8 ENGLISH RURAL LIFE 



duty of bearing arms, of repairing strongholds and of 

 keeping bridges in order. 



(3) Then there was the right to administer justice. 

 This right appears as a rule to have been exercised in 

 early days only by way of appeal from the democratic 

 ' hundred ' courts dealt with below ; later on it was 

 extended and became a valuable perquisite, for justice 

 was a luxury and no one provided it free. It is true 

 that trials took place under what was substantially a 

 committee, got together for the purpose of the trial. 

 This committee consisted of men of the litigants' own 

 class, but the president of the court might be the 

 king or someone who held under the king ; and he, 

 whilst conducting the proceedings, took at least a part 

 of the fees and of the fines imposed on a wrongdoer. 



(4) Further, there was the right to regulate markets 

 and fairs and other forms of trading and fisheries, and 

 to take tolls in relation to these matters. 



(5) There was also a vague right akin to owner- 

 ship, which seems to have held good, so long as the 

 cultivators installed on the land were not interfered 

 with. As a result a ruler or his representative 

 could take over and cultivate, or colonize with his 

 dependents, any land in the country districts not 

 actually in use. 



(6) Lastly there was the right, that did not ap- 

 parently exist in early times, of levying king's taxes 

 or 'geld.' 



The kings, in place of retaining these rights in their 

 own hands, proceeded in many cases to distribute them, 

 reserving for themselves, as a general rule, the right to 

 levy king's taxes, and also the right to claim from land- 

 holding people the performance of ' the threefold duty.' 

 In the earliest days grants of these rights were generally 



