Page:Ashorthistoryofwales.djvu/105

Rh whole Welsh march, between 1534 and 1543. Before his time a lord would keep murderers and robbers at his castle, protect them, and perhaps share their spoil. But no man could keep a felon out of the reach of Bishop Rowland Lee. If he could not get them alive he got their dead bodies; and you might have seen processions of men carrying sacks on ponies—they were dead men who were to swing on Ludlow gibbets. But, severe as Lee was, the peasant was glad that he could go to the Court at Ludlow instead of going to the court of a march lord, as he had to do before 1535. The shire had been much better governed than the lordship. When the lordship of Mawddwy was added to the shire of Merioneth in 1535, the officers of the shire found that it was a nest of brigands and outlaws.

In the more peaceful and humane days of Queen Elizabeth, Sir Henry Sidney became President of the Court of Wales. He was one of the best men of the day ; and he was proud of ruling Wales and the border counties, "a third part of this realm," because his high office made him able " to do good every day."

Besides the Court of Wales for the whole country, a court of justice was held in each