criminals and to convict or acquit them is what is meant by the popular and inexact phrase, "the power of life and death." The Bishop’s revenue was managed by special officers of his own appointment, who got returns from the local bailiffs, and then recorded them at Durham, where a special audit was held. A special set of buildings were erected near Durham Castle, with various adjacent offices, for the management and arrangement of all the mass of business--financial, judicial, and administrative--which was entailed by the Bishopric. In this way the conditions of life, and the administration of the Palatinate, followed roughly the general order of the kingdom outside, and the Bishopric was, as has already been said, virtually a little kingdom ruled by a Bishop instead of a King. The Bishops who followed Pudsey maintained and developed his organization, but not without strife. The thirteenth century, in particular, presents a long record of obstinate struggle between the Bishop and those who tried to limit his power or to gain concessions which he was unwilling to make. Indeed, the struggle between the King and the people, which is the great feature of English history in that century, finds a close parallel on a small scale in Durham. At one time it is a long feud between the Bishop and the Monastery over their respective lands, a feud which was at last ended by an agreement between the contending parties. At another time the Bishop is trying to curb the independence of the Barons of the Bishopric, who held large estates for which they were supposed to yield homage, or to perform some kind of service. In this way Nevilles and Balliols, two of the great Bishopric families, held out against the crusading Bishop Bek, and in the end they had to give way. And once more there was strife on more than one occasion with the King, who now and then attempted to restrain the exuberant independence of the Bishop of Durham; and here, in the main, the Bishop was successful in asserting his rights and powers as inalienable.