[212]. Swá eác we settað be eallum hádum, ge ceorle, ge eorle: “so also we ordain concerning all degrees of men, churl as well as earl.” Leg. Ælfr. § 4.
[213]. Conf. Grimm, Deut. Rechtsalt. 283. The Latin laws of the Middle Ages usually adopt the words, Liber, liber homo, ingenuus. In reference to the noble, he is mediocris, minofledus, καταδεέστερος; in respect of his wife, he is baro.
[214]. “Si quis liber homo migrare voluerit aliquo, potestatem habeat infra dominium regni nostri, cum fara sua, migrare quo voluerit.” Leg. Roth. 177. The free folk on the Leutkircher Heide “are free and shall have no nachjagende Herr,” (i. e. Lord hunting after them, the Dominus persequens of our early law-books). Lünig. Reichsarch. p. spec. cont. 4. p. 803. See further Grimm, Deut. Rechtsalt. 286, etc.
[215]. Tac. Germ. xiii. A century ago gentlemen wore swords in France and England, and courtiers still wear them. The Hungarian freeman transacts no public business unarmed.
[216]. Lex. Fres. ii. 2.
[217]. There were differences in this respect among the different races, and in some, the long hair may have been confined to the noble families. Among the Saxons, however, it seems that it was also used by the free: gif freo wíf, locbore, lyswæs hwæt gedó, if a free woman, that wears long hair, do any wrong. Lex Æðelb. § 73. To cut a freeman’s hair was to dishonour him. Lex Ælfr. § 35. See also Grimm, Deut. Rechtsalt. pp. 240, 283. Eumenius speaks of the Franks as “prolixo crine rutilantes.” Paneg. Constant. c. 18.
[218]. “De minoribus rebus principes consultant; de majoribus omnes. Ita tamen ut ea quoque quorum penes plebem arbitrium est, apud principes pertractentur.” Tac. Germ. xi. Something similar to this probably prevailed in the Dorian constitution, and in the old Ionian before the establishment of the great democracy. The mass of the people might accept or reject, but hardly, I think, debate the propositions of the nobles. After all the πρόβουλοι seem necessary in all states. See Arist. Polit. iv. § 15.
[219]. In the Rígsmál, Jarl is the progenitor of all the noble races, as Karl is of the free.
CHAPTER VI.
THE KING.
As the noble is to the freeman, so in some respects is the King to the noble. He is the summit of his class, and completes the order of the freemen. Even in the dim twilight of Teutonic history we find tribes and nations subject to kings: others again acknowledged no such office, and Tacitus seems to regard this state as the more natural to our forefathers. I do not think this clear: on the contrary, kingship, in a certain sense, seems to me rooted in the German mind and institutions, and universal among some particular tribes and confederacies. The free people recognize in the King as much of the national unity as they consider necessary to their existence as a substantive body, and as the representative of the whole nation they consider him to be a mediator between themselves and the gods[[220]]. The elective principle is the safeguard of their freedom; the monarchical principle is the condition of their nationality. But this idea of kingship is not that which we now generally entertain; it is in some respects more, in others less, comprehensive.