454 INDUSTRIAL INSTITUTIONS. 



And this segregation carried out, probably associated those 

 of the same stirp. Doubtless retaining their preceding- 

 pagan usages, along with the super-posed Christian creed, 

 the early English exhibited kindred relations. Says Breii- 

 tano &quot; The Craft-Gilds were, like the rest of the Gilds, at 

 the same time religious fraternities.&quot; According to its stat 

 utes the Abbotsbury Gild, dating from the time of Canute, 

 had for its purposes 



&quot;The support and nursing of infirm Gild-brothers, the burial of the 

 dead, and the performance of religious services, and the saying of 

 prayers, for their souls. The association met every year, on the feast 

 of St. Peter, for united worship in honour of their patron saint. 

 Besides this there was a common meal.&quot; 



&quot;The Exeter Gild . . . was of altogether the same character. 

 Here, however, association for the purpose of worship and prayer 

 stands out more prominently as the object of the brotherhood than in 

 the former case.&quot; 



The long survival of this religious character is shown by Mrs. 

 Green s digest of fifteenth century records. 



&quot;If a religious guild had become identified with the corporation, 

 the town body and the Church were united by a yet closer tie. The 

 corporation of Plymouth, which on its other side was the guild of our 

 Lady and St. George, issued its instructions even as to the use of vest 

 ments.&quot; 



But in its primitive form this multiplying family-group 

 out of which the industrial group developed (becoming as 

 time went on changed by the admission of those of other 

 blood) had not only a religious character but also a political 

 character; and tended to evolve within itself the essentials 

 of an independent social structure. 



790. The quasi-political autonomy of these early groups 

 was a concomitant of the enmities among them. Between 

 adjacent tribes of savages, trespasses frequently committed 

 generate chronic antagonisms; and chronic antagonisms 

 were similarly generated between settlements of the scarcely 

 less savage men from whom we have descended. Says Cun 

 ningham: 



