Legislation naturally followed the movements of those positive and material interests. The earliest of the towns, after the invasion of the Normans, were in some degree but places of refuge. It was soon however, established that the regular inhabitants of these bulwarks of the country should not be subjected to any servitude beyond their care and defence; but the citizen who might absent himself for a longer period than forty days was considered a deserter and deprived of his rights. It was about the year 1100 that the commons began to possess the privilege of regulating their internal affairs; they appointed their judges and magistrates, and attached to their authority the old custom of ordering all the citizens to assemble or march when the summons of the feudal lord sounded the signal for their assemblage or service. By this means each municipal magistracy had the disposal of a force far superior to those of the nobles, for the population of the towns exceeded both in number and discipline the vassals of the seigniorial lands. And these trained bands of the towns made war in a way very different from that hitherto practiced; for the chivalry of the country, making the trade of arms a profession for life, the feuds of the chieftains produced hereditary struggles, almost always slow, and mutually disastrous. But the townsmen, forced to tear themselves from every association of home and its manifold endearments, advanced boldly to the object of the contest; never shrinking from the dangers of war, from fear of that still greater to be found in a prolonged struggle. It is this that it may be remarked, during the memorable conflicts of the thirteenth century, that when even the bravest of the knights advised their counts or dukes to grant or demand a truce, the citizen militia never knew but one cry--"To the charge!"