Page:The History of the Church & Manor of Wigan part 1.djvu/148

136 giving charge to enquire of bloodshed, the said Richard Moore had challenged his authority to do so unless it were drawn or shed within certain limits of time and place. They further deposed that they did not know whether any of the inhabitants of Wigan ought of right to do any suit or service to the said parson's leet or to his three week's court, that most of them had done so, until now of late, to be and pass upon juries there, but that some had departed out of the court and would not be sworn, among whom were the said John Scott and Geoffrey Pilkington and others whose names they did not certainly remember. That James Henryson, servant of the bishop about the [blank] day of February last, did make an assault upon one Christopher Sweeting, and the said Richard Moore, being Mayor of Wigan, went to the place where the assault was committed and sent Henryson to prison; but that on finding sureties for keeping the peace he was liberated; that about the [blank] day of August, being Sunday, when the parishioners were gathered together at divine service, William Straitbarell [mentioned in the bill of complaint as one of the bishop's servants who had been misused and falsely imprisoned] being accompanied by a number of persons and a "mynstrell called a pyper" went through the said church to the Table whereupon the Communion is administered and did cause the said piper to play upon a "paire of graitt and lowde bagg-pypes," whereupon the said Mayor did "gently require the said piper to cease." That some time after the said Straitbarell came to the Mayor in Wigan and asked him "What he hadde to do to cause the said pyper to cease and leave hys playinge," and did then speak these words to the Mayor, "Thou art a very foole and more mete to be a swynnarde than a Mayor," with many other evil and opprobrious words. That the said Straitbarell was thereupon committed to prison, but upon his submission and acknowledgment of his offence was set at liberty. That they did not know that any attachment had been awarded against the said Richard Moore and others on the suit of the said bishop and Sir Thomas Langton, but had heard that such had been awarded and