20
Lord of a Manor in Epping Forest who had made en-
closures, and against two persons claiming to hold
enclosed lands by purchase from Lords of Manors,
these two cases being chosen as representative cases
to test the legality of all other enclosures held by persons
in a similar position. The right which the Plaintiffs
in that suit asserted was that they were owners and
occupiers of about 200 acres of land within the ancient
limits of the forest, and that they were entitled in res-
pect of that ownership and occupation to a right of
common of pasture over all the wastes of the Forest,
and that any enclosures which had heen made within
twenty years preceding the date of the filing of that
Bill were unlawful as against the Plaintiffs, and all
other owners and occupiers of lands within the Forest,
Whether in consequence of this spirited procedure
of the Corporation, or in consequence of the address
to the Crown carried in the House of Commons it is
not necessary to enquire, but a Bill was brought into
Parliament on the 5th July, in the same Session of
.1871, appointing certain Commissioners to enquire
into the enclosures in Epping Forest, and to report what
steps should be taken for preserving that Forest for the
use of the public. It was to say the least, strange
that the preamble of the bill should recite the address
of 1870, and that no action should have been taken
upon that address until the Corporation had vigorously
taken up the subject fifteen months afterwards.