Humour of The Law
OBSOLETE LAWS
RAKED from the ashes where still “live their wonted fires,” may be found, as chance offers, the remains of “strict statutes and most biting laws.” Not many years since a Dorsetshire labourer made a disturbance in a church. The offence was becoming common, and the law on the subject was intricate. But industry discovered an old Act of Parliament, not passed in Protestant times, but in the reign of Mary, nicknamed “Bloody.” Under this law he was committed for nearly six days, then sent to prison by two justices for three months, and beyond that to the Quarter Sessions. There he was to express his sense of repentance, and to find a surety for one year for his good behaviour. And if he refused to repent: he was to remain in gaol. But the Dorsetshire labourer did repent, after having been in prison for some months. Another statute, of which Lord Wensleydale had the care, prescribes an easy and mitigated remedy for these unholy brawls; “but we are much mistaken, says Serjeant Woolrych ‘ (Lives of Eminent Serjeants, Vol. II. p. 836), “if the old Act of Queen Mary is not still on the Statute Book.”
