In these ways and in many others by which personal freedom was checked and thwarted, the rights of the feudal lord were irresistibly swept away by the pressure of growing societies of active traders and artizans.[377] But the need for political emancipation was no less urgent; and here the way to liberty was neither simple nor easy. A very hierarchy of powers held the path. The authority which the lord of the manor did not assume was exercised by the sheriff of the county; and where the authority of the sheriff ceased the supreme right of the king began. All government and jurisdiction were divided among powers in high places; and whatever privileges the burghers might secure must be won here a little and there a little, bought for money, or snatched amid the distresses and calamities of their masters, or held as the reward of importunate persistence, the tribute to successful craft, the recompense of some timely service rendered.
The case of Bridport illustrates the life of any provincial town in early times whose burghers still served many masters.[378] It was a busy little trading community in the thirteenth century. Hemp was grown in its fields which was sent to Plympton to be made into rope yarn, returned to Bridport to be woven into ropes, and then sent back again to Plympton for sale, or fashioned at home into the girths, horse-nets, and reins for which the Bridport men were famous. The inhabitants had won a considerable measure of self-rule. They elected the two bailiffs who were at the head of their local government, presided in the little town court, and doubtless regulated the market and controlled the trade. These two had under them under-bailiffs, cofferers, and constables; and were assisted by twelve jurors chosen every Michaelmas, who yearly perambulated the town to watch over its boundaries, and who had charge of the “parish cheste” or coffin and the parish bier, and of the pillory, whipping post, and cucking stool. Twelve men were also chosen to conduct any business in which Bridport was concerned. At the visits of the king’s justices they were summoned with the clerk in council to assist in the business of the court; they represented their fellow burgesses if any question was called for trial before the sheriffs court at Dorchester, or if a dispute arose with the bishop, or a settlement had to be made with the convent at Abbotsbury.