perform service to the amount of eight shillings per virgate[743]. Bidenham, Bedfordshire, also presents an assessment of four shillings per free virgate[744]. In that part of Fulborne which is owned by Alan de la Zuche the virgates and half-virgates of the free holders are variously rented; but twelve shillings per half-virgate is of common occurrence[745], while in the fee of Maud Passelewe we find only four and five shillings as the rent for the half-virgate[746]. Papworth Anneys exhibits a ferdel of seven and a half acres, for which ten to twelve shillings are paid[747]. As to the cases in which the service varies a great deal, although the land is held in shares, I need not give quotations because they are to be found on every page of the printed Hundred Rolls. We may say, in conclusion, that the process of disruption acts much more potently in the sphere of free holding than it does in regard to villainage; but that it has by no means succeeded in destroying all regularity even there. [Free shareholders.] Thus, even among the freeholders, landholding is often what I shall take leave to call 'shareholding,' Now, whatever ultimate explanation we may give of this fact, it has one obvious meaning. That part of the free population which holds in regular shares is not governed entirely by the rules of private ownership, but is somehow implicated in the village community. Bovates and virgates exist only as parts of carucates or hides, and the several carucates or hides themselves fit together, inasmuch as they suppose a constant apportionment of some kind. Two sets of important questions arise from this proposition, both intimately connected with each other, although they suggest different lines of enquiry. We may start from an examination of the single holding, and ask whether its regular shape can be explained by the requirements of its condition or by survivals of a former condition. Or again, we may start from the whole and inquire whether the equality the elements of which we detect is equality in ownership or equality in service. Let us take up the first thread of the inquiry. [Origins of free shareholding.]