502 INDUSTRIAL INSTITUTIONS. 



the command of Edgar &quot; that every man be in surety both 

 within the towns and without the towns/ 7 as well as that of 

 Edward the Confessor that &quot; all men are bound to be in a 

 guarantee by tens, so that if one of the ten men offend the 

 other nine may hold him to right/ illustrate that universal 

 system of bail in early days, under which, instead of the 

 family-group protecting and coercing its members, there 

 came groups otherwise formed doing the like. And in spite 

 of the changes progressing through the centuries, social re 

 lations of allied kinds persisted ; so that while each man be 

 longed to a manor or parish, the manor or parish was re 

 sponsible for him. 



Surviving usages suggest that after the labourer had 

 become nominally free, there continued, in the farmer s 

 household, usages which faintly simulated those of lord and 

 vassal. For as the old patriarchal relations were repeated in 

 the baronial hall, where superiors, seated higher, took their 

 meals along with their dependents; so, in the farm house, 

 even down to recent days, the labourers were members of the 

 family, in so far that they boarded with it and were under 

 family government : such of them as were not married being 

 probably provided with sleeping places in out-houses. And 

 some such arrangement was in large measure needful during 

 turbulent times, when safety was sought in mutual protec 

 tion. 



The freedom of the rural labourer has indeed long re 

 mained much qualified, and appears to be so still in some 

 districts. Already I have quoted Mr. Jefferics account 

 showing that the complete subordination of sons to fathers 

 continued among farmers in certain parts of the country 

 down to generations still surviving; and he points out that 

 a kindred coercion was simultaneously exercised over those 

 the farmer employed. 



&quot;These labouring men, like his own children, must do as the farmer 

 thought best. They must live here or there, marry so and so, or forfeit 

 favour in short, obey the parental head. Each farmer was king in 

 his own domain. 1 



