“And when any shall flee into the church or churchyard for felony, claiming thereof the privilege for any action of his life, the head officer of the same liberty where the said church or churchyard is, with his fellow jurats or commoners of the same liberty, shall come to him and shall ask him the cause of being there, and if he will not confess felony immediately, it shall be entered in record, and his goods and chattels shall be forfeited, and he shall tarry there forty days, or before, if he will, he shall make his abjuration in form following before the head officer, who shall assign to him the port of his passage: and after his abjuration there shall be delivered unto him by the head officer, or his assignees, a cross, and proclamation shall be made that while he be going by the highway towards the port to him assigned, he shall go in the king’s peace, and that no man shall grieve him in so doing, on pain to forfeit his goods and chattels. And the said felon shall lay his right hand on the book, and swear this:—‘You hear, Mr. Coroner, that I ... a thief, have stolen such a thing, or have killed such a woman, or man, or a child, and am the king’s felon, and for that I have done many evil deeds and felonys in this same his land, I do abjure and forswear the lands of the kings of England, and that I shall haste myself to the port of ... which you have given or assigned me: and that I shall not go out of the highway, and if I do, I will that I shall be taken as a thief, and the king’s felon, and at the same place I shall tarry but one ebb and flood, if I may have passage: and if I cannot have passage in the same place, I shall go every day into the sea to my knees and above, crying, Passage, for the love of God, and King ... his sake: and if I may not within forty days together, I shall get me again into the church, as the king’s felon. So help me God and by this book according to your judgment.’ And if a clerk flying to the church for felony, affirming himself to be a clerk, he shall not abjure the realm, but yielding himself to the laws of the realm, shall enjoy the liberties of the church, and shall be delivered to the ordinary, to be kept safe to the convict prison, according to the laudable custom of the realm of England.” CHAPTER VIII MIRACLE AND MYSTERY PLAYS