of large and small estates. CH. I. which at the present time will be effectively appreciated. It is a common matter of dispute Respective advantages whether landed estates should be large or small; whether it is better that the land should be divided among small proprietors, cultivating their own ground, or that it should follow its present tendency, and be shared by a limited and constantly diminishing number of wealthy landlords. The advocates for a peasant proprietary tell us truly, that a landed monopoly is dangerous; that the possession of a spot of ground, though it be but a few acres, is the best security for loyalty, giving the state a pledge for its owner, and creating in the body of the nation a free, vigorous, and manly spirit. The advocates for the large estates tell us, that the masses are too ill-educated to be trusted with independence; that without authority over them, these small proprietors become wasteful, careless, improvident; that the free spirit becomes a democratic and dangerous spirit; and finally, that the resources of the land cannot properly be brought out by men without The diffi- capital to cultivate it. Either theory is plausible. culty of de- The advocates of both can support their arguments tween the with an appeal to experience; and the verdict of tems, and fact has not as yet been pronounced emphatically. The problem will be resolved in the future history of this country. It was also nobly and skilfully resolved in the past. The knights and nobles retained the authority and power which was attached to the lordships of the fees. They retained extensive estates in their own hands or in the occupation of their immediate tenants; but ciding be two sys the feudal solution of that difficulty. from land a be adminis trust. the large proportion of the lands was granted out CH. 1. by them to smaller owners, and the expenditure of their own incomes in the wages and maintenance of their vast retinues left but a small margin for indulgence in luxuries. The necessities of their The income position obliged them to regard their property revenue to rather as a revenue to be administered in trust, tered as a than as 'a fortune' to be expended in indulgence. Before the Reformation, while the differences of social degree were enormous, the differences in habits of life were comparatively slight, and the practice of men in these things was curiously the reverse of our own. Dress, which now scarcely suffices to distinguish the master from his servant, was then the symbol of rank, prescribed by statute to the various orders of society as strictly as the regimental uniform to officers and privates; diet also was prescribed, and with equal strictness; but the diet of the nobleman was ordered down to a level which was then within the reach of the poorest labourer. In 1336, the following law was enacted by the Parliament of Edward III. :* 'Whereas, heretofore Law of Edthrough the excessive and over-many sorts of restricting costly meats which the people of this Realm have dulgence. used more than elsewhere, many mischiefs have happened to the people of this Realm-for the great men by these excesses have been sore grieved; and the lesser people, who only endeavour to imitate the great ones in such sort of meats, are much impoverished, whereby they are not able to aid * 10 Ed. III. cap. 3. ward III. sensual in fers hon bodily CH. I. themselves, nor their liege lord, in time of need, as they ought; and many other evils have happened, as well to their souls as their bodies-our Lord the King, desiring the common profit as well of the great men as of the common people of his Realm, and considering the evils, grievances, and mischiefs aforesaid, by the common assent of the prelates, earls, barons, and other nobles of his Rank con- said Realm, and of the commons of the same our, but not Realm, hath ordained and established that no the privilege of man, of what estate or condition soever he be, larger shall cause himself to be served, in his house or enjoyment. elsewhere, at dinner, meal, or supper, or at any other time, with more than two courses, and each mess of two sorts of victuals at the utmost, be it of flesh or fish, with the common sorts of pottage, without sauce or any other sorts of victuals. And if any man choose to have sauce for his mess, he may, provided it be not made at great cost; and if fish or flesh be to be mixed therein, it shall be of two sorts only at the utmost, either fish or flesh, and shall stand instead of a mess, except only on the principal feasts of the year, on which days every man may be served with three courses at the utmost, after the manner aforesaid.' Possible value of sumptuary laws, although be enforced. Sumptuary laws are among the exploded fallacies which we have outgrown, and we smile at the unwisdom which could expect to regulate they cannot private habits and manners by statute. Yet some statutes may be of moral authority when they cannot be actually enforced, and may have been regarded, even at the time at which they were issued, rather as an authoritative declaration of what wise and good men considered to be CH. 1. right, than as laws to which obedience could be compelled. This act, at any rate, witnesses to what was then thought to be right by the great persons' of the English realm; and when great persons will submit themselves of their free will to regulations which restrict their private indulgence, they are in little danger of disloyalty from those whom fortune has placed below them. able aspects dal system. Such is one aspect of these old arrangements; it is unnecessary to say that with these, as with all other institutions created and worked by human beings, the picture admits of being reversed. When by the accident of birth men are placed in a position of authority, no care in their training will prevent it from falling often to singularly unfit persons. The command of a Unfavourpermanent military force was a temptation to of the feuambition, to avarice, or hatred, to the indulgence of private piques and jealousies, to political discontent on private and personal grounds. A Danger of combination of three or four of the leading nobles of power. was sufficient, when an incapable prince sate on the throne, to effect a revolution; and the rival claims of the houses of York and Lancaster to the crown, took the form of a war unequalled in history for its fierce and determined malignancy, the whole nation tearing itself in pieces in a quarrel in which no principle was at stake, and no national object was to be gained. A more terrible misfortune never befel either this or any other country, and it was made possible only in the abuse CH. I. virtue of that loyalty with which the people followed the standard, through good and evil, of their feudal superiors. It is still a question, however, whether the good or the evil of the system predominated; and the answer to such question is the more difficult because we have no criterion by which, in these matters, degrees of good and evil admit of being measured. Arising out of the character of the nation, it reflected this character in all its peculiarities; and there is something truly noble in the coherence of society Yet fidelity upon principles of fidelity. Fidelity of man to bond of co- man is among the rarest excellences of humanity, than inte- and we can tolerate large evils which arise out of such a cause. Under the feudal system men were held together by oaths, free acknowledgments, and reciprocal obligations, entered into by all ranks, high and low, binding servants to their masters, as well as nobles to their kings; and in the frequent forms of the language in which the oaths were sworn we cannot choose but see that we have lost something in exchanging these ties for the harsher connecting links of mutual selfinterest. a nobler herence rest. Oath of the freeman. 'When a freeman shall do fealty to his lord,' the statute says, 'he shall hold his right hand upon the book, and shall say thus:— -Hear you, my lord, that I shall be to you both faithful and true, and shall owe my faith to you for the land that I hold, and lawfully shall do such customs and services as my duty is to you, at the times assigned, so help me God and all his saints.' 'The villain,' also, when he shall do fealty |