In the reign of Robert the Bruce, as we find the first advance in membership we meet also the first indications of a growth of power. His parliaments took measures for the security and defence of the kingdom; they passed laws regulating the succession; they established the English principle involved in the writs of Novel Disseisin and Mort d'ancestor; they addressed the Pope on the subject of the English claims, and told him of their great deliverance at the hands of King Robert. The great parliament of 1326 made a bargain with the king. In consideration of the "many hardships he had sustained both in person and goods," during his ten years' conflict with the invaders, they granted him "the tenth penny of all their fermes and rents, as well of demesne lands and wards as of their other lands." The collection was to be made by the king's officers; and all who claimed liberties promised faithfully to pay the proper sum to the royal servants. The grant was made only for the king's life, and two conditions were attached to it. Any remission made by the king would invalidate the whole grant. The king must not impose any further taxes (except, of course, the ordinary feudal dues), nor must he take prisage or carriage, except on a journey, and, even then, not without payment. In the last parliament of the reign, the treaty of Northampton, by which England acknowledged the independence of Scotland, was discussed. The first reign in which the term parliament is really applicable is that of King Robert. At the very beginning of parliamentary history in Scotland, we have, then, distinct precedents for three important constitutional rights--the regulation of the succession, participation in the settlement of foreign affairs, and powers of taxation. If we could regard these as having been claimed by Parliament with consciousness of their full significance, and admitted by the Crown, we might fairly join with the older historians in urging that Scotland can be said to have anticipated the parliamentary institutions of England. The explanation lies in the circumstances of the reign. The king's title consisted in his leadership in his glorious war. The succession was uncertain; the Crown was poor; the nation was loyal. A writer on the English constitution could take these three points of which we have spoken, and trace their history through the centuries. Such a method would be futile here. These rights, and all other rights, stand or fall together. We can scarcely draw the wonted distinction between political and constitutional history. At times, we have neither, in any strict national sense; only family and personal history.