CHAP. I.
Pleas concerning the Debts of the Laity also belong to the King’s Crown and Dignity. When, therefore, any one complains to the Court, concerning a Debt that is due to him, and be desirous of drawing the suit to the King’s Court, he shall have the following Writ, for making the first Summons——
CHAP. II.
“The King to the Sheriff, Health. Command N., that justly and without delay, he render to R., one hundred Marks which he owes him, as he says, and of which he complains that he has unjustly deforced him. And, unless he does so, summon him, by good Summoners, that he be before me or my Justices at Westminster in fifteen days from the Pentecost, to shew wherefore he has not done it. And have there the Summoners and this Writ. Witness, &c.”
CHAP. III.
We have sufficiently explained the course of proceeding to be adopted, in case of the absence of either of the parties, or of default, before the suit is entered upon. We should, however, remark that, it is not usual for the King’s Court to compel any one by distraining his Chattels to appear in Court, on account of any suit. In such a Suit, therefore, any one may by the Judgment of the Court be distrained by his Fee, or by attaching his Pledges, as is usually done in other suits. Both parties being present in Court, the Plaintiff may found his demand on a variety of causes. His Debt may arise either upon a Lending,[372] or a Sale, or a Borrowing, or a Letting out, or a Deposit, or from some other just cause inducing a Debt.
A Debt of the first description arises, when one person entrusts another with any such thing as consists in Number, or Weight, or Measure.[373] When one person so entrusts another, if he should receive back more than he lent, he commits Usury; and, if he die in such Crime, he shall, by the Law of the Land, be punished as a Usurer, of which, indeed, we have spoken more fully in the preceding pages.[374] But when any thing is entrusted to another, it is, generally, confided upon the giving of Pledges:[375] sometimes, indeed, upon the putting things in Pledge: sometimes, under a solemn promise; sometimes upon the Exposition of a Charter: and at other times upon the conjoined strength of many of these Securities. When, therefore, any Debt is secured upon the giving of Pledges alone, if the principal Debtor should be so much reduced as to be incapable of discharging it, then, recourse must be had to the Pledges; and they shall be summoned by the following Writ——