[30]. See END-NOTE 2 at the end of the volume





CHAPTER III. LOCAL SERVICES DUE BY THE PRIVILEGED CLASSES.

I. Examples in Germany and England. - These services are not
rendered by the privileged classes in France.

LET us consider the first one, local government. There are
countries at the gates of France in which feudal subjection, more
burdensome than in France, seems lighter because, in the other scale,
the benefits counterbalance disadvantages. At Munster, in 1809,
Beugnot finds a sovereign bishop, a town of convents and a large
seigniorial mansion, a few merchants for indispensable trade, a small
bourgeoisie, and, all around, a peasantry composed of either colons or
serfs. The seignior deducts a portion of all their crops in provisions
or in cattle, and, at their deaths, a portion of their inheritances.
If they go away their property revert to him. His servants are
chastised like Russian moujiks, and in each outhouse is a trestle for
this purpose "without prejudice to graver penalties," probably the
bastinado and the like. But "never did the culprit entertain the
slightest idea of complaint or appeal." For if the seignior whips them
as the father of family he protects them "as the father of a family,
ever coming to their assistance when misfortune befalls them, and
taking care of them in their illness." He provides an asylum for them
in old age; he looks after their widows, and rejoices when they have