an utter absence of
administrative centralisation. The units meeting in parliament formed a
supreme assembly; but they did not sink their own individuality. They
only met to distribute the various functions among themselves.

The English parish with its squire, its parson, its lawyer and its
labouring population was a miniature of the British Constitution in
general. The squire's eldest son could succeed to his position; a second
son might become a general or an admiral; a third would take the family
living; a fourth, perhaps, seek his fortune at the bar. This implies a
conception of other political conditions which curiously illustrate some
contemporary conceptions.

NOTES:

[8] See _Dictionary of National Biography_.

[9] _The Law of the Constitution_, p. 209.

[10] See Sir J. F. Stephen's _History of the Criminal Law_ (1883), i.
470. He quotes Blackstone's famous statement that there were 160
felonies without benefit of clergy, and shows that this gives a very
uncertain measure of the severity of the law. A single act making
larceny in general punishable by death would be more severe than fifty
separate acts, making fifty different varieties of larceny punishable by
death. He adds, however, that the scheme of punishment was 'severe to
the highest degree, and destitute of every sort of principle or system.'
The number of executions in the early part of this century varied
apparently from a fifth to a ninth of the capital sentences passed. See
Table in Porter's _Progress of the Nation_ (1851), p. 635.

[11] See the references to Cottu's report of 1822 in Stephen's
_History_, i. 429, 439, 451. Cottu's book was translated by Blanco
White.

[12] Gneist's _Self-Government_ (1871), p. 194. It is characteristic
that J. S. Mill, in his _Representative Government_, remarks that the
'Quarter Sessions' are formed in the 'most anomalous' way; that they
represent the old feudal principle, and are at variance with the
fundamental principles of representative government (_Rep. Gov._ (1867),
p. 113). The mainspring of the old system had become a simple anomaly to
the new radicalism.

[13] See Arthur Young, _passim_. There was, however, an improvement even
in the first half of the century. See Cunningham's _Growth of English
Industry, etc. (Modern Times)_, p. 378.

IV. THE ARMY AND NAVY

We are often amused by the persistency of the cry against a 'standing
army' in England. It did not fairly die out until the revolutio