“Concedo eidem aecclesiae ad victum monachorum portum de Sanduuíc et omnes exitus eiusdem aquae, ab utraque parte fluminis cuiuscumque terra sit, a Pipernæsse usque ad Mearcesfleóte, ita ut natante nave in flumine, cum plenum fuerit, quam longius de navi potest securis parvula quam Angli vocant _Tapereax_ super terram proici, ministri aecclesiae Christi rectitudines accipiant, ... Si quid autem in magno mari extra portum, quantum mare plus se retraxerit, et adhuc statura unius hominis tenentis lignum quod Angli nominant _spreot_, et tendentis ante se quantum potest, monachorum est. Quicquid etiam ex hac parte medietatis maris inventum et delatum ad Sanduuíc fuerit, sive sit vestimentum, sive rete, arma, ferrum, aurum, argentum, medietas monachorum erit, alia pars remanebit inventoribus.” ----- Footnote 104: Hist. Rams. 106. Footnote 105: There are two places of this name on the coast of the Wash near Burnham Market in Norfolk. The one intended is most probably Ringstead St. Andrew’s. Footnote 106: Cod. Dipl. No. 809. Footnote 107: See Bracton, ii. 5. § 7. Westm. i. cap. 4. Stat. Praerog. Reg. cap. 11. Also 17. Edw. II. cap. 11. Rot. Chart. 20. Hen. III. m. 3. and 14. Edw. III. m. 6. Pat. 42. Hen. III. m. 1. dorso. See also Sir W. Stamford, Expos. King’s Prerog. fol 37, b. Footnote 108: Leg. Hen. I. 10. § 1. Ducange reads _laganum_ for _algarum_. Footnote 109: Cod. Dipl. No. 737, where it is printed both in Latin and Saxon. ----- These words are quite wide enough to carry _wreck_, although this be not distinctly stated by name. But Eádweard the Confessor furnishes us with still further evidence. In a writ addressed by him to Ælfwold bishop of Sherborne, earl Harold, and Ælfred the sheriff of Dorsetshire, he says[110]: “Eádweard the king greets well Bishop Ælfwold, earl Harold, Ælfred the sheriff and all my thanes in Dorsetshire: and I tell you that Urk my húscarl is to have his strand, over against his own land, freely and well throughout, up from sea, and out on sea, and whatsoever may be driven to his strand, by my full command.” ----- Footnote 110: Cod. Dipl. No. 871. ----- In this, as in many other cases, the principle seems to be, that that which has no ostensible owner is the property of the state, or of the king as its representative; and hence, in the later construction of the law of _wreck_, it was necessary that an absolute abandonment should have taken place, before wreck could be claimed. If there were _life_ on board, even a dog, cat, or lower animal, there could legally be no wreck, and this provision of the law has very often led to the perpetration of the most savage murders, as a precaution lest any living creature, by reaching the strand, should defeat the avarice of its barbarous owners. From the little evidence we can now recover, of the Saxon practice, this limitation does not appear to have existed.