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 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.[1301] 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