Certainly there are many legal
procedures besides trial by jury, through which a party's goods or
person may be taken. But one may doubt whether these were in
contemplation of the framers of Magna Carta. In an entry of the
Charter of 1217 by a contemporary hand, preserved in the
Town-clerk's office in London, called Liber Custumarum et
Regum antiquarum, a various reading, et per legem terrae, occurs.
Blackstone's Charters, p. 42 (41.) And the word vel is so frequently
used for et, that I amnot wholly free from a suspicion that it was
so intended in this place. The meaning will be, that no person shall
be disseized, &c;., except upon a lawful cause of action, found by
the verdict of a jury. This really seems as good as any of the
disjunctive interpretatios; but I do not offer it with much
confidence." 2 Hallam's Middle Ages, Ch. 8, Part 2, p. 449,
note." [29]
The idea that the word vel, should be rendered by and, is
corroborated, if not absolutely confirmed, by the following passage
in Blackstone, which has before been cited.
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