e
blending of an hotel dining-room and a Court of Justice, has
nevertheless a link with the far distant past more wonderful
than anything that has come down to us in the ruins of Greece
or Rome.

Look at the simple card that notifies the dates of holding
the Vederer's Court. Here is an old one which the Verderer,
Philip Baylis, has kindly sent to Senator Hoar in response
to his request for a copy.

V. R.
Her Majesty's Forest of Dean,
Gloucestershire,
VERDERERS' COURT.
Verderers:
Charles Bathurst, Esq. Sir Thomas H.
Crawley-Boevey, Bart.
Maynard Willoughby Colchester-Wemyss, Esq.
Russell James Kerr, Esq.
Deputy-Surveyor:
Philip Baylis, Esq.
Steward:
James Wintle.
----NOTICE----
The VERDERERS of Her Majesty's Forest of Dean hereby give
Notice that the COURT of ATTACHMENT of our Sovereign Lady
the Queen for the said Forest will be holden by adjournment, at
the Speech House, in the said Forest, at half-past Two o'clock, in
the afternoon, on the following days during the year 1897, viz.:
Wednesday, the 27th January;
Monday, the 8th March;
Saturday, the 17th April;
Thursday, the 27th May;
Tuesday, the 6th July;
Monday, the 16th August;
Friday, the 24th September;
Wednesday, the 3rd November;
Monday, the 13th December;
James Wintle,
Steward.
Newnham, 1st January, 1897.

Many years ago I stood in the Court Room examining a similar
notice, puzzled at the absence of any system or order in the
times appointed for the sittings, which did not come once
a month, or every six weeks; and did not even fall twice in
succession on the same day of the week. Turning to the landlord
of the hotel I asked, "What is the rule for holding the Court?
_When_ is it held?" _"Every forty days at twelve o'clock
at noon"_ was the reply. Reflection showed that so strange
a periodicity related to no notation of time with which we
are now in touch; it must belong to a system that has passed
away; but what could this be?

We are reminded by the date of the building we are in (1680),
that the room itself cannot have been used for much more than
two centuries for holding the Courts.

But there was a Verderer's Court held in several Forests
besides this Forest of Dean, long before the Stuart days.
The office itself is mentioned in Canute's Forest charter,
dating back nearly nine hundred years; and as at that period
about a third of England was covered with Forests, the