620 Transact tniis. — Miscellaneous. 



and for peace. Tins election of chieftains is a strange exception to the 

 ordinary custom of hereditary chieftainship. It is to be regretted that Mr. 

 Stubbs did not live and write in the days of our Stuart Kings and the men 

 who maintained the doctrine of " Divine Eight." 



Before converting the folkland into boclcmd, in order to keep his family 

 around him for purposes of defence, he (the Teuton) doubtless divided his 

 communal strip of cultivated land among his sons, share and share alike. 

 And when he individualized his title, the custom still ran. In some such 

 manner we may presume that the custom arose. 



Taken as a whole, I may say that the north-western nations of Europe 

 adopted this mode of inheritance in preference to the Asiatic communal 

 customs, which then- ancestors had brought with them from Asia Minor 

 during the course of the original migrations. The law of gavelkind is the 

 great opponent to any system of nationalization of land. It also flies 

 directly in the face of Leviticus, cap. xxv., 23: — " The land shall not be 

 sold for ever ; for the land is mine : Ye are but strangers and sojourners 

 with me." 



I would ask members to carefully read the Mosaic land laws as laid 

 down in Leviticus. It will be noticed that the peoples of Western Asia 

 apparently adopted a six-year rotation of crops. By the 50th Jubilee Year 

 too, all mortgaged property was to be returned to the mortgagor. A 

 curious mode of equalizing wealth, which of course failed. 



While thanking Mr. Wallace, therefore, for having directed our attention 

 to the state of the land question in England, Ireland, and Scotland, we 

 must not overlook the fact that the Bible places these words in the mouth 

 of the Deity : " The land shall not be sold for ever," and that the actions 

 of the north-western nations of Europe have run contrary to this 

 command. 



We may therefore now accept as a fact, that this custom of gavelkind, 

 this division among the sons, ran concurrently with the individualization of 

 landed property. But while this was taking place, William the Norman 

 conquered England, and imposed his law of primogeniture, under which all 

 the land evils of Great Britain have arisen and grown : the law of primo- 

 geniture, the law of primogeniture alone. 



William was a land nationalizator pure and simple. He compelled every 

 man to whom he had granted lands, to meet him upon Salisbury Plain, 

 within twenty years of his conquest, and swear to him that they held their 

 lands from him alone. Fifty-nine thousand men solemnly took this oath. 

 William had determined that every acre of land should be held from his 

 Crown. Strange to say, it is not until every vestige of this law, this con- 

 quest has been swept away, and we return to the customs of Saxon 



