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STATE OF SOCIETY.
1216–1399.

Although the narration of political facts implies much of the history of the country, it leaves out of sight much that touches the real life of the people. During the last hundred years great social changes had been going on, and great social progress made. In fact, till the end of the reign of King John, the social, like the political history of the country scarcely deserves the name of national. The description of any feudal society will in a great measure suit it. But the national existence had been worked out in the reign of Henry III., and was completed and finally established by the great time of Edward I. From that time onwards, continuous change and growth had been visible, and that growth had been national. The great fact of all modern history is the breaking up of the feudal and ecclesiastical system of the middle ages, and the introduction, as political and social elements of weight, of the middle and industrial classes. It is the beginning of that process which constitutes therefore the history of this period. The points to observe will be, therefore, the growth and advance of the commons, the decay of the aristocracy. But it is as yet quite impossible to speak of the commons as one body. The line which divided the class which sent its representatives to Parliament, and which was already becoming of political importance, from the mass of the labouring part of the nation, was very clearly drawn, and the characteristics, the employments, and the feelings of the one class, as well as the causes of their advance, will be very different from those of the other. A brief sketch has been already given of the gradual introduction of the commons into Parliament. But it still remains to explain and illustrate the sources of their wealth, their aristocratic tendencies, and the prevalence among them of a strong distaste for the pre-eminent position occupied by the Church. It was their wealth which gained them admission to Parliament, and the way in which that wealth was gained which greatly influenced their views after they had been admitted.

Trade, on which their riches depended, was as yet in its infancy; and the views which regulated its management as yet too crude to be spoken of by such a dignified title as political economy. As far as they went, however, they were very clear, and were, in fact, though afterwards improved, the same in spirit as those which existed in England before the time of Adam Smith. Observing only the obvious fact, that the possession of money enabled a man to purchase whatever he wanted, early traders conceived the idea that money was wealth, and that nothing else was. And as the wealth of the nation was of the last importance, both to the governor and to the governed, and as trade was the chief method by which money could be supplied, and by which money might be drawn from the country, the regulation of trade became one of the most important duties of the King and the Parliament. Now money being the sole wealth, in that regulation of trade it became necessary to aim first at the introduction of money; secondly, at its retention. It was to these objects that the frequent ordinances and statutes with regard to trade were directed. Although very various and, as such regulations were almost certain to be, frequently inefficacious, they were energetic and simple. England was not as yet a manufacturing country. Its trade was an export trade of raw materials, principally derived from sheep farming on the vast spaces of uncultivated land which then existed, and from its mineral wealth. Its principal commodities were wool, sheep-skins, or wool-fells, and leather, together with tin and lead.[70] Only the coarsest kind of cloth was manufactured; sometimes intentionally rough and coarse, to be changed into fine cloth afterwards in Flanders, but exported as cloth to avoid the tax on wool. Primitive trade, when the seas were beset with pirates, had been carried on chiefly inland, and great fairs, such as that of Troyes in France, had been established under the guardianship of feudal lords, who guaranteed the safety of the merchants for a toll. Domestic trade was carried on in the same way, and one of the forms of royal exaction was to open a fair, and insist upon all other shops and other places of sale being closed during its continuance.[71] As the seas became safer, and the mercantile spirit of the Flemings rose, the great free cities of Flanders became as it were perpetual fairs, and were known as staples, from the German “stapeln,” to keep up. In order that trade should be well under command, it was necessary that it should be carried on in few channels. The English government had therefore chosen some of these Flemish towns, and ordered that all the chief productions of England, which have been already mentioned, should be sold in those towns, and nowhere else. These goods were therefore called staple commodities; the merchants who traded in them, the merchants of the staple. And this staple trade was put under an organization—there being a mayor, a constable, and courts of the staple. At these staple towns, the King’s customers, or custom-house officers, by means of this organization, had every bargain under direct supervision; and every bargain thus supervised was obliged to be made for a certain sum of actual coin, the government thus securing a continual flow of silver into the hands of the English merchants. The staple towns were frequently changed. To reward any particularly faithful ally, or to raise the importance of any particular town, as for instance Calais, the staple was removed to that Prince’s province, or to that town. The proportion of each bargain to be brought over in coin was also constantly varying. Indeed, the frequent interference of government in such matters was not among the least of the restrictions of trade. Edward III. was said, at one time of his life, to have had a different plan every month. Upon the whole, however, the principle was the same. Amongst the most remarkable plans of Edward III. was one for keeping the evident riches that accrued to the staple towns within the limits of England. In the twenty-seventh year of his reign he named nine towns in England which were to be the exclusive selling places of the English staple commodities. For an Englishman to carry such commodities beyond the seas was punishable by death. As Edward could not protect the foreign merchants visiting his staples, and as the additional trouble of purchasing goods at them naturally lowered prices, this plan did not answer. It was, in fact, suicidal for an island people, since it destroyed all object in the keeping up a mercantile navy. It was therefore speedily abandoned; and after the reign of Henry VI., Calais became the sole English staple town. A similar attempt was made in the fourteenth year of Richard II., when it was enacted that no Englishman should buy wool except of the owners of the sheep, and for his own use. The export trade was thus again for a time given over to the foreign merchant, for the sake of securing to the wool-grower the profits of the retail as well as the wholesale trade; the effect was naturally a decrease of purchasers, which reduced the growers to great distress. The government had, by insisting on money payments in every bargain, secured an influx of silver; but as the nation was too far advanced in civilization to do without foreign products, there were a certain number of foreign importers, who threatened in their turn to withdraw it again. One or two attempts were indeed made to confine English trade to the limits of the country. Thus, it was the view of Simon de Montfort, who disliked all extravagance in dress, that the production of the country was enough to supply its own inhabitants; and in 1261, and in 1271, exportation of English wool was forbidden, and people acquired the habit of dressing in undyed native cloth. Such primitive patriotism could not last in an advancing nation. Trade soon resumed its old course. The greater part of the foreign merchants were Germans, and to keep them under government supervision, they were formed into a guild, given certain privileges, allowed to possess a guild-hall, and are generally known as the Merchants of the Steelyard.[72] Other alien merchants there also were, who were protected by law; notably by the great statute of Edward I., “De mercatoribus.” But although the goods they brought were necessary, their bargains, no less than those of the staple merchants, were under supervision. They were bound to employ a certain proportion of the money obtained from their sales in English goods.[73] Moreover, all foreign merchants were held to be mutually responsible for each other’s debts. Thus the retention of the silver in England was also secured, while, to avoid any varieties in the value of money, English coin alone was current, and foreign coin had at once to be exchanged at the royal exchangers.

Since money was so important an object, the coinage was naturally regarded with great care. It was an exclusive royal monopoly, and in the reign of Edward III. the punishment of death was enacted against false coiners. There was a constant dread lest in the exchange England should be the loser. The belief was prevalent that the value of the money depended upon the denomination. It had not yet entered men’s minds to think that it was but another commodity, worth exactly its intrinsic value, which no change of name could alter. Up till the reign of Edward III., although clipped and lightened in use, and although Edward I. had begun the bad practice of depreciating the coin by diminishing its legal weight, the coinage had been on the whole but little tampered with. But between the years 1344 and 1351, the number of silver pennies made from the pound of silver had increased from 243 to 270. In that year, groats of the nominal value of 4d., but of the weight of only three and a half of the diminished penny, were issued. It is impossible to make any true estimate of the comparative value of money then and at the present time. The facts with regard to the actual amount of silver employed are these: The pound, which only nominally existed, was a full pound of silver, which would at present be coined into £2, 16s. 3d. The shilling, which seems also to have been a nominal coin, was the twentieth part of this, or 2s. 9¾d. The silver penny, which was, till the time of Edward III., almost the only coin, was therefore worth 2¾d. Edward introduced several new coins; some of gold, which, as there was no fixed proportion between them and silver, were not popular, and were recalled; and nobles of the value of 6s. 8d., or half a mark; together with the groats above mentioned. But of the purchasing value of the money thus made no fixed estimate can be given, as that of course depends upon the relative value of the articles purchased; and under the very different circumstances of those times the relative value of those articles was so different, that to compare the value of money with any one of them would give a totally false impression. It is usual to say roughly that to reach the present value of any sum mentioned it should be multiplied by fifteen.

This form of commerce, restricted as has been before explained, was certain to break down as the wants of the nation increased. There was a company of merchant adventurers founded, perhaps, though this seems very uncertain, as early as Henry III.’s reign, which had the right to trade in other commodities besides the staple, and to choose its own ports. It was the growth of this company which, in the next century, had most to do with breaking down the staple monopoly. It is needless to point out the bad effects which this constant interference must have produced. It is certain that the foreign merchant paid himself well for the extreme difficulties placed in the way of his business; while, at the same time, the difficulties of procuring foreign articles of luxury must have gone far to render the habits of ordinary life rough and simple. The same principle of restriction, which was established in the commerce of the country, existed in the retail trade. The towns of England were of natural and accidental growth, accumulations of men who had gathered for purposes of self-defence or convenience, living in accordance with the ordinary habits of the country, in the same position, in fact, with regard to the king and their lords as any other society of men—citizens originally by right of the possession of land, and as the system of lordship established itself, bound to customary duties to their lord, just as the inhabitants of the country were. In the same way the citizens of the town, with the exception of these customary duties, were free and self-governing. They gradually, and chiefly by means of purchase, obtained freedom from the customary duties, and thus became independent, self-governing communities. Charters securing them freedom, in the case of the royal cities at all events, were many of them due to the necessities of the Angevin kings, and to their want of money for the payment of their mercenary troops. The close neighbourhood of the inhabitants of towns early introduced an artificial system of union, analogous to the frankpledge. Men formed themselves into what were known as frith-guilds,[74] the members of which were mutually responsible for one another, met at periodical feasts, supported one another’s poor, and in other respects performed the duties of members of an artificial family. As trade increased these guilds in the generality of cases coalesced into one, which took upon itself the direction of trade, and was known as the merchant guild. With the natural tendency of a governing body, this old merchant guild became exceedingly exclusive. New-comers to the town were not admitted to it, and craftsmen were generally excluded from its limits. In turn those craftsmen established guilds of their own, known as craft-guilds, by the warden and leaders of which the bye-laws of the particular craft were formed. Between these and their aristocratic neighbours, the merchant guild, quarrels arose, and in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries the contest between the two was fought out, the craft-guilds eventually securing their acknowledgment and a share in the government of the town. Speaking generally, therefore, we may conceive of the towns of England as being divided into a series of guilds, the leaders of which usually formed a governing body, and which were capable of making bye-laws for their own special members. The commercial aim of these associations was, to insure good work, to insure work for all its members, and to resist that spirit of competition which was gradually rising, and which ended in the creation of two classes, the capitalist and the workman. To secure these objects, they limited the number of master workmen, admitted candidates to their association only after lengthened apprenticeships, limited the number of apprentices each master might employ, and kept a close supervision over the articles made, which were usually authenticated by the corporation mark.[75]

These restrictions upon industry at the close of our period were beginning to break down; round the master workmen, there was arising a class of journeymen or day labourers, whose ranks were constantly swelled by fugitive serfs from the country; while, on the other side, individual enterprise was making itself felt, and capital was being collected, the owners of which refused to submit to the old corporation laws. The constant supervision both of trade and of the work of artisans supported the notion that governing bodies had the right to set prices on the articles under their control, a principle which was used not only by the guilds, but by the Government, as when, in the famine years of 1315 and 1316, it prescribed the exact price of all articles of food. As this had the natural effect of keeping things entirely out of the market, so that butcher’s meat disappeared altogether, it was shortly repealed; the prices to be demanded for victuals were constantly subject to the supervision of justices. The assize of bread, which is commonly assigned to the fifty-first year of Henry III., 1266, regulated the price in accordance with the market prices of corn, but the assizes of other matters, such as wine, wood, fish, fowls, etc., seem to have been perfectly arbitrary.

Though thus restricted, the trade of the English was very considerable. Their ships reached into the Baltic, where a constant communication was kept up with the Teutonic order, to whom Prussia belonged. The intercourse with that order was close. We hear of Henry, the first Duke of Lancaster, the Earl of Derby, afterwards Henry IV., and Thomas of Gloucester, repairing to their assistance. But the English merchants could never secure an equality of rights in the Baltic, the trade of which was regarded as a monopoly by the Hanseatic towns. English ships also visited Spain, so that Chaucer could describe his experienced shipman as knowing all the harbours from Gothland to Finnisterre;[76] while Venetian and Genoese merchants, in whose hands the whole trade of the East was, brought their goods largely to England; indeed, in 1379, a Genoese merchant is said to have suggested to Richard II. to make Southampton the emporium of all the oriental trade of the North. So great was the importance of the English shipping, that Edward III. distinctly claimed for himself and his predecessors the dominion of the sea.[77] The ships were, however, though numerous, of small burden; in the great fleet employed by Edward at Calais, there were 710 vessels, with crews amounting to 14,151 persons, which would give an average crew of about twenty men; and as it is said that there were about sixty-five sailors to every hundred tons, it would make the average size of the vessels very small. Indeed, a ship manned by thirty seamen, employed to convey Edward I. to the Continent, was regarded as a wonder for its size. Of navy, properly speaking, there was little or none. There were only twenty-five royal ships at Calais, the rest were all merchantmen pressed for the service. About this time it became habitual to put cannon on board ships. When used for military purposes, they were manned by troops and archers.

It has been mentioned that the trade of England was almost entirely in raw materials. The cloth manufactured had hitherto been of the roughest description, but Edward III., true to his view of keeping English trade for the English, and moved perhaps by the wealth of his allies the Flemish, attempted to introduce the manufacture of finer cloths. In 1331, he invited weavers and fullers from Flanders, and the patent exists which he gave to one John Kempe, to practise and teach his mystery.[78] This seems to have been the beginning of the finer cloth manufactures of England.

The fact of so much trouble being taken to organize trade shows the extent of it, and in spite of all ignorance and mismanagement, it was certain to produce wealth. The standard of comfort among all classes was improving, though there was nothing like what we should now speak of as luxury. The furniture used, even in the houses of the rich, was still rude. Things which are now found everywhere, and taken as matters of course, were then valuable rarities—beds, bedsteads, and rich clothing were frequently left by will. The lists of moveables, on which taxes were paid, are exceedingly meagre. A stool or two, a chest, and a few metal pots, constituted the ordinary supply of furniture. In the houses of the very rich, art had indeed begun to show itself. The payments of Henry III. to foreign artists for paintings in his house are mentioned. Intercourse with the French, and especially with the Spaniards, tended to increase these more luxurious habits. Carpets had always been used by Eastern people, and the Moors had introduced the custom in Spain. Thus, on the marriage of Edward I., before the arrival of Eleanor of Castile, her brother, the Archbishop of Toledo, made his appearance. The hangings of his chamber excited the wonder of the people, and Edward, always inclined to ostentation, had the rooms of the bride elect similarly decorated. This is said to have been the introduction of carpets to England; but still the usual covering of the floor was rushes. There is frequent mention of payments for rushes for the King’s chambers. In the matter of clothes the same change is observable. The extravagant court of Edward II. is said to have introduced parti-coloured garments. In Edward III’s reign, wealth had so increased in all ranks that it was found necessary to pass sumptuary laws, sharply dividing classes by the dress they were allowed to wear, and to confine silk and the finer woollen cloths to the higher ranks, for the sake perhaps of the English wool manufactures. In Richard II.’s reign, extravagance went still further. With his Queen, Anne of Bohemia, came in the awkward habit, soon adopted by all classes, of wearing long shoes, called cracowys or pykys, which required to be tied with silver chains to the knee before the wearer could move.[79] And Stowe says that Richard himself wore a garment made of gold, silver, and precious stones, worth 3000 marks. At the same time the rich built more comfortable houses. Castles ceased to be mere places of defence. They were at once strongholds and handsome dwelling-places. Warwick and Windsor castles may be looked on as fair specimens of the more magnificent buildings of the time. Meanwhile, though among the few, and on special occasions, splendour was found, houses, even in the streets of considerable towns, such as Colchester, the tenth city of the empire, were still built of mud. In Edward III.’s reign, it was still necessary to issue frequent orders for the cleansing of the streets of London, that his courtiers might not get into difficulties as they moved from Westminster to the City. Filth accumulated in the narrow by-lanes; and, as in the East, crows were held sacred as the only scavengers. Pavement there was none, and lanterns were hoisted from the top of Bow Church, to guide the wayfarer through the paths of the heaths that surrounded the metropolis.

Barbaric profusion in the matter of food made up for the want of substantial comforts. At the coronation of Edward I., 380 head of cattle, 430 sheep, 450 pigs, 18 wild boars, 278 flitches of bacon, and 20,000 capons, was the amount of food provided. The conduits ran wine, and hundreds of knights, who attended the great nobles, let their horses run free, to be the prize of the first captor. In 1399, at a Christmas feast of Richard II., there were daily killed twenty-eight oxen and 300 sheep, beside numberless fowl. Richard of Cornwall, at his marriage, is said to have invited 30,000 guests; while we are told that the usual household of Richard II. numbered 10,000. But though at these great festivals there was vast abundance of meat, at other times, especially at the Church fasts, fish, often of the coarsest sort, was eaten. The wife of Simon de Montfort ate the tongue of a whale dressed with peas, and a porpoise dressed with furmenty, saffron and sugar. Enormous quantities of herrings were consumed, spoken of as Aberdeens; in six days of March, Eleanor de Montfort’s household consumed no less than 3000. Her meals were diversified by dog-fish, stock-fish, conger eels, and cod. Wine was drunk in great quantities, frequently mixed with honey. Hops, though known in Flanders, had not been introduced; the beer which was largely consumed was made of any grain, and seasoned with pepper.

It was the increasing wealth of the country, especially of the mercantile classes, which had caused their introduction to Parliament. Thither they came with all the exclusive notions which their trade traditions had fostered. They were as careless of the class below them as the Barons. Indeed, it would be true to say that the feeling of the House of Commons was completely aristocratic. One part of it was of necessity entirely so: the knights of the shire, originally the representatives of the lower baronage, were elected in the county court, which was the general meeting-place of all freeholders, whether they held immediately from the crown or not. Consequently, the baronial freeholders became merged in the lesser freeholders, and the class of gentry was created. Many things had tended to the increase of that class. The breaking up of great properties, the division of property among younger children, and alienation, had increased the number of freeholders. The statute “Quia Emptores,” intended as a check upon subinfeudation, had really increased alienation by authorizing it. The smaller estates, thus separated from the large baronies, had to be worked to profit, and could not be regarded merely as means of military or political influence. There thus had arisen an industrial as well as a military class of landholders. The representatives of towns, also elected upon a writ directed to the Sheriff, were, if not at first, certainly soon after elected in the county courts. This similarity of election united the two classes in feeling; and the smaller baronies, small landowners, and burghers, formed the body of representative Commons, aristocratic in feeling in accordance with the origin of the more aristocratic part of the class. It is thus that we find the Commons regarding the Barons as their natural leaders, not joining the crown against them as in France. Edward III., in his difficulties with Stratford, had tried to produce this combination, but had failed; and the Commons joining with the Barons, had insisted on the restoration to favour of that prelate. And thus, too, we find the Commons without sympathy with the demands of the rebels in Wat Tyler’s insurrection. They had, indeed, certain grievances of their own, on which they were always petitioning, such as the encroachments of the King’s purveyors, and the too great authority, sometimes misused, of the sheriffs. But apart from these particular wrongs, they may be regarded as siding as a whole with the Barons.

In their hatred to the Church they made common cause with all classes. The peculiar position which the submission of John had given the Popes in England was the primary cause of this dislike. Annates, or first-fruits, had been early demanded, but the great grievance, as we have seen, was Provisors. Against this assumption of authority, which forestalled the rights of the patrons, there was the strongest feeling. The exactions of the Pope had been strongly spoken of in the Statute of Carlisle in the end of Edward’s I.’s reign. Edward II., like other weak princes, had yielded to this assumption. But in Edward III.’s reign, a series of enactments were passed, each one stronger than the last, against the interference of the Papacy. In 1343 the Statute of Carlisle had been read, and it was enacted that no more Papal instruments should be allowed in England. In 1344, the penalty of exile was pronounced against all provisors. By a Statute of the 25th year of Edward III.’s reign, it was ordained that “kings and all other lords were to present unto benefices, of their own or their ancestor’s foundation, and not the Pope of Rome.” If the Pope interfered the matter was to come into the King’s hands, and penalties were enacted. In the 38th year of his reign these enactments were all confirmed and strengthened by the Statute of Provisors, by which the introduction of Papal Bulls and Briefs was forbidden. The strife, as we have seen, was continued in Richard II.’s reign, and finally completed in the 16th year of that King, by a statute declaring the freedom of the crown of England, which was in earthly subjection to no realm, and pronouncing the penalties of the Præmunire against all who should purchase or procure any Bulls from the Court of Rome; any who were guilty of this should be put out of the King’s peace, and forfeit all their property. In Edward III.’s reign, also, the annual tribute, or census, as it was called, of a thousand marks was left unpaid. At the end of Edward I.’s reign 17,000 marks had become due. Edward II. paid this, and continued throughout his reign to discharge the debt. Edward III. was again strong enough to refuse the payment, and in 1366, Urban V. demanded the arrears of thirty-three years. The King laid the matter before his Parliament, and an instrument was drawn up in the name of the King, Lords, and Commons, declaring that John had acted without the advice of his realm, and that any demand for the money would be resisted to the utmost. It was not again claimed. But it was not against the Roman Church only that the popular feeling had been aroused. The Church itself had become unpopular. The wealth and idleness of the older monastic orders, the spiritual encroachments and licentious lives of the new mendicant orders, had excited popular anger. The charges against them are humorously summed up in the Song of the Order of Fair-ease, a description of an imaginary order, to which each existing class of monks subscribes a characteristic or two. The monks of Beverley give the habit of deep drinking, in which they are joined by the Black Monks; the Hospitallers dress well and amble fairly on grey palfreys; the Secular Canons are the willing servants of the ladies; the Grey Monks are given to licentiousness; while the Friars Minor, whose order is founded on poverty, will never lodge with a poor man so long as there are richer men to be found. In the same way the constant interference of the consistory courts was the cause of popular complaint. “Yet there sit somnours, six or seven, misjudging all men alike, and reach forth their roll: herdsmen hate them, and every man’s servant, for every parish they put in pain.”

To crown all, the doctrine itself of the Church had begun to be questioned. In 1360, the name of Wicliffe first becomes prominent. His first attack was upon the mendicant orders, who had contrived to get into their hands much of the education of the country. From this time onwards he continually waged war against the abuses of the Church. The clergy, he urged, should be poor, in imitation of Christ. This doctrine he carried out by the establishment of an order of poor priests. With regard to the Sacrament, he appealed to common sense; and while not yet ready to attack the doctrine of Transubstantiation, upheld that the elements taken were really bread and wine. But his great work was neither his assault on the wealth of the clergy, nor his attack on their doctrine, but the translation of the Bible into English, which was, in fact, an appeal to private judgment in opposition to ecclesiastical authority. His influence was very widespread. His poor priests worked largely among the lower orders, and his view of the necessity of poverty for the clergy was so in harmony with the feelings of the day, that it met with ready acceptance. As has been mentioned, the Church was too strong for him. He was obliged, when the support of John of Gaunt failed him, to make some sort of recantation, and retire to his living of Lutterworth. But his disciples are said to have numbered a third of the population of England, and when, as was inevitable, social and political views were added to their religious doctrines, they became an object of dread, not only to the Church, but also to the Government.

It is perhaps in the lower commons that social change is most obvious. The great insurrection of Wat Tyler is a sign of something more than mere temporary discontent. Agricultural villeinage was disappearing, and giving birth to a new class almost peculiar to England, the free but landless labourer. The existence of this class first comes prominently into notice in the Statute of Labourers. In the terrible pestilence of the Black Death which had ravaged England, a third, perhaps a half, of the population had been carried off. Labour became scarce. The labourers took the opportunity of making what we should now call a strike for higher wages. Such a demand, however consonant with economical principles, was quite repugnant to the feelings of that age, when prices were a constant matter of legal enactment. The Statute of Labourers, stating in its preamble that servants, taking advantage of the necessities of their masters, would not serve except for excessive wages, enacted that every able-bodied man should be bound to serve any one who required him at the old wages under pain of imprisonment; and that every master giving more than the old wages should forfeit thrice the sum he had offered. Such an ordinance could not be kept; but strenuous efforts were made to insist upon it, and again and again in some form or other it was re-enacted. But whether successful or not, it shows the existence of labour for wages, and of a rising knowledge on the part of the labourers of the value of their work. Several causes combined to create this labouring class. The early form of agricultural society may be roughly described as a village of serfs lying round the manor-house of their lord. Each serf had his share in the common fields of the village, and was bound to join in the cultivation of his lord’s domain or manor farm. For the simple farming at that time prevalent this forced labour was sufficient; and the lord valued his serfs more for military purposes than as agricultural labourers. As subinfeudation and alienation went on, the holders of small properties were obliged to work their land to better profit. The alienations also were chiefly made from the lord’s domain, but it was not usual to part with serfs. Consequently, their number increased, while the domain land diminished; there were more hands than the lord could employ, and the tenant working for profit could therefore find labour among the surplus serfs who would work for wages. A change in the character of war took place at the same time. The insular condition of England made the feudal arrangement with its limited term of service inconvenient; in the highest ranks, therefore, military service was changed to scutage or money payment, and a large number of dependants became less desirable than money; proprietors were willing to work their farms with fewer servants and to receive money rent instead of service. There were thus at work the two principles which broke down villein labour; labour paid by wages, and land held for money rent. The change in war had another effect. Armies were raised by contract with some great lord. The payment was beyond the ordinary agricultural wages. The earl himself received a mark a day, the common foot-soldier, 3d. or 4d., and the archer, 6d.[80] Anxious to fulfil his contract, the leader would not be careful to inquire whether he was enlisting serfs or not. On his return from a war, the well-paid soldier would be unwilling to fall back into a state of serfdom. He swelled the ranks of wage-paid labour. Again, the residence of a year and a day uninterrupted within the limits of a borough gave freedom. Serfs, seeing the advantage of money payments, fled thither and became free. Again, the Church, in whose eyes all men were equal, would not refuse to admit them within its ranks; a serf could thus become a priest or monk, and withdraw himself from his lord’s power. On the same principle, the Church constantly urged the manumission of serfs. To all these causes was now added the disarrangement of labour consequent on the Black Death. With a general demand for labour all superfluous hands would find easy employment, perhaps at a considerable distance from their old homes. With a sufficient supply himself, the lord would not waste time or money to redeem them. We thus see how there may have been a vast number of free labourers in England. The Statute of Labourers, destroying their freedom of bargain, attempted, though with but partial success, to force these free labourers back into a semi-servile condition. But they had now joined the ranks of freemen, such as the small farmers of Kent, and the unincorporated artisans of towns. The spirit of equality fostered by the teaching of the mendicant friars, who had reached England in Henry III.’s reign, and who took up their abode among the poor city populations, was still further increased by the teaching of Wicliffe and his poor priests.

a doggerel couplet frequent in the mouths of the insurgents of 1382, shows how the lessons of the Bible made public by Wicliffe’s translation could be turned in the same direction. The feeling that it was the plebeian archer, and not the lordly man-at-arms, who had won the great victories in France, and the success with which, during the last half century, the smaller trade corporations had in the cities forced themselves into an equality with the great ones, all led to the same democratic feeling. The lower freemen made common cause with the villeins. They had all felt the heavy pressure of the tax-gatherer. The popular songs of the day are full of wretchedness. One, said to belong to the reign of Edward I. or II., speaks thus—

“To seek silver for the King, I sold my seed, wherefore my land lies fallow and learns to sleep. Since they fetched my fair cattle in my fold, when I think of my old wealth I nearly weep; this breeds many bold beggars. There wakes in the world consternation and woe, as good is it to perish at once, as so to labour.”[81] The democratic outbreak of Wat Tyler was the consequence.

While the two sections of the commons were thus rising in social position, a change had also taken place in the character of the nobility. It may be roughly characterized as the change from feudalism to chivalry.[82] Many of the same causes which had conduced to the freedom of the labourer had tended to loosen the territorial system on which the ancient strength of the nobility rested. Especially had the voluntary character of military service dealt heavy blows at the practical side of feudalism. Soldiering was no longer the necessary duty of every man; but the military spirit remained, and to the bulk of the aristocracy fighting became a pastime. The subordination of proprietors gave place to a sort of system of freemasonry, to which all knights were admitted. Knighthood made its holder any man’s equal for actual military purposes. It was no longer the great noble, but the good soldier, who was the commander. Manny, Chandos, Knowles, all of them simple knights, were the generals to whom Edward III. trusted. As an amusement war was decked with ostentatious ornament. This is the period of showy tournaments, of armorial bearings, and of grotesque vows, like that of the young knights who attended Edward with black patches over their eyes. It is this chivalrous aspect of war which explains the short-lived character of Edward’s expeditions. But it had a more important effect. Importance in the country became a more personal matter; partly from love of show, partly to produce respect, great men began to surround themselves, not with feudal followers, but with paid retainers. To these they granted liveries. It was a point of honour among these retainers to stand by each other and by their chief. Quite in the beginning of Richard II.’s reign, the Commons petitioned against these liveries and the bands of maintainers,[83] who upheld each other in illegal actions. Thus great households, and by degrees factions, were formed, and things were ready for the great outbreak of faction fighting, which ended in the destruction of the old nobility in the Wars of the Roses.

The feeling of national life, which is one of the characteristics of the time, had shown itself in literature. Public transactions were still carried on in French or Latin; but it will be remembered that as early as the Provisions of Oxford it had been found necessary to publish any important proclamation in English as well. Up till that time the languages of the nobility and of the common people had been distinct. From that time onwards they begin to blend. This, as it happens, can be very well observed. Geoffrey of Monmouth wrote a Latin Chronicle of England in 1130. Before the end of the century it was versified by two writers; one wrote for the nobles and the aristocracy, the other for the common people. Master Wace, a native of Jersey, translated Geoffrey for Henry II. into Norman-French. Layamon, who wrote about 1180, translated it into a language which may be fairly called Anglo-Saxon, although of a somewhat degraded type. We have here a perfect division of the languages. But about the middle of the next century the same work was translated by Robert of Gloucester. In his language there is a much nearer approach to English, and a considerable number of French words are easily to be traced. Some fifty years afterwards, Robert Mannyng, or De Brunne, again rewrote the Chronicle; and again the further introduction of French words is striking. We have thus means of testing, as it were, at three different points, the process of amalgamation that was going forward. The Court language still continued to be French, but French not much like the language of France, and it was ceasing to be thoroughly understood by the bulk of the people. By the time that Chaucer wrote, he could laugh at English-French. His Prioress spoke Cockney-French,

And in recommending English writing, he says,—“Certes there ben some that speke thyr poysy mater in Frensche, of whyche speche the Frensche men have as good a fantasye as we have in hearing of Frensche mennes Englyshe.” This indeed was to be expected. From the Conquest the language of schools had been French; but in 1356, John of Cornwall had begun a change in this habit, and taught Latin translation by means of English, and not French. The consequence, as described by Trevisa, was, their “avauntage is, that thei lerneth her gramer in lasse tyme than children were wont to do; desavauntage is, that now children of gramer scole kunneth no more Frensch than her lifte heele.” Other signs also point to this change. Latin had ceased to be the language of public documents in the reign of Edward I. In 1362, in answer it appears to a petition from the Commons, the opening address delivered in Parliament was in English, and the Commons’ debates in English also. At the same time it was ordered that English should be the language of courts of law, because the French tongue was too much unknown. But it was not till the reign of Richard III. that the statutes and rolls of Parliament were written in English. It is probable that Parliamentary business continued to be carried on in both languages for some time longer. In 1381 English seems to have been generally used. There were thus during this period extant three languages for literary purposes—Latin, the language of learned men and historians; French, an acquired Court language, in which most of the legends of chivalry and lengthened rhyming chronicles were produced; and the gradually rising English language, which, as the popular tongue, was chiefly employed in songs and political satire. The earliest form of English poetry was alliterative,—metrical, but without rhyme, and depending for its effect upon a certain number of words in each couplet beginning with the same letter. But rhyme, and not only rhyme, but very easy and varied metres, were introduced as early as the reign of Henry III. Not unfrequently both principles were blended, and rhyme and alliteration occur together. Latin was also employed, we must suppose by the clergy, in satirical songs. All classical metres were then discarded, and Latin was used as a rhyming language. There are some instances also of verses, partly in one language, partly in the other. It may be worth while to give an instance of two of these various metres. Thus a verse of a song shortly after the battle of Lewes runs thus:—

This is rhyme, the rhythm is free, and there is a refrain. In the following verse, from a satire on the consistory courts, alliteration and rhyme go together:—