FOREST-LAWS, are peculiar laws different from the common law of England. Before the making of Charta de Foresta, in the time of king John and his son Henry III. confirmed in parliament by 9 Henry III. offences committed therein were punished at the pleasure of the king in the severest manner. By this charter, many forests were disafforested and stripped of their oppressive privileges, and regulations were made for the government of those that remained; particularly, killing the king's deer was made no longer a capital offence, but only punished by fine, imprisonment, or abjuration of the realm: yet even in the charter there were some grievous articles, which the clemency of later princes have since by statute thought fit to alter per assisas foresta. And to this day, in trespasses relating to the forest, voluntas reputabitur pro facto; so that if a man be taken hunting a deer, he may be arrested as if he had taken a deer.