about tenure by barony to pass
it over as obsolete, or this arose from negligence alone, it cannot be
doubted that the proviso preserving the right of sitting in parliament
by a feudal honour was introduced in order to save that privilege, as
well for Arundel and Abergavenny as for any other that might be entitled
to it.[470]

NOTE X. Page 142.

The equitable jurisdiction of the Court of Chancery has been lately
traced, in some respects, though not for the special purpose mentioned
in the text, higher than the reign of Richard II. This great minister of
the crown, as he was at least from the time of the Conquest,[471] always
till the reign of Edward III. an ecclesiastic of high dignity, and
honourably distinguished as the keeper of the king's conscience, was
peculiarly intrusted with the duty of redressing the grievances of the
subject, both when they sprung from misconduct of the government,
through its subordinate officers, and when the injury had been inflicted
by powerful oppressors. He seems generally to have been the chief or
president of the council, when it exerted that jurisdiction which we
have been sketching in the text, and which will be the subject of
another note. But he is more prominent when presiding in a separate
tribunal as a single judge.

The Court of Chancery is not distinctly to be traced under Henry III.
For a passage in Matthew Paris, who says of Radulfus de Nevil--"Erat
regis fidelissimus cancellarius, et inconcussa columna veritatis,
singulis sua jura, praecipue pauperibus, juste reddens et indilate," may
be construed of his judicial conduct in the council. This province
naturally, however, led to a separation of the two powers. And in the
reign of Edward I. we find the king sending certain of the petitions
addressed to him, praying extraordinary remedies, to the chancellor and
master of the rolls, or to either separately, by writ under the privy
seal, which was the usual mode by which the king delegated the exercise
of his prerogative to his council, directing them to give such remedy as
should appear to be consonant to honesty (or equity, _honestati_).
"There is reason to believe," says Mr. Spence (Equitable Jurisdiction,
p. 335), "that this was not a novelty." But I do not know upon what
grounds this is believed. Writs, both those of course and others, issued
from Chancery in the same reign. (Palgrave's Essay on King's Council, p.
15.) Lord Campbell has given a few specimens of petiti