By _27 Eliz. c. 12._ § 2., all persons that shall be admitted to or take upon them the executing of the office of an undersheriff, before he intermeddle with the use or exercise of the said office, shall receive and take a corporal oath upon the Holy Evangelists, before the justices of assise, or one of them, of the same circuit wherein that county is whereof he shall be undersheriff, or before the _Custos Rotulorum_, or two justices of the peace whereof one to be of the _quorum_ of the said county, for and concerning the supremacy, in such manner and form as that oath is expressed and declared in one act of parliament made and ordained in the first year of the reign of our Sovereign Lady the Queen's Majesty[31], together with which oath he shall in like sort, before the same person or persons, receive and take another corporal oath as followeth, (that is to say) I _A. B._ shall not use or exercise the office of undersheriff corruptly during the time that I shall remain therein, neither shall or will accept, receive or take, by any colour, means or device whatsoever, or consent to the taking any manner of fee or reward of any person or persons for the impanelling or returning of any inquest, jury or _tales_, in any court of record for the Queen, or betwixt party and party, above two shillings or the value thereof, or such fees as are allowed and appointed for the same by the laws and statutes of this realm, but will, according to my power, truly and indifferently, with convenient speed, impanel all jurors, and return all such writ or writs touching the same as shall appertain to be done by my duty or office, during the time that I shall remain in the said office. So help me God. By § 4., every bailiff of franchises, deputy and clerk of every sheriff and undersheriff, and every other person and persons which shall have authority, or take upon him to impanel or return any inquest, jury or _tales_, or to intermeddle with execution of process in any court of record, shall before he or they intermeddle with any further execution thereof, receive and take the oaths aforesaid corporally before the person or persons appointed by this act to minister the same, or before the head officer of the place (if it be a town corporate), changing only the words (the office of the undersheriff) contained in the oath expressed in this act, to such words as are convenient for the deputation, office, or place in which the party which taketh the oath is to be exercised in: and if any the said persons limited to take the oath aforesaid, do take upon him to impanel or return any inquest, jury or _tales_, or to intermeddle with the execution of process not having before taken the oaths aforesaid, every [such] person shall lose and forfeit the sum of forty pounds of current English money, the one moiety to be to the use of our Sovereign Lady the Queen, the other to him or them that will sue for the same.