To the reign of Henry the Second, the citizens and burgesses were little removed from absolute slaves.  They might be taxed individually at what sum the king thought fit to demand; or they might be discharged by offering the king a sum, from which, if he accepted it, the citizens were not at liberty to recede; and in either case the demand was exacted with severity, and even cruelty.  A great difference is made between taxing them and those who cultivate lands:  because, says my author, their property is easily concealed; they live penuriously, are intent by all methods to increase their substance, and their immense wealth is not easily exhausted.  Such was their barbarous notion of trade and its importance.  The same author, speaking of the severe taxation, and violent method of extorting it, observes that it is a very proper method,—­and that it is very just that a degenerate officer, or other freeman, rejecting his condition for sordid gain, should be punished beyond the common law of freemen.

I take it that those who held by ancient demesne did not prescribe simply not to contribute to the expenses of the knight of the shire; but they prescribed, as they did in all cases, upon a general principle, to pay no tax, nor to attend any duty of whatever species, because they were the king’s villains.  The argument is drawn from the poverty of the boroughs, which ever since the Conquest have been of no consideration, and yet send members to Parliament; which they could not do, but by some privileges inherent in them, on account of a practice of the same kind in the Saxon times, when they were of more repute.  It is certain that many places now called boroughs were formerly towns or villages in ancient demesne of the king, and had, as such, writs directed to them to appear in Parliament, that they might make a free gift or benevolence, as the boroughs did; and from thence arose the custom of summoning them.  This appears by sufficient records.  And it appears by records also, that it was much at the discretion of the sheriff what boroughs he should return; a general writ was directed to him to return for all the boroughs in a shire; sometimes boroughs which had formerly sent members to Parliament were quite passed over, and others, never considered as such before, were returned.  What is called the prescription on this occasion was rather a sort of rule to direct the sheriff in the execution of his general power than a right inherent in any boroughs.  But this was long after the time of which we speak.  In whatever manner we consider it, we must own that this subject during the Saxon times is extremely dark.  One thing, however, is, I think, clear from the whole tenor of their government, and even from the tenor of the Norman Constitution long after:  that their Witenagemotes or Parliaments were unformed, and that the rights by which the members held their seats were far from being exactly ascertained.  The Judicia Civitatis Londoniae afford a tolerable