silver and given to Brougham, Thethe Story other half of the mustGreat never go Seal. outside the kingdom is393 of
similarly set he bestowed upon Lyndhurst. Great reverence has been shown from the earliest times for the " clavis regni" as Lord Coke terms the Great Seal. Round it has gathered a store of curious learning and anti quated practice. Concealed in its immemo rial purse its history is wrapped in mystery, sometimes in romance, and it is always asso ciated with the fate of the nation. Its pre cise origin is difficult to ascertain. Edward the Confessor had a Great Seal, the Norman kings were represented on the one side enthroned and on the reverse seated on horseback. John actually put the Great Seal up to auction and sold it to Walter de Gray during the term of his natural life for the sum of 5,000 marks, but after six years de Gray parted with it not entirely of free will. The custodian of the seal was not neces sarily the Chancellor, his title properly was Lord Keeper, a distinction which occurs as late as the eighteenth century. There is one instance at least of a Lady Keeper, Queen Eleanor, wife of Henry III., who kept the Great Seal when her husband was in Gascony in 1253. At that period the seal was usually engraved REX ANGLI^E ET FRANCIS on one side and REX FRAN CIS ET ANGLLE on the reverse. To counterfeit the Great Seal was at all times a heinous crime. Bracton speaks of it as high treason, and Glanville writes to the sameeffect. By the statute of 25 Edward III. it was de clared to be high treason, and with trifling exceptions it has remained so to this day. The object aimed at was not the benefit of the King but the protection and safeguarding of the privileges of the subjects. Once the Great Seal was affixed to any document nothing could avail against it. By a false seal the King might without his Chancellor's knowl edge improperly barter away the legal rights of his subjects. The rule that the Great Seal
comparatively modern growth. In Plantagenet times it was frequently taken abroad and during its absence another seal was made and used in its stead. Of this practice there were instances in the reign of Edward I. Yet in later years we find it alleged as one of the articles of impeachment against Wolsey that he took the Great Seal out of the kingdom, namely to Calais, without the authority of the King or of Parliament. The loss of the Great Seal was a serious affair of state, for without it the business of the kingdom could not be conducted. There is the well known instance of James II. throwing the Great Seal into the Thames on the eventful night of 10 December, 1688, when he fled from Westminster on his way to France. It was shortly afterwards recov ered in the net of a fisherman near Lambeth, and the lucky finder was handsomely re warded. After the battle of Worcester in 165 1 the Great Seal of Charles II. was lost, probably it was thrown into the Severn; at any rate it was never seen again. This did not dislocate the national business, because some years before the Long Parliament had ordered a new Great Seal to be prepared to take the place of the one which had been carried away by Charles I. to Oxford. The custody of this new seal was entrusted to six Commissioners. There was much discussion and considerable opposition before this vital step was taken. No precedent was to be found for making a new Great Seal when the original seal was within the kingdom and still retaining its potentiality. In support of the resolution of the Commons the learned Prynne wrote an elaborate treatise of justifi cation setting forth reasons why the action of Parliament was necessary and lawful. It is a common error to imagine that the seal is never in the custody of the monarch. No doubt it was properly meant to be in the
