HISTORY AND NATURE OF LAWS. 



paid in the case of royal personages only ; a few 

 centuries back, men of any rank deemed them- 

 selves honoured by paying the like service to men 

 of the rank next above their own, or even to men 

 of their own rank who had the start of them in 

 age or reputation. The knight was served by 

 his esquire, and the master by his scholar.' 

 Apart from its more special political effects alto- 

 gether, may it not be owing to this principle, or 

 the spirit which engendered it, that we and the 

 other nations whose blood is in a preponderating 

 measure Teutonic, have escaped the allurements 

 of a false equality which has been so ruinous to 

 the Romanic races ? The esquire might become 

 a knight, the scholar a master, but the one was 

 not ashamed of acknowledging that he was an 

 esquire, or the other a scholar, so long as such 

 was the fact. The right which he claimed was 

 the right to rise, not the right to be treated 

 as if he had risen, which is that for which the 

 Romanic races so keenly contend, and which the 

 French Revolution is supposed to have vindicated. 

 Ultimately, no doubt, services were performed as 

 the consideration for feudal benefices, which would 

 not otherwise have been rendered. The menial 

 servant of the monarch might have tenants and 

 retainers under him ; and from this relation to the 

 crown which pervaded the whole system, the wages 

 ennobled the functions, and were ennobled by 

 them. Hence we have had in modern Europe 

 masters of the robes, grooms of the stole, 

 masters of the horse, &c. held by the highest 

 nobility of the realm. The graf, or land-steward 

 of a district, was an important personage. In- 

 stead of attending to the letting of paddocks 

 and the rotation of crops, he was intrusted 

 with the power of life and death over the in- 

 habitants. The humble grieve, who has the 

 management of a small landed estate in Scotland, 

 and the shire-reeve, or sheriff, who performs 

 judicial functions in the same part of the empire, 

 have divided, as it were, between them the original 

 duties of the feudal officer from whom their names 

 are derived. 



To the necessity of having acts regarding the 

 fiefs of a superior witnessed by his vassals, can be 

 traced two of the most important institutions of 

 modern times. The great vassals of a king, met 

 together in public assembly to discuss what aids 

 they might afford for their fiefs, how they were to 

 defend them, &c. merged into a great council or 

 legislature ; and it is to such a body that the 

 British parliament partly owes its origin. Vassals 

 of the lower grade were often summoned to attend 

 at the hall of their lord as assessors, or assizers, to 

 give, partly opinion, partly evidence, concerning 

 some matter connected with the fief, or the conduct 

 or rights of a fellow-vassal. With this institution, 

 the system of trial by jury is intimately connected. 

 A jury of perambulation, for the purpose of ascer- 

 taining boundaries a sort of body lineally de- 

 scended from the assemblage of co-vassals who 

 were present at the investiture, and witnessed the 

 extent of the gift has been known in modern times. 

 It was with a view to the preservation of evidence to 

 be produced before such juries, or, according to the 

 older custom, to have witnesses who should form 

 part of them, that the singular practice, still ob- I 

 served in some places in England, of ' beating the 

 bounds' by a band of schoolboys with white wands, 

 was instituted ; and the still quainter practice of 



beating the boys themselves, in order to fix the 

 transaction in their memories. 



It is probable that if the feudal system had only 

 established a relation between the monarch and 

 his immediate vassals, the influence it would have 

 exercised over the state of Europe would have 

 been comparatively slight The distribution of 

 land as the reward of services, is frequently exem- 

 plified in history ; but that which chiefly distin- 

 guished the feudal system, is the numerous grades 

 of dependence, and the manner in which all parts 

 of society, from the emperor to the lowest serf, 

 were bound together in one system of lord and 

 vassal. The highest feudal noble was the Here- 

 toch or Herzog, the leader of the Heer, or army, 

 who, from the Latin dux, a leader, received 

 amongst the Romanic nations the designation of 

 duke : this class was intrusted with the adminis- 

 tration of large provinces. The graf, who had a 

 smaller charge, was called comes, or count ; and 

 one class of graf, who was intrusted with the 

 marches, was called the mark-graf, mar-grave, 

 or marquis. These nobles generally held lands of 

 their sovereign, while they were authorised to re- 

 present his person over the districts to which they 

 were assigned, administering justice in his name, 

 levying his feudal exactions on his vassals, and 

 receiving their homage. 



From these high personages, vassalage went 

 through many gradations, till it reached a con- 

 dition not greatly superior to slavery. There 

 were the vavassors and ch&telains, dependents 

 on the higher nobility, but who themselves had 

 large estates and fortified their houses. There 

 were the burghers of free towns, whose privileges 

 have been already mentioned. Of rank corre- 

 sponding in the rural districts, were the socage- 

 holders, and the class so well known in England 

 by the designation yeomen. The lowest grade 

 were the villains or serfs, to whom was committed 

 the task of tilling the lands which the soldier 

 gained or protected. 



THE LAW OF ENGLAND. 



England has already been mentioned as an 

 exception to the general prevalence in Europe of 

 the civil and canon laws. So in the parliament 

 held at Merton in 1236, the barons of England 

 refused to admit the canon law legitimation by 

 subsequent marriage, giving as their sole reason, 

 ' Nolumus mutari leges Angliae.' This resistance 

 was due to the existence of a different and 

 hostile system, called the common law, and the 

 large power exercised by parliament of making 

 new laws or statutes. The three great elements 

 of the jurisprudence of England have for many 

 centuries been the common law, equity law, and 

 the statute law. 



Common Law. 



Speaking of the common law, Sir Matthew 

 Hale, its historian, says : ' This is that law by 

 which proceedings and determinations in the 

 king's ordinary courts of justice are directed and 

 guided. This directs the course of descents of 

 lands, and the kinds, the natures, and the extents 

 and qualifications of estates ; therein, also, the 

 manner, forms, ceremonies, and solemnities of 

 transferring estates from one to another ; the rules 

 of settling, acquiring, and transferring of properties; 



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