"Certainly," said he; "how else could we settle them? You see in
matters which are merely personal which do not affect the welfare of
the community--how a man shall dress, what he shall eat and drink,
what he shall write and read, and so forth--there can be no
difference of opinion, and everybody does as he pleases. But when
the matter is of common interest to the whole community, and the
doing or not doing something affects everybody, the majority must
have their way; unless the minority were to take up arms and show by
force that they were the effective or real majority; which, however,
in a society of men who are free and equal is little likely to
happen; because in such a community the apparent majority IS the real
majority, and the others, as I have hinted before, know that too well
to obstruct from mere pigheadedness; especially as they have had
plenty of opportunity of putting forward their side of the question."

"How is that managed?" said I.

"Well," said he, "let us take one of our units of management, a
commune, or a ward, or a parish (for we have all three names,
indicating little real distinction between them now, though time was
there was a good deal). In such a district, as you would call it,
some neighbours think that something ought to be done or undone: a
new town-hall built; a clearance of inconvenient houses; or say a
stone bridge substituted for some ugly old iron one,--there you have
undoing and doing in one. Well, at the next ordinary meeting of the
neighbours, or Mote, as we call it, according to the ancient tongue
of the times before bureaucracy, a neighbour proposes the change, and
of course, if everybody agrees, there is an end of discussion, except
about details. Equally, if no one backs the proposer,--'seconds
him,' it used to be called--the matter drops for the time being; a