A Manual of Constitutional History, founded on the works of Hallam ... and Broom: containing the fundamental principles and the leading cases in constitutional law

Front matter

I Stephen's Blackstone s Commentaries. 7th edition.: 4 sols. i De Colyars Law of Guarantees and Principal and Surety. |: Grants Law of Bankers and Ean'.-.ing. 3rd edition, by 1 Hunters Suit in Equity, MB i ||S by Lawrance. Po.;t 8vo. I -liedœari a I.jw of AjMtratjatJs {uid*.A^iiirt^<iAti*:. 12it.£Wtl)_ H I ' H-unit a Lav or Frauds and Bilfc/tf "fctte^ . Pjwt 8v$. flBVitfeCni Jj ifcio'hael andWlilsLawol Gar andWiite* 8aJ(g(>1y- *?"#<«». | I Heale3s History and Law ot Church ."eats, or i'ev.-s. 2^Nft. 11 ii Goldsmiths Doctrine and Practice of Equity. <3ct| ed^on. | J-A*li», Untotbl, • I ; Seaborne s Law of Vendors and Purchasers of Real Tro ll ,■ peity, atiil supplement to IK74. Poa»«v».- U*. cWm. II Faweett's Law of Landlord and Tenant. 8vo. 14*. 'raft* Saunders's Law applicable to Negligence.

Post 8vO|^Tfe. cl. II Davi3 s Law of Registration and Elections. 12niO,< 1SB. cl. Cutler s Law of Naturalization. 12rao. Cs Cd. cloth. I Bulley and Bund s Bankruptcy Manual: 12raot,'- 16a. cloths I I Clifford and Stephens s Practice of tfo^ourt of Referees I « Private BitU, ?oU. I aim *. ltWlj| "■•».j«irtii: I Shelford's Law and Practice of Joint Stock Companies. | || :<'.,1 , ilition. lly I). )'il('MH> anil B . 1,. I. A rii * M . >w,, :> I.*. , lui n. || Sh< H«W s Law of Railways. 4th edit. By W. C. Glen, Esq. . ■ is. Royal Nvu. Ms. cloth. ' B&^;'a%niSiiaii]rf4^BKraui|BK. tgp. IsC'cjtott. ■ Woolr/ch on the Law of Sewers, wit:, the BmHJ| Acts. Wills en gHKgm^g^P^mmbS.- Ith^Cit. 8vo. 10a: ■ IHWis s Criminal Li-w Consolidation Acts. 12mo. 10s. A MANUAL in- CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY, POUNDED ON THE WORKS OF Pallam, (frcasn, |Uau anb i.room; CoNTAINrNG THE FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES AND THE LEADING CASES IN CONSTITUTIONAL LAW.

BY FORREST FULTON, LL.B., B.A. (Lond.) OF THE MIDDLE TEMPLE, ESQ., BARRISTER-AT-LAW. "Coudisce nioilos, amanda Voce quos reddas : minuentur atræ Coi'mine curse." Horace. LONDON BUTTERWORTHS, 7, FLEET STREET, fab |3nblisb£i-s io ibc Quern's most tmllent Psjeslg. HODGES, FOSTER & CO., GRAFTON STREET, DUBLIN. CALCUTTA: THACKER, SPINK & CO. BOMBAY: THACKER, VIKING & CO. MELBOURNF.: GEORGE ROBERTSON. 1875. LONDON : PRINTED BY C. ROWORTH AND SONS, NEWTON STREET, HIGH HOLBORN. TO CHAELES T. RITCHIE, ESQ., . M.P., AS A TRIBUTE TO THE GALLANT MANNER IN WHICn HE FOUGHT TILE BATTLE OF TILE CONSTITUTION IN THE TOWER HAMLETS AT THE LATE GENERAL ELECTION, THIS HUMBLE ATTEMPT TO FACILITATE A KNOWLEDGE OF Constitutional i^afo anb Pistorg IS INSCRIBED BY HIS SINCERE FRIEND, THE AUTHOR.

Preface

. There is scarcely any branch of learning which has received fuller elucidation at the hands of some of our ablest men than Constitutional History. Our libraries have been enriched by the stately periods of Henry Hallam, and the graceful eloquence of Sir Erskine May, and new light is being continually thrown upon the subject by the researches of Professors Stubbs and Freeman. Yet, in spite of the value of these works, the field of Constitutional History is a terra incog nita to the great mass of the public, and the reason is not far to find. A very general feeling exists that Hallam is a very hard book, and it must be confessed that it is not the lightest possible reading; but if Hallam is hard Professor Stubbs is ten thousand times harder, and without a general acquaintance with the subject it is difficult to follow either author. The authorities of our schools have been at last compelled by the force of public opinion to «3 VI

PREFACE.

. introduce modern subjects into their curriculum ; the old antiquated idea that all that was necessary for the purposes of education was a smatter ing of Latin and Greek and the Mathematics, is dead and buried, the old order has changed and given place to a new, and the late Mr. Cobden's sneer about the Ilissus and Chicago is no longer deserved. Modern subjects have not, however, so far included Constitutional History, mainly because no one has been hitherto sufficiently enterprising to write a careful, comprehensive text-book ; the existing ignorance of its simplest facts is most deplorable, and it is in the earnest hope that the present work may supply the want so much felt that I have been induced to bring it before the public. But though primarily this book is written in the hope that it may have a general circulation, I have had distinctly in view the wants of our numerous law-students.

Constitutional Law and History are now special subjects both for the General Examina tion prior to call to the Bar, and for the first LL.B. at the University of London, and I trust this book may be found useful in preparing for both examinations.

PREFACE.

. VII One word of warning to those who use it for this purpose — recollect that a text-book should be merely the basis of other reading, and that the examiners at London are somewhat hard to please. Besides the works of Hallam, and Sir Erskine May, I have derived the very greatest assistance from Sir Edward Creasy's Constitutional History, which, if it were a little more complete, would be of incalculable value to the law student. The constitutional law portion of the work I have gathered from Dr. Broom's book. Very many thanks are due to the learned doctor for having collected the leading cases on the subject; but what evil genius could have tempted him to compile the ponderous tome in which they are published, which I venture to say no law-student ever regarded for the first time without a shudder, it is impossible to conjecture.

One thing is quite certain, and that is that if it were the one twentieth part of its present size, it would be twenty times more valuable. A word more and I have done, and that is with reference to the unhealthy desire to reform everything, which is the leading characteristic of the present day. Knowing nothing of the history of the institutions under which they have the good fortune to

PREFACE.

. live, and consequently ignorant how much of her greatness England owes to the present form of her constitution, which has been the slow growth of centuries, the masses are only too ready to listen to unprincipled demagogues, and to believe that, instead of being the most fortunate, they are the most miserable of mankind. I trust this book may tend to dispel some at least of this ignorance, and that if the day should ever come, when political adventurers, to answer party purposes and promote their own miserably selfish ends, shall raise their voices to bring about the abolition of the House of Lords, or the sup planting of the Monarchy, an enlightened public opinion may prevent our constitution from lying stranded like some stately ship upon the shore of time. il My task is done — my song hath ceased — my theme Has died into an echo ; it is fit The spell should break of this protracted dream.

The torch shall be extinguished which hath lit My midnight lamp — and what is writ, is writ, — Would it were worthier ! " 4, Essex Court, Temple, Dec. 9th, 1874. CONTENTS.

Chapter I. From The Earliest Times To The Accession Of William

I. PAGE Introductory — Montesquieu quoted — Rome and England compared — Freeman quoted — Governments — Limited Monarchy — Austin quoted — From Cæsar to Hastings — Thanes and Ceorls — Slaves — Townships — Sac and Soc — Hundreds — Courtof the Hundred— The Shire Court — TheWitanagemot — The Clergy — The Towns — Trial by Jury — BushelVs Case — Frankpledge — Bocland and Folcland 1 — 21 CHAPTER H. FROM THE ACCESSION OF WILLIAM I. TO THE BATTLE OF BOSWORTH. The Conquest— Feudal System — How far in Existence previously — Fully established at the Conquest — Tenants-incapite — The Feudal Incidents— Aids, &c. — The Feudal System as established in England how different from that existing on the Continent — William II.— The Crusades — Henry I. — His Charter — The Laws of the Confessor, what — Stephen — Establishment of Schools at Oxford for the Study of theCanon and Civil Law— Henry H.— The Quarrel with Becket — Constitutions of Clarendon — Richard I. — John— State of England at his Accession — Villeinage — Somerset's Case— Slave Grace's Case — Pressing for the Navy — Wallis v. Day — Villeinage, when established — Villeins regardant — Villeins in gross — Means for gradual Extinction of Villeinage— Probably confined to Rural Districts — Tenures by which Lands were held— Tenure by Knight Service — Tenure by free Socage— Grand Serjeanty — Petit Serjeanty — Incidents common to all three Tenures CONTENTS.

X Chapter H. — continued. and those peculiar to each— Tenure in Villeinage — Copyholds—Rights of Common— Inclosure of Commons, how effected— The Legal System— Curia or Aula Regis— Court of King's Bench— Of Common Pleas— Of Exchequer— The Chief Justiciar — The Curia Regis, how distinguished from the Great Council— The Court of Exchequer— Justices in Eyre— The Court of Common Pleas— The Office of Chief Justiciar abolished by Edward I.— The Court of King's Bench— The Lord Chief Justice of England— The Court of Chancery — Magna Charta— Hallam's Summary of the Provisions of the Charter — Mackintosh on the Charter — Edward I. — Legislative Improvements — Blackstone's Classification— Mortmain, what— Gifts in Mortmain forbidden by Statute — Invention of Uses — Statute of Uses — Use upon a Use— The Use devisable— Statute of Wills— Mortmain Act — Statute of Provisors— Statute of Præmunire — Nobility — Noblesse — Civil Equality, to what attributable.

PAGE 22— GO CHAPTER HI. THE GROWTH OF PARLIAMENT. Part I. Early History of Parliament. The Great Conncil — The Barons and inferior Tenants-in-chief — Principle of Representation — Name of Parliament when first given — Lesser Barons — Selden's Theory — Madox's Theory — Selden's Theory adopted — Representation of Cities and Boroughs — Rendered indispensable by the Abolition of Tallages— Progress of the Towns — Towns let to Fee-farm— Charters of Incorporation — City of London — Political Influence of London — Authorities in favour of an earlier Representation of Boroughs — St. Albans — Barnstaple — The Upper House — The Bishops — The temporal Peers — Peerage becomes hereditary — Life Peers — Fact of there being only two Houses of Parliament important — One Parliament for all England — Differences between the two Houses few — Reasons — Gradual Growth of the Constitution — Right of Taxation— Directing and checking Expenditure — Supply to depend on Redress of Grievances— Illegal Ordinances and Interpolations — Private Bills — Punishing Members — Instances of important Impeachments — Mompesson — Bacon — The Earl of Middlesex— Buckingham — Stratford — Clarendon — Danby — Fitzharris. . . . . . .

( 61—83 CONTENTS. XI Chapter HI. — continued. Part II. page Privileges of Parliament and its later History. Freedom from Arrest — Summary of Cases — Freedom of Speech — Summary of Cases— Money Bills— Disputed Elections — Punishing Members — Appropriation of Supplies — Commission of Public Accounts — Qualification of Electors — 7 Hen. IT. c. 15—8 Hen. VI.— First Disfranchising Statute on record — Growing Importance of the House of Commons — Members Paid up to Henry VIII.'s Reign — Number of the House, temp. Edward I. — Creation of Boroughs, temp. Edward VI. — Temp. Mary — Temp. Elizabeth — Newark last instance of Borongh created by Royal Charter — In whom the Elective Franchise in Ancient Boroughs was vested — Theories on the Subject — Number of Members composing the House of Lords — Judicial Power of the House of Lords — Skinner's Case — House of Lords establish their Right to Freedom from Arrest, temp.

Charles I. — Tlie Earl of Arundel's Case — Refusal of a Writ of Summons to the Earl of Bristol — Voting by Proxy — Recording Dissent in Journals of the House — Attempt to limit the Number of Peers — Constant additions to the House — Representative Peers of Scotland — Representative Peers of Ireland — Permission given to Irish Peers to sit in the House of Commons — Peerages of the United Kingdom— Summary of Creations — Antiquity of Peerage — Changes in the Composition of the Peerage — Its Representative Character — Extension of the Representative Principle — Disproportion between the Representative and Hereditary Peers — Scottish Peers created Peers of Great Britain — Their Right to sit denied — Rights admitted — Present Position of Scottish Peerage — Fusion of the Peerages of the Three Kingdoms— Hereditary Character of Peerage — Reform Bill of 1832 — Reform Bill of 1867— The Ballot Act— Table of Privileges of Parliament —Grenville's Act— Sir R. Peel's Act— The Act of 1868— Government by Party — Publication of Debates. . . 83 — 123 Part HI.

Constitutional Lam in its relation to Parliament, and the Prerogatives of the Crown. Privileges of Parliament, how far controllable by Courts of Law — Stockdale v. Hansard — Case of the Sheriff of Middlesex —3 & 4 Viet. c. 9 — Summary — the Royal Prerogative — Writ ne exeat regno. .. .. . . . . . . 124 — CONTENTS. XII PAGE 189

CHAPTER IV.

Part I. From the Accession of Henry VII. to the Restoration. Limitations to the Royal Authority on the Accession of Henry VII. — Statute for the Security of a King de facto — Vane's Case— Statute of Fines— The Aula Regis— The Origin of the Conrt of Star Chamber— Poyning's Law — Henry VIII. — Powers of the Crown — How extended — In extorting Money — Extending Laws relating to Treason — Declaring the King's Proclamations equal to Laws — Despotic Power of Henry VIII.— To what due— Edward VI.— Repeal of Statutes— History of the Law of Treason — Mary — Elizabeth — The defective Security for the Liberty of the Subject — Illegal Proclamations — Martial Law — The Relations of the Crown with the House of Commons— Monopolies— Members imprisoned for discussing forbidden Matters — Strickland — Bell— Peter Wentworth — Cope — Sir E. Hobbey — Moriee — Pretensions of the Crown — Case of Cavendish— First general Poor Law — Second great Poor Law Bill — James I. — Bates's Case — Grievances — Lord Coke — State Trials — Impeachments — House of Commons — Charles I. — First Parliament —Second Parliament — Charles endeavours to rule absolutely — Darnel's Case — Third Parliament — Petition of Right— Charles rules absolutely — Imports on Merchandise — Knighthood — Forest Laws— Monopolies — Ship Money — Fourth Parliament — The Long Parliament — First Period — Triennial Bill — The Septennial Act — Second Period — Historical Sketch of the History of the Military Force in England — Cromwell — His Powers— Barebones' Parliament — Navigation Laws — The Convention Parliament. . . 138 Part H. From the Restoration to the Revolution.

Charles H. — Acts of Uniformity — The Conventicle Act— The Five Mile Act — Acts of Supremacy — The Test Act — The Parliamentary Test Act — Summary — Penal Laws relating to Religion classified — The Restraints put on the Press— The Licensing Acts— History of the Law relating to the Press summarized — The Attack on the Corporations — Corporations after the Revolution — The Municipal Corporations Act — The Corporation of London exempted — The Habeas Corpus Act — Proclamations — James H. — CONTENTS. XIII PAGE ■242 253 Chapter IV.— Part 11.— continued. Creasy's Account of this Reign — The Case of the Seven Bishops — The Dispensing Power — The Right of the Subject to petition — The Kentish Petition — Lord George Gordon's Petition — The Chartist Petition — Nature of a Seditions Libel — Important Trials for Seditious Libel — The Crisis in 1688 — Constitutional Difficulties at the Revolution — William III.— Bill of Rights— Act of Settlement— The Fifth Section considered — The Privy Council— The Cabinet Council — The Sixth Section — Placemen — The Seventh Section — The Difficulties of William's Position — Com pletion of the Revolution — The Non-jurors — The Pro ceedings of Parliament -The Mutiny Act — The Civil List — The Toleration Act — Religious Toleration not extended to Papists till Reign of George III. — The Roman Catholic Relief Act of 1788— Catholic Emancipation, 1829—Con clusion 189

CHAPTER V. LEADING CASES IN CONSTITUTIONAL LAW.

The Provinces of Constitutional Law and History compared — Calvin's Case — Allegiance defined — Allegiance how severed — Denizen — Colonies — Law relating to — Alien friend — Alien enemy— The Bankers' Case — Leach v. Money — Wilkes v. Wood — Entick v. Carrington— Law as to General Warrants epitomised — Cases seemingly in opposition to above — Hill v. Bigge— Civil Liability of a Governor — Governor not a Viceroy — Criminal Liability of a Governor — General Picton's Case— Governor Walts Case— Summary— Sutton v. Johnstone — Kemp v. Neville . ■ 243 b F. % ggawl OF CONSTITUTIONAL HISTOEY.

CHAPTER I. FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO THE ACCESSION OF WILLIAM

I. Introductory— Montesquieu quoted — Rome and England compared — Freeman quoted — Governments — Limited Monarchy — Austin quoted — From Cæsar to Hastings — Thanes and Ceorls — Slaves — Townships — Sac and Soc — Hundreds — Courtof the Hundred— The Shire Court— The Witanagemot —The Clergy— The Towns— Trial by Jury— Bushell's Case — Frankpledge — Bocland and Folcland. It is our intention in the following pages to endeavour to trace the growth and progress of the British Constitution through the many centuries of its gradual development. For most, if not for all men, the study of history possesses great and varied attractions, but that portion of it which treats of the history of the institutions under which we have the good fortune to live, is, for Englishmen, at once the most interesting and the F. B most important.

Montesquieu says, "as Rome, Lacedæmon and Carthage perished, so England will perish when the legislative power shall have become more corrupt than the executive." Eng land, however, differs both in its structure and resources from all those with which history makes us acquainted — her free institutions have been ever growing, and her constitution has had within itself the means of effecting reforms, without bringing about a revolution in the form of go vernment. Rome, of all ancient states, most resembled England, but the Roman people in the later ages of the commonwealth were not a people of citizens but conquerors ; Rome was not a state, but the head of a state. By the immensity of her conquests she became only an accessory part of her own empire ; her wealth was bound less, and all possible enemies being defeated she ceased to be an army, and thence dates the era of her corruption.

Rome, in a word, was destined to lose her liberty when she lost her empire, and she was destined to lose her empire whenever she began to enjoy it. In England all liberty and power is not accu mulated in one point. The same laws and the same interests prevail everywhere ; the whole nation equally concurs in the framing of the government; no one part has therefore need to fear that another part will supply the necessary forces to destroy it. Freeman. The ruin of Rome may be in a great measure traced to the exorbitant power which several of its citizens succeeded in attaining; in England the power of the crown has effectually prevented this. Such a violent establishment of monarchical power as that which took place in Rome after the death of Julius Cæsar cannot take place in England. Here that kind of power has existed for ages, it is circumscribed by fixed laws, and established upon regular and well-laid foundations ; nor is there any great danger that this power may, by means of those legal prerogatives it already possesses, assume others, and at last openly make itself absolute.

The power of granting supplies is vested in the nation ; let the prerogatives be as great as they will, the people of England have the power of preventing the exercise of them. The most singular government upon earth, and which has carried farthest the liberty of the individual, was in danger of total destruction when Bartholomew Columbus was on his passage to England to teach Henry VII. the way to Mexico and Peru. Freeman says : " On the Teutonic mainland the old Teutonic freedom, with its free assemblies, national and local, gradually died out before the encroachments of a brood of petty princes. In the Teutonic island it has changed its form from age to age ; it has lived through many storms ; it b2 has withstood the attacks of many enemies, but it has never utterly died out. The continued national life of the people, notwithstanding foreign conquests and internal revolutions, has remained unbroken for 1,400 years.

At no time has the tie between the present and the past been wholly rent asunder; at no time have Englishmen sat down to put together a wholly new constitution in obedience to some dazzling theory. Each step in our growth has been the natural consequence of some earlier step; each change in our law and constitution has been, not the bringing in of anything wholly new, but the development and improvement of something that was already old. Our progress has in some ages been faster, in others slower ; at some moments we have seemed to stand still or even to go back, but the great march of political development has never wholly stopped; it has never been permanently checked since the day when the coming of the Teutonic conqueror began to change Britain into England. New and foreign elements have from time to time thrust themselves into our law ; but the same spirit which could develop and improve whatever was old and native has commonly found means, sooner or later, to cast forth again what ever was new and foreign.

The lover of freedom, the lover of progress, the man who has eyes keen enough to discover real identity under a garb of outward unlikeness, need never shrink from tracing up the political institutions of England to their earliest shape. The 1,400 years of English his tory are the possession of those who would ever advance, not the possession of those who would stand still or go backward. The wisdom of our forefathers was ever shown, not in a dull and senseless clinging to things as they were at any given moment, but in that spirit, the spirit alike of the true reformer and the true conservative, which keeps the whole fabric standing, by repair ing and improving from time to time whatever part of it stands in need of repair or improvement. " But the old paths have in England ever been the paths of progress ; the ancient custom has ever been to shrink from mere change for the sake of change, but fearlessly to change whenever change was really needed.

And many of the best changes of later times — many of the most wholesome improvements in our law and con stitution — have been only the casting aside of innovations which have crept in, in modern and evil times. They have been the calling up again, in an altered garb, of principles as old as the days when we get our first sight of our forefathers in their German forests. Changed as it is in all out ward form and circumstances, the England in which we live has in its true life and spirit far more in common with the England of the earlier times than it has with the England of days far nearer to our own. In many a wholesome act of Govern ments. modern legislation we have gone back, wittingly or unwittingly, to the earliest principles of our race. We have advanced by falling back on a more ancient state of things ; we have reformed by calling to life again the institutions of earlier and ruder times, by setting ourselves free from the slavish subtleties of Norman lawyers, and by casting aside as an accursed thing the innovations of Tudor tyranny and Stuart usurpation."

Austin divides all supreme governments into two great classes : — I. Monarchies, or the government of one. II. Aristocracies, or the government of a number. These latter he again subdivides into three classes : — (a) Oligarchies — when the proportion of the sovereign number to the number of the entire community is extremely small. (b) Aristocracies (in the specific sense) — when the proportion is small, but not very small. (c) Democracies — when the proportion is large. Now, inasmuch as every elector must be held to be a unit of the governing body of this country, it is obvious that, probably since the Reform Bill of 1832, and certainly since that of 1867, we have been living under a democratic form of govern ment, since the proportion of those having votes to the entire community is large.

Limited monarchy Austin The government of England is usually styled a " limited monarchy." In all, or most governments of the kind, a single individual shares the sovereign powers with a body of other individuals, the share of the single individual being greater than that of any of the individuals composing the body taken singly. But, as Austin points out, the foremost individual cannot be called a monarch in the true sense of the term, since, considered singly, he is subject to the sovereign body of which he is merely a limb ; and a monarch, pro perly so called, is supreme. Limited monarchy, therefore, is not monarchy but one of the forms of aristocracy. As meaning monarchical power, limited by positive law, the name "limited monarchy " involves a contradiction in terms, since a sovereign or supreme power is incapable of legal limitation.

It is true that an aristocracy called a limited monarchy is limited by positive morality, and also by the law of God, but so is every government, which renders the term absurd. If the head of the aristocracy is called a king, the government of king, lords and commons is styled a limited monarchy; if the head were called a protector, or stadtholder, it would probably be called a republic. "And," says Austin, "for such verbal differences between the forms of supreme government has the peace of mankind been frequently troubled by ignorant and head long fanatics." From Cæsar to Hastings. Not a little of our national character is due to the fact of our being an essentially composite nation, and four elements have combined to make up the great whole. First, the Roman and Celtic element, but this only in a small degree; secondly, the Saxon element, which largely pre dominates; thirdly, the Danish element, like the Roman and Celtic, to a very small extent; and, lastly, the Norman, which, together with the Saxon, practically makes up the English nation.

The Romans under Julius Cæsar made two incursions into Britain in the years B.C. 55 and B.C. 54 ; but they attempted nothing like a per manent settlement until a.d. 43, in the reign of the Emperor Claudius. They continued to occupy Britain for nearly four centuries, until pressed by the inroads of the barbarians at home, they with drew their legions a.d. 409. The unfortunate Britons, who under Roman rule had entirely lost their warlike attributes, and degenerated into a race of husbandmen, soon fell a prey to the attacks of their neighbours the Picts and Scots; and, being unable to defend themselves, had re course for assistance to the Saxons, a race living in the district bordering on the mouth of the Elbe. The Saxons landed under Hengist and Horsa, and effectually disposed of the Picts and Scots ; but finding Britain likely to prove a very much more pleasant place to live in than their own country, they proceeded to conquer the whole kingdom, and the Britons found that they had only escaped the rock of Sylla to fall into the whirlpool of Charybdis.

Fresh bodies of Saxons continued to arrive, and the seven very unequal kingdoms of the Saxon Heptarchy were formed successively out of the districts wrested from the Britons. Three out of the seven kingdoms became after a while predominant — Wessex, Mercia and Northumber land. The latter soon gave way under the prowess of the Mercian kings ; finally Mercia itself was overrun, and all England united under Egbert in the year 827. About this time, a fresh and formidable enemy appeared in the Danes, a horde of Scandinavian pirates, who threatened to subvert the Saxon monarchy, and bring about a period of anarchy; but from this fate the country was saved by the courage and genius of Alfred. The Danes, how ever, made considerable settlements in different parts of the kingdom, and the weakness and cruelty of Ethelred the Unready, who planned and executed a cowardly massacre of the Danes in the year 1002, led to the temporary overthrow of the Saxon line, and established Canute of Denmark upon the throne of England.

Two centuries had, however, much altered the character of the Danish people ; they had lost much of their rude barbarism, had abandoned their hideous religion and submitted themselves to the civilizing influences of Christianity. b5 Thanes and ceurls. Three sovereigns only of the Danish line sat on the throne of England, — Canute, Harold and Hardicanute ; and on the death of the latter in 1042, the Saxon line was restored under Edward the Confessor, and finally overthrown by the defeat of Harold on the plains of Hastings in 1066. The only denominations of persons in Saxon times above the class of servitude were thanes and ceorls — the gentry and the inferior people. The thanes were subdivided into king's thanes, whose lives were valued at 1200s., and those of inferior degree, whose composition was half that sum.