Royalty was ever jealous of these rights. A Fee-buck and a Fee-doe were allotted to every verderer yearly (but these were but wages in kind); and every lord of Parliament going or returning through the forest, on summons from the king, might take one or two beasts, but if no forester was at hand, he must sound his horn, lest the kill might seem done in secret. But all the king's horses and all the king's men could not quench English love of sport. Robin Hood and his merry band are but the glorified types of a very multitude who chased the deer night and day, for the forest stretched mile after mile over hill and dale, and the tall deer were fair to look on, and the taste of their flesh was as sweet to the wanderer and the outlaw as to the noble or the monarch; and the law, albeit cruel, was weak, and a touch of danger but gave zest to the pursuit. To take a later instance, was not Shakespeare himself the most illustrious of poachers? Not on such rovers but on the poor hard-working folk within the Regard did the forest laws press with cruel weight, and yet old Manwood highly extols their sweet reasonableness--"The king," he says, "wearied with his anxious care for the weal of his subjects, is given by law these forests that he may delight his eye at sight of the vert, and mind and body by the hunting of the wild beasts," and so he finds it in his heart to regret that in his day the forests were somewhat diminished. And since the sovereign's good is now the peoples' good, we may agree with him, though not for the same reason. PAR NOBILE FRATRUM JOHN DOE AND RICHARD ROE Old English law being full of fictions, had pressing need ever and anon of imaginary characters to play imaginary parts. Sometimes a name was picked at random from the street, and Smith, you hear without surprise, was in great request, or, as those shadows came and went in couples, you find Richard Smith as often as not paired with William Styles. But your ancient scribe lusted after quaintness. He loved a jingle, so names like John Den and Richard Fen--rare in actual life--peopled his parchment, and strove for mastery in his mock combats. But his prime favourites were Doe and Roe, nor would he raise Den or Fen or any other ghost, excepting he had need of more than two. Here is a simple instance of their use. In early times a man who commenced an action had to give surety that he would go on with it; nowadays, if he discontinue, he must pay the costs of the other side, but costs, incredible as it may sound, were not always the necessary shadow, or perhaps the substance, of law; and hence the need for the pledge. Under Edward III. the practice went out of use, but the form of it, as legal forms are apt to do, lingered on for centuries in this style:-- _Pledges of Prosecution_ { JOHN DOE. { RICHARD ROE.