n imposed
by nature on mankind."

Sir Henry Maine thinks that there are traces in England of the commune
or MARK system in the village communities which are believed to have
existed, but these traces are very faint. The subsequent changes were
inherent in, and developed by, the various conquests that swept over
England; even that ancient class of holdings called "Borough English,"
are a development of a war-like system, under which each son, as he came
to manhood, entered upon the wars, and left the patrimonial lands to the
youngest son. The system of gavel-kind which prevailed in the kingdom of
Kent, survived the accession of William of Normandy, and was partially
effaced in the reign of Henry VII. It was not the aboriginal or
communistic system, but one of its many successors.

The various systems may have run one into the other, but I think there
are sufficiently distinct features to place them in the following order:

1st. The Aboriginal.

2d. The Roman, Population about 1,500,000.

3d. The Scandinavian under the ANGLO-SAXON and Danish kings--A.D. 450 to
A.D. 1066. The population in 1066 was 2,150,000.

4th. The Norman, from A.D. 1066 to A.D. 1154. The population in the
latter year was 3,350,000.

5th. The Plantagenet, from 1154 to 1485; in the latter the population
was 4,000,000.

6th. The Tudor, 1485 to 1603, when the population was 5,000,000.

7th. The Stuarts, 1603 to 1714, the population having risen to
5,750,000.

8th. The Present, from 1714. Down to 1820 the soil supported the
population; now about one half lives upon food produced in other
countries. In 1874 the population was 23,648,607.

Each of these periods has its own characteristic, but as I must compress
my remarks, you must excuse my passing rapidly from one to the other.

I. THE ABORIGINES.

The aboriginal period is wrapped in darkness, and I cannot with
certainty say whether the system that prevailed was Celtic and Tribal.
An old French customary, in a MS. treating upon the antiquity of
tenures, says: "The first English king divided the land into four parts.
He gave one part to the ARCH FLAMENS to pray for him and his posterity.
A second part he gave to the earls and nobility, to do him knight's
service. A third part he divided among husbandmen, to hold of him in
socage. The fourth he gave to mechanical persons to hold in burgage."
The terms used apply to a much more recent period and more modern ideas.

Caesar tells us "t