(301) peculiar to that body, that for a convict to be able to read (though never in holy orders,) was, of itself, sufficient to entitle him to the privilege of clergy. 4 Bl. Com. 367. The mere certificate of the ordinary or his deputy, legit ut clericus, (he reads as a clerk, like one of the clergy,) procured his immediate discharge from the temporal court. See Benefit of clergy, Clericus. The still rarer accomplishment of writing was so far engrossed by the clergy as, in the course of time, to obtain for any person who habitually used his pen, in any employment, the appellation of "a clerk," (clericus); and this circumstance, in addition to the fact that the judges of courts were for merly usually created out of the sacred order, and that all the inferior offices were supplied by the lower clergy, sufficiently accounts for the application of the term clerk (once peculiar to the clergy) to those officers of courts whose principal function was to use their pen in recording the proceedings. Termes de la Ley. 1 Bl. Com. 17. Selden's Diss. ad Fletam, ch. 9, sec. 3. (302) * plation of law, as when one man's landing proper for public inspection, are closed adjoins to another's in the same field. 3 up and sealed on the outside, and are thereBl. Com. 209, 210. In common acceptafore called writs close, (literæ clausa,) and tion, close means an enclosed field; but in are recorded in the close rolls, in the same law it rather signifies the separate interest manner as writs or letters patent are in the of the party in a particular spot of land, patent rolls. 2 Bl. Com. 346. whether enclosed or not. 7 East, 207. ** The terms writ and letter, or letters, Doct. & Stud. dial. 1, c. 8. appear to have anciently been synonymous. The idea of a close, as a piece of land adWrits were, in England, from the earliest joining and enclosing a dwelling-house, period, framed in the style of letters or and peculiarly privileged from entry or inepistles, and are frequently described as vasion, is of very great antiquity in Eurosuch. See Breve, Epistola, Litera, Writ. pean law, and is clearly traced by MontesLetters of attorney, on the other hand, quieu to the habits of the ancient Germans, were frequently termed writs. Bract. fol. of whom it is said by Tacitus,-Suam 40. The ancient justices in eyre acted unquisque domum spatio circumdat; every der the authority of writs or commissions one surrounds his house with a space of directed to them. Where there were sevground. De Mor. Germ. c. 16. Monteseral, each justice had a writ specially diquieu translates this passage "chacun laisse rected to himself, called breve clausum, a autour de sa maison un petit terrien ou close writ. Besides this, there was a writ space, qu'est clos et fermé," and refers to directed to all of them jointly, called breve some of the laws of the barbarian codes patens, a writ patent, which was publicly (as the law of the Allemans, c. 10, and the read at the opening of the eyre, as their law of the Bavarians, tit. 10, §§ 1, 2;) as warrant for holding the court. Bract. fol. containing decrees against those who threw 108, 109, et seq. Id. fol. 115 b. down this enclosure, as well as against those who broke into the house. Esprit de Lois, liv. 18, c. 22. This enclosure was called curtis (a court) in the ancient charters. See Court, Curtis.