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 partridges and hares are reserved upon pain of the galleys. As for their poultry, the soldiers eat it—the peasants hardly get the eggs. And if a man is observed to thrive, he is presently assessed higher than his neighbours, and so is soon reduced to their level again. The nobles and gentry are not so heavily burdened, but if one of them is impeached for a State crime—though by his enemy—he is very often examined privately, perhaps in the King's own apartment, and sometimes only by the King's pursuivants; and if the King judges him guilty, he may quite likely be put in a sack and dropped by night into the river. Whereas in England the King cannot lay taxes or make new laws without consent of the whole kingdom in Parliament assembled. Nor can any man be condemned save by process of law. For the laws of England know nothing of "the will of the Prince."

Fortescue describes England as so fertile, that it produces almost spontaneously, without man's labour. Even uncultivated spots are so luxuriant, that they often bring in more than those that are tilled and manured—though these too bring in plentiful crops of corn. The feeding lands are enclosed with hedgerows and ditches, and planted with trees to fence the herds from bleak winds and sultry heats, and are generally so well watered that they do not need the attendance of the hind day or night. There are no wolves, bears, nor lions ; the sheep he out o' nights without their shepherds.

Throughout the comparison is between the "Common Law" and the "Civil Law." The Common Law is the unwritten Law of the Land, older than any statutes, and based on the simple principles of justice. The Civil Law is the law of Statute Books, framed or modified to suit the convenience of the Prince, who makes abstract justice secondary to the strengthening of his own authority.

But already the forces were at work which were for a long time to deprive this country of the right to say that in England the Common Law, and not the will of the Prince, was supreme. As long as the kings of England had to ask their people for money, knowing that if the people refused it would be very difficult to enforce their demands, we find a great spirit of independence in the English nation, and all classes had well-defined rights and privileges. Even the