OBJECTS OF INTEREST. 65
sent not to take notice thereof. Next year the
same men of Waltham went to the abbot the
Tuesday before Easter, in the name of the whole
village, and demanded of him to remove his
mares and colts out of the marsh. This the
abbot refused to do, adding that if his bailiffs had
placed his cattle otherwise than they ought, they
might do well to have it amended, and yet so as
to defer the matter till the Tuesday after Easter.
On that Tuesday, Richard, brother to the King,
Duke of Cornwall, came to Waltham, at which
time both the men and the women of the town
repaired to the gate of the abbey to receive the
abbot's final answer.
" He put them off with the information that he
was preparing for a journey into Lincolnshire to meet
the justices itinerant, and said that he would settle
the affair at his return. Not satisfied, they went
into the pasture, and, in driving out the abbot's
mares and colts, drowned three worth twenty shil-
lings, spoiled ten more to the value of ten marks,
and beat the keepers, who resisted them, even to
the shedding of blood. Fearing, however, that
they should be prosecuted on the return of the
abbot, they desired a ' love day,' and offered to
pay damages for the injuries committed; but, in-
stead of doing so, they went to London and accused
the abbot to the king of having wrongfully taken
away their common land, and bringing up new
customs, adding that he would ' eat them up to the
bone.' The abbot then excommunicated the men
of Waltham, and they impleaded him at common
law for appropriating their common land to himself.
They were unsuccessful, and after a long suit in the
King's Bench, were glad to confess that they had
F