Domesday Book shows that the toll of the market at Lewes in
Sussex was a penny for a cow, and fourpence for a slave--not a serf
(_adscriptus glebae_), but an unconditional bondsman. From that time
slavery continued in various forms. It is recorded of "the good old
times," that it was not till the reign of Henry IV. (1320--1413) that
villeins, farmers, and mechanics were permitted by law to put their
children to school; and long after that, they dared not educate a son
for the Church without a licence from the lord.[1] The Kings of England,
in their contests with the feudal aristocracy, gradually relaxed the
slave laws. They granted charters founding Royal Burghs; and when the
slaves fled into them, and were able to conceal themselves for a year
and a day, they then became freemen of the burgh, and were declared by
law to be free.
[Footnote 1: _Henry's History of England_, Book v., chap. 4]
The last serfs in England were emancipated in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth; but the last serfs in Scotland, were not emancipated until
the reign of George III, at the end of last century. Before then, the
colliers and salters belonged to the soil. They were bought and sold
with it. They had no power to determine what their wages should be. Like
the slaves in the Southern States of America, they merely accepted such
sustenance as was sufficient to maintain their muscles and sinews in
working order.
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