without armed guards. The forests were emptied
of outlaws, and confidence and security succeeded distrust and
lawlessness.... The frank pledge-system, which was worked in country
districts, was supplied in towns by the machinery of the
guilds,--institutions combining the benefit of modern clubs, insurance
societies, and trades-unions. As a rule, they were limited to members of
one trade or calling."

Mr. Pearson, in his history of England, as quoted by Hughes, thus sums
up this great administrative reform for the preservation of life and
property and order during the Middle Ages:--

"What is essential to remember is, that life and property were not
secured to the Anglo-Saxon by the State, but by the loyal union of his
fellow-citizens; the Saxon guilds are unmatched in the history of their
times as evidences of self-reliance, mutual trust, patient
self-restraint, and orderly love of law among a young people,

"To recapitulate the reforms of Alfred in the administration of justice
and the resettlement of the country, the old divisions of shires were
carefully readjusted, and divided into hundreds and tythings. The
alderman of the shire still remained the chief officer, but the office
was no longer hereditary. The king appointed the alderman, or eorl, who
was president of the shire gemot, or council, and chief judge of the
county court as well as governor of the shire, but was assisted and
probably controlled in his judicial capacity by justices appointed by
the king, and not attached to the shire, or in any way dependent on the
alderman. The vice-domini, or nominees of the alderman, were abolished,
and an officer substituted for them called the reeve of the shire, or
sheriff, who carried out the decrees of the courts. The hundreds and
tythings were represented by their own officers, and had their
hundred-courts and courts-leet, which exercised a trifling criminal
jurisdiction, but were chiefly assemblies answering to our grand juries
and parish vestries. All householders were members of them, and every
man thus became responsible for keeping the king's peace."

In regard to the financial resources of Alfred we know but little.
Probably they were great, considering the extent and population of the
little kingdom over which he ruled, but inconsiderable in comparison
with the revenues of England at the present day. To build fortresses,
construct a navy, and keep in pay a considerable military force,--to say
nothing of hi