Page:John Wycliff, last of the schoolmen and first of the English reformers.djvu/368

 an end, and authority had renewed its sway. The strong course would have been to confirm the amnesty and the emancipation, to compensate those who had suffered from mob violence, to keep the word of the King, and to maintain the supremacy and impartiality of the law. Richard's Council acted fairly enough in suggesting to Parliament that the serfs should have their liberty. The land-owners would not listen to it, wrongly supposing that things could be put back on their old footing, and urging that the King had no right to take away their chattels without their consent—which, said they, "we have never given, and never will give, if we were all to die on the same day." That was at the beginning of the autumn session of 1381; and though many members came up prepared to think more of redress than of vengeance, the majority were bent on a policy of stern repression. It was determined that the promises extorted from the King by force were not binding, and ought not to be kept. Amongst these promises were a large number of individual manumissions, and some half-dozen charters of emancipation and pardon to the serfs of different counties, drawn up in the following terms:

"Richard by the grace of God King of England and France, and Lord of Ireland, to all his stewards and trusty servants to whom this present letter may come, greeting. Know ye that by our special grace we have manumitted all our lieges and bondmen of the county of, and we have freed them from all bondage, themselves and each of them, and do satisfy them by these presents; and moreover we