country, the whole of this ſyſtem of tenures now tended to nothing elſe, but a wretched means of raiſing money to pay an army of occaſional mercenaries. In the mean time the families of all our nobility and gentry groaned under the intolerable burthens, which (in conſequence of the fiction adopted after the conqueſt) were introduced and laid upon them by the ſubtlety and fineſſe of the Norman lawyers. For, beſides the ſcutages they were liable to in defect of perſonal attendance, which however were aſſeſſed by themſelves in parliament, they might be called upon by the king or lord paramount for aids, whenever his eldeſt ſon was to be knighted, or his eldeſt daughter married; not to forget the ranſom of his own perſon. The heir, on the death of his anceſtor, if of full age, was plundered of the firſt emoluments ariſing from his inheritance, by way of relief and primer ſeiſin; and, if under age, of the whole of his eſtate during infancy. And then, as ſir Thomas Smith very feelingly complains[1], "when he came to his own, after he was out of wardſhip, his woods decayed, houſes fallen down, ſtock waſted and gone, lands let forth and ploughed to be barren," to make amends he was yet to pay half a year's profits as a fine for ſuing out his livery; and alſo the price or value of his marriage, if he refuſed ſuch wife as his lord and guardian had bartered for, and impoſed upon him; or twice that value, if he married another woman. Add to this, the untimely and expenſive honour of knighthood, to make his poverty more completely ſplendid. And when by theſe deductions his fortune was ſo ſhattered and ruined, that perhaps he was obliged to fell his patrimony, he had not even that poor privilege allowed him, without paying an exorbitant fine for a licence of alienation.
A slavery ſo complicated, and ſo extenſive as this, called aloud for a remedy in a nation that boaſted of her freedom. Palliatives were from time to time applied by ſucceſſive acts of parliament, which aſſwaged ſome temporary grievances. Till at length the humanity of king James I conſented[2] for a proper
