[733]. See article 18 (Select Charters, p. 404). Other articles show a similar strong bias against seignorial justice. Cf. chapter 29 of the Petition of the Barons (Select Charters, 386), and the comment of Pollock and Maitland, I. 182: “The voice of the nation, or what made itself heard as such, no longer, as in 1215, demanded protection for the seignorial courts.”
[734]. There was, however, a partially successful attempt made to revive feudal jurisdictions as late as the reign of Edward III. See Stubbs, Const. Hist., II. 638-9.
[735]. Technical details are admirably given by Pollock and Maitland, II. 63-7. The whole family of writs were known as “writs of entry sur disseisin”; and these were applied to still wider uses after 1267 on the authority of the Statute of Marlborough, as “writs of entry sur disseisin on the post.” See also Maitland, Preface to Sel. Pleas in Manorial Courts, p. lv.
[736]. Cf. Pollock and Maitland, I. 151, and Sel. Pleas in Manorial Courts, already cited.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE.
Una mensura vini sit per totum regnum nostrum, et una mensura cervisie, et una mensura bladi, scilicet quarterium Londonie, et una latitudo pannorum tinctorum et russetorum et halbergectorum, scilicet due ulne infra listas; de ponderibus autem sit ut de mensuris.
Let there be one measure of wine throughout our whole realm; and one measure of ale; and one measure of corn, to wit, “the London quarter”; and one width of cloth (whether dyed, or russet, or halberget), to wit, two ells within the selvedges; of weights also let it be as of measures.
This chapter re-enacted an important ordinance of Richard I., usually known as the Assize of Measures, but sometimes as the Assize of Cloth. That ordinance, the exact date of which is 20th November, 1197, was, according to modern conceptions of the proper sphere of government, partly commendable and partly ill-advised. It showed, on the one hand, a praiseworthy desire to set up definite standards of weights and measures, uniform throughout all parts of England. It strove thus to overcome the serious inconvenience experienced by traders, who met with varying standards as they moved with their wares from place to place. What was of more importance, the assize sought to obviate also the frauds frequently perpetrated upon buyers by unscrupulous merchants under the shelter of ambiguous weights and measures. The London quarter must, therefore be used everywhere for corn; and one measure for wine or beer. So far good. On the other hand, the ordinance of Richard went much further than modern ideas of laissez faire would tolerate. In particular, legitimate freedom of trade was interfered with by the cloth regulations reported by Roger of Hoveden.[[737]] No cloth, he tells us, was to be woven except of a uniform width, namely, “two ells within the lists.”[[738]]
Dyed cloths, it was provided, should be of equal quality through and through, as well in the middle as at the outside. Merchants were prohibited from darkening their windows by hanging up, to quote the quaint language of the ordinance, “cloth whether red or black, or shields (scuta) so as to deceive the sight of buyers seeking to choose good cloth.” Coloured cloth was only to be sold in cities or important boroughs. Here we have, apparently, a sumptuary law meant to ensure that the lower classes went in modest grey attire. Six lawful men were to be assigned to keep the Assize in each county and each important borough. These custodians of measures must see that no goods were bought or sold except according to the standards; imprison those found guilty of using other measures, whether by their own admission or by failure in the ordeal (confessus vel convictus); and seize the chattels of defaulters for the king’s behoof. If the custodes performed their duties negligently they were to suffer amercement of their chattels.[[739]] Richard’s Assize of Measures was supplemented in 1199 by John’s Assize of Wine, which tried to regulate the price of wines of various qualities,[[740]] an attempt not repeated in Magna Carta.
The same author who gives us the text of the ordinance of 1197 tells us also that its terms were found to be too stringent, and had to be frequently relaxed in practice.[[741]] This was done in 1201. The king’s justices, we are told, wished to seize the cloth of certain merchants on the ground that it was less than the legal width. They compromised, however, by accepting a great sum of money “to the use of the king and to the damage of many.” Thus Hoveden denounces what he regards as an unlawful bargain between the justices and the traders for injuring buyers by evading the strict letter of the ordinance.