However righteous the anger of these holy men, it has proved vain. The communes ever wax stronger, and annually some new seigneur is compelled to sell a charter or even to grant one for nothing. The kings watch complacently a movement which weakens their unruly feudatories. Sometimes the townsfolk have grown insolent and tried to defend their privileges by sheer violence. Once there was a very tyrannous bishop of Laon. He foolishly tried to cancel a charter granted the city, and boasted: "What can you expect these people to do by their commotions? If my negro boy John were to seize the most terrible of them by the nose, the fellow would not even growl. What they yesterday called a 'commune' I have forced them to give up--at least as long as I live!" The next day the yell, "Commune! Commune!" rang in the streets. A mob sacked the episcopal palace and found the bishop hiding in a cask at the bottom of the cellar. The howling populace dragged him into the street and killed him with a hatchet. Then, to add to this sacrilege upon an anointed bishop, they plundered most of the nobles who chanced to be in the town. After such deeds it is no wonder that the king went to Laon and re-established order with a strong hand. Nevertheless, some years later, a new charter was granted the town, and the succeeding bishops have had to walk warily, despite inward groanings. [Sidenote: Rule by Echevins and Rich Merchants] Fortunately, Pontdebois has been spared these convulsions. As a rule the local prelates have been reasonable and conciliatory. The bishop is still called "suzerain." He receives the fixed tax provided in the original agreement. He has jurisdiction over the citizens in spiritual matters, which include heresy, blasphemy, insults, and assaults upon priests and outrages to churches. Likewise much of what might be called "probate litigation"--touching the validity of marriages and children, and consequently the wills and property rights affected thereby. However, in most secular particulars the citizens have pretty complete control. They levy numerous imposts, direct taxes, tolls, and market dues; they enroll a militia to defend the walls and to take the field under their own officers and banner when the general levy of the region is called out; they pass many local ordinances; and they name their own magistrates who administer "high justice." They can even wage local wars if they have a grievance against neighboring barons, being themselves a kind of collective seigneur. The one thing they _cannot_ do is to coin money; that is a privilege carefully reserved to the king and to the superior nobility.