From the note which is appended to it, the existing MS. is evidently the only authentic copy of the original "parchment roll," out of which it was transcribed by the gaveller, Richard Morse, A.D. 1673, of the penmanship of which period it is a good specimen. It seems to be a presentment of the Court of Mine Law, duly signed by the jury of forty-eight free miners. Although its early date, and one or two forms of expression, may seem to indicate that it was first of all written in Latin, yet so many of its words and phrases, together with its concluding signatures, are so thoroughly old English, as to show that it was most probably composed in our own language. There are no paragraphs nor punctuations. In character it is "sui generis," though it exhibits traces of resemblance to the laws and customs of the old mining districts of Somerset and Derbyshire, and even with those of Germany, as the accompanying notes show. The words between brackets do not occur in the original MS., having been inserted by modern printers. Those in italics give the corrections needed in modern copies. THE MINERS LAWES AND PRIVILLEDGES. _Bee itt in minde and_ [in] Remembrance what the Customes and [the] Franchises _hath_ been that were graunted tyme out of Minde and after in tyme of the Excellent and Redoubted Prince King Edward {71a} [the Third] _un_to ye Miners of the Forrest of Deane and the Castle of St Bridvills and the bounds of the said Perambulations of the Mine.Forrest (That _is to say_) First {71b} betweene Chepstowe Bridge and Gloucester Bridge the halfe _deale_ of Newent Ross Ash Monmouth_s_ bridge and soe farr in_to_ the Seasoames as the Blast of a horne or the voice of a man may bee heard Soe that if any did Trespasse Miners' power to sue trespassers.against the Franchises of the Min_ers_ [that is to say] that pass[ing] by boat {71c} Trowe Pinard {71d} or any other Vessell without gree {71e} made for the Customes due to the King and also to the _said_ Miners for the Myne {72a} then hee that passe_th_ _ought_ [passed out] to come by the noyse of the horne or _the_ cry And if hee will not come again Then his Boate or Vessell and all his Cattell Forfeiture.within forth beene forfeit _un_to the King for the Forbadment {72b} broken the which is attachmet in the Franchises of the said Miners [and] Also {72c} that the said Their power to mine in any place.Myners may myne in any place that they will as well without the bounds as within without _the_ Forebodment of any man But if so [be] _that_ a_ny_ Smith {72d} have a Smithman at Karleton {72e} Newport or at Barkley th_en such_ [which] Smithman is occupied {72f} in Smith _craft_ [work] and in Covenant with a Smith holder within the Covenant servant a fugitive.said Bounds Then the Smith holder [that is] within shall goe to the said Townes to prove his Covenant and after _his_ [the] proffe _he may_ [made] not have his Smithman Then ye Smith holder shall forbidd all