The chapters of the present Book will be devoted to an investigation of the institutions proper to this altered condition, to the officers by whom the government of the country was conducted, from the seventh to the eleventh centuries, and to the general social relations which thus arose. If in the course of our investigation it should appear that a gradually diminishing share of freedom remained to the people, yet must we bear in mind that the old organization was one which could not keep pace with the progress of human society, and that it was becoming daily less suited to the ends for which it first existed; that in this, as in all great changes, a compromise necessarily took place, and mutual sacrifices were required; after all, that we finally retained a great amount of rational and orderly liberty, full of the seeds of future development, and gained many of the advantages of Roman cultivation, without paying too high a price for them, in the loss of our nationality. CHAPTER II. THE REGALIA, OR RIGHTS OF ROYALTY. In the strict theory of the Anglosaxon constitution the King was only one of the people[27], dependent upon their election for his royalty, and upon their support for its maintenance. But he was nevertheless the noblest of the people, and at the head of the state, as long as his reign was felt to be for the general good, the keystone and completion of the social arch. Accordingly he was invested with various dignities and privileges, enabling him to exercise public functions necessary to the weal of the whole state, and to fill such a position in society as belonged to its chief magistrate. Although his life, like that of every other man, was assessed at a fixed price,—the price of an æðeling or person of royal blood,—it was further guarded by an equal amount, to be levied under the name of _cynebót_, the price of his royalty; and the true character of these distinctions is clear from the fact of the first sum belonging to the family, the second to the people[28]. ----- Footnote 27: The names by which the King is commonly known among most of the Germanic nations are indicative of his position. From Þeód, the people, he is called þeóden: from his high birth (cyne nobilis, and cyn genus, i.e. generosus a genere), he is called Cyning: from Dryht, the troop of comites or household retainers, he is Dryhten: and as head of the first household in the land, he is emphatically Hláford: his consort is seó Hlǽfdige, the Lady. His poetical and mythical names need not be investigated on this occasion. Footnote 28: Be Wergyldum, Norðleóda laga, § 1. Myrcna laga, § 1. Thorpe, i. 186, 190: “Se wer gebirað magum ⁊ seó cynebót ðám leódum.” -----