plenty of children. He is bound to them by common sympathies they are
neither miserable nor uneasy; they know that, in every extreme or
unforeseen necessity, he will be their refuge.[1] In the Prussian states
and according to the code of Frederick the Great, a still more
rigorous servitude is atoned for by similar obligations. The
peasantry, without their seignior's permission, cannot alienate a
field, mortgage it, cultivate it differently, change their occupation
or marry. If they leave the seigniory he can pursue them in every
direction and bring them back by force. He has the right of
surveillance over their private life, and he chastises them if drunk
or lazy. When young they serve for years as servants in his mansion;
as cultivators they owe him corvees and, in certain places, three
times a week. But, according to both law and custom, he is obliged "to
see that they are educated, to succor them in indigence, and, as far
as possible, to provide them with the means of support." Accordingly
he is charged with the duties of the government of which he enjoys the
advantages, and, under the heavy hand which curbs them, but which
sustains them, we do not find his subjects recalcitrant. In England,
the upper class attains to the same result by other ways. There also
the soil still pays the ecclesiastic tithe, strictly the tenth, which
is much more than in France.[2] The squire, the nobleman, possesses a
still larger portion of the soil than his French neighbor and, in
truth, exercises greater authority in his canton. But his tenants, the
lessees and the farmers, are no longer his serfs, not even his
vassals; they are free. If he governs it is through influence and not
by virtue of a command. Proprietor and patron, he is held in respect.
Lord-lieutenant, officer in the militia, administrator, justice, he is
visibly useful. And, above all, he lives at home, from father to son;
he belongs to the district. He is in hereditary and constant relation
with the local public through his occupations and through his