waggoner, who provoked him by his boorish behaviour. At St. Saumer Eustace became a monk "Illuec fist mainte dyablie Wistaces lor faisoit mesdire (v. 223.) "There he performed much devilry, He caused the monks to fast When they ought to have broken fast; When they ought to have gone with feet Eustace made them say wrong When they ought to say their service. When they ought to give thanks." After the quarrel between Eustace and the Count of Boulogne (which originated in the death of the father of Eustace, Bauduins Buskés, by the hand of Hainfrois de Heresinguehans), the former became what M. Michel very justly calls "a kind of Boulonois Robin Hood," and the stories, often exceedingly droll, of his encounters with, and escapes from, the Count, occupy the greater part of the poem. We will give one as a specimen. One day a spy informed the Count that Eustace was in the forest. The Count, with his retainers, followed the spy on foot, and lay in ambush in a ditch. One of Eustace's spies, however, had seen them, and immediately carried information of their movements to his master. Eustace went to a collier who was carrying charcoal upon an ass, blackened his own face, neck, and hands with the coal, put on the collier's frock and black cap, giving his own in exchange, and set out for Boulogne with his ass and burden. When he passed by the spot where the Count lay concealed, the latter took no notice of him, but Eustace cried out, "My Lord, what are you doing there?" "What concern is it of yours, Sir villain?" was the reply. "By St. Omer," said Eustace, "I will go and tell it to the Count, how the men of Eustace the Monk are always injuring and insulting us. I dare not bring out my beast to carry my charcoal to sell, but Eustace must rob me of it. Meanwhile he is sitting at his ease by a good fire, for he has burnt all my charcoal, which has cost me so much labour to make." "Is he near this place?" asked the Count. "He is close by. Go straight along this path, if you wish to speak with him." Eustace goaded his beast onwards, and the Count and his people entered the forest, where they found the collier, drest in the garments of the monk. They insulted and beat him much, for they thought, sure enough, it was Eustace they had caught at last, till he cried out, "For the love of God, my Lord, mercy! Why do you beat me so? You may take my coat, if you will, for it is all the property I have. It is the coat of Eustace the Monk, who has gone with my ass and charcoal towards Boulogne, his hands, face, and neck blackened, and my cap on his head. He took my frock, and left me this coat of silk." The Count, in a rage, hurried on in pursuit of Eustace, who, in the meanwhile, had washed his face, and, meeting with a potter, had exchanged his ass and charcoals for pots and jugs, and his collier's garments for those of the potter. Eustace was marching along, and crying lustily, "Pots! pots!" when the Count and his men suddenly issued from a thicket, and asked him if he had seen a collier riding along that way. "Sir," said Eustace, "he is gone straight to Boulogne, with an ass laden with charcoal." The Count and his party put spurs to their horses, and overtook the collier, whom they immediately began to beat and insult, and, tying his feet and hands, they mounted him upon a horse, with his face towards the tail. The man began to roar and shout. "My Lord," said he, "I pray you, for God's sake, have mercy upon me! Why have you taken me? If I have done any thing wrong, I will willingly make amends." " Aha! Aha! you vagabond!" said the Count, "you think to escape. In due time I'll have you hanged, safely enough." A knight, however, who had often seen the potter, and chanced now to look at him and recognise him, said, "What devil has made thee a collier? Thou wast formerly a potter. No man will ever thrive that has so many trades." Then the potter told how he had exchanged his. ware with a collier, bad luck to him! and how the latter went towards the wood, crying, "Pots! pots!" "Haloo!" cried the Count, "quick to the wood, hunt it well, and bring me every one you find there." And so they liberated the collier, and again entered the forest. Eustace, however, had thrown away his pots in a marsh, and had concealed himself in the nest of a kite. "Wistasces li escervelés Par foi!' dist li quens de Bouloigne, Non l'ot! si ot! non l'ot! si ot!' "Eustace the madman There made himself a nightingale. Then again has uttered two words, When the Count of Boulogne heard him, 'He has taken all my good horses.' For the nightingale cries to me That I must strike him and kill him.'"' Then the Count hunted eagerly the monk Eustace. First were caught four monks, who were immediately put in prison. After them were sent to prison four pedlars and a pig; next, three men who carried fowls to sell, and two men who drove asses; then, six fishermen and their fishes; and after them four clerks and an arch-priest: so that by the end of the day there had been arrested more than forty persons, who were all taken for examination before the Count. Eustace, in the mean time, entered the town in the disguise of a woman, and succeeded in carrying away one of the Count's horses, and in publishing the news that he had not himself been taken. Eustace afterwards came to England, and was well received by King John, who gave him thirty galleys, with which he performed as many strange actions on the sea as he had previously done on land. The King also gave him lands in England, and a palace in London; but he subsequently joined the party of the Barons, and thus merited, by his infidelity, the name of traitor, which is given him in the chronicles. The sea-fight in which he was killed is described briefly in the poem; but more details are given in the passages from the chronicles, which are all printed at the end of M. Michel's introduction. M. Michel has also commenced, under the title of "Des Vilains," a series of publications of ancient tracts, in prose and verse, illustrative of the condition and manners of the lower orders of the people in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The first number contains a prose tract, "Des XXIII Manières de Vilains," of the twenty-three kinds of vilains, ending with a metrical prayer that all evils and misfortunes may fall upon them, for their want of courte GENT. MAG. VOL. III. F The second, edited by M. Monmerqué, a distinguished fellow-labourer in the same mine, contains a poem entitled “De l'Oustillement au Villain," of the household of a vilain, which describes very minutely his goods and chattels and tools. The third number, which has recently appeared, was edited by M. Michel, and contains a satirical treatise in prose, entitled, "La Riote du Monde;" which may, perhaps, be best translated into English by The World in Burlesque, and a metrical version of the same work under the title of "Le Roi d'Angleterre et le Jongleur d'Ely." The Riote du Monde seems to have been very popular among our Norman forefathers, and in a poem, published in the collection of Barbazan, it is alluded to as one of the most excellent performances of the minstrel and jogelour : Before concluding, we will observe that at the same time with the books above-mentioned, was published, by the same learned editor, a contemporary Norman ballad on Hugh of Lincoln, with all the Scotch ballads on the same subject which have been published by Percy, Gilchrist, Jamieson, Pinkerton, Motherwell, and Sir Egerton Brydges; and that he has in the press, in London, two most important books, which we shall notice as soon as they are published, a collection of all the remains of the Norman romans of Tristram, and the Travels of Charlemagne to Jerusalem and Constantinople, the oldest Norman poem known to exist. Both these books will, we understand, be rendered doubly valuable, by having excellent glossaries. THE RECORD COMMISSION. No. V. continued. Testa de Nevill, sive Liber Feodorum in Curia Scaccarii, one vol. 1807. THE territorial Revenue of the Kings of England during the middle ages, was of two kinds; permanent, derived from the profits of the royal demesnes, and the rents reserved upon grants of lands; and, contingent, or occasional, comprehending payments made upon the happening of certain peculiar events. Of the latter description were those singular payments incident to the old feudal tenures, termed aids.' These were paid to the Lord 'pur fille marier,' to furnish a marriage portion for his eldest daughter, ' pur faire fitz chivaler,' to make his eldest son and heir a knight; and to redeem his own person from captivity, if that disaster ever occurred. These three aids seem to have been demanded by the Lord of his Vassals as a right, but upon other occasions aids were levied rather on account of the necessities of the Lord, than of any proper obligation to pay them on the part of the tenant. The aid varied in amount, and was proportioned to the number of knights' fees held by the tenant. The king was also entitled to receive escuage, or scutage, a payment or service from each of his tenants whenever he set forth an army, and to various other peculiar, and in many cases fantastical, payments and services from those who were his tenants by serjeanty, upon the occurrence of certain previously contem plated events, as upon the day of his coronation, his going into Wales, or Scotland, or such like. All these payments were made to the Exchequer, sometimes immediately by the tenants, and sometimes by the Sheriffs, to whom the tenants paid them. In either case, the Exchequer was the ultimate place of receipt and settlement, and it was therefore necessary that the officers of that establishment should be accurately informed as to the number of the tenants in capite, the knights' fees they held, and the nature of the tenure of such of them as held by Serjeanty. These particulars were collected by the officers of the Exchequer, from Inquisitions and Returns, from the reports of the Justices Itinerant, from the accounts of the Sheriffs, and various other sources. Sometimes they appear to have been entered on Rolls and sometimes in books, being preserved in either case for general reference and Several miscellaneous office books of this description are in existence. The most important of them are known by the names of Liber Niger,' the Black Book; 'Liber Rubeus,' the Red Book; and Liber Feodorum,' the Book of Fees, or as it is more frequently, although erroneously, termed Testa de Nevill.' use. The principal contents of the Liber Niger' are the Dialogus de Scaccario, published by Madox, (Hist. of the Exchequer, vol. ii. 349) copies of the will of Henry II., and various Charters in his reign, and also of certain documents commonly known as Chartæ Baronum, the nature of which will be best explained by stating the circumstances out of which they arose. An aid was levied by Henry II. upon the occasion of the marriage of his daughter Matilda with Henry the Lion, Duke of Saxony. The aid was one mark for every knight's fee, and in order to secure its due collection the tenants in capite were commanded to certify to the Exchequer how many knights' fees they held, how many of the old feoffment, that is, in the time of Henry I., and how many of the new, that is, since the time of Henry I., and by whom they were holden. The certificates, or Chartæ Baronum, were returned to the Exchequer in pursuance of these directions, and contained the prescribed particulars; they were ordered to be preserved in the Exchequer, and a place set apart for their safe custody. One, and only one of the originals is now known to be in existence, but the Liber Niger contains copies of them. They are in various forms, some extremely terse and laconic, others diffuse and full of the ordinary phrases of legal flattery. It may be worthy of remark, that in the majority of those Chartæ, in which the King is addressed by his titles, he is termed King of the English, Rex Anglorum, and not Rex Angliæ, although that title sometimes occurs. The principal parts of the Liber Niger, with the exception of the Dialogus de Scaccario, were published by Hearne, in 2 vols. 8vo, Oxon. 1728, and again under the Editorship of Sir John Ayloffe, in 2 vols. 8vo, Lond. 1771 and 1774. Both these publications contain, besides the Liber Niger, a Cotton MS. (Claudius C. v.) comprising a Catalogue of the Tenants of Lands in Lincolnshire, in the reign of Henry II., the Annals of William of Worcester, and much miscellaneous matter. The later Edition contains some papers not inserted in Hearne's publication, but others are omitted from it, and it is deficient in that Editorial accuracy which gives a peculiar value to all Hearne's heterogeneous publications. The Liber Rubeus has never been published, and may therefore be noticed more particularly. Great part of it was compiled by Alexander de Swereford, Archdeacon of Shrewsbury, one of the Clerks, and afterwards one of the Barons of the Exchequer in the reign of Henry III. The entries are of a very miscellaneous character, but consist principally of copies of Royal Charters of Liberties and other instruments of a legislative character; ordinances for the regulation of the Mint and the Exchequer, Memoranda of Scutages collected from the 2d Henry II. to the 13th John; Chartæ Baronum, being transcripts similar to those in the Liber Niger; Serjeanties in several counties in the time of King John, with a Summary of the In. quisitions taken in the same reign, concerning the tenants in capite; pleadings in Parliament in the reign of Edward I.; transcripts of various Papal Bulls and Grants of Sovereigns and other persons; the Sentence of Excommunication pronounced in Westminster Hall in the 37th Henry III. against the Transgressors of the Charters; the Oaths of the Officers of the Exchequer, and of the Lord Mayor and Sheriffs, taken by them when presented in that Court; various memoranda calculated to be of use in the transaction of the Exchequer business, and especially a table of the dates of the commencement of the reigns of various English Monarchs, which has lately been frequently referred to, in order to settle the doubts which long existed, as to the ancient mode of reckoning the regnal years of our Sovereigns. The Liber Rubeus also contains a Copy of the Dialogus de Scaccario. Many of the entries in this volume are of considerable interest and importance. Some of them have been published in various works-in Ryley's Plac. Parliamentaria; in Wilkins's Leges AngloSaxonicæ; in Spelman's Glossary; in the Statutes; in the Foedera; in the Record Report; in Cooper on Records; by Hearne; and in Gale's Quindecim Scriptores; but many are quite unknown, and any antiquary who has or can procure access to the volume, would do good service in giving the world a detailed account of it, with Copies of its unprinted portions. The Liber Feodorum, or Testa de Nevill, refers to a late period, but is of a somewhat similar character to the two preceding works. It consists of two volumes, which are preserved in the King's Remembrancer's office. On the cover of each of them is written the following memorandum, in an ancient hand, Contenta pro Evidenciis habeantur hic in S'cc'io et non pro recordo!' These books' appear to have been compiled near the close of the reign of Edward II., or the commencement of that of Edward III., partly from Inquests taken [in the reigns of Henry III. and Edward I.] on the presentments of Jurors of Hundreds before the Justices Itinerant, and partly from Inquisitions upon writs awarded to the Sheriffs for collecting of Scutages, aids, &c.' (Introduction to the Testa de Nevill). The name 'Testa de Nevill' is quite inapplicable to this work. That title properly belonged to a roll containing the names of tenants in capite, a part of which is still extant in the Chapter House, and many quotations from which occur in the present volume; but these quotations form a very trifling part of the whole work, and ought not by any means to have given it their name. The Roll properly called Testa de Nevill, is conjectured to have been compiled either by Ralph de Nevill, or Jollan de Nevill, legal officers in the reign of Henry III., who are mentioned in the Liber Feodorum, as we shall in future term the volume before us, and not Testa de Nevill, At p.16 b. is mention of the widow of Jollan de Neville; she is said to have held lands in the wapentake of Turgarton, in the honour of Richmond, and to have been worth ten marks per annum, but the jurors, it is added, do not know whether she is in the gift of the King or of the Earl of Chester.' The contents of the Liber Feodorum consist principally of lists of the tenants in capite in the several counties, and of the actual terre-tenants; serjeanties; accounts of Scutages, and of the collectors of the aid granted to Henry III., to marry his sister to the Emperor, and that of the prelates upon occasion of the same King's passage into Gascony; lists of wards in the King's gift; extracts from Inquisitions shewing the occupiers of lands at various periods, and frequently their descents; together with quotations from the Testa de Nevill before mentioned. Such particulars are of evident use to the genealogist and topographer; they enable the one to trace the course of many a noble family, and the other to throw a faint light upon the varying occupancy and condition of lands. The enumerations of Serjeanties contain many curious particulars illustrative of the state of manners, and of the nature of the ancient legal tenures, and as these passages are likely to be the |