§ MR. PEEKasked Mr. Attorney General, Whether any obstacle exists to the revival of the Verderers' Court having jurisdiction over Epping Forest, as the only means of preserving it in the interest of the public; and, whether he will issue the necessary orders for the election of a verderer by the freeholders of Essex, in accordance with ancient usage?
THE ATTORNEY GENERAL, in reply, said, the hon. Member seemed not to be aware that the Verderers' Court had for some time been obsolete. That was, however, the fact, and he very much questioned whether it could be revived, one of the obstacles in the way of its revival being that if it were to sit and pronounce judgments there was apparently no machinery by which they could be enforced. He could not, he might add, acquiesce in the assumption contained in the Question, that the jurisdiction of such a Court afforded the only means of preserving Epping Forest in the interest of the public. In reply to the second part of the Question, he had to state that the election of a Verderer was held in pursuance of a writ issued by the order of the Court of Chancery, and not by the Attorney General.