st Century.]

Fines were levied everywhere, at all times, and for all sorts of reasons.
Under the name of _epices_, the magistrates, judges, reporters, and
counsel, who had at first only received sweetmeats and preserves as
voluntary offerings, eventually exacted substantial tribute in current
coin. Scholars who wished to take rank in the University sent some small
pies, costing ten sols, to each examiner. Students in philosophy or
theology gave two suppers to the president, eight to the other masters,
besides presenting them with sweetmeats, &c. It would be an endless task
to relate all the fines due by apprentices and companions before they
could reach mastership in their various crafts, nor have we yet mentioned
certain fines, which, from their strange or ridiculous nature, prove to
what a pitch of folly men may be led under the influence of tyranny,
vanity, or caprice.

Thus, we read of vassals descending to the humiliating occupation of
beating the water of the moat of the castle, in order to stop the noise of
the frogs, during the illness of the mistress; we elsewhere find that at
times the lord required of them to hop on one leg, to kiss the latch of
the castle-gate, or to go through some drunken play in his presence, or
sing a somewhat broad song before the lady.

At Tulle, all the rustics who had married during the year were bound to
appear on the Puy or Mont St. Clair. At twelve o'clock precisely, three
children came out of the hospital, one beating a drum violently, the other
two carrying a pot full of dirt; a herald called the names of the
bride-grooms, and those who were absent or were unable to assist in
breaking the pot by throwing stones at it, paid a fine.

At Perigueux, the young couples had to give the consuls a pincushion of
embossed leather or cloth of different colours; a woman marrying a second
time was required to present them with an earthen pot containing twelve
sticks of different woods; a woman marrying for the third time, a barrel
of cinders passed thirteen times through the sieve, and thirteen spoons
made of wood of fruit-trees; and, lastly, one coming to the altar for the
fifth time was obliged to bring with her a small tub containing the
excrement of a white hen!

"The people of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance period were literally
tied down with taxes and dues of all sorts," says M. Mary-Lafon. "If a few
gleams of liberty reached them, it was only from a distance, and more in
th