APPRENTICESHIP. 
which is the proper Latin name for any 
incorporation whatever. The university, 
of smiths, the university of tailors, &c. are 
expressions commonly occurring in the old 
charters of ancient towns. When those 
particular incorporations, which are now 
peculiarly called universities, were first 
established, the term of years during which 
it was necessary to study, in order to ob- 
tain the degree of Master of Arts, appears 
evidently to have been copied from the 
term of apprenticeship in common trades, of 
which the incorporations were much more 
ancient. As to have wrought seven years 
under a master properly qualified, was ne- 
cessary to entitle any person to become a 
master, and to have himself apprentices, 
in a common trade, so to have studied se- 
ven years under a master properly quali- 
fied, was necessary to entitle him to be- 
come a master, teacher, or doctor (words 
anciently synonymous) to study under him. 
By the 5th of Elizabeth, commonly called 
the statute of apprenticeship, it was enact- 
ed, that no person should, for the future, 
exercise any trade, craft, or mystery, at 
that time exercised in England, unless he 
had previously served to it an apprentice- 
ship of seven years at least ; and thus, what 
before had been the bye-law of many par- 
ticular corporations, became in England 
the general and public law of all trades car- 
ried on in market-towns. To country vil- 
lages the term of seven years apprentice- 
ship doth not extend ; but the limitation of 
this statute to trades exercised before it was 
passed, has given occasion to several distinc- 
tions, which, considered as rules of police, 
appear as foolish as can well be imagined. 
A coacbmaker, for instance, has no right to 
make, or employ journeymen for making, 
coach-wheels : but lie must buy them of a 
master wheel-wright, this latter trade hav- 
ing been exercised in England before the 
5th of Elizabeth. But a wheel-wright, 
though he has never served an apprentice- 
ship to a coachmaker, may, by himself or 
journeyman, make coaches, because this 
trade, being of a later origin, is not within 
the statute. Thus also the manufactures of 
Manchester, Birmingham, and Wolverhamp- 
ton, are, many of them, upon this account, 
not within the statute, not having been ex- 
ercised in England before the 5th of Eliza- 
beth. 
The regulations of apprenticeship in Ire- 
land are upon a different footing, and some- 
what less illiberal than in England. Prohi- 
bitions similar to those of the statute of the 
5th of Elizabeth, obtain in all corporate 
towns, by authority of bye-laws of the several 
corporations : but these prohibitions extend 
only to natives of Ireland ; for by a regula- 
tion made by the lord lieutenant and privy- 
council having in this instance, by 17 and 
18 Car. II. the force of a law, all foreigners 
and aliens, as well persons of other reli- 
gious persuasion as Protestants, who are 
merchants, traders, artificers, &x. shall, 
upon coming to reside in a city, walled 
town, or corporation, and paying twenty 
shillings, by way of fine to the chief magi- 
strate and common-council, or other per- 
sons authorized to admit freemen, be ad- 
mitted to the freedom of that city, &c. and 
to the freedom of guilds of their respective 
trades, with the full enjoyment of all privi- 
leges of buying, selling, working, &c. ; and 
any magistrate refusing to admit foreigners 
so applying, shall be disfranchised. 
In Scotland, there is no general law which 
regulates universally the duration of ap- 
prenticeships. The term is different in dif- 
ferent corporations ; where it is long, a 
part of it may generally be redeemed by 
paying a small fine. In most towns, too, a 
very small fine is sufficient to purchase the 
freedom of any corporation. The weavers 
of linen and hempen cloth, the principal 
manufactures of the country, as well as all 
other artificers subservient to them, wheel- 
makers, reel-makers, &c. may exercise their 
trades in any town corporate, without pay- 
ing any fine. In all towns corporate, all 
persons are free to sell butchers’ meat upon 
any lawful day of the week. Three years 
are, in Scotland, a common term of appren- 
ticeship, in some very nice trades ; and, in 
general, there is no country in Europe in 
Which corporation laws are so little oppres- 
sive. In France the duration of appren- 
ticeships is different in different towns, and 
in different trades. In Paris, 5 years are the 
term required in a great number ; and before 
any person can be qualified to exercise the 
trade as a master, he must, in many of them, 
serve 5 years more as a journeyman. During 
this latter time he is called the companion of 
his master, and the term itselfis called his com- 
panionship. The institution of long appren- 
ticeships, says Dr. Smith, can give no security 
that insufficient workmanship shall not fre- 
quently be exposed to sale ; nor has it any 
tendency to form joung people to industry. 
Apprenticeships were altogether unknown 
to the ancients : the Roman law is perfectly 
silent with regard to them. There is no 
Greek or Latin word which expresses the 
