It had been recognised as early as 1269 that all previous crimes were pardoned, for the act of pardon granted by the bailli to Nicole Lecordier in that year speaks of him as "delivre franc et quite de tous forfes ... quielz qil soient, del tens en arriere jusques au jor dui." And by 1446 the charter of Charles VII., which is still preserved in the archives of the Cathedral, announces in May of that year that the prisoner who raises the Fierte "est absolz du cas pour le quel il l'a levee et de tous crismes precedents." So that we reach the astonishing proposition that the Chapterhouse of Rouen enjoyed a far greater power than even the royal prerogative of mercy, which only pardoned a specified crime; whereas the Chapterhouse by a kind of baptism and regeneration from sin, started their prisoner afresh on a new life without any reference to his past misdeeds. What this involved I shall show when opportunity arises; but the release of the accomplices as well as the prisoner was an even more extraordinary extension of powers. It had already taken place before this test case, in a tavern brawl in 1370, in the crime of two drapers in 1356, and in a very important example when Guillaume Yon with another man of Pavilly were released after the slaying of a butcher; and the Seigneur d'Esneval gave sworn testimony that when a friend of the dead butcher publicly called the accomplice in the crime "a murderer," that accomplice would have been delivered up to justice if the principal had not carried the Fierte. The retrospective action of the pardon on the principal also extended to his accomplices, who began life afresh just as he did. And this extension was solemnly confirmed at the inquiry, from which I have just quoted. There is no doubt, however, that so excessive a "prolongation" of the powers of pardon cannot have been allowed throughout the whole history of the Fierte; for public opinion could scarcely have permitted a gang of ruffians every year to return to the full privileges enjoyed by their more honest comrades. So at the end of the fifteenth, and again at the end of the sixteenth century, we find it laid down that only those crimes _named_ by the prisoner should be pardoned, if the Chapter thought fit, and that only those accomplices who appeared _with him_ in the procession should share in his pardon. It was only in April 1407 that this long appeal was finally decided in favour of the two accomplices of Maignart, who bore the Fierte thirteen years before. But the Chapterhouse took good care that so much tedious and costly legal work should not be thrown away, and the strength of the precedents and charters they secured at this time was never entirely lost while the "Privilege" existed in Rouen at all.