and of these thirteen, ten were to be called Aldermen or Chief Benchers, out of whom the mayor is to be chosen, and the two bailiffs out of the brethren of the burgh." 'And if the ancient charters, writings, and monuments of all burghs, or pretended burghs, in England were inspected, judiciously examined, and compared one with another, the meaning of the word communitas, community (or, as vulgarly translated, the commonalty), would be as clear and perspicuous as it is in this place of Windsor, or in any other city or burgh."* According to Du Cange, Brady states that the chief things which constituted a community were "a mayor, eschevins or aldermen; a body, society, fraternity, or common counsell, out of whom they were to be chosen; a bell-fry and bell, to call them together to public meetings; a common seal and jurisdiction. Du Fresne gives an account of ninety-seven in France, and parts adjoining, which were erected by charters of the ancient kings thereof, and their great vassals, the most ancient being by Lewis the Sixth, called the Gross, to the town of St Riquier in Pontieu, A.D. 1126." + Suffice it to add the following notandum of Brady, in connection with this subject: "In 1191, which was the second of Richard the First, John Earl of Moreton, the archbishop of Rouen, and all the bishops, earls, and barons, with the citizens of London, met in St Paul's Churchyard on the 11th of October, and inter alia granted to the citizens of London to have their community." In consequence of the commonly - received ecclesiastical origin of the title, Dunblane, with only a small population, and not a burgh, but after being the residence of a Culdee fraternity, having been restored by David I. to the rank of a sedes episcopi (occupied so worthily at the middle of the seventeenth century by the mild and pious Bishop Leighton), was, and still is, honoured with the designation of "City of Dunblane." Dunkeld, too, has been thus styled for a similar reason, and having still a district adjoining called "The Bishopric;" as is also Elgin, with more inhabitants than either of these two, having an old iron seal, which bears this inscription in Saxon characters, apparently as early as the beginning Pp. 83-83. + Pp. 17, 18. + P. 20. of the sixteenth century: "S. Commune Civitatis de Helgyn;" and Brechin, too, on a similar ground; while many populous, wealthy, and important commercial towns and burghs have been denied this civic honour. Manchester, noted equally for its size, opulence, and manufacturing importance, but having, besides, the prestige of an episcopal see, was created by royal charter a city only in the spring of 1853. Soon after this dignity was conferred, some able articles on the general subject appeared in the Manchester Guardian newspaper, which, for their ability and information, may be interesting and acceptable to many readers. One bears the signature of John Jackson, a gentleman of the legal profession there, and the others are from the pen of the talented editor, Mr Harland, who was kind enough to put them at my disposal. I give them without abridgment : 66 (6 THE CITY OF MANCHESTER.* "TO THE EDITOR OF THE MANCHESTER GUARDIAN. SIR,- Our neighbours at Liverpool, sore at the distinction conferred on Manchester, and envious of a like honour for their town, complain also of their lack of a bishop, whom they seem to consider as a necessary condition precedent. The incorrect definitions of Coke, Blackstone, and others, founded on a supposed necessary connection between bishops' sees and cities, although long since shown by the learned Hargrave, Woodeson, and other commentators, to be quite erroneous, seems to have infected the minds of the people down to this day with this obstinate popular delusion. I wish it were fairly weeded out. Perhaps you will therefore let me say a word or two on it, as well as notice the remarks of another about the necessity of a city being 'begirt with walls.' "1. The title 'city' never had any necessary connection with a bishopric. The supposed connection arose, as I think history warrants, from the assumption of ecclesiastical supremacy by the pope, who, as Bishop of Rome, claimed for his see, as the mother of cities, ' matrix civitatum,' that universal ecclesiastical dominion which ancient Rome, as ' matrix civitatum' in a civil sense, claimed and enjoyed over the countries which became subjugated to her. Rome, therefore, claims the sole right of creating cities at this day, as is apparent from the late rescript, making Salford and other places Roman bishops' sees, and also cities. But this claim in England has never been recognised. There is no city here which became so by making it a bishopric; and those who keep fomenting this popular error do their best to make 'city' an ecclesiastical and not a civil distinction. From the Manchester Guardian of April 13, 1853. 66 "2. But it is not equally true that the title 'city' never had any connection with walls and intrenchments. An old writer, who is better known as an antiquarian than a lawyer-Mr Francis Tate, of the Middle Temple, London-in rather a rare tract, which I shall have pleasure in showing you, and which is published in the "Collectanea Curiosa” of Archbishop Sancroft (one of the seven bishops)—gives this definition of a city : A city with us is a town fortified and enclosed with trenches, gates, and walls, by license of the king, and so by him entitled.' It is impossible to argue, at this time of day, that a town, in order to be a city, must be walled; but etymology shows that walls at one time had something to do with a city, though one is not prevented disputing that in Britain they were only a privilege, and not parcel of the thing, however uncommon it might be for a city to be without walls; which line of argument is supported by what Grotius says, that the destruction of the walls of a city does not destroy the city, thus showing that it does not earn its title merely from its walls. To return to etymology—urbs and civitas both signify city, but the two words have quite different significations-urbs refers to the locality, and is so called ab urbe, urvo, vel orbe, i. e. the circle or curvature made by the plough on the founding of a city-ab urbo parte aratri quo muri designabantur. It is said that urbs and oppidum are alike in this-that both were defensible, and enclosed for the safety of the people, the difference between them being, that the one was intrenched with greater solemnity, and for the most part walled about, the other commonly not at all. If not in this, it is difficult to say what was the difference between urbs and oppidum. Commonly they are confounded, and both have reference in nomina to places defended by intrenchments. Oppida quæ prius erant circumdata aratro, ab orbe et urbo urbes. And Cæsar (lib. 5, c. 21) says: 'Oppidum Britanni vocant quum silvas impeditas vallo atque fossa munierunt quo incursionis hostium vitandæ caussa convenire consueverunt.' And the civilian Pomponius (in his Epistles, 308) thus writes: 'Oppidum ab ope dicitur quod ejus rei causa moenia sunt constituta.' The fact is, that caer, urbs, oppidum, and burgus, have all reference to intrenched places ; and urbs also includes walls. The right of creating cities was necessarily inter regalia, or amongst the prerogatives of the sovereign power; because no town could fortify itself with walls without letters of authority from the prince. This was always law in all states, as part of jus gentium, for the fact of a people building a wall round their town was looked upon as an assumption of independent power, and significative of claims inconsistent with or dangerous to the sovereigns. Many examples in history may be furnished as exemplifying this. "Civitas, on the contrary, has reference to the inhabitants. It is significative that the same word is used to express both city and state, or commonwealth. In this sense city may have reference to 'corporation,' and possibly this accounts for another error in our legal writers representing that city must be a corporate town, for which there is no neces sity, as Westminster shows. With us, however, urbs and civitas are totally confounded, as Coke himself says. "I have stated above, that the destruction of the walls of a city does not destroy the city. The history of our corporations, particularly that of the city of London, from the great case of which, during Charles II.'s time (State Trials), it will be seen that the adjudication of its forfeiture did not destroy the title 'City of London,' and shows that that title is not necessarily incident to a corporation; and from that part of Coke and Blackstone's definition, which runs, that 'though the bishoprick be dissolved, the city remaineth,' it is clear that city is a civil, and not an ecclesiastical distinction. "There is one thing to be observed, which accounts for the reason why some old towns, which in this country were formerly called cities, are not recognised as such now. It is necessary, as all professional writers know, that a city, to be such, must have been recognised as such within time of memory, that is, from the time of King Richard I.; which is not the case with the old towns alluded to.-I am, Sir, your obedient servant, "BROWN STREET, April 11, 1853." "JOHN JACKSON. 66 WHAT IS A CITY? * 66 WHAT ITS RIGHTS, PRIVILEGES, AND IMMUNITIES? "The elevation of Manchester to the rank of city seems a fitting time to answer these questions, so far as a reference to authorities on a subject confessedly of much obscurity can enable us to offer an explanation. As in thought we endeavour to penetrate the gloom of remotest antiquity, we are carried back to those ancient abodes of our race, whose names in the traditions of history, or the songs of poets, are almost all that remain to us, of Tadmor of the desert, perhaps better known as the Queen-ruled Palmyra,-Memphis, and the hundred-gated Thebes. Recent events are again unfolding to our eager gaze some of the wonders of Nimroud and Nineveh, and recalling the associations connected with Persepolis and Babylon the great. From these thoughts we descend to the merchant cities of Tyre and Sidon, to Ephesus and Damascus, to the fallen Carthage, the holy city of Zion, and their destroyer the once mighty Rome; to the cities, too, of that wonderful race that peopled the Hellene peninsula, Sparta and Athens, Corinth and Ægina, Argos, Delos, and the Boeotian Thebes. The Greek name for a city was modis, which is still retained in the name of the city founded by the Emperor Constantine, and now the capital of Turkey; and we have it also in our word metropolis, literally mother-city, the chief city or capital of a country; and in the words by which we express the government and regulation of a city, a state, or a nation as police, polity, politics, &c. The word 'city,' how * From the Manchester Guardian of April 13, 1853. ever, we have from the Latin civitas, which the Italians (dropping the S), retain in Civita Vecchia, and other names of their cities, and which, in the universal tendency of language to curtail and compress, they abbreviated into Citta, as in Citta Castellana, Citta Nuova, &c. We derive our word city direct from the Norman-French cité; and its modern signification may be given on the authority of Webster's dictionary, as, in a general sense, a large town; a large number of houses and inhabitants, established in one place; and, in a more appropriate sense, a corporate town; a town or collective body of inhabitants, incorporated and governed by particular officers, as a mayor and aldermen. Such, says Webster, is the sense of the word in the United States. He adds that in Great Britain, a borough town corporate, which is or has been the seat of a bishop, or the capital of his see, is called a city. Anciently 'city,' in the countries of Greece and Rome, was synonymous with state; and citizen had a much larger signification than with us. Under certain circumstances, many of the inhabitants of towns throughout Italy, and indeed in Spain, France, Germany, and Great Britain, were raised to the privileges of Roman citizens. "It is suggestive of a singular train of reflections, that in Roman Manchester (whether Mancunium or Manucium be its name, now matters little) there were dwelling citizens of Rome more than 1400 years ago. But a brief historical notice of cities derived from various authorities, as a phase of human society, civilisation, and progress, may be here given, as having an important bearing on our subject, especially as to the polity or policy, the politics and the police, of cities. Mankind have twice been indebted for civilisation and liberty to cities. With them civilisation and political institutions began, and in them were developed the principles of democracy, or of equal rights, in the middle ages. The origin of cities belongs to the earliest period of history. According to Moses, Nimrod built three, among which Babylon was the most important. The Jews believe, though without foundation, that Shem erected the first city after the Deluge. At the commencement of society, the form of government was patriarchal. The ruler was the head of the family, or clan. Relationship, the innate wish of men to live in society, and more, perhaps, than both these causes, the necessity of providing means of defence against more powerful clans, brought together separate families into one spot. The fertility of the East, also, was an inducement to men to give up the rambling life of nomades, and to form permanent settlements. These settlers began to barter with those tribes who continued to wander with their herds from place to place. Thus cities sprang up. These were soon surrounded with walls, to prevent the inroads of the wandering tribes. The bond of connection between their inhabitants thus became closer, and their organisation more complete. As by degrees the chiefs of these family states died away, the citizens began to elect the most able or most popular men for magistrates, without respect to birth or descent. Thus political institution began to assume a systematic |