There was this virtue about the Parish Stocks, that it was a wholesome correction always ready. It was not necessary to caution a man as to what he might say, before clapping him in the stocks. Nor was much formality needed--he was drunk, quarrelling, fighting, or brawling, it was enough; and the man who could not stand was provided with a seat at the expense of the parish. Indeed, I am told that in one parish, near Royston, a farmer, who was himself generally in the same condition, finding one of his men drunk, would remark that one drunken man was enough on a farm, and would bundle the other drunkard off to the stocks without the least respect for, or care about, informing a magistrate thereof! The Parish Stocks were, as may be supposed, sometimes tampered with, and became the medium of practical jokes, of which, perhaps, the best story on record is that of a Chief Justice in the stocks. The story is as follows:-- Lord Camden, when Chief Justice, was on a visit to Lord Dacre, his brother-in-law, at Alely in Essex, and had walked out with a gentleman to the hill where, on the summit by the roadside, were the Parish Stocks. He sat down upon them, and asked his companion to open them, as he had an inclination to know what the punishment was. This being done the gentleman took a book from his pocket and sauntered on until he forgot the Judge and his situation, and returned to Lord Dacre. The learned Judge was soon tired of his situation, but found himself unequal to open the stocks! He asked a countryman passing by to assist him in obtaining his liberty, who said "No, old gentleman, you were not placed there for nothing"--and left him until he was released by some of the servants who were accidentally going that way! Not long after he presided at a trial in which a charge was brought against a magistrate for false imprisonment and setting the plaintiff in the stocks. The counsel for the defendant made light of the charge and particularly of setting in the stocks, which, he said, everybody knew, was no punishment at all! The Lord Chief Justice rose, and, leaning over the Bench, said, in a half whisper--"Brother, were you ever in the stocks?" The Barrister replied, "Really, my Lord, never."--"Then, I have been," rejoined his Lordship, "and I do assure you, brother, it is not such a trifle as you represent!" {86}