"Our English Parliaments were _un_symmetrical realities. They were elected anyhow. The sheriff had a considerable licence in sending writs to boroughs, that is, he could in part pick its constituencies; and in each borough there was a rush and scramble for the franchise, so that the strongest local party got it whether few or many. But in England at that time there was a great and distinct desire to know the opinion of the nation, because there was a real and close necessity. The nation was wanted to do something--to assist the sovereign in some war, to pay some old debt, to contribute its force and aid in the critical juncture of the time. It would not have suited the ante-Tudor kings to have had a fictitious assembly; they would have lost their sole _feeler_, their only instrument for discovering national opinion. Nor could they have manufactured such an assembly if they wished. Looking at the mode of election, a theorist would say that these Parliaments were but 'chance' collections of influential Englishmen. There would be many corrections and limitations to add to that statement if it were wanted to make it accurate, but the statement itself hits exactly the principal excellence of these Parliaments. If not 'chance' collections of Englishmen, they were 'undesigned' collections; no administrations made them, or could make them. They were bona fide counsellors, whose opinion might be wise or unwise, but was anyhow of paramount importance, because their co-operation was wanted for what was in hand."[30] (3) _The political position of women in the Middle Ages._--Abbesses were summoned to the convocations of clergy in Edward I.'s reign. Peeresses were permitted to be represented by proxy in Parliament. The offices of sheriff, high constable, governor of a royal castle, and justice of the peace have all been held by women. In fact, the lady of the manor had the same rights as the lord of the manor, and joined with men who were freeholders in electing knights of the shire without question of sex disability.[31] (A survival of the medieval rights of women may be seen in the power of women to present clergy to benefices in the Church of England.) In the towns women were members of various guilds and companies equally with men, and were burgesses and freewomen. Not till 1832 was the word "male" inserted before "persons" in the charters of boroughs. "Never before has the phrase 'male persons' appeared in any statute of the realm. By this Act (the Reform Bill), therefore, women were technically disfranchised for the first time in the history of the English Constitution. The privilege of abstention was converted into the penalty of exclusion." NO THEORY OF DEMOCRACY IN THE MIDDLE AGES