which its true strength lay, and not in any outer at-
tack, that we must look for the cause of the ruin
which now hung over the English realm. From
Ælfred's day it had been assumed that no man
could exist without a lord, and the "lordless man"
became a sort of outlaw in the realm. The free-
man, the very base of the older English constitu-
tion, died down more and more into the "villein,"
the man who did suit and service to a master, who
followed him to the field, who looked to his court
for justice, who rendered days of service in his de-
mesne. Eadgar's reign saw the practical comple-
tion of this great social revolution. It went on, in-
deed, unequally, and was never wholly complete.
Free ceorls remained; and they remained in far
larger numbers throughout northern England than
in the south. But the bulk of the ceorls had disap-
peared. The free social organization of the earlier
English conquerors of Britain was passing into the
social organization which we' call feudalism; and
the very foundations of the old order were broken
up in the degradation of the freeman and in the up-
growth of the lord with his dependent villeins. The
same tendencies drew the lesser thegns around the
greater nobles, and these around the provincial eal-

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