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of them the least trace of any character or letter to be found. The parti ble quality also of lands by the custom of gavel-kind, which still obtains in many parts of England, and did universally over Wales till the reign of Henry VIII. is undoubtedly of British original. So likewise is the ancient division of the goods of an intestate between his widow and children, or next of kin; which has since been revived by the statute of distributions. And we may also remember an instance of a slighter nature mentioned in the present volume, where the same custom has continued from Cæsar's time to the present; that of burning a woman guilty of the crime of petit treason by killing her husband (1).

The great variety of nations, that successively broke in upon [*409] and destroyed both the British inhabitants and constitution, the Romans, the Picts, and after them, the various clans of Saxons and Danes, must necessarily have caused great confusion and uncertainty in the laws and antiquities of the kingdom; as they were very soon incorporated and blended together, and therefore we may suppose, mutually communicated to each other their respective usages (a), in regard to the rights of property and the punishment of crimes. So that it is morally impossible to trace out with any degree of accuracy, when the several mutations of the common law were made, or what was the respective origi. nal of those several customs we at present use, by any chemical resolution of them to their first and component principles. We can seldom pronounce, that this custom was derived from the Britons; that was left behind by the Romans; this was a necessary precaution against the Picts; that was introduced by the Saxons; discontinued by the Danes, but afterwards restored by the Normans.

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Wherever this can be done, it is matter of great curiosity, and some use: but this can very rarely be the case; not only from the reason above mentioned, but also from many others. First, from the nature of traditional laws in general; which, being accommodated to the exigencies of the times, suffer by degrees insensible variations in practice (b) so that, though upon comparison we plainly discern the alteration of the law from what it was five hundred years ago, yet it is impossible to define the precise period in which that alteration accrued, any more than we can discern the changes of the bed of a river, which varies its shores by continual decreases and alluvions. Secondly, this becomes impracticable from the antiquity of the kingdom and its government which alone, though it had been disturbed by no foreign invasions, would make it impossible to search out the original of its laws; unless we had as authentic monuments, thereof, as the Jews had by the hand of Moses (c). Thirdly, [410] *this uncertainty of the true origin of particular customs must also in part have arisen from the means, whereby christianity was propagated among our Saxon ancestors in this island; by learned foreigners brought over from Rome and other countries, who undoubtedly carried with them many of their own national customs; and probably prevailed 'pon the state to abrogate such usages as were inconsistent with our holy religion, and to introduce many others that were more conformable thereto And this perhaps may have partly been the cause, that we find not only some rules of the mosaical, but also of the imperial and pontifical laws blendea and adopted into our own system.

(a) Hal. Hist. C. L. 62.

(b) Ibid. 57

(c) Hal. Hist. C. L. 59.

(1) But this is now altered by 9 Geo. IV. c. 31. See ante, p 204

A farther reason may also be given for the great variety, and of course the uncertain original, of our ancient established customs; even after the Saxon government was firmly established in this island: viz. the subdivi sion of the kingdom into an heptarchy, consisting of seven independent kingdoms, peopled and governed by different clans and colonies. This must necessarily create an infinite diversity of laws: even though all those colonies, of Jutes, Angles, Anglo-Saxons, and the like, originally sprung from the same mother-country, the great northern hive; which poured forth its warlike progeny, and swarmed all over Europe, in the sixth and seventh centuries. This multiplicity of laws will necessarily be the case in some degree, where any kingdom is cantoned out into any provincial establishments; and not under one common dispensation of laws, though under the same sovereign power. Much more will it happen, where seven unconnected states are to forin their own constitution and superstructure of government, though they all begin to build upon the same or similar foundations.

When therefore the West Saxons had swallowed up all the rest, and king Alfred succeeded to the monarchy of England, whereof his grandfather Egbert was the founder, his mighty genius prompted him to undertake a most great and necessary work, which he is said to have executed in as "masterly a manner: no less than to new-model the con- [*411] stitution; to rebuild it on a plan that should endure for ages; and, out of its old discordant materials, which were heaped upon each other in a vast and rude irregularity, to form one uniform and well connected whole. This he effected, by reducing the whole kingdom under one regular and gradual subordination of government, wherein each man was answerable to his immediate superior for his own conduct and that of his nearest neighbours: for to him we owe that master-piece of judicial polity, the subdivision of England into tithings and hundreds, if not into counties; all under the influence and administration of one supreme magistrate, the king; in whom, as in a general reservoir, all the executive authority of the law was lodged, and from whom justice was dispersed to every part of the nation by distinct, yet communicating, ducts and channels; which wise institution has been preserved for near a thousand years unchanged, from Alfred's to the present time. He also, like another Theodosius, col lected the various customs that he found dispersed in the kingdom, and reduced and digested them into one uniform system or code of laws, in his Dom-bec, or liber judicialis. This he compiled for the use of the courtbaron, hundred, and county-court, the court-leet, and sheriff's tourn; tribunals, which he established, for the trial of all causes civil and criminal, in the very districts wherein the complaint arose all of them subject however to be inspected, controlled, and kept within the bounds of the universal or common law, by the king's own courts; which were then itinerant, being kept in the king's palace, and removing with his household in those royal progresses, which he continually made from one end of the kingdom to the other.

The Danish invasion and conquest, which introduced new foreign customs, was a severe blow to this noble fabric: but a plan so excellently concerted, could never be long thrown aside. So that, upon the expulsion of these intruders, the English returned to their ancient law; retaining, However, some few of the customs of their late visitants; which went "under the name of Dane-Lage: as the code compiled by [*412! VOL. II.

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Alfred was called the West-Saxon-Lage; and the local constitutions o. the ancient kingdom of Mercia, which obtained in the countries nearest to Wales, and probably abounded with many British customs, were called the Mercen-Lage. And these three laws were, about the beginning of the eleventh century, in use in different counties of the realm: the provincial polity of counties, and their subdivisions, having never been altered or discontinued through all the shocks and mutations of government, from the time of its first institution; though the laws and customs therein used, have (as we shall see) often suffered considerable changes.

For king Edgar (who, besides military merit, as founder of the English navy, was also a most excellent civil governor), observing the ill effects of three distinct bodies of laws, prevailing at once in separate parts of his dominions, projected and begun what his grandson king Edward the Confessor afterwards completed; viz. one uniform digest or body of laws to be observed throughout the whole kingdom; being probably no more than a revival of king Alfred's code, with some improvements suggested by necessity and experience; particularly the incorporating some of the British or rather Mercian customs, and also such of the Danish as were reasonable and approved, into the West-Saxon-Lage, which was still the groundwork of the whole. And this appears to be the best supported and most plausible conjecture (for certainty is not to be expected) of the rise and original of that admirable system of maxims and unwritten cus toms, which is now known by the name of the common law, as extending its authority universally over all the realm; and which is doubtless of Saxon parentage.

Among the most remarkable of the Saxon laws we may reckon, 1 The constitution of parliaments, or rather, general assemblies of the prin cipal and wisest men in the nation: the wittena-gemote, or commune con

silium of the ancient Germans, which was not yet reduced to the [*413] forms and distinctions of our modern parliament; without whose concurrence, however, no new law could be made, or old one altered. 2. The election of their magistrates by the people; originally even that of their kings, till dear-bought experience evinced the conveni ence and necessity of establishing an hereditary succession to the crown But that of all subordinate magistrates, their military officers or heretochs, their sheriffs, their conservators of the peace, their coroners, their port reeves (since changed into mayors and bailiffs), and even their tything-men and borsholders at the leet, continued, some till the Norman conquest, others for two centuries after, and some remain to this day. 3. The descent of the crown, when once a royal family was established, upon nearly the same hereditary principles upon which it has ever since continued; only that, perhaps, in case of minority, the next of kin of full would ascend the throne, as king, and not as protector; though, after his death the crown immediately reverted back to the heir. 4. The great paucity of capital punishments for the first offence; even the most notorious offend ers being allowed to commute it for a fine or weregild, or, in default of pay ment, perpetual bondage; to which our benefit of clergy has now in some measure succeeded. 5. The prevalence of certain customs, as heriot and military services in proportion to every man's land, which much resembled the feodal constitution; but yet were exempt from all its rigorous hardships and which may be well enough accounted for, by supposing them to be brought from the continent by the first Saxon invaders, in the

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primitive moderation and simplicity of the feodal law: Defore i got into the hands of the Norman jurists, who extracted the most slavish doctrines and oppressive consequences out of what was originally intended as a law of liberty. 6. That their estates were liable to forfeiture for treason, but that the doctrine of escheats and corruption of blood for felony, or any other cause, was utterly unknown amongst them. 7. The descent of their lands to all the males equally, without any right of primogeniture; a custom, which obtained among the Britons, was agreeable to the Roman law, and continued among the Saxons till the Norman conquest: *though really inconvenient, and more especially destructive to [*414] ancient families; which are in monarchies necessary to be supported, in order to form and keep up a nobility, or intermediate state between the prince and the common people. 8. The courts of justice consisted principally of the county courts, and in cases of weight or nicety the king's court held before himself in person, at the time of his parliaments; which were usually holden in different places, according as he kept the three great festivals of christmas, easter, and whitsuntide. An institution which was adopted by king Alonso VII. of Castile, about a century after the conquest: who at the same three great feasts was wont to assemble his nobility and prelates in his court; who there heard and decided all controversies, and then, having received his instructions, departed home (d). These county courts however differed from the mo dern ones, in that the ecclesiastical and civil jurisdiction were blended together, the bishop and the ealdorman or sheriff sitting in the same county court; and also that the decisions and proceedings therein were much more simple and unembarrassed: an advantage which will always attend the infancy of any laws, but wear off as they gradually advance to an tiquity. 9. Trials, among a people who had a very strong tincture of superstition, were permitted to be by ordeal, by the corsned, or morsel of execration, or by wager of law with compurgators, if the party chose it; but frequently they were also by jury: for, whether or no their juries consisted precisely of twelve men, or were bound to a strict unanimity; yet the general constitution of this admirable criterion of truth, and most impor tant guardian both of public and private liberty, we owe to our Saxon ancestors. Thus stood the general frame of our polity at the time of the Norman invasion; when the second period of our legal history com

mences.

II. This remarkable event wrought as great an alteration in our laws, as it did in our ancient line of king's: and though the alteration of the former was effected rather by the *consent of the people, than [*415] any right of conquest, yet that consent seems to have been partly extorted by fear, and partly given without any apprehension of the consequences which afterwards ensued.

1. Among the first of these alterations we may reckon the separation of the ecclesiastical courts from the civil: effected in order to ingratiate the new king with the popish clergy, who for some time before had been endeavouring all over Europe to exempt themselves from the secular power; and whose demands the conquerer, like a politic prince, thought it prudent to comply with, by reason that their reputed sanctity had a great influence over the minds of the people; and because all the little learning of the times was engrossed into their hands, which made them

(d) Mod. Un. Hist. xx. 114.

necessary men, and by all means to be gained over to his interests. And this was the more easily effected, because the disposal of all the episcopal sees being then in the breast of the king, he had taken care to fill them with Italian and Norman prelates.

2. Another violent alteration of the English constitution consisted in the depopulation of whole countries, for the purposes of the king's royal diversion; and subjecting both them and all the ancient forests of the kingdom, to the unreasonable severities of forest-laws imported from the continent, whereby the slaughter of a beast was made almost as penal as the death of a man. In the Saxon times, though no man was allowed to kill or chase the king's deer, yet he might start any game, pursue, and kill it, upon his own estate. But the rigour of these new constitutions vested the sole property of all the game in England in the king alone (2); and no man was entitled to disturb any fowl of the air, or any beast of the field, of such kinds as were specially reserved for the royal amusement of the sovereign, without express licence from the king by a grant of a chase or free-warren and those franchises were granted as much with a view to preserve the breed of animals as to indulge the subject. From a similar

principle to which, though the forest-laws are now mitigated, and [416] by degrees grown entirely obsolete, yet from this root has sprung a bastard slip, known by the name of the game-law, now arrived to and wantoning in its highest vigour: both founded upon the same unreasonable notions of permanent property in wild creatures; and both productive of the same tyranny to the commons; but with this dif ference, that the forest-laws established only one mighty hunter throughout the land, the game-laws have raised a little Nimrod in every manor And in one respect the ancient law was much less unreasonable than the modern for the king's grantee of a chase or free-warren might kill game in every part of his franchise; but now, though a freeholder of less than 100l. a year is forbidden to kill a partridge upon his own estate, yet nobody else (not even the lord of the manor, unless he hath a grant of freewarren) can do it without committing a trespass, and subjecting himself to an action.

3 A third alteration in the English laws was by narrowing the reme dial influence of the county courts, the great seats of Saxon justice, and extending the original jurisdiction of the king's justiciars to all kinds of causes, arising in all parts of the kingdom. To this end the aula regis, with all its multifarious authority, was erected; and a capital justiciary appointed, with powers so large and boundless, that he became at length a tyrant to the people, and formidable to the crown itself. The constitution of this court, and the judges themselves who presided there, were fetched from the duchy of Normandy: and the consequence naturally was the ordaining that all proceedings in the king's courts should be carried on in the Norman, instead of the English language. A provision the more necessary, because none of his Norman justiciars understood English; but La evident a badge of slavery as ever was imposed upon a conquered people. This lasted till king Edward the Third obtained a double victory, over the armies of France in their own country, and their language in our

courts here at home. But there was one mischief too deeply [417] rooted thereby, and which this caution of *king Edward came too late to eradicate. Instead of the plain and easy method of deter

(2) See this controverted, ante, 2 book, p. 419. n 9.

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