Gloss, in verbo Hundred:] [*** None of the feudal governments in Europe had such institutions as the county courts, which the great authority of the Conqueror still retained from the Saxon customs.

All the freeholders of the county, even the greatest barons, were obliged to attend the sheriff in these courts, and to assist them in the administration of justice.
By this means they received frequent and sensible admonitions of their dependence on the king or supreme magistrate: they formed a kind of community with their fellow-barons and freeholders; they were often drawn from their individual and independent state, peculiar to the feudal system, and were made members of a political body: and perhaps this institution of county courts in England has had greater effects on the government than has yet been distinctly pointed out by historians, or traced by antiquaries.

The barons were never able to free themselves from this attendance on the sheriffs and itinerant justices till the reign of Henry III.] [**** Brady, Tref.p.

143.] Circumstances which, being derived from a very extensive authority assumed by the conqueror, contributed to increase the royal prerogative; and, as long as the state was not disturbed by arms, reduced every order of the community to some degree of dependence and subordination.
The king himself often sat in his court, which always attended his person:[**] he there heard causes and pronounced judgment;[***] and though he was assisted by the advice of the other members, it is not to be imagined that a decision could easily be obtained, contrary to his inclination or opinion.

In his absence the chief justiciary presided, who was the first magistrate in the state, and a kind of viceroy, on whom depended all the civil affairs of the kingdom.[****] The other chief officers of the crown, the constable, mareschal, seneschal chamberlain, treasurer, and chancellor,[*****] were members, together with such feudal barons as thought proper to attend, and the barons of the exchequer, who at first were also feudal barons appointed by the king.[******] This court, which was sometimes called the king's court, sometimes the court of exchequer, judged in all causes, civil and criminal, and comprehended the whole business which is now shared out among four courts the chancery, the king's bench, the common pleas, and the exchequer.[*******] Such an accumulation of powers was itself a great source of authority, and rendered the jurisdiction of the court formidable to all the subjects; but the turn which judicial trials took soon after the conquest, served still more to increase its authority, and to augment the royal prerogatives.