bo ok The burghers enjoyed the privileges juft mentioned dur- '
ing the Jaghetlon line, as appears from the different a6ts of
Sigifmond I. and his fon Sigifmond Auguftus. During the
reign of the former the nobles endeavoured to exclude the
deputies of Cracow from the diet; but that monarch not
only confirmed the right of that city to fend reprefentatives,
but even decreed, that the citizens were included within the
clafs of nobles *.
When the crown became wholly elective, the burghers
fuffered continual encroachments on their privileges at every
nomination of a new fovereign ; they loft the right of pof-
iefling lands, excepting within a fmall diftance of their
towns, of fending deputies to the diets, and were of courfe
excluded from all iliare of the legiilative authority. The
principal caufe of this exclufion was, that as the burghers
were not obliged, b y the nature of their tenures, to march
againft the enemy, but were only under the neceffity of fur-
•niihing arms and waggons for the ufe of the army ; they
incurred, therefore, the contempt of the warlike gentry,
who, in the true fipirit of feudal arrogance, confidered all
occupations, but that of war, as beneath a freeman, and all
perfons, not bound to military fervices, as unqualified for
the adminiftration of public affairs.
The burghers, however, ftill enjoy a confiderable portion
of freedom, and poffefs the following immunities : they
elect their own burgomafter and council; they regulate their
interior pdlice, and have their own criminal courts of juftice,
m ir , he gave a rooft fiimptuons entertain- bride. Chromer, p. 3.24,
ment to his lovereign, to the emperor, kings * Confules CracovienTes, &c. dtfbere et
^of Hungary, Denmark, Cyprus, and other pofle omnibus contiliis., <quibus alii nuniii
princes, who were prefent at the marriage: terreilres aderunt, &c. more folito confulvbefkie
other magnificent gifts which he be- tari, Statuta Pol. p. 8. Cracpvia eil iricor-
iiowed upon the company, he prefented C-a- porata et xinita nobilitati; ih. tecraiHimqup
.-ilmir.y/kh a.fum equal .to thepqrtion of-the civitaf unique nuntjio, .p. 333.
w h i c h
■which decide without appeal. A burgher, when plaintiff c h a p .
againft a noble, is obliged to carry the caufe into the courts . Vni‘
of juftice belonging to the nobles, where the judgement is
final: when defendant, he muft be cited before the ma-
giftrates of his own town, from whence an appeal lies only
to the king in the aiiefforial tribunal. To this exemption
from the jurifdiftion of the nobles, though only in one fpe-
cies of caufes, the burghers owe whatever degree of independence
they ftill retain ; as without this immunity they
Would long ago have been -reduced to a ftate of vaffalage.
IV, The peafants in Poland, as in all feudal governments*
are ferfs or flaves and the value of an eftate is not eftimated
fo much from its extent, as from the number of its peafants,
who are transferred from one mafter to another like fo many
head of cattle.
The peafants, however, are not all in an equal ftate .of
fubjeftion : they are diftinguifhed into two forts ; i . German;
2. Natives.
1. During the reign of Boleilaus the Vlhafte, and more
particularly in that o-f Cafimir the Great, many Germans
fettled in Poland, who were indulged in the ufe-of the
German law s * ; and their defeendants ftill continue to
epjoy feveral privileges not poffefled by the generality of
Polilh peafants. The good effects of thefe privileges are
Very, vifible in the general ftate of their domeftic ceco-
nomy; their' villages are better built, and their, fields
better cultivated, than thofe which belong to the native Poles;
they poffefs more cattle, pay their quit-rents to their lords
with greater exadlnefs; and-, when compared with the others,
»re cleaner and neater in their performs-,
* Lubieniki, p. roB. FloTu's Pol. p. 118. Chromer; t iq .
VaL' L S " ' The