As usual, the trouble began at the fountain-head. Everybody knows the term "billeting" as applied to soldiers on the march, who are compulsorily quartered on licensed victuallers and others at fixed rates. This is really a very ancient custom, which is closely, and indeed lineally, connected with the topic under discussion.
In the early days of royal progresses it was the duty of the Marshal of the King's Household to secure lodgings for the members of the retinue which accompanied him; and this he did by means of a billet, by virtue of which he appropriated for the occasion the best of the houses in the vicinity, marking them with chalk and ruthlessly ejecting the occupiers. The Marshal, it may be observed, did not do the chalking himself--a task which seems to have been delegated to the Sergeant Chamberlain of the Household.
Even London did not escape this intolerable vexation, though its immunity from billeting was expressly laid down in a succession of charters. The royal officials, paying scant heed to the sanctity of these clauses, repeatedly invaded the precincts of the City; and in the reign of Edward II. they went so far as to seize the house of one of the sheriffs, John de Caustone, and quarter therein the King's Secretary, sergeants, horses, and harness. The sheriff acted boldly. He erased the chalk marks, and proceeded to expel the intrusive sergeants--perhaps even the Secretary himself, unless, as Mr. Riley thinks probable, that person "walked quietly away." For this resolute vindication of the liberties of the City, Caustone had to answer before the Seneschal and Marshal of the King's Household, sitting in the Tower, but, as there was no excuse for the insolent aggression, he suffered no harm. The citizens, indeed, were so assured of their rights in this particular, that at some date--probably in the reign of Edward I.--an ordinance had been passed:
"That if any member of the royal household, or any retainer of the nobility, shall attempt to take possession of a house within the City either by main force or by delivery [of the Marshal of the King's Household]; and, if in such attempt he shall be slain by the master of the house, then, and in such case, the master of the house, shall find six of his kinsmen [i.e. as compurgators], who shall make oath, himself making oath as the seventh, that it was for this reason that he so slew the intruder; and thereupon he shall go acquitted."