What else ensued we shall never know.
The glimpses we get of the ways and doings of the old stewards of
manors are not pleasing; I am afraid that as a class they were hard
as nails. Perhaps they could not help themselves, but they certainly
very rarely erred on the side of mercy and forbearance. Is not that
phrase "making allowances for," a comparatively modern phrase? At any
rate the _thing_ is not often to be met with in the fourteenth
century. Yet in the plague year every now and then one is pleased to
find instances actually of consideration for the distress and penury
of the homagers at this place and that. Thus at Lessingham, when the
worst was over and a court was held on the 15th of January, 1350, the
steward writes down that only thirty shillings was to be levied from
the customary tenants by way of tallage, "Because the greater part of
those tenants who were wont to render tallage had died in the
previous year by reason of the deadly pestilence."
Here and there, too, we come upon heriots remitted because the heir
was so very poor, and here and there fines and fees are cancelled
_causa miseri? propter pestilentiam._ Surely it is better to
assume that this kind of thing was done, as our friend Bonington puts
it, _mero motu pietatis su?_ than because there was no money to
be had. Better give a man the benefit of the doubt, even though he
has been dead five hundred years, than kick him because he will never
tell any more tales.
Pages:
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222