The enslaved part of the inhabitants, and which is said to have constituted by far the most numerous class of the community, went, like the privileged orders, by different names. Of them the chief and most remarkably were the _Villani_ and the _Servi_. In regard to the former, we are told that Villenage was of two kinds: 1st _Pure Villenage_, to which some were subject from their birth, from whom uncertain and indeterminate service was due to the lord. The successors of these are our _copy-holders_; who, though time has dealt favourably with them in other respects, still retain one mark of their original vassalage, or servitude; for as of old the former were not reckoned as members of the commonwealth, but merely as part and parcel of the owner’s substance, no way entitled to the privileges of freemen, so do their successors still continue without any right to vote at elections by virtue of their copy-holds. 2nd _Villenage by Tenure_, which bound the tenant to perform certain services agreed upon between him and his lord; such as ploughing his ground, reaping his corn, &c. The lowest, as well as most numerous class of slaves among the Anglo-Saxons were the _Servi_, who, (as well as all the rest of the unfreemen,) were probably the descendants of the aboriginal inhabitants, who had escaped the general massacre, or whose lives had been spared at the reduction and conquest of the country. These were protected by neither law nor religion, for a very long period; and they consequently suffered the most unfeeling and cruel treatment. Christianity is said to have ameliorated their condition. It certainly ought to have done so; but from such a christianity no material amelioration could well have been expected. Even our own boasted protestantism, how feeble has generally been its influence in such cases! The long and bloody contest between the rival and barbarous houses of York and Lancaster did more, it seems, for the relief and emancipation of those poor English slaves than any thing else; for the contending parties, in order to recruit and reinforce their armies, found it convenient and necessary to liberate great numbers of them: at length they were all manumitted, and Britain now contains no people of that description. It would be well if the same could be said of every other, part of the British dominions. These Servi are often mentioned by Bloomfield and Parkin, and appear to have been very numerous in the parts about Lynn before the conquest, and even long after that period.