Beside these women, who by marriage or apprenticeship had acquired the full rights of butchers and were acknowledged as such by the Corporation under whose governance they lived, a multitude of poor women tried to keep their families from starvation by hawking meat from door to door. They are often mentioned in the Council Records, because the very nature of their business rendered them continually liable to a prosecution for regrating. Thus at the Court Leet, Manchester, Anne Costerdyne was fined 1s. “for buyinge 4 quarters of Mutton of Wᵐ. Walmersley & 1 Lamb of Thomas Hulme both wᶜʰ shee shold the one & same day.”[491] Their position was the more difficult, because if they did not sell the meat the same day sometimes it went bad, and they were then prosecuted on another score. Elizabeth Chorlton, a butcher’s widow, was presented in 1648 “for buieing and sellinge both on one day” and was fined 3s. 4d.[492] She was again fined with Mary Shalcross and various men in 1650 for selling unlawful meat and buying and selling on one day.[493] Footnote 491: _Ibid._ p. 221, 1674. Footnote 492: _Manchester Court Leet Records_, Vol. IV., p. 31. Footnote 493: _Ibid._ p. 40. She was presented yet again in 1653 for selling “stinking meate,” and fined 5s.[494] Evidently Elizabeth Chorlton was an undesirable character, for she had previously been convicted of selling by false weights;[495] nevertheless it seems hard that when it was illegal to sell stinking meat women should also be fined for selling it on the same day they bought it, and though this particular woman was dishonest no fault is imputed to the character of many of the others who were similarly presented for regrating. Footnote 494: _Manchester Court Leet Records_, Vol. IV., p. 68. Footnote 495: _Ibid._ p. 15, 1648. There remains yet another class of women who were connected with the Butchers’ trade, namely the wives of men who were either employed by the master butchers, or who perhaps earned a precarious living by slaughtering pigs and other beasts destined for domestic consumption. In such work there was no place for the wife’s assistance, and, like other wage-earners, in spite of any efforts she might make in other directions, the family remained below the poverty line. An instance may be quoted from the Norwich Records where, in a census of the poor (i.e. persons needing Parish Relief) taken in 1570, are given the names of “John Hubbard of the age of 38 yeres, butcher, that occupie slaughterie, and Margarit his wyfe of the age of 30 yeres that sell souce, and 2 young children, and have dwelt here ever.”[496] Footnote 496: Tingey, J. C., _Records of the City of Norwich_, Vol. II., p. 337.