A curious development of dramatic art runs parallel to the movement we have traced. One of the earliest Corporations of Paris was that of the famous Basoche,[180] or law-clerks and practitioners, at the Palais de Justice, who were organised in a little realm of their own, subject to the superior power of the Parlement. The Basoche had its own king (_roi de la Basoche_), chancellor, masters, almoners, secretaries, treasurers and a number of minor officials, made its own laws and punished offenders. It had its own money, seal, and arms composed of an escritoire on a field _fleur-de-lisé_, surmounted by a casque and morion. It had, moreover, jurisdiction over the _farces_, _sottises_ and _moralités_ played by its members before the public. The clerks of the Basoche organised processions and plays for public festivals, and were compensated for out-of-pocket expenses if for any reason the celebrations were cancelled by the Parlement. If the date, 6th January 1482, of one of these performances in the Grande Salle of the Palais de Justice, so vividly described by Victor Hugo in _Notre Dame_, be correct, the prohibition by the Parlement in 1477, renewed in 1478, of any performances of _farce_, _sottise_, or _moralité_ by the king of the Basoche in the Palais or the Châtelet, or elsewhere in public, under pain of a whipping with withies and banishment, must have been soon withdrawn. In 1538 the Basoche was ordered to deliver to the Parlement any plays they proposed to perform, that they might be examined and emended (_visités et reformés_) and to act in public, only such plays as had been approved by the court. The clerks of the Basoche were clothed in yellow and blue taffety, and, on extraordinary occasions, in gorgeous costumes varying according to the company to which they belonged. Each captain had the form and style of his company's dress painted on vellum, and whoso desired to join signed his name beneath, and agreed to be subject to a fine of ten crowns if he made default. In 1528 a famous trial took place before the Parlement on the occasion of an appeal by one of the clerks against the chancellor of the Basoche, who had seized his cloak in payment of a fine and costs. After many pleadings by celebrated lawyers, the case was referred back to the king of the Basoche, with instructions that he was to treat his subjects amiably.