The courts of the forest were three in number, viz. the court of attachments, swainmote and justice-seat. The court of attachments (called also the wood-mote) is held every forty days for the foresters to bring in their attachments concerning any hurt done to vert or venison (_in viridi et venatione_) in the forest, and for the verderers to receive and mark the same, but no conviction takes place. The swainmote, held three times in the year, is the court to which all the freeholders within the forest owe suit and service, and of which the verderers are the judges. In this court all offences against the forest laws may be tried, but no judgment or punishment follows. This is reserved for the justice-seat, held every third year, to which the rolls of offences presented at the court of attachment, and tried at the swainmote, are presented by verderers. The justice-seat is the court of the chief justice in eyre, who, says Coke, "is commonly a man of greater dignity than knowledge of the laws of the forests; and therefore where justice-seats are to be held some other persons whom the king shall appoint are associated with him, who together are to determine _omnia placita forestae_." There were two chief justices for the forests _intra_ and _ultra Trentam_ respectively. The necessary officers of a forest are a steward, verderers, foresters, regarders, agisters and woodwards. The verderer was a judicial officer chosen in full county by the freeholders in the same manner as the coroner. His office was to view and receive the attachments of the foresters, and to mark them on his rolls. A forester was "an officer sworn to preserve the vert and venison in the forest, and to attend upon the wild beasts within his bailiwick." The regarders were of the nature of visitors: their duty was to make a regard (_visitatio nemorum_) every third year, to inquire of all offences, and of the concealment of such offences by any officer of the forest. The business of the agister was to look after the pasturage of the forest, and to receive the payments for the same by persons entitled to pasture their cattle in the forests. Both the pasturage and the payment were called "agistment." The woodward was the officer who had the care of the woods and vert and presented offences at the court of attachment.