ITS HISTORY. 7
Although in some cases, such as the New
Forest, cultivated lands were laid waste to gratify
the royal pleasure, villages and enclosures were
often allowed to exist within the limits; but
it is important to observe that they and their in-
habitants were subject to the full stringency of the
Forest laws. One end which the kings had
in view, in enacting these laws, and which em-
bodied a policy natural to a conquering people,
and found in all the countries subjugated by the
Germans, was to keep weapons out of the hands
of the people. Another reason was the extortion
which severe laws enabled the Crown to practise.
But the primary object, to which everything else
had to bow, was the preservation of the Forest
animals, especially the deer—the King's right of
" vert and venison," as it was called. Not only
were these animals forbidden to be killed, under
penalties of mutilation and even death, but the
fences were kept down to such a height that a doe
with her fawn could readily jump them,1 and the
owners could not even drive the deer from their
crops, on which they fattened; nor could new
houses be erected, because of the "increase of
men and dogs and other things, which fright the
deer from their food;" or the cultivation changed,
or trees cut down in enclosed lands without special
leave granted by the Forest Courts. Dogs were
"expeditated" that is, three claws of the fore-feet
were cut off close to the ball of the foot to prevent
their chasing the deer, and one writer says that
only such dogs were allowed " as would go through
the Lord Vesci's stirrup, who was Justice in Eyre
1 This condition has had an important legal bearing on
the fate of the Forest, even in modern times.