s to the
constable of the next town, tells him the case, described the felon, and
the way he went. Whereupon the constable, be it day or night, is to take
the assistance of those in his own town, and pursue him according to
those directions immediately, at the same time sending with the utmost
expedition to the neighbouring towns, who are to make like pursuit, and
to send like notice until the felon be found._

_So desirous is our Law of bringing offenders to Justice, and of
preserving the roads free from being infested with these vermin. For the
better effecting of this, besides those means prescribed by the customs
of our ancestors, of later times rewards have been given to such as
hazarded their own persons in bringing offenders to justice, and of
these, as far as they are settled by Acts of Parliament and thereby
rendered certain and perpetual, I shall speak here; though not of those
given by proclamation, because they being only for a stated time, people
must hereafter have been misled by our account, when that time is
expired._

_Highwaymen becoming, some time after the Revolution, exceedingly bold
and troublesome, by an Act made in the reign of William and Mary, a
reward of forty pounds is given for apprehending any one in England or
Wales, and prosecuting him so as he be convicted; which forty pounds is
to be paid by the sheriff on a certificate of the judge or justices
before whom such a felon was convicted. And in case a person shall be
killed in endeavouring to apprehend or making pursuit after such
robbers, the said forty pounds shall be paid to the executors or
administrators of such persons upon the like certificate. Moreover,
every person who shall take, apprehend, or convict such a person, shall
have as a reward the horse, furniture, arms, money or other goods of
such robber as shall be taken with him, the right or title of his
Majesty's bodies politic or corporate, lords of manors, or persons
lending or letting the same to such robber notwithstanding; excepting
only the right of those from whom such horses, furniture, arms, money,
or goods were before feloniously taken._

_A like reward of forty pounds was, by another Act in the same reign,
given to such as shall apprehend any person convicted of any capital
crime relating to the coin of this land._

_By an Act also made in the reign of the late King William, persons who
apprehend and prosecute to conviction any who feloniously steal goods to
the v