of the government; and the consequence was, that laws were passed at different times for their suppression, with the excep tion of the more useful of the mechanical societies 1. These, it is clear, still continued to exist, as we find them mentioned by Pliny, and in the Digest and Code 2. In the Digest 3, it is laid down, that the power of establishing such bodies was not permitted to all persons, but was restrained by the laws, the decrees of the senate, and the imperial ordinances. In addition to the societies of a mechanical nature there noticed, we find mention made of a provincial association, called the Collegium Naviculariorum,' which must have been a mercantile body. There appear to have been in the province of Gaul several bodies of those navicularii or nautæ, as they were often called; and they deserve attention, because attempts have been made, as we shall presently see, by some of the historians of Paris, to deduce the modern system of municipal government of that city from one of these naval associations. These collegia partook of the nature of corporate bodies, being capable of possessing common property and funds, and having a chief person or head, called in the digest, actor,' or syndicus,' who appears to have insisted in their law-suits". At other times, we find the appellations of primates profes'sionum 6, and of magistri 7,' applied to the chief persons of these associations. Institutions of a similar nature to these collegia may probably be discovered in the greater number of the nations of modern Europe. In Rome, in modern times, we find mention made of collegia or universitates of various mercantile and mechanical bodies. In France, according to Loyseau, 1 Sigon. de Antiq. Jur. Civ. Rom. lib. ii. c. 12. 3 L. i. ff. quod cujuscunque universitatis. 7 Sigonius, ubi sup. 2 Rossini, p. 603. L. unic. C. de Monopoliis. 8 See Madox, Fir. Burg. p. 32. 9 Des Offices, liv. v. ch. vii. No. 74. &c. arts. there were two classes of these subordinate communities; the one class, consisting of the different bodies of the liberal arts, and the other, of the various associations of the mechanical The latter class were corporate societies, the members of which were sworn upon their entry; from whence the trades to which they belonged were called Metiers jurés, and the towns in which they occurred, Villes jurées. In France, in ancient times, there were only certain towns of this description; but by a royal edict, in the year 1581, all the towns of that country were put on this footing. These trades' societies had officers, distinguished by the various denominations of Jurés, Visiteurs, and Gardes de Métiers. They were chosen either annually, or every two or three years, in the assembly of the masters of the trades, before the judge-ordinary of the town, who received their oath. They had no other salary than a portion of the fines and confiscations 1. There appears to have existed in Paris an association, pertaking very much of the nature of a mercantile gild; and the more worthy of remark, because its system of internal government seems to have been, to a considerable extent, identified with the municipal government of the town itself. The association got the name of La Marchandise, or La Marchandise de l'Eau, and sometimes of La Confraërie des Marcheanz de l'Eau; and appears to have consisted of those person who had the privilege of the river Seine for mercantile purposes 1. No one enjoyed the right of the river without being, as it was expressed, HANSE' de la merchandise de l'eau,―i. e. made a member of the hanse, or association of the river merchants. According to some writers, this association existed at a period of the most remote antiquity, even so far back as the 4 This account of these mechanical associations is that given by Loyseau (Des Offices, liv. v. ch. vii. No. 77. et seq.) who wrote in the end of the sixteenth century; whether they may be precisely on the same footing at present, I do not pretend to say. 2 Hist. de Paris, tom. i. xxix. 4 Ib. tom. i. p. xxvii. p. 3 Ih, tom. i. xxxii. p. reign of the Emperor Tiberius, and, at that time, formed one of those bodies of nautæ or navicularii which have been already noticed1. It has been conjectured, that the chief municipal government of Paris was always vested in this body, or in its principal members; and that, when the town was in the time of the Romans, under the controul of the officer called a Defensor, that magistrate was selected from this body 2. Without determining what weight may be due to these suppositions, it is at least certain, that, in the course of time, the principal magistrate of Paris received the denomination of the Prevôt des Marchands, and some subordinate functionaries were occasionally called Li Eschevins de la Marcheandise, or Li Jurez de la confraërie. These titles first occur in some police regulations, drawn up in the year 12585. There was, however, another functionary, called the Prevôt de Paris, whose office seems to have been of more ancient date than the name at least of the prevôt des marchands; but if the former ever enjoyed the chief authority, he appears to have afterwards yielded to the higher controul of the latter. 1 Hist. de Paris, tom. i. p. lxxix. According to the author of this History, p. lxxx, a stone was found in Paris, in the year 1711, with this inscription: TIB. CAESARE. AVG. IOVI OPTVM. MAXSVMO 'M. NAVTAE PARISIACI PVBLICE POSIERV TN.” 2 Ib. tom. i. p. lxxxix, and other passages. Loyseau des Seign. p. 150. 5 Ib. Hist. de Paris, tom. i. p. xxxii. 6 Ib, p. iv. CHAPTER II. RISE AND PROGRESS OF THE GOVERNMENT OF TOWNS IN ENGLAND. DURING the time of the Romans, we learn that there existed in Britain twenty-eight cities, besides castles or fortified places; and we may reasonably suppose, that the system of municipal government which was established in the different cities throughout the various provinces of the Roman empire, would extend also into Britain. But there can be little doubt, that, if such institutions were established in this island at that period, these were subverted between the final departure of the Romans and the Norman conquest, during which interval successive nations introduced their own peculiar establishments. There is no evidence that any of those nations took any pains to maintain the Roman laws and customs, as was done by the Franks in the Gallic province. During the Saxon period, we may therefore look for a new state of things in the towns; and those traces which are at the present day to be found of Roman municipal establishments, if such they are really to be considered, were principally, although perhaps not entirely 2, introduced by the Normans. During the Saxon sway, there was a considerable number of towns, which, although certainly not then possessing the same extent or importance which they afterwards obtained, were probably not in so inferior a condition as has sometimes been represented. Of these, the principal were Lon 1 Gildas; Historia. See a list of the cities, Appendix to Bede's Hist. Eccles. Num. iii. 2 See what is afterwards said as to the Mercantile Gild. 6 6 don, Winchester, and York', We may presume that the opulence which writers of the reign of Henry II. describe as then existing in London, including its 113 churches, 13 convents and 3 colleges or academies, had not entirely arisen since the Conquest 2. The charter which the Conqueror granted to that city is undoubtedly not calculated to raise very high ideas of its importance 3; but, on the one hand, we may remember, that he spoke as a victor to a subdued nation; and, on the other, that he confirms certain privileges, such as they are, which had existed in the time of the Confessor. From this charter it appears, that London at that period was under the controul of an officer called the Portreve1; a functionary probably known in other towns during the Saxon period, especially those which were maritime 5. 1 Littleton's Henry II. vol. ii. p. 317. Hume's Hist. App. i. 2 See Littleton, vol. ii. p. 315, where Fitzstephen and Peter of Blois are cited. The following is the English translation of this charter from the Saxon, in which it was framed: William the king greets William the bishop and Godfrey the portreve, and all the burgesses within London, 'French and English, friendly; and I declare to you, that I will that you 'be all law-worthy, as ye were in King Edward's days; and I will, that ' each child be his father's heir, after his father's days; and I will not that ' any man command any wrong to be done to you. God you keep.'— Brady, p. 16. Portreve, from the Saxon port, a harbour or town in general, (See Merewethers' West Looe Case, p. xxxix.) and reve, or greve, præpositus. 'Dicebantur portgrefii non solum portuum custodes, sed per translationem ' oppidorum etiam urbiumque præfecti ;' Spelman eo voce. 'Reve alias gre ve, Germanice grave, præpositus, præfectus. Hoc a Saxon gereva, illud a reva, quæ idem sunt; gereva enim a reva provenit, atque ambo a rævan ' id est rapere, &c. quod mulctas regias et delinquentium facultates in fis'cum raperent, &c. Est igitur Reve idem quod Ballivus, qui in villis et quæ dicimus maneriis, domini personam sustinet ejusque vice omnia dis'ponet et moderatur.'...Spelman voce Reve. We have here the plain etymology of our Scottish word grieve. • The Tungreve appears to have been properly merely a manorial officer, Tungrevius quasi Tungereve, i. e. villæ propositus, Villicus. Ho |