the Archaic 
Period with some changes in the direction of certainty in the 
law of antecedent rights and the law of legal procedure, and 
with many additions to the law of remedies in the form of new 
writs. The law of the Strict Period was essentially a law 
of writs, and was as technical as the writs. 
Criminal Law. A few changes in criminal law occurred in 
this period. Imprisonment for debt was introduced. Edward 
I enacted a law against sedition. The law of treason was 
modified by the statutes of treason of Edward III so as to 
cut the offense down to compassing or imagining the death 
of the king, queen, or their eldest son; violating the queen, 
the king’s eldest unmarried daughter, or his eldest son’s wife ; 
levying war against the king in his realm or adhering to 
his foes; counterfeiting the king’s coin or seal; and slaying 
the chancellor, treasurer, or judges while in the discharge 
of their duty. During the Wars of the Roses this statute 
did not afford much protection, for if a man pleaded that he 
had been supporting the king de facto he was hanged for not 
supporting the king de jure. Henry VII assented to an act 
by which treason was defined as an offense committed only 
against the king de facto. 
Real Property. While real property had attained most of 
its development before the time of Edward I, some important 
changes in the law occurred during his reign and the re- 
mainder of the Strict Period. A number of celebrated statutes 
were enacted during the reign of Edward I. One of the most 
important was the Statute De Donis, (1285), which created 
