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 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 upon principles of fidelity.  Fidelity of man to man is among the rarest excellences of humanity, 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 self-interest.

“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 to his lord, shall hold his right hand over the book, and shall say:—­Hear you, my lord, that I from this day forth unto you shall be true and faithful, and shall owe you fealty for the land which I hold of you in villanage; and that no evil or damage will I see concerning you, but I will defend and warn you to my power.  So help me God and all his saints."[11]

Again, in the distribution of the produce of land, men dealt fairly and justly with each other; and in the material condition of the bulk of the people there is a fair evidence that the system worked efficiently and well.  It worked well for the support of a sturdy high-hearted race, sound in body and fierce in spirit, and furnished with thews and sinews which, under the stimulus of those “great shins of beef,"[12] their common diet, were the wonder of the age.  “What comyn folke in all this world,” says a state paper in 1515[13] “may compare with the comyns of England in riches, freedom, liberty, welfare, and all prosperity?  What comyn folke is so mighty, so strong in the felde, as the comyns of England?” The relative numbers of the French and English armies which fought at Cressy and Agincourt