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1094 
conspire to produce it; but what- 
ever those errors may be, one point 
is clear—that they are all to be 
found in the laws. Without wander- 
ing from my subject, I may be per- 
mitted to observe, that the chief 
mistake lies in the faulty police of 
our villages. Many magistrates are 
misled by an ill-judged zeal, to 
suppose that the perfection of muni- 
cipal government consists in the 
subjection of the people ; they ima- 
gine that the great object of sub- 
ordination is accomplished, if the 
inhabitants tremble at the voice of 
Justice, and no one ventures to 
move, or even to breathe, at the 
very sound of her name. Hence 
any mob, any noise, or disturbance, 
is termed a riot or a tumult; and 
every little dispute or scuffle be- 
_ comes the subject of a criminal 
proceeding, involving in its conse- 
quences examinations and arrests, 
imprisonments and fines, with all 
the train of legal persecutions and 
vexations. Under such an oppres- 
Sive police, the people grow dispi- 
rited and disheartened ; and sacri- 
ficing their inclinations to their se- 
curity,they abjure diversions, which, 
though public and innocent, are 
replete with embarrasments, and 
have recourse to.solitude and inac- 
tion, dull and painful indeed to 
their feelings, but at least unmolest- 
ed by law, and unattended with 
danger. 
*¢ The same system has occasioned 
numberless regulations of police, 
not only injurious to the liberties, 
‘but prejudicial to the welfare and 
prosperity of the villages, yet not 
less harshly or less rigorously en- 
ANNUAL REGISTER, 1806. 
forced on that account. There are 
some places where music and ringing 
of bells*, others where balls and 
marriage suppers are prohibited. 
In one village the inhabitants must 
retire to their houses at the curfew, 
in another they must not appear in 
the streets without a light; they 
must not loiter about the corners, or 
stop in the porches; and in all they 
are subject to similar restraints and 
privations. 
‘¢ The rage for governing, in 
some cases perhaps the avarice of 
the magistrates has extended to the 
most miserable hamlets, regulations 
which would hardly be necessary in 
all the confusion of a metropolis ;and 
the wretched husbandman who has 
watered the earth with the sweat of 
his brow, and slept on the ground 
throughout the week, cannot on 
Saturday night baw] at his will in the 
streets of his village, or chaunt his 
ballad at the door of his sweetheart. 
‘¢ Even the province in which I 
live (Asturias), remarkable for the 
natural cheerfulness and innocent 
manners of its inhabitants, is not 
exempt from the hardship of similar 
regulations. Indeed the discontent 
which they produce, and which I 
have frequently witnessed, has sug- 
gested many of these reflections on 
the subject. The dispersion of its 
population fortunately prevents that 
municipal police, which has been 
contrived for regular villages and 
towns; the cottagers assemble for 
their diversions at a sort of a wake, 
called Romerias, or Pilgrimages. 
And there it is that the regulations 
of the police pursue and molest 
them. Sticks, which are used more 
_* There is a custom in Spanish villages of parading the streets on holiday nights 
with the bells taken from the mules and wethers. The rude kind of music they 
produce is called cencerrada. e 
mn): 
