Legal historian Sir John Baker writes that Ayton was primarily a teacher: his gloss is filled with humor and lively examples crafted to keep a student's attention. On one law ordering that clergy should not keep concubines publicly in their houses, but should discard them within a month, Ayton points out that the law does not concern clergy that keep concubines secretly, and that penalty is avoided if a clergy keeps a concubine on and off, as long as he never keeps her for a month at a time. Ayton uses the law as an opportunity to point out in an amusing way the importance of precise draftsmanship. (Baker, Monuments of Endlesse Labours, 1998 at 39)