Each borough has its own civil and criminal ordinances and police jurisdiction. Borough courts tended to deal with more laws than other local courts because of the borough's denser populations, which were composed of merchants, manufacturers, and traders, as well as those engaged in agriculture. Only borough courts have jurisdiction over fairs. In some boroughs the villein who resides for a year and a day becomes free, a right first given by Henry II in his charter for Nottingham. There are special ordinances relating to apprentices. There are sometimes ordinances against enticing away servants bound by agreement to serve another. The wife who is a trader is regarded in many places as a feme sole [single woman rather than a woman covert, who was under the protection of a husband]. There may be special ordinances as to the liability of masters for the acts of their apprentices and agents, or as to brokers, debt, or earnest money binding a bargain. The criminal and police jurisdiction in the borough was organized upon the same model as in the country at large, and was controlled by the King's courts upon similar principles, though there are some survivals of old rules, such as mention of the bot and the wer. The crimes committed are similar to those of the country, such as violence, breaches of the assize of bread and beer, stirring up suits before the ecclesiastical courts, digging up or obstructing the highway, not being enrolled in a tithing, encroachments upon or obstructions of rights of common. The most striking difference with the country at large are the ordinances on the repair or demolition of buildings, encroachments on another's building, fires, and nuisances. Specimens of other characteristic urban disputes are: selling bad food, using bad materials, unskillful or careless workmanship, fraudulent weights and measures, fraud in buying and selling, forestalling or regrating [buying in one market to resell in another market], acting in a way likely to endanger the liberties of the borough, usury, trading without being a citizen, assisting other unlicensed persons to trade, unlawfully forming a guild, complaints against various guilds in which trade might be organized. Since the ordinances were always liable to be called in question before the King's courts, they tended to become uniform and in harmony with the principles of the common law. Also, trading between boroughs kept them knowledgeable about each other's customs and conditions for trade, which then tended to standardize. Boroughs often had seals to prove communal consent and tended to act as a corporate body.