1.] [**** Spel.

Gloss, in verbo Justiciarii.] [***** Madox, Hist.Exch.p.27, 29, 83, 38, 41, 54.

The Normans introduced the practice of sealing charters; and the chancellor's office was to keep the great seal.
Ingulph.Dugd.p.33, 34.] [****** Madox, Hist, of the Exch.p.134, 135.
Gerv.Dorob.p, 1387,] [******* Madox.Hist.of the Exch.p.56, 70.] [******** Dial, de Scac.p.30, apud Madox, Hist, of the Exch.] Law now became a science, which at first fell entirely into the hands of the Normans; and which, even after it was communicated to the English, required so much study and application, that the laity in those ignorant ages were incapable of attaining it, and it was a mystery almost solely confined to the clergy, and chiefly to the monks[*] The great officers of the crown, and the feudal barons, who were military men, found themselves unfit to penetrate into those obscurities; and though they were entitled to a seat in the supreme judicature, the business of the court was wholly managed by the chief justiciary and the law barons, who were men appointed by the king, and entirely at his disposal.[**] This natural course of things was forwarded by the multiplicity of business which flowed into that court, and which daily augmented by the appeals from all the subordinate judicatures of the kingdom.
In the Saxon times, no appeal was received in the king's court, except upon the denial or delay of justice by the inferior courts; and the same practice was still observed in most of the feudal kingdoms of Europe.
But the great power of the Conqueror established at first in England an authority which the monarchs in France were not able to attain till the reign of St.Lewis, who lived near two centuries after: he empowered his court to receive appeals both from the courts of barony and the county courts, and by that means brought the administration of justice ultimately into the hands of the sovereign.[***] And, lest the expense or trouble of a journey to court should discourage suitors, and make them acquiesce in the decision of the inferior judicatures, itinerant judges were afterwards established, who made their circuits throughout the kingdom, and tried all causes that were brought before them.[****] [* Malms, lib.iv.p.

123.] [** Dugd.Orig.Jurid.p.

25.] [*** Madox, Hist.