i92 MANORIAL ADMINISTRATION
formed the first item (frequently misstated, as we have seen) on
the next year's account. Whether it were the same reeve or
another, there it appeared on record, and we see it slowly dwind-
ling as, bit by bit, it is accounted for by the debtor. Thus at
Stevenage,in Hertfordshire, in 1284,3 sometime reeve made two
payments—one of ics. 6^d. and another of 5$.—being part of the
arrears on his compotus of the previous year; while during 1285
he paid a further 20s.1 Sometimes the lord was not so sure of his
man, and in such cases he took care to demand adequate sureties.
One reeve has to find twenty-five pledges that he will pay up his
arrears within the next year sine ulteriore dilations? while another
outgoing reeve finds four sureties that he will pay twenty marks
of silver (£13. 6$. 8d.) of the arrears due from him on his account
within the next nine months.3 Even more severe measures might
be taken, for we read of Roger Losse who was put in the stocks
"for arrears of his accounts and not for any other cause",4 while
the auditors of the monks of Canterbury handed over one of their
bailiffs to the Sheriff of Kent to be kept in the county gaol.6
As we have already seen, on many manors when a manorial
officer went out of office he was given a document either acquit-
ting him entirely, or stating what he owed his lord, and setting
forth exactly what stock and grain there was left on the manor.6
A duplicate of this was sewn on the compotus for the year, where
it might be referred to when necessary.7 Once the reeve had re-
ceived this chirograph acquittance he could, if not reappointed,
safely retire again into his humble obscurity, from whence he
had been drawn to play so important a part in the affairs of his
rural community.
1 Min. Ace. 870/9, 10; cf. 859/23, 930/5, 998/25.
* Ibid. 1070/8; cf. H20/II.
8 Hales Rolls, 259; Min. Ace. 1078/13, where men are given three years in
which to pay arrears.
4 Derby Arch. Soc. XXXT, 122. 6 Lit. Cant, II, 168.
6 See above, p. 166. 7 Min. Ace. 1030/8, 1070/8, 1297/23.