in.] DISTRIBUTION OF LAND IN ENGLAND. 9 



doubt, reinforced, and supported by a large immi- 

 gration of their countrymen ; but still after 

 deducting those who fell in the struggle with the 

 Romanised Britons, the residue must have formed 

 a scanty band, when considered in connection with 

 the extent of territory which lay at their disposal. 

 They, however, were the ancestors of the kings and 

 Saxon nobility of England. Is it to be supposed 

 that these conquerors first ravaged the open country, 

 and then began to cultivate it, in small properties, 

 with their own hands ? Is it not more probable, that 

 the principal men among them took possession of the 

 Roman villas, with which the country was studded, 

 and cultivated the land like their immediate pre- 

 decessors, by means of forced labour ? I find no 

 reason for holding, that the Saxon invaders of England 

 differed greatly from the Germans as described by 

 Tacitus strenuous in war, slothful in peace. " Nee 

 arare terram, aut expectare annonam, tarn facile 

 persuaseris, quam vocare hostes et vulnera mereri : 

 pigrum quinimmo et iners videtur sudore adquirere 

 quod possis sanguine parare." Germania, cap. 14. 



All conquerors and colonists bring with them 

 their own laws and customs. Now, in Germany, the 

 land was cultivated, according to the same testimony 

 of Tacitus, by men who were not free, though not, 

 like the Roman slaves, in a state of absolute bondage ; 

 the German serfs having separate dwellings and 

 occupying portions of land, whilst rendering a return 



