[427] See Chapter XIV.
[428] Dr. Gross is one of the latest writers who insists especially on the passage from democracy to oligarchy. (i. 108-110, 125-6, 160, 171, 285.)
[429] Gross, i. 23-6; ii. 115 et sq. Compare Hist. MSS. Com. ix. 239, for the forms used in 1291. For elections in 1310 see Ibid. 242.
[430] In Romney an instance is given in 1442 of a man being arrested who had come, not being free, to hear the common council. Hist. MSS. Com. v. 540. For Wycombe, Ibid. 557.
[431] Journal Archæological Association, xxvii. 464.
[432] Ibid.
[433] Hist. MSS. Com. v. 493.
[434] Boys’ Sandwich, 429. See also Berwick, English Guilds, 344.
[435] Journ. Arch. Ass. xxvii. 462. If a townsman struck the mayor and was too harshly punished the friends of the prisoner might call a jury “of the discreetest and stoutest men of the city,” who should ordain a just penalty. In Rye as in Hereford the old custom was that the man who struck the mayor was to lose his right hand (Lyon’s Dover, ii. 352); in Preston there was some punishment for a mayor who struck a burgess in or out of court (Custumal, Hist. Preston Guild). In Canterbury if a bailiff did wrong to any “that may be found by two lawful men of syght and of hyerth” complaint was made to the twelve aldermen; and if they charged the bailiff in vain to amend the wrong, the case was carried to a court of the thirty-six, the aldermen, and the most wisest men, “and by them right shall be ordained” (Hist. MSS. Com. ix. 171).
[436] Hist. MSS. Com. v. 559.