by Walter Scott
NOTE TO CHAPTER I.
Note A.--The Ranger or the Forest, that cuts the foreclaws off our dogs.
A most sensible grievance of those aggrieved times were the Forest Laws.These oppressive enactments were the produce of the Norman Conquest,for the Saxon laws of the chase were mild and humane; while those ofWilliam, enthusiastically attached to the exercise and its rights, wereto the last degree tyrannical. The formation of the New Forest, bearsevidence to his passion for hunting, where he reduced many a happyvillage to the condition of that one commemorated by my friend, MrWilliam Stewart Rose:
"Amongst the ruins of the church The midnight raven found a perch, A melancholy place; The ruthless Conqueror cast down, Woe worth the deed, that little town, To lengthen out his chase."
The disabling dogs, which might be necessary for keeping flocks andherds, from running at the deer, was called "lawing", and was in generaluse. The Charter of the Forest designed to lessen those evils, declaresthat inquisition, or view, for lawing dogs, shall be made every thirdyear, and shall be then done by the view and testimony of lawful men,not otherwise; and they whose dogs shall be then found unlawed, shallgive three shillings for mercy, and for the future no man's ox shall betaken for lawing. Such lawing also shall be done by the assize commonlyused, and which is, that three claws shall be cut off without the ballof the right foot. See on this subject the Historical Essay on the MagnaCharta of King John, (a most beautiful volume), by Richard Thomson.