ss of other points upon which directions
are given, we notice the following: the necessity of keeping secret the
matters in course of deliberation; the prohibition to councillors from
receiving, either directly or indirectly, anything in the shape of a
douceur from the parties in any suit; and the forbidding all attorneys
from receiving any bribe or claiming more than the actual expenses of a
journey and other just charges.

The great charter of the Parliament, promulgated in April, 1453, was thus
amended, confirmed, and completed, by this code of Charles VIII., with a
wisdom which cannot be too highly extolled.

The magistrature of the supreme courts had been less favoured during the
preceding reign. Louis XI., that cautious and crafty reformer, after
having forbidden ecclesiastical judges to examine cases referring to the
revenues of vacant benefices, remodelled the secular courts, but he
ruthlessly destroyed anything which offended him personally. For this
reason, as he himself said, he limited the power of the Parliaments of
Paris and Toulouse, by establishing, to their prejudice, several other
courts of justice, and by favouring the Chatelet, where he was sure always
to find those who would act with him against the aristocracy. The
Parliament would not give way willingly, nor without the most determined
opposition. It was obliged, however, at last to succumb, and to pass
certain edicts which were most repugnant to it. On the death of Louis XI.,
however, it took its revenge, and called those who had been his favourites
and principal agents to answer a criminal charge, for no other reason than
that they had exposed themselves to the resentment of the supreme court.

The Chatelet, in its judicial functions, was inferior to the Parliament,
nevertheless it acquired, through its provost, who represented the
bourgeois of Paris, considerable importance in the eyes of the supreme
court. In fact, for two centuries the provost held the privilege of ruling
the capital, both politically and financially, of commanding the citizen
militia, and of being chief magistrate of the city. In the court of
audiences, a canopy was erected, under which he sat, a distinction which
no other magistrate enjoyed, and which appears to have been exclusively
granted to him because he sat in the place of _Monsieur Saint Loys_ (Saint
Louis), _dispensing justice to the good people of the City of Paris_. When
the provost was installed, he was solemnly