But the long train of services that made afterwards the learning of the tenures were then not thought of, because these feuds, if we may so call them, had not then come to be inheritances,--which circumstance of inheritance gave rise to the whole feudal system.

With the Anglo-Saxons the feuds continued to the last but a sort of pay or salary of office.

The _trinoda necessitas_, so much spoken of, which was to attend the king in his expeditions, and to contribute to the building of bridges and repair of highways, never bound the lands by way of tenure, but as a political regulation, which equally affected every class and condition of men and every species of possession.
[Sidenote: Gavelkind.] The manner of succeeding to lands in England at this period was, as we have observed, by Gavelkind,--an equal distribution amongst the children, males and females.

The ancient Northern nations had but an imperfect notion of political power.

That the possessor of the land should be the governor of it was a simple idea; and their schemes extended but little further.