e H A 



734 



C H A 



houses had been replaced by others more spacious 

 <.'ha?nparty anc j a i rV) an d consequently more healthy. 

 V ""~"Y""' It is to be feared, however, that these occasional 

 visits of strangers sometimes produce the very oppo- 

 site effect, by leading the people to prefer the high, 

 but precarious profits of being hired as guides, to 

 the more slow but sure gains of regular industry. 

 Hence we find a spirit of enterprise, and a desire of 

 acquiring sudden wealth, the great spring of all their 

 pursuits. For while the whole labours of the field 

 devolve upon the women, not even excepting those 

 severe labours, which in other countries are always 

 the peculiar province of the other sex, as ploughing 

 the fields, cutting the woods, mowing the hay, and 

 threshing the corn ; the men are employed as guides, 

 in searching for crystals, in hunting the chamois, or 

 in discovering the lurking places of the marmot. 

 (For a minute and interesting account of all these 

 occupations, we refer our readers to Saussure. ) The 

 same love of gain induces the remaining part of the 

 male population to go abroad to Paris and the cities 

 of Germany, or to hire themselves during the sum- 

 mer months to the people of the Tarentaise and the 

 valley of Aosta, for the purpose of making cheese, 

 in which they are said greatly to excel. Even their 

 winter amusements have something of the same cha- 

 racter, especially in the large villages, where the men, 

 perhaps for want of some employment to occupy 

 their active minds, pass the greater part of their time 

 in taverns, and play at games of hazard, in which 

 they have sometimes been known to risk their whole 

 property. In the small hamlets, however, the win- 

 ter evenings are spent in a different manner. The 

 whole village assemble in the house which has the 

 largest room with a fire. The women spin, dress 

 flax, and tell stories ; while the men occupy them- 

 selves in making milk-pails, spoons, and other utensils 

 in wood. The mistress of the house is at no other 

 expence for their entertainment than a pitcher of wa- 

 ter and a basket of wild apples, which are roasted 

 under the ashes. 



The men of Chamouni are of a middle stature, 

 stout and active. They have a lively and penetrating 

 air, and a gay character, inclined to raillery. They 

 are in general honest, faithful, religious, and parti- 

 cularly distinguished for acts of charity and benefi- 

 cence. They have no hospitals or foundations in 

 behalf of the poor ; but the old men and orphans, 

 who have no means of subsistence, live at the houses 

 of the inhabitants of the parish in regular succession. 

 The government of the valley is that of a small re- 

 public, and is entrusted to a register, a syndic, and 

 seven councillors. The chapter of Sallenche en- 

 joys the sovereignty in all ecclesiastical matters; 

 names the curates, and draws the church revenues. 

 The curate of the priory has the title of administra- 

 tor, because, besides possessing the cure of souls, he 

 has also the management of the temporalities of the 

 chapter, (s) 



CHAMPARTY, (campi partitio,) in English 

 law, an offence against public justice, whereby the 

 champertor engages to carry on, at his own expence, 

 the suit of the plaintiff or defendant, on condition of 

 having the land, or other property in dispute, divided 

 between them in the event of success in the suit. It 

 it a species of maintenance, or the undue encourage- 

 ment of law suits, to the oppression and disturbance 



of the honest and peaceable. Like that offence, it is Cfaanapioa 

 punished at common law by fine and imprisonment, fi 

 and by statute 32 Hen. VIII. c. 9. by a forfeiture 

 of ten pounds. Such avaricious or malignant distur- 

 bers of other men's quiet, have been regarded as pro- 

 per objects of chastisement by the laws of every well 

 regulated state, and particularly by those of ancient 

 Rome, which enact, qui improbe coeunt in alienam li- 

 tcm, nt quicquid ex condemnations in rem ipsius re- 

 daction Juerit, inter eos communicarctur, lege Julia 

 de vi privata, tenentur ; and accordingly perpetual in- 

 famy, with the forfeiture of a third part of their 

 goods, was the consequence of a conviction, (j. B.) 



CHAMPION, he who undertakes to maintain, 

 by single combat, his own right or that of another. 

 By the law of England, a species of trial was former- 

 ly in use, known by the name of wager qfbattel, a 

 rude mode of terminating disputes practised by most 

 barbarous nations. In this judicial combat, the parties 

 appeared either themselves, or (as came afterwards 

 to be more usually the case) by their champions, 

 having their armour on, and attended with every cir- 

 cumstance of pomp and ceremony that could give dig- 

 nity to the spectacle. The weapons used were more 

 or less dangerous according to the nature of the cause, 

 as military, civil, or criminal. The consequences 

 likewise, even when the unsuccessful combatant es- 

 caped unhurt, were more or less serious, both to the 

 champion himeself and his principal. If the cham- 

 pion of a woman, charged with a capital offence, was 

 overcome, or proved recreant, the woman was burnt, 

 and her champion hanged ; and so with regard to 

 smaller offences. Principals seem originally to have 

 been allowed to wage their battle from casualties of 

 sex, nonage, or other excusable disability ; but as the 

 better ranks became more effeminate, or wise, prox- 

 ies came to be allowed in all cases, being either re- 

 tained as a standing officer among the great lord's 

 other dependents, or hired for the special occasion. 



The king's champion is an officer still employed at 

 the coronation of our kings, as a relic of the ancient 

 manner of that solemnity. In the true spirit of the 

 wager of battel, he rides armed cap-a-pie into West- 

 minster Hall where the king is at dinner, and makes 

 challenge by proclamation of a herald, That if any 

 man shall deny the king's title to the crown, he is 

 there ready to defend it in single combat. The office 

 is hereditary. (j. B.) 



CHAMPLAIN LAKE. See CANADA, p. 330. 



CHANCELLOR, a judicial officer, who appears 

 originally to have been only a principal register or 

 scribe under the emperors ; but in modern times has 

 greatly advanced in dignity, having become, in dif- 

 ferent kingdoms of Europe, the chief administrator 

 of justice. The name has also been extended to a 

 variety of inferior officers, but all of them of a judi- 

 ciary character ; as chancellor of a diocese, or of a 

 bishop ; chancellor of a university, of the exchequer, 

 &c. Its etymology, as in so many other instances, 

 is disputed ; some deriving it from cancelli, because 

 anciently the cancellarius is said to have sat within 

 an inclosed place, or lattice, to protect him from the 

 press of persons who had occasion to transact busi- 

 ness with him : others preferring cancellare, to delete 

 or cancel, because, as the highest point of his juris- 

 diction, he has the right of cancelling, by his own 

 proper authority, the king's letters patent, when 



