ne
years, nor infected persons, nor idiots, nor madmen, nor deaf, nor
dumb, nor parties in the pleas, nor men excommunicated by the bishop,
nor criminal persons. * * And those who are not of the Christian
faith cannot be judges, nor those who are out of the king's
allegiance."--_Mirror of Justices_, 59-60.

In the section "_Of Inferior Courts_," it is said:

"From the first assemblies came consistories, which we now call
courts, and that in divers places, and in divers manners; whereof the
sheriffs held one monthly, or every five weeks, according to the
greatness or largeness of the shires. And these courts are called
county courts, _where the judgment is by the suitors_, if there be no
writ, and is by warrant of jurisdiction ordinary. The other inferior
courts are the courts of every lord of the fee, to the likeness of
the hundred courts. * * There are other inferior courts which the
bailiffs hold in every hundred, from three weeks to three weeks, _by
the suitors of the freeholders of the hundred. All the tenants within
the fees are bounden to do their suit there_, and that not for the
service of their persons, but for the service of their fees. But
women, infants within the age of twenty-one years, deaf, dumb,
idiots, those who are indicted or appealed of mortal felony, before
they be acquitted, diseased persons, and excommunicated persons are
exempted from doing suit."--_Mirror of Justices_, 50-51.

In the section "_Of the Sheriff's Turns_," it is said:

"The sheriffs by ancient ordinances hold several meetings twice in
the year in every hundred; _where all the freeholders within the
hundred_ are bound to appear for the service of their fees."--_Mirror
of Justices_, 50.

The following statute was passed by Edward I., seventy years after Magna
Carta:

"Forasmuch also as sheriffs, hundreders, and bailiffs of liberties,
have used to grieve those which be placed under them, putting in
assizes and juries men diseased and decrepit, and having continual or
sudden disease; and men also that dwelled not in the country at the
time of the summons; and summon also an unreasonable number of
jurors, for to extort money from some of them, for letting them go
in peace, and so the assizes and juries pass many times by poor men,
and the rich abide at home by reason of their bribes; it is ordained
that from henceforth in one ass