[Sidenote: A jury at Chichester refuses to convict a gang of burglars.]
In 1536, 7, 8, or 9,[483] a series of burglaries had been committed in the town and the neighbourhood of Chichester; and there had been a riot also, connected with the robberies, of sufficient importance to be communicated to the government. The parties chiefly implicated were discovered and taken; the evidence against them was conclusive, and no attempt was made to shake it; but three "froward persons" on the jury, one of whom was the foreman, refused to agree to a verdict. They were themselves, the magistrates were aware, either a part of the gang, or privately in league with them; and the help of the crown was invited for "the reformation of justice."[484] I do not find how this matter ended.
[Sidenote: Felons allowed to plead benefit of clergy after the right had been abolished by statute.]
Benefit of clergy was taken from felons in 1531-2.[485] At least five years later, when Cromwell was privy seal, three men were arraigned at the gaol delivery at Ipswich, "upon three several indictments of several felonies." They were convicted regularly, and their guilt does not seem to have been doubted; but "every of them prayed their book." The see of Norwich being vacant at the time, the ecclesiastical jurisdiction was suspended; no "ordinary" was present in court to "hear them read;" the magistrates thereupon "reprieved the said felons, without any judgment upon the said verdict." The prisoners were remanded to the gaol till the spiritual courts were ready to take charge of them: they were kept carelessly, and escaped.[486]
[Sidenote: Description of a sanctuary at Bewley in Hampshire.]
The following extract from a letter written in 1539 will show, better than any general description, the nature of a sanctuary, and the spirit in which the protection was enjoyed. The number of sanctuaries had been limited by act of parliament previous to their final abolition; certain favoured spots were permitted for a time to absorb the villany of the country; and felons who had taken refuge elsewhere, were to be removed into some one of these. Bewley in Hampshire had been condemned to lose its privilege. Richard Layton, the monastic visitor, describes and pleads for it to the privy seal.
