When an Elizabethan parish undertook some work on a great scale, such as the rebuilding of its church, or of the church steeple; or, again, when it had suffered great losses by fire or flood, it solicited through Begging Proctors the Contributions of Outsiders, sometimes from all parts of England.[304]

To terminate our enumeration of means of raising money, or of contributions of all sorts on which the wardens could count (as apart from rates, properly so-called), we might mention Fixed Contributions, of money or of labor, issuing out of certain tenements; and Annual Payments to Mother Churches. Certain lands or houses, generally abutting on the church grounds, had fixed upon them the obligation to repair a certain portion of the churchyard enclosure, Tenement X, so many feet of fence, Tenement Y, such a portion of brick or stone wall, and so forth.[305]

Sometimes also certain houses or lands are spoken of as yielding so much a year for the repair of the church and the support of the poor.[306] Incidentally we might mention—though hardly connected with parish finance—certain payments for church repair, etc., claimed of old by some cathedral churches from the parishes of the diocese. Originally a tax varying from a farthing to a penny for each household (hence the names "smoke farthings," "hearth penny," "smoke silver"), the payments were commuted for a small lump sum exacted yearly. Thus we find in the Elizabethan accounts mention of "St. Swithin farthings;"[307] of "Ely farthings;"[308] of "Lincoln farthings,"[309] etc., according to the name of the cathedral to which they were paid; or, again, of "Whitsun farthings;" of "Pentecost farthings," etc., according to the time of the year at which the payments were made.[310] These payments must not be confused with "Peter's pence," which had before the Reformation been paid by English parishes to Rome.[311]

Lastly the mother parish church, in large parishes requiring chapels of ease, would exact (when it could) contributions from those congregations who frequented for ordinary divine worship these chapels of ease within the parish. And these exactions would be made irrespective of the fact that these congregations were bound to repair their own chapels and possessed their own churchwardens.[312]

When the means or expedients we have hitherto set forth were found insufficient, or impracticable, or too tardy for an emergency, the parish was compelled to resort to Rates or Assessments.

Assessments were levied in all sorts of ways and for all sorts of purposes. In an emergency, or if the sum to be raised was not large, a levy might be made by the principal men of the parish upon themselves only.[313] A "rate" might, however, be made to collect a very small sum, as well as a very large one.[314] All kinds of units or rules of assessment were resorted to from parish to parish, and (apparently) sometimes no fixed unit at all was taken, men's ability to pay being roughly gauged, or a man being permitted to rate himself,[315] or give his "benevolence."

In the wardens' accounts are frequently seen long lists of names, each being taxed at a sum varying from 1/2d. to three or four shillings. Such lists may represent an attempt to tax each man at 1/2d. or 1d. in the pound, or, likely as not, it may merely mean a crude sizing up of the ability of each to contribute.

Furthermore, a "rate" might consist in a fixed sum, the same for all, and levied by polls or by households,[316] say 1d. or 2d. each. Or, again, it might be levied by pews at varying sums.[317] Assessments to pay the parish clerk or sexton might sometimes be made in kind, and issue from households, from cottages, or from ploughlands: so much corn at Easter, so much bread, so many eggs.[318]

When it came to the more accurate basing of rates upon lands, or goods at a valuation, the inhabitants of the various communities observed no uniform ratio of taxation from parish to parish, nor even in the same parish, and disputes were always recurring.[319]

It must be borne in mind that parish financiering was largely of the hand-to-mouth variety. Indeed, it was difficult it should be otherwise, for the exigencies of the civil or the ecclesiastical authorities were constantly shifting, now a petty lump sum being required (and to be spent as soon as raised), now a great one to be disbursed in the same manner.

In conclusion, a few observations on the parish as a financial unit in connection with county government may be made. There seems to have been no general treasury at the disposal of the hundred or of the county, but merely certain treasurers charged with the disbursement of this or that special collection for this or that special purpose. A collection is made by order of the justices, for instance, in certain hundreds, or throughout the shire, for the support of the prisoners in the county gaol, and a treasurer for the fund is appointed. Or it may be that this treasurer is a more or less permanent official. And so with collections for hospitals, for houses of correction, for great bridges, etc. If the constables levied more than was sufficient for a parish, or if the contemplated disbursement turned out to be less than originally estimated, the surplus, if the justices had no immediate use for it, might be returned to that parish to go back into the pockets of the rate payers.[320] Furthermore, it seems scarcely accurate in Elizabethan times to speak of any county rate,[321] for there was no recognized basis of assessment common to all parishes, unless it were at any given time the then prevailing subsidy rate, and a rating according to the subsidy books by the justices would fail to reach many whom a parish rating might attain. As a matter of fact the justices, when they had a large sum to levy on the county at large, almost always apportioned it in lump sums among the hundreds, or among the parishes of their respective divisions, according to "the bygnes or smallnes of their parishes."[322] It comes, then, to all practical intents and purposes to this: that each parish is left to produce according to its own local methods, or rating, the wherewithal for carrying on county government.

While in local government itself the parishioners have practically no voice, the large measure of freedom they enjoy for the devising of ways and means to meet the demands made upon them (though they have no option whatever in granting or withholding supplies) gives to the parish a vigorous entity and a certain autonomous life of its own, which otherwise it never could have possessed over against the all-regulating and inquisitorial Tudor machinery of Church and State.

As the reign advanced the parish developed a selfish, jealous and exclusive gild life of its own, especially under the operation of the poor laws.

Non-parishioners, or "foreigners," were viewed with the strongest suspicion. Generally they were discriminated against if they happened to have dealings with the parish. Wedding or funeral fees were doubled in their cases.[323] If the parishioners could have had their will no alien poor could have gained a settlement amongst them—no, not even after twenty years' residence. In 1598 the West Riding, Yorkshire, justices were compelled to interfere in favor of divers poor persons in various parishes, where officers were seeking to expel them as vagrants born elsewhere, though they had been domiciled in their adopted communities for twenty years and upwards.[324]

Already that "organized hypocrisy," so characteristic of parish life in later reigns, shows itself in the many presentments of, and petitions against, persons supposedly immoral—especially single women. Not zeal for morality prompts these indictments, but fear that the community may have to support illegitimate children.[325] Quite typical of the times is the language held by the inhabitants of Castle Combe in appealing to the Wiltshire justices against a townwoman in 1606. They are apprehensive, they say, lest "by this licentious life of hers not only God's wrath may be powered downe uppon us ... but also hir evill example may so greatly corrupt others than great and extraordinary charge ... may be imposed uppon us."[326]

Few laws on the statute book were so frequently enforced as the 31 Eliz. c. 7, which required four acres to be laid to every cottage to be constructed, for there was a powerful local backing behind the law. When John Fletcher, "a meere stranger lately come into this Parish with his wife and children," took certain parcels of land in Severn Stoke in 1593, and was suspected of the intention to build a cottage without laying to it the requisite number of acres, the parishioners immediately complained to the Worcester justices, for they wanted to provide against the contingent liability of having to support the inmates.[327] Four acres was then the quantity considered necessary to maintain a man and his family. It was an indictable offence to sublet, for then there would be two families where only one was before. Nor could lodgers be taken, for such increase of the inmates of the house would surcharge the land.[328]

In short, that feeling of distrust and discrimination against the outside world, which, in the 18th century, led a Lancashire vestry to dub all outsiders "foreigners,"[329] is already fully developed by the end of the 16th century. But we must also recognize that this feeling engendered in the parish itself solidarity of interests, close fellowship and local spirit.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Richard Hooker, Ecclesiastical Polity, Bk. viii, 448-9 (ed. 1666).

[2] Coke, 4 Inst., 320 (ed. 1797).

[3] See 14 Eliz. c. 5, sec. 16, and 39 Eliz. c. 3.

[4] 37 Hen. VIII, c. 17, re-enacted I Eliz. c. I. "The real effect of the statute was this—that lay lawyers were substituted for the clerical canonists of pre-Reformation times." Lewis T. Dibden, An Historical Inquiry into the Status of the Ecclesiastical Courts (1882), 59. By canon cxxvii of the Canons of 1604 in order to be a chancellor, a commissary, or an official in the courts Christian, a man must be "ad minimum magister artium, aut in jure bacalareus, ac in praxi et causis forensibus laudabiliter exercitatus." E. Cardwell, Synodalia (etc.), i, 236. Cf. Blomefield, Hist. of Norfolk, iii, 655-6 (Parker's report, 1563. Officials of the archdeacons not required to be in orders). E. Cardwell, Documentary Annals of the Reformed Church of England, i, 426 (Complaint in a document of circa 1584 [or later] that excommunication is executed by laymen. In the answer by the bishops it is stated [ibid., 428] inter alia, "that in later times, divines have wholly employed themselves to divinity and not to the proceedings and study of the law"). To the same effect, but for a later period, see White Kennett, Parochial Antiquities (Oxon. ed. 1695), 642.

[5] Harrison, writing in 1577, says that archdeacons keep, beside two visitations or synods yearly, "their ordinarie courts which are holden within so manie or more of their several deaneries by themselues or their officials once in a moneth at the least." Harrison, Description of England, Bk. ii, New Shakespeare Soc. for 1877 (ed. Dr. Furnivall), p. 17. Between 27th Nov., 1639, and 28th Nov., 1640, there were thirty sittings in the court of the Archdeacon of London. Hale, Crim. Prec., introd. p. liii. Any casual inspection of the visitation act-books reveals the fact that the judge sits either in court or in chambers between visitations, for offenders are constantly ordered to appear again in a few days or in a few weeks. Compulsory presentments were, however, limited by law and custom to two courts a year. See canons 116 and 117 of the Canons of 1604. Also Gibson, Codex, ii, 1001.

[6] See p. 18 and p. 20 infra. For the duty to read the injunctions or the articles based on them see p. 32 infra.

[7] See 5 Eliz. c. 3. Stats. of the Realm, iv, Pt. i, 411. Also Visitation of Warrington Deanery in 1592 by the Bishop of Chester in Lancashire and Cheshire Historic Soc. Trans., n. s., x (1895), 186 et passim. Hereinafter cited as Warrington Deanery Visit. Cf. also Grindal's Injunc. for the Province of York (1571), art. 17, Remains of Grindal, Parker Soc., 132 ff.

[8] See Visitations of the Archdeacon of Canterbury, Archaeologia Cantiana, xxvi (1904), 24 (1602). Mr. Arthur Hussey has published copious extracts from the act-books of these visitations extending over a considerable period in vols. xxv-xxvii of the Arch. Cant. Hereinafter cited as Canterbury Visit., xxv (etc.). For perambulations see p. 27 infra.

[9] Cordy Jeaffreson, Middlesex County Records, i, 100-1 (Indictment reciting that John Johnson had had due notice in his parish church, yet had not sent his wain, etc., 1576). Cf. provisions of the statutes 5 Eliz. c. 13, and 18 Eliz. c. 10, Stats. of Realm, iv, Pt. i, 441-3, and 620-1 respectively.

[10] Brownlow v. Lambert, C.B., 41 Eliz., I Croke Eliz. Rep., Leache's ed. (1790), Pt. ii, 716.

[11] Canterbury Visit., xxvi, 23 (1599); ibid., 20 (1591). W.H. Hale, A Series of Precedents in Criminal Causes from the Act Books of the Ecclesiastical Courts of London, 1475-1640 (pub. in 1847), 190 (Schoolmaster of Stock presented in court for defacing the church "in makinge a fire for his schollers," 1587). This work hereinafter cited as Hale, Crim. Prec.

[12] Constables Acc'ts of Melton in Leicester Architec. and Archaeol. Soc. Trans., iii (1874), 72-3. Chelmsford Churchwardens Acc'ts in Essex Archaeol. Soc. Trans., ii (1863), 225 ff.

[13] Stratton (Cornwall) Churchwardens Acc'ts, Archaeologia, xlvi, 200 ff. s. a. 1565 and editor's note.

[14] "Sir W.. A.. and I with divers other justices, being met together at Sondon church" (1582). Strype, Annals of the Reformation, iii, Pt. ii, 214. This meeting here may have been in the churchyard.

[15] See in the Antiquary, xxxii (1896), 147-8, the inquest held at St. Botolph Extra Aldgate (1590), and the coroner's judgment delivered in the church that a suicide should be buried at cross-roads with a stake through her breast.

[16] For the noisy proceedings in Bow Church and in St. Paul's, London, see The Spiritual Courts epitomised [etc.], a satire printed in 1641 at London. For this and similar satires see Mr. Stephen's Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires in Brit. Mus. (1870). Cf. Strype, Life of Grindal (Oxon. ed. 1821), 83 ff. (Proclamation of 1561 for reverent use of churches). Also Augustus Jessop, One Generation of a Norfolk House, 15. Sir J.F. Stephen, Hist. of Criminal Law, ii. 404.

[17] In the Canons of 1571 the churchwardens are called "aeditui," in those of 1604 "oeconomi." In the older churchwardens accounts their Latin designations are "gardiani" and "custodes," sometimes "prepositi" (or 'reeves'). English equivalents are churchmen, highwardens, stockwardens (alewardens even), kirkmasters, church masters, proctors, etc. Sidemen are called also questmen, assistants and (apparently) sworn men or jurates. They do not always appear in small country parishes, neither are they generally found before the latter half of Elizabeth's reign. Their Latin appelation was "fide digni" and they were chosen from among the parishioners to the number of two, four, six or more to present offences along with the churchwardens, or offences which the wardens would not present (Gibson, Codex, ii, 1000). The sidemen went about the parish during service time with the wardens and warned persons to come to church (See p. 23 infra). For rector, etc., see p. 30 infra.

[18] Toulmin Smith, The Parish (2d ed., 1857), 69 ff., strongly insists that churchwardens "never were ecclesiastical officers." But the authorities he cites are post-Elizabethan. The courts in Elizabeth's time held that the execution of the office "doth belong to the Spirituall jurisdiction" (See Brown v. Lother, 40 Eliz., in J. Gouldsborough's Rep., ed. 1653, p. 113). Lambard (The Duties of Constables, etc., ed. 1619, p. 70) says that wardens are taken in favor of the church to be a corporation at common law for some purposes, viz., to be trustees for the church goods and chattels.

[19] See "The Othe which the Parsons ... shall minister to the Churche Wardens," of which the text is given in Bishop Barnes' Injunctions and other Ecclesiastical Proceedings, Surtees Soc., xxii (1850), 26 (Hereinafter cited as Barnes' Eccles. Proc.). The wording of this oath is evidently very similar to, if not identical with, that of the oath administered to the wardens by the archdeacon.

[20] For a number of examples clearly illustrating this point see Visitations of the Dean of York's Peculiar, Yorkshire Archaeological Journal. xviii (1905), 202, 221, 222, 224, et passim. Hereinafter cited as Dean of York's Visit. We have a number of these articles of inquiry formulated by archbishops or bishops. E.g., see in T. Nash, Hist. and Antiq. of Worcestershire, i, 472 (Wardens of Grimley make answer to the 5th and 6th articles inquired of by the bishop in 1585). Cf. Cardwell, Doc. Ann., ii, 13-16 (Whitgift's Articles of 1588).

[21] E.g., Canterbury Visit., xxv, 12 (Birchington wardens arraigned in court "for that they have not presented divers faults Committed within the parish." 1591). Act-Books in Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 118 (A warden of Long Newton detected to the official because "he refused to present faltes with his fellowe churchwardone, et fatebatur delationem, viz., that he wolde not present his owne wief." 1579). Ibid., 129 (1580). See also Warrington Deanery Visit., 188 ("Departing and not exhibitinge there presentments"). W.H. Hale, Precedents in Causes of Office against Churchwardens and Others (1841), 81 (Wardens of Sarratt [Herts] excommunicated for not exhibiting their "billas detectionum." 1577). The last named work hereinafter cited as Hale, Churchwardens' Prec.

[22] For numerous examples of excommunication for non-appearance, see Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 29 ff. Under the heading of each parish we see "aegrotat" or "excusatur," or "nullo modo" (sc. comparuit) placed after the name of each person cited to attend from that parish. Incumbents, wardens and sidemen were almost always in attendance. Schoolmasters usually so when there were such. Delinquent parishioners were of course cited in person, or remanded to appear at the next court day holden elsewhere. Upon non-appearance the formula usually entered by the registrar or scribe in the act-book was "et omnes et singulos hujusmodi non comparentes [judex] pronuntiavit contumaces et eos excommunicavit in scriptis." At Alnwick in 1578 fifteen persons were excommunicated for non-attendance. Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 41. Cf. Hale, Crim. Prec., passim.

[23] Lists of "furniture," implements and books will be found in the metropolitan or diocesan injunctions of the time. A typical one is given in Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 25, entitled "The furnitures, implements and bookes requisite to be had in every churche, and so commaunded by publique aucthoritie" (1577). Cf. Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 287 ff. ("Advertisements partly for due order in the publique administration of common prayers [etc.] ..." Jan., 1564).

[24] Warrington Deanery Visit., 184.

[25] That is, Bishop John Jewel's Apologia Ecclesiae Anglicanae, published in 1560, and his Defence of the Apology, published in 1567, sometimes called in the act-books and wardens accounts (where both works are frequently mentioned) The Reply to Mr. Harding.

[26] Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 116.

[27] J.L. Glasscoek, The Records of St. Michael's, Bishop Stortford (1882), 63. See also Minchinhampton (Gloucester) Acc'ts, Archaeologia, xxxv, 422 ff. ("Allowynge the regester booke." 1575). Shrop. Arch, and Nat. Hist. Soc. Tr., 2d Ser., i, Ludlow Acc'ts, s. a. 1585-6 (Record of the new bible and other books).

[28] Glasscock, op. cit., 59 (1578).

[29] Hale, Crim. Free., 170-1.

[30] Visitations of the Dean of York's Peculiar, Yorkshire Archaeological Journal, xviii (1905), 209.

[31] Ibid., 210.

[32] With the exception of the High Commission by the terms of its commission. See the writ of 1559 in Gee, The Elizabethan Clergy and the Settlement of Religion, 150. Also Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 220, for the Commission for York in 1559. As a matter of fact, as will appear from the illustrations cited, fines were virtually inflicted by way of court or absolution fees. Again, while the canons or injunctions forbade the commutation of penance for money, an exception was made for money taken in pios usus, such as church repair or the relief of the poor. Examples of the practice will be found in Hale, Crim. Prec., 232 (Repair of St. Paul's, London); Warrington Deanery Visit., 189 (Poor); Chelmsfofd Acc'ts, Essex Arch. Soc., ii, 212 (Paving of church). For fines inflicted for the benefit of the poor see Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 122 ("For that he gave evill words" an offender was enjoined by the judge to pay 2s. to the poor and to certify); Hale, op. cit., 198 (An offender to pay a rate of 4d., and 12d. more "pro negligentia." 1589/1590) Cf. Canons of 1585 in Cardwell, Synodalia, i, 142.

[33] Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 24 (1577). In the case of individuals interdiction or suspension (i.e., from service and sacraments) does not differ in effect from excommunication, except that the former are temporary penalties and to terminate upon compliance with the judge's order. See Burn, Eccles. Law (ed. 1763), i, 616 (Interdiction) and ii, 362-3 (Suspension).

[34] Thomas North, A Chronicle of the Church of St. Martin's in Leicester (1866), 116 (1568-9).

[35] Leicester Archit. and Archaeol. Soc. Tr., iii (1874), 192 (1567).

[36] Ibid., 197 (1594-5).

[37] W.F. Cobb, Churchwardens Accounts of St. Ethelburga-within-Bishopsgate (1905), p. 10 (1595) and p. 12 (1604), respectively. Stanhope was chancellor to the bishop of London.

[38] See p. 46 ff. infra.

[39] See infra p. 40, p. 48 (note 169), p. 131, etc. Also Ch. ii, infra. Cf. note 32 supra (p. 19).

[40] Hale, Crim. Prec., 155.

[41] Ordinary is that ecclesiastical magistrate who has regular jurisdiction over a district, in opposition to judges extraordinarily appointed. At common law a bishop was taken to be the ordinary in his diocese, and so he was designated in some acts of Parliament. But as a matter of fact 'ordinary' signifies any judge authorized to take cognizance of causes by virtue of his office or by custom. Such were pre-eminently the archdeacons. These officers, at first merely attendant on the bishops at public services, were gradually entrusted by the latter with their own jurisdictional powers, owing to the vast extent of dioceses, so that "the holding of General Synods or Visitations when the Bishop did not visit, came by degrees to be known and established Branches of the Archidiaconal Office, as such, which by this means attained to the dignity of Ordinary instead of delegated jurisdiction." Edmund Gibson, Codex Juris Ecclesiastici Anglicani, or the Statutes, Constitutions (etc.) of the Church of England, ii (1713), 998. Cf. Richard Burn, Eccles. Law, ii, 101-2. As the ordinary in practice entrusted his office of judge to an official, I have used the two terms interchangeably. In some places exempted from the archdeacon's jurisdiction commissaries acted as judges, Burn, i, 391.

[42] That is, services and sacraments (except baptism) were suspended in it. The words of Burn (Eccles. Law, i, 616, quoting Gibson, 1047) are misleading. He says: "But this censure hath been long disused; and nothing of it appeareth in the laws of church or state since the reformation." Of course interdiction temp. Elizabeth was no longer the terrible punishment it used to be.

[43] At Shrewsbury.

[44] Shrop. Arch, and Nat. Hist. Soc. Tr., i (1878), 62.

[45] R.W. Goulding, Records of the Charity known as Blanchminster's Charity (1898), Stockwardens Acc'ts, 68. For other examples of interdiction of churches or excommunication see Hale, Churchwardens' Prec., 111-12 (Shoreham Vetera interdicted. 1599/1600), et passim.

[46] Except in the city of London and some few other places, the chancel was at the charge of the rector or other recipient of the great tithes. Sidney and Beatrice Webb, English Local Government (1906), 20, note. Also W.G. Clark-Maxwell in Wilts Arch. etc. Mag., xxxiii (1904), 358. H.B. Wilson, History of St. Laurence Pountney (London, 1831), 73.

[47] Canterbury Visit., xxvi, 21.

[48] Ibid.

[49] Ibid., 32. In 1599 the wardens of this parish inform the archdeacon that both church and churchyard need repairs "which we mean shortly to do." The next year, too, they make a report in almost identical words. Ibid., 33.

[50] See p. 15 supra.

[51] Dean of York's Visit., 341.

[52] Numerous other presentments at visitations for failure to supply the requisites for worship besides those adduced in the text will be found in Hale, _Crim. Prec_., 173 (A warden failing to supply the elements for communion, 1579-1580) _Ibid_., 154 ("The rode lofte beame, the staieres of the rode loft standinge, the churche lacketh whittinge to deface the monuments." 1572), etc. _Barnes' Eccles. Proc_._, 115 ("The Degrees of Mariage" and "the Postils" lacking. 1578-1579). _Warrington Deanery Visit_., 189 ("Cloth for the communion table." 1592). Visitation of Manchester Deanery in 1592 by the Bishop of Chester in _Lancashire and Cheshire Antiquarian Soc. Tr_., xiii, 58. (Communion cup lacking). _Ibid_., 62 ("Noe fonte," and christenings in "a bason or dish"). This source hereinafter cited as _Manchester Deanery Visit_.

[53] Hale, Crim. Prec., s. a. 1587 (21st June).

[54] Manchester Deanery Visit., 66 (1592). Cf. Canterbury Visit., xxv, 23 (1600).

[55] Hall, Crim. Prec., 13 (1598).

[56] Warrington Deanery Visit., 189.

[57] Manchester Deanery Visit., 69.

[58] Ibid. Then as now the ale-house was the strongest rival of the House of God. A very common class of offenders were those who would not leave their ale cups to go to service (see authorities cited, passim). Men were also great gossipers ("common talkers") in the churchyard, as a number of presentments show.

[59] Order of the archdeacon, Essex Archdeaconry, to the wardens of St. Peter's and of All Saints. Maldon, in 1577, Hale, Crim. Prec., 158. For refusing to keep her seat in church according to this order Elizabeth Harris was presented the next year, Hale, loc. cit., 171.

[60] The vestry of St. Alphage's (G.B. Hall, Records of St. Alphage, London Wall, 31) grew highly indignant in Aug., 1620, when the business of seating the parishioners came up for discussion, that a Mr. Loveday and his wife should presume to sit "togeather in one pewe and that in the Ile where men vsually doe & ere did sitt; we hould it most ynconvenyent and most vnseemely, And doe thinke it fitt that Mr Chancellor of London be made acquainted w[i]th it [etc]..."

[61] Hale, Crim. Prec., 241-2: "Contra Hayward, puellam. Presentatur, for that she beinge but a yonge mayde, sat in the pewe with her mother, to the greate offence of many reverend women." The child (as the vicar who made the presentment continues should have sat at her mother's "pewe dore." 1617). Cf. Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 122-3 (Janet Foggard cited for that "she beinge a yonge woman, unmarried, will not sit in the stall wher she is appointed ..."). Cf. Hale, op. cit., 210 (One Clay and his wife "will not be ordered in church by us the church wardens [etc.]..". 1595).

[62] Examples will be found in the act-books cited supra.

[63] Hale, Crim. Prec., 149 (1566). Cf. ibid., 163 (The divine service not "reverently, plainelye and distinctlye saide..." 1576).

[64] Hale, op. cit., 182 (1584). Cf. Whitgift's Articles for Sarum diocese in 1588, art. viii: "Whether your ministers used to pray for the quenes majestie ... by the title and style due to her majestie." Cardwell, Doc. Ann., ii, 14.

[65] Dean of York's Visit., 320 (1596).

[66] Hale, op. cit., 159 (1575).

[67] 3 Rep. Hist. MSS. Com., 275 (A vicar presented by churchwardens in the commissary's court at Poddington-apud-Ampthill for not catechising the youth, etc., though required to do so by one of the wardens. 1616). For not presenting their minister when he neglected to catechise on the Sabbath, the wardens of St. Mary Woolchurch Haw, London, had to pay divers fees to the chancellor. Brooke and Hallen, Registers of St. Mary Woolchurch Haw (1886), Wardens Acc'ts, s.a. 1593.

[68] Accordingly, by a later entry in the book we see that the warden brought in court a certificate that the surplice had been bought and worn by the vicar. Manchester Deanery Visit., 59. For a precisely similar injunction see ibid., 62 (Wardens of Eccles).

[69] See p. 15 supra.

[70] For presentments of vicar's (etc.) offences see pp. 31 ff. infra.

[71] L.G. Bolingbroke; The Reformation in a Norfolk Parish, Norf. and Norw. Arch. Soc., xiii, 207-8 (1593).

[72] Dean of York's Visit, 231 (1594).

[73] Ibid., 315. See also ibid., 225 and 229.

[74] Ibid., 339 (1602).

[75] See Queen's Inj. of 1559, art. xviii. Also art. xviii of Archbp. (of York) Grindal's Inj. of 1571, Parker Soc., Remains of Grindal, 132. Also Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 337, etc. For the enforcing of the obligation by the ordinary, see numerous examples in Canterbury Visit., xxv, 22 (1585); 32 (Controversy in 1584 between two parishes as to bounds); 37 (1594). Also ibid., xxvi, 24, 25, et passim. Other examples in Hale, Crim. Prec., 162, where a parishioner of Burstead Parva (Essex) is cited at a visitation for ploughing up a dole (a balk or unploughed ridge), which marked the boundary line between Burstead and Dunton parishes. Cf. Canterbury Visit., xxv, 15, where three parishioners are presented for covering up a parish procession linch (1617).

[76] See, e.g., A.G. Legge, North Elmham (Norfolk) Acc'ts (1891), 76 (1562), 82 (1566 and 1567). Melton Acc'ts in Leicest. Archit. and Arch. Soc., iii, 192 (1566). Ludlow Acc'ts in Shrop. Arch. Soc., 2nd ser., i, s.a. 1601-2, etc.

[77] In this year the 39 Eliz. c. 3 was enacted which instituted overseers of the poor nominated by the licence of the justices, and placed wholly under their supervision. In spite of the provisions of an earlier act (14 Eliz. c. 5) giving the justices power to appoint, or see collectors appointed, the ecclesiastical courts rather than the justices, as the act-books show, seem to have looked after the matter. See, e.g., Manchester Deanery Visit., 57, 59, 60, 62, 63, 64, 68, etc. Also Warrington Deanery Visit., 184, 186, 187, 191, etc. Cf. the item in the Ludlow Acc'ts, Shrop. Arch. Soc., i, s.a. 1586-7, where is recorded an expense item for a payment to "Mr. Chauncelor" for entering a presentment for collections for the poor.

[78] See act-books above cited. Also Hale, Crim. Prec., 165, et passim. Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 118, et passim. Norf. and Norw. Arch. Soc., xiii, 207-8 (Great Witchingham wardens).

[79] Stanford (Berks) Accounts, Antiquary, xvii (1888), 169 (Expenses to Oxford "to speke with [the] ... Archedyacon for caryeng a strem[e]r in Rogacion weke." 1564). Hale, Crim. Prec., 150 (Wearing of surplice on same occasion. 1567); 152 (Do. 1572). Cf. Grindal's Inj. at York, 1571, in Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 337.

[80] Melton Acc'ts, ubi supra, 192 ("Beyng somonyd ffor Ryngng off all Hallodaye att nyght." 1566). Halesowen Acc'ts in T.R. Nash, History and Antiq. of Worcestershire, ii, App., p. xxx (1578). Stanford Acc'ts, ubi supra, 169 (1566). Manchester Deanery Visit., 64 (Wardens of Manchester "ringe more than is necessarie at Burialls..."). Cf. Canons of 1571, Cardwell, Syn., i, 124 (Ordained that wardens must not suffer "campanas superstitiose pulsari, vel in vigilia Animarum, vel postridie Omnium Sanctorum...").

[81] Accordingly some seven weeks later the wardens (or rather their successors) appeared again and reported that the rate had been laid, but not gathered. The court granted them a further space to buy the implements. Hale, Churchwardens' Prec., 2-3 (1583/1584). Similar examples abound in Archdeacon Hale's work, just cited, which covers the period 1557 to 1736.

[82] Ibid., 4 (1584). For other cases see passim.

[83] Hale, Churchwardens' Prec., 98 (1601). Burn, Eccles. Law, i, 268 (citing Gibson, Codex, 196, and 1 Bacon, Abridg., 373), says that if no parishioners appear at a meeting duly called for the purpose of assessment," the churchwardens alone may make the rate, because they and not the parishioners are to be cited and punished in defect of repairs." To these words should be added the qualification that the parishioners were sometimes collectively punished, viz., by interdiction of their church. Thus in St. Alban's archdeaconry the parishioners of Redbourn were directed through the wardens to make a rate to levy L60 "sub pena interdictionis eccl[es]ie sue a divinoru[m] celebratione et sacramentaru[m] et sacramentaliu[m]...[etc]." Hale, op. cit., 89 (1599). In Jan., 1599/1600; we find Shoreham Vetera in Lewes archdeaconry interdicted, and one of its wardens appearing, "humil[ite]r petijt interdicc[i]o[n]em ... emissam pro defect[u] eccle[s]ie ruinos[e] ... revocari ..." in order that time might be given him to call together the tenants and owners of land in the parish and outlying districts as well as "strangers" who held lands in the parish. Ibid., 111-12. In 1603 the wardens of Northawe are to see a levy made "sub pena interdicti." Ibid., 90. Cf. pp. 36-7.

[84] Examples are: Hale, Crim. Prec., 189 (Mucking, Essex, wardens. 157-6/7). Ibid.,199 (East Horndon, Essex, wardens confess they have not accounted "by reason the parishioners will not come to recken with them." They are warned to make their account and if the parishioners will not audit it, to exhibit it at the next court. 1590). Ibid., 222 (Several parishioners presented for "not receiving" a warden's account. They plead that he was not chosen to be warden by their parson. 1600). See also Canterbury Visit., xxvi, 20, 21, also Ibid., xxvii, 220, et passim. Dean of York's Visit., 335.

[85] "The cases in which the advowson of the parish belonged to the inhabitants, though more numerous than is often supposed, were distinctly exceptional." Beatrice and Sidney Webb, Local Government, the County and the Parish (1906), 34 note.

[86] On the distinction between rector, vicar, curate, etc., see Felix Makower, The Constitutional History and Constitution of the Church of England (Engl. trans. 1895), 334-7. Also Rev. W.G. Clark-Maxwell in Wilts Arch., (etc.) Mag., xxxiii (1904), 358-9.

[87] E.g., the Canons of 1571, sec. De Episcopis, required that the bishops ordain no one except such as had a good education and were versed in Latin and the Holy Scriptures. Nor was a candidate to be admitted to orders "si in agricultura vel in vili aliquo et sedentario artificio fuerit educatus."

[88] Of some 8,800 parish churches in England in 1601 only 600, it was computed, afforded a competent living for a minister. Dr. James in debate in Parliament November 16th, 1601. Heywood Townshend, Historical Collections or Proceedings in the last Four Parliaments of Elisabeth (ed. 1680), 218-19. Sir S. D'Ewes, The Journals of all the Parliaments during the Reign of Elizabeth (ed. 1682), 640. How this came about see White Kennett, Parochial Antiquities (ed. 1695), 433-45.

[89] Examples will be found in the churchwardens' accounts of the period, the Morebath, (Devon) Acc'ts for instance, which have been transcribed in extenso up to 1573 by Rev. J. Erskine Binney (Exeter, 1904). The garrulous old vicar here, Christopher Trychay, who wrote the parish accounts himself for more than a generation, and always punctiliously styled himself "Sir," is a fascinating figure. Thanks to his chatty explanations on all subjects, bits of the daily life of this little Devonshire parish from Henry VIII's, from Edward VI's, from Mary's, and from Elizabeth's reigns are brought down to us with great vividness. Cf. James Stockdale, Annals of Cartmel (1872), 58-9 (Custom of addressing minister as "Sir" lingering down to nineteenth century in Lancashire).

[90] Lambard, Duties of Constables, Borsholders, etc. (ed. 1619 frequently made an appendix to his Eirenarcha), 67, says: "The ... Lawes, hauing imployment of many to make, hath borrowed some use in a few easie matters of spirituall Ministers, chiefly for the helpe and readinesse of their pen, which in many Parishes few, or none (besides they) can serue withall."

[91] Canterbury Visit., xxv, 22 (1590); 23 (1593). Dean of York's Visit., 231 (1594); 315 (1595).

[92] Warrington Deanery Visit., 184 (Farmer of advowson not repairing chancel); 186 ("Wm. Brereton of Hareford, Esquire," ditto); 188 (Executors of will of the late rector, ditto); 191 (Rector of Warrington); 192 (Rector of Wigan). Canterbury Visit., xxv, 32 (Dean and Chapter of Christ Church. 1583); 26 ("Mr. John Smyth, Esquire"). For not keeping in repair vicarages, barns, dove-houses, etc., see ibid., xxvi, 20, 32. Also ibid., xxvii, 222, etc.

[93] Hale, Crim. Prec., 160 ("Dominus injunxit dicto Simpson [rector of Pitsea, Essex] that he shall procure iiijor sermons in the yeare ..." 1575-6). Canterbury Visit., xxvi, 44 (Wardens present "they have no quarter sermons"). Ibid., 213 (1569); 214 (1574); 222 (1600). Dean of York's Visit., 222 (Wardens present "Mr. Deane for want of the quarter sermons." 1592). Canterbury Visit., xxv, 43 ("Sir Wm. Baldock our Vicar, himself unlicenced to preach, doth not provide a preacher for the sermons appointed by her Majesty's Injunctions." 1593). The Queen's Injunctions of 1559, art. iv, provided that parsons should preach in their own persons at least one sermon in every quarter of the year.

[94] Canterbury Visit., xxv, 22, 23 (two examples). Ibid., vol. xxvi, 31, 44, 222, 319, etc. See Queen's Injunc. of 1559, art. xi.

[95] See authorities above cited. Whether the incumbent kept hospitality was a standing article of inquiry in the visitations of the period; e.g., Grindal's Metrop. Visit. Art of 1576, Remains of Grindal, Parker Soc., 157 ff.

[96] Manchester Deanery Visit., 63 ("They [ministers of Manchester] be nott dutifull in visitinge the sicke").

[97] "And if the churchwardens and swornmen be negligent, or shall refuse to do their duty ... ye shall present to the ordinary both them and all such others of your parish as shall offend...." Archbp. Grindal's Inj. at York, 1571, Remains of Grindal, Parker Soc., 129.

[98] Or judge acting by delegation from the ordinary.

[99] "Against the Reader [of Denton Chapel] ... doth not Reade the Injunctions...." Manchester Deanery Visit., 60. "Qui [wardens of Belby] dicunt, the Articles being diligentlie redd unto them [etc.]..." Dean of York's Visit., 221 (1591). Ibid., 341. Cf. Queen's Inj. of 1559, Art. xiv.

[100] Hale; Crim. Prec., 193. Cf. Grindal's Inj. at York, 1571: "Ye [the ministers] shall openly every Sunday ... monish ... the churchwardens and sworn men of your parish to look to their oaths [etc.] ..." Remains of Grindal, 129. Also Whitgift's Articles of 1583, Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 406 (Ministers to warn parishioners once a month to repair to church).

[101] Canterbury Visit., xxv, 36.

[102] Cf. Canons of 1597: "De recusantibus et aliis excommunicatis publice denunciandis." Cardwell, Syn., i, 156. Also Croke's Eliz. Rep., Leache's ed. (1790), i, Pt. ii, 838, where a plaintiff sues for damages because defendant, a curate, maliciously erased the original name in an instrument of excommunication and inserted plaintiff's name, "and read it in the church, whereupon he was inforced to be absent from divine service, and to be at the expence to procure a discharge for himself" (1599). Canterbury Visit., xxvii, 219 (Rector of Swalecliffe presented for keeping back and not announcing excommunications "sent out of this court." 1596).

[103] Canterbury Visit., xxvii, 219 (Rector suffering excommunicates to come to his church during service). See also infra, p. 47.

[104] Canons of 1585 and 1597, Cardwell, Syn., i, 144 and 155-6 respectively.

[105] See in Hale, Crim. Prec., 206-7, the elaborate formula of confession prescribed for Wm. Peacock of Leighton, Essex, in 1592. He was to "publiquely after the minister ... confesse [etc.] ..."

[106] Hale, op. cit., 160 (Margaret Orton's penance for adultery. "And ther was redd the firste parte of the homilie againste whoredome & adulterie, the people ther present exorted to refraine from soche wickedness...").

[107] See pp. 12-13, and p. 27, supra.

[108] Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 114 (Parishioner in a Durham parish presented for absenting himself "twice at morning prayer, and verrey often at eveninge prayer." 1579). Houghton-le-Spring Acc'ts, s.a., 1596, Surtees Soc., lxxxiv (1888), 271 (Giving in a bill of presentment for those absent from morning and from evening prayer).

[109] Canterbury Visit., xxvii, 221 (Four persons cited "for that they dwell so far from their own Church come now to the Parish Church of Westbere." 1569). Ibid., xxv, 21 (Two men presented for not attending their parish church "being two miles off, but go to the next Parish Church." 1569). Ibid., 23 (1600). Op. cit., xxvi, 46 (Presentment of one who had often to be absent from his parish on business. 1593). Dean of York's Visit., 227 (Attending another church for fear of arrest for debt in his own. 1594).

[110] See in Daniel Neal, History of the Puritans (J. Toulmin's ed., Bath, 1793-7), i. 413-17, contemporary (1585-6) statistics for the licenced preachers of nine counties. See also J.C. Cox, Three Centuries of Derbyshire Annals, i, 245 (Only 82 clergymen licenced to preach out of a total in the diocese of Lichfield of 433, according to a document circa 1602).

[111] For such a permit to hear preaching elsewhere, see Hale, Crim. Prec., 189 (Six parishioners of Shopland (Essex) authorized by the archdeacon to repair to a neighboring church for a sermon when there is no preaching in their own, but only two permitted to leave their own services at any one time. 1586-7).

[112] Hale, ibid., 187-8.

[113] 1 Eliz., c. 2, sec. iii, ad finem.

[114] See 23 Eliz. c. i, sec. iv (Forfeiture of L20 for every month's forbearance from church attendance). Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 406 (Whitgift's Articles of 1583; minister and wardens to diligently observe those absenting themselves for the space of a month, according to 23 Eliz. [supra] in order that they may be presented as recusants to the justices at quarter sessions). See also in Roxburghe Ballads (1871), i, 118, a ballad written circa 1620 which tells us: "There be diuers Papists, That to saue their Fine, Come to Church once a moneth, To heare Seruice Diuine. The Pope giues them power, As they say, to doe so; They saue money by't too, But I know what I know." Cf. Canterbury Visit., xxv, 27 (Presentment "that he is a negligent comer to our Parish Church, being not able to pay the forfeiture." 1597). Ibid., xxvii, 223 ("John Wilkins be slothful in coming to the Church, and because he is a poor man we cannot take the fine of twelve pence." 1578). Also ibid., xxvi, 46 (Humphrey Watts coming sometimes but once a month to church).

[115] Canterbury Visit., xxvi, 18 (One Deal presented for keeping a schoolmaster, "and also being a victualler, suffereth him to remain in his house and not frequent Divine Service on the Sabbath Day." 1580).

[116] Warrington Deanery Visit., 191 (One Motley "married not known where"). See other visitations, passim.

[117] Warrington Deanery Visit., 192 (Four persons presented from Wigan for marrying without banns); 189, et passim.

[118] Ibid. 184 (A child not baptized at the parish church); 189 ("A child christened, and not known where"); 190 (Same). Hale, Crim. Prec., 216 ("Keeping her child unbaptized a whole moneth." 1597). Ibid., 183 (Curate of Blackmore, Essex, suspended from the celebration of the rites because "there was tow children... which died unchristened by his necligence." 1584).

[119] Warrington Deanery Visit., 189; 190 ("His wife churched not known where"). Hale, ubi sup., 167.

[120] Warrington Deanery Visit., 185 (Office of judge against James Woswall: "His children come not to bee catechised"). See Canons of 1571 (Parents and masters to be presented for not regularly sending children or apprentices to learn the catechism), Cardwell, Syn. i, 120.

[121] See Queen's Visit. Art. of 1559 in Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 211. Hale, Crim. Prec., 226 (One Robinson presented for not going to his minister to be examined in the principles of religion of which he was ignorant). Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 122-3 (An offender "lackeinge the catechism dyde thrust in amongest others and receyvid ..." Another was "repulsed from the Communion because he coulde not saye the 10 commaundements, in whome we can perceyve no towardnes to learne them"). Also Hale, ubi supra, 146, 159, etc.

[122] Presentments for not receiving are numerous in the act-books. A few references are, Dean of York's Visit., 219 ff. E.g., at Goathland 20 persons are presented by name. See also Hale, Crim. Prec., 163, 171, 176, etc., and the other act-books heretofore cited. Also canons, injunctions and visitation articles of the time, e.g., Canons of 1571 (Vicars, etc., to present all over fourteen who have not received) in Cardwell, Syn., i, 120. Grindal's Inj. for York, 1571 (All above fourteen to receive in their own churches at least three times a year), Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 336.

[123] See Heywood Townshend, Proc. in the Last Four Parl. of Eliz., Debates, passim.

[124] J.E. Foster: Ch'wd'ns Acc'ts of St. Mary the Great, Cambridge (1905), 225 (Item for paper book to write in all names of the parish at Easter. 1590-1). Ibid., 202 (Item to a scribe for writing names of communicants). Thos. North, Chronicle of St. Martin, Leicester, Ch'ivd'us Acc'ts, 171 (Item same as above. 1568-9).

[125] E. Freshfield, Vestry Minutes of St. Christopher-le-Stocks, Append., 71.

[126] Ibid., 7. For similar vestry orders see Vestry Minutes of St. Margaret, Lothbury, London (also edited by Dr. Freshfield), pp. 1 (1571) and 15 (1583). Also G.W. Hill and W.F. Frere, Memorials of Stepney Parish, 43 (1602), and 51 (1605/6).

[127] Burn, Eccles. Law, i (ed. 1763), 274, sub voce Church, says: "And if any of the parishioners refuse to pay their rates, being demanded by the churchwardens, they are to be sued for, and to be recovered in, the ecclesiastical courts, and not elsewhere."

[128] Memorials of Stepney, 51. Cf. Acts of the Privy Council (ed. Dasent), xxii, 482-3 (A tenant refusing a customary payment for church repair, presented by "the generall consent" of the parishioners of Lewesham to the commissary's court. He removes the cause to Star Chamber "to the extreame chardgis, trouble and hinderance" of one of the wardens, to the encouragement of like offenders, and to the "utter ruin and decaie" of the church. 1592). The source last quoted hereinafter cited as A.P.C., xxii (etc.).

[129] Besides the order just mentioned, the Stepney vestry had three years before ordained concerning their wardens that these were "to shew how they haue p[re]sented them [old dues in their books], Otherwise the said churchwardens shalbe charged to pay those Arrearages as shall remayne so vnpaid and not p[re]sented by them." Op. cit., 43.

[130] Art. xxi, Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 326.

[131] Leicest. Archit. (etc.) Soc., iii, 204.

[132] J.H. Butcher, The Parish of Ashburton in the 15th and 16th Centuries (1870), 42. See also ibid., 40 and 49. Also H.J.F. Swayne, Acc'ts of St. Edmund and St. Thomas, Sarum (Wilts Rec. Soc. 1896), introd., p. xxv, and p. 317.

[133] Hale, Churchwardens' Prec., 4-10, 5th to 8th March, 1607-8. Cf. ibid., 16.

[134] Hale, op. cit., 109-110.

[135] Canterbury Visit., xxvii, 218. Authorization to tax the land is not asked for in express terms, but seems to be implied. In other cases it is clear that a warrant was given for the assessment of lands, e.g., Hale, Churchwardens' Prec., 4 (A warden of Chelmsford, Essex, to appear in court "for a warrant for seassment of the landes." 1584). Sometimes the rates made were offered in court to be confirmed, Hale, ibid., 8 (A rate "offered" to the judge at Stratford at Bow. 1607). Canterbury Visit., xxv, 14 (A rate, subscribed by the boards of the parishioners, "and certified under Mr. Doctor Newman's own hand." 1613).

[136] Canterbury Visit., ubi supra.

[137] Hale, Churchwardens' Prec., 90-1 (1603).

[138] Canterbury Visit., xxvii, 223 (1569). Cf. ibid., 214. Also ibid., xxvi, 18 (Three persons presented who will not "pay to the poor mens' box." 1574).

[139] Hale, Crim. Prec., 149 (1566). Cf. ibid., 176 ("Detected for beinge an uncharitable person & for not gevenge to the poore & impotent..." 1583). Ibid., 208 (One Crisp detected for not paying his accustomed "offering" for himself and wife to the minister at Easter. 1593).

[140] Dean of York's Visit., 229 (1595). Ibid., 214 (Similar presentment, 1570). Ibid., 335 (Same. 1600). Ibid., 223 (Bellman's wages).

[141] Canterbury Visit., xxvi, 22 (1598).

[142] Ibid., 20 (1592).

[143] Ibid., 21 (1596), 44. Op. cit., xxv. 32 ("We do suppose that [name] ... doth keep back from us a certain sum ... given by will to the use of the Church ... and we know not how we may come by the same, unless your Worship's aid be ministered unto us in that behalf." 1581). Ibid., 22, 23, 26 etc.

[144] Op. cit., xxvii, 219 (1569). Op. cit., xxv, 14 (Keeping church ewes and not paying rent for them. 1613).

[145] Op. cit., xxvi, 33 (1605).

[146] Ibid., 39 (1600). Ibid., 31.

[147] Op. cit., xxvii, 224 (1584).

[148] Op. cit., xxv, 13 (1600).

[149] E.g., Hale, Crim. Prec., 221 (1599).

[150] Dean of York's Visit., 333 (Church house. 1601). Ibid., 214 (Churchyard fence. 1570).

[151] The higher nobility excepted.

[152] Cardwell, Syn., i, 128.

[153] Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 19.

[154] See, e.g., op. cit., 42-45 (5 schoolmasters mentioned by name at Allhallows, Newcastle; 4 at St. Nicholas). In Durham city "sub-pedagogi" are also spoken of in the various wards.

[155] Op. cit., passim. Other examples will be found in Dean of York's Visit., 225, 229 etc. Hale, Crim. Prec., 154, 184-8 (John Leache's case. 1584-6), 190, 198 (One Dawe's wife teaches without a licence. Warned not to teach any "man child above the age of x yeres, untyll she shall be lawfully licenced." 15-89/90). Canterbury Visit., xxvi, 20, 21, 25, 31, etc.

[156] See J. Cordy Jeaffreson, A Book about the Clergy, ii, 58.

[157] Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 176 and 182.

[158] See also Archbishop Parker's and other commissioners' precept to churchwardens and others in June, 1571 ("And that in no wise ye suffer any person publicly, or privately to teach, read or preach ... unless such be licenced [etc.] ... as you and every one of you will answer to the contrary"). Corresp. of Archbp. Parker, Parker Soc., 382-3. Cf. also Archbp. Whitgift's 'Commission' to the ministers and churchwardens of London, Aug., 1587, forbidding "that they ... do suffer any to preach in their churches or to read any lectures [etc.] ..." Neal, History of the Puritans, (Toulmin's ed. 1793), i, 428.

[159] E.g., Hale, Crim. Prec., 188 ff. (Leach, a schoolmaster, was cited for catechizing and preaching, being unlicenced. He was strictly warned by the judge not to "use any private lecture or expositions of Scripture or catechisinge of his schollers in the presence of anye ... not ... of his owne howse-hold [etc.]." 1586-7). Ibid., 202 (A curate detected for preaching without a licence. He confessed "that he hathe expounded" a little on the text, "but wold that Mr Archdeacon would appoint some time that he might preache before his wor[ship], and yf he should accepte of him, he would request his wor[ship] to be meanes unto my Lord of London that he may be licenced to preache." 1591). W.H. Overall and A.J. Waterlow, St. Michael's, Cornhill, (London) Acc'ts (1869), 176 ("Paide to Mr. Sadlor for avoidinge one excommunication for suffering a Preacher to preache in o[u]r Churche, being unlycenced, iij s. viij d." 1587-8).

[160] In 1585 the wardens of Pittington (Durham) are "commanded to bye for everie person in our parish a booke ..." Surlees Soc., lxxxiv, 19. Examples taken promiscuously from the wardens accounts of the day are: "paid for three prayer books for the good successe of the French Kinge;" "paid for a prayer of thankes gevinge for ye over throwe of the Rebelles in the North." In many accounts occur items for books of prayers "for the Earthquake," or "against the Turke," or "Omelies against the rebells," or "in plague tyme," etc.

[161] A number of ballads dating from the reigns of Elizabeth and James have been very recently (Oxon. 1907) published by Mr. Andrew Clark under the title of Shirburn Ballads.

[162] One of the earliest orders of the High Commissioners preserved dates from 1560 and directs the Wardens of the Stationers to stay certain persons from the printing of primers and psalters in English and Latin, for which printing one Seres had obtained a monopoly. C.R. Rivington, The Records of the Worshipful Company of Stationers in London and Middlesex Archaeol. Soc. Tr., vi, 302.

[163] "A writing of the bishops in answer to the book of articles offered the last session of parliament anno reginae xxvii [etc.]." So called by Strype, but assigned by Dr. Cardwell to a date later than 1584. Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 426. "Excommunication" in the act-books and elsewhere almost invariably refers to the lesser excommunication.

[164] Thus he could not receive communion, be married, stand as godfather, etc. Burn, Eccles. Law, i, 252-3. Compare Antiquary, xxxii (1896), 143 (Penance and heavy costs for a man who "being excominecated ... ded preseume to marye before ... he was absolved." 1583). Also Hale, Crim. Prec., 223 (Presentment of an excommunicate for marrying. 1600).

[165] See Hale., op. cit., 198 (Archdeacon's instructions to a curate in 1589). Ibid., 200 (Minister stopping service as an excommunicate would not leave. 1590). Hist. MSS. Com. Rep. Var. Coll. (1901), 78 (Complaint by a vicar to Wilts quarter sessions that an excommunicate tried to remain at service. 1606). Associated Architectural Soc. Rep., (etc.), xxxiii, Pt. ii (1897), 373-4 (Device of procuring an excommunicate to enter church and interrupt service so certain youths could continue their morris-dancing, 1617). Chelmsford Acc'ts, Essex Arch. Soc., ii, 213 (Item for "carrying Roger Price out of the Church, he being exc[mmunicated]..." 1632).

[166] See Canons of 1597, Cardwell, Syn., i, 156. Burn, op. cit., 457-8. For such a sentence see E.H. Chadwyck Healey, Hist. of West Somerset (1901), 184 (Archdeacon of Taunton requiring a minister to denounce solemnly three obstinate excommunicates, and to warn all good Christians not to eat or drink, buy or sell, or otherwise communicate with them under the pains of being themselves excommunicated. 1628).

[167] Thus those who talked with him, ate at the same table with him, saluted him, or gave anything to him were themselves ipso facto excommunicate. See Reeve, Hist. of English Law (Finlayson's ed.), iii, 68. If such an excommunicate brought an action at law, the defendant could plead in bar the excommunication. The testimony of such a man was not admissible in court. Finally, he could not be buried in the parish churchyard nor could services be performed over his body. Burn, loc. cit., supra.

[168] See the case of Kenton v. Wallinger, 41 Eliz., Croke's Eliz. Rep., Leache's ed., Pt. ii, 838. This has already been mentioned on p. 33, note 102. In the Leverton, Lincoln, Overseers for the Poor Acc'ts, there occurs, s. a. 1574 an item of 7s. given to John Towtynge "for the discharge of ... his excomynacion," and the next year a sum of 2s. 6d. given to a woman for a like discharge. Archaeologia, xli, 369-70.

[169] Whereby any but a perjured man would be forced to incriminate himself.

[170] Cf. Maitland, Canon Law in the Church of England, chapter, "The Pope the Universal Ordinary." For proceedings by High Commissioners see Stubbs in Eccles. Courts Com. Rep. to Parliament (1883), i, Hist. Append., 50.

[171] As to the expense in suing out the writ, and also the slackness of bailiffs, etc., in executing it, see [R. Cosen], An Apologie of and for Sundrie proceedings by Jurisdiction Ecclesiasticall (1st ed., London, 1591), 64-5. Speaking of the great charges incurred in suing out the writ Cosen writes: "So that I dare auowe in Sundrie Diocesses in the Realme, the whole yeerly reuenue of the seuerall Bishops there woulde not reach to the iustifying of all contemnours ... by the course of this writte." That temporal judges sometimes set prisoners under the writ free at their own discretion without notice to the spiritual judges, see Bancroft's Petition to the Privy Council in 1605, Cardwell, Doc. Ann. ii, 100. For hostility of temporal judges for ecclesiastical jurisdiction, see Bancroft, op. cit., 85. He counts up 488 prohibitions during Elizabeth's reign, many of them awarded without good cause and "upon frivolous suggestions" of defendants (Op. cit., 89).

[172] Hale, Crim. Prec., 145 ("Dominus decrevit scribendum fore regie majestate pro corporis capcione [etc.]." The threat subdued the excommunicate, for 15 days later "solutis xxxiiis.... pro expensis contumacie," absolution was given, and penance enjoined. 1562). Ibid., 172 (Similar threat, we do not hear of the outcome). Cf. R.W. Merriam, Extracts from Wilts Quarter Sess. In Wilts Arch. and Nat. Hist. Mag., xxii (1885), 20 (Affray because of an arrest under the writ. 1604). See also Whitgift's note to his bishops in 1583, Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 404-6 ("If the ordinarie shall perceave that, either by slackness of the justices or waywardness of juries," recusants cannot be indicated at quarter sessions, then the ordinary shall, after first trying persuasion, excommunicate the culprits, and after forty days procure the writ against them). Bancroft writes, March, 1605, that he will use his "uttermost endeavour" to aid his suffragans in procuring the writ, and in having it faithfully and speedily served. Cardwell, Doc. Ann., ii, 80. Cf. also the satirical single-sheet, published June, 1641, entitled The Pimpes Prerogative ... a Dialogue between Pimp-Major Pig and Ancient Whiskin, in Brit. Mus. Coll. of Polit. and Personal Satires. Pig: "Tush, their Excommunications fright not us; but our Land-ladies (poore soules) lie in most danger; for them they serve after with Excommunicato capiendo, and then our Forts are beleaguer'd with Under-Sheriffs, Bum-Bayliffs, Shoulder-clappers, etc., whom we sometimes beat back by violence."

[173] Cardwell, loc. cit., 100. Ecclesiastical jurisdiction derived also much temporal strength from the fact that practically every bishop was also a justice of the peace. For proof of this see Strype, Annals of the Reformation (Oxon. ed.), iii, Pt. ii, 451 (Bishop of Peterboro' complaining that he alone was left out of the commission. 1587). Cardwell, Doc. Ann., ii, 80 (Bancroft's letter, 1605: "We that are bishops, being all of us (as is supposed) justices of the peace"). When commissioning justices Burghley referred to the bishops for lists of orthodox men. See such lists in Strype, op. cit., 453-60. Also in Strype, Life of Whitgift, i, 187-8. Victoria County History of Cumberland, ii, 73-4. Sussex Arch. Soc. Coll., ii (1849), 58-62. Mary Bateson, Letters from the Bishops to the Privy Council, 1564, with Returns of the Justices of the Peace, etc., in Camden Miscellany, ix (1895). By 1 Eliz. c. 2, bishops could at pleasure associate themselves to justices of oyer and terminer or of assize. Cf. Strype, Whitgift, 329.

[174] Presentments on this score are frequent. Take only a single jurisdiction, that of the Dean of York's Peculiar, between the years 1592-1601, and a number will be found. See Dean of York's Visit., 222 (5 persons); 226, 229, 315, 326, 329 (Remaining excommunicate for a month); 334 (Over 40 days. Also a person presented for harboring an excommunicate); 335 (Over a year); 341 (14 days).

[175] Cosen, An Apologie, etc., 64. As has been above stated, an excommunicate could not attend service. P. 47 supra.

[176] According to 23 Eliz. c. i, sec. 4 and sec. 6.

[177] See A.P.C., xiii, 271-2 (1581). Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 406 (Whitgift alludes to the "waywardnes" of juries).

[178] Not suspension from office (as might be supposed) but from service and sacraments.

[179] P. 19, note 33, supra.

[180] Hale, Crim. Prec., 150 ("Contra ... Because he will not be churchwarden accordinge to the archdeacon's judgment." Excommunicated. 1566). Ibid., 162 ("Contra ... Detectum that he obstinately refuseth to be churchwarden, notwithstanding he was chosen by the consent of the parson and parishioners." Excommunicated. 1576). Cf. ibid., 183 (Presentment for refusing to be sideman), and ibid., 207 (Refusing churchwardenship).

[181] In equity specific performance is nothing more than the giving of an instrument transferring title after all has previously been done on both sides, but this, to complete the transaction.

[182] Denunciation "in many poyntes resembleth a Presentment," Cosen, An Apologie (etc.), 70. See his book for the modes of proceeding. Cf. also Hale, Crim. Prec., Introd., p. lviii. In commenting on Archdeacon Hale's book, which we have so often here cited (A Series of Precedents in Criminal Causes from the Act Books of Ecclesiastical Courts of London, 1475-1640 [pub. in 1847]), Sir J.F. Stephen in his History of Crim. Law in England, ii, 413, makes these observations: "It is difficult even to imagine a state of society in which, on the bare suggestion of some miserable domestic spy, any man or woman whatever might be convened before an archdeacon or his surrogate and put upon his or her oath as to all the most private affairs of life; as to relations between husband and wife; as to relations between either and any woman or man with whom the name of either might be associated by scandal; as to contracts to marry, as to idle words, as to personal habits, and, in fact, as to anything whatever which happened to strike the ecclesiastical lawyer as immoral or irreligious."

[183] The case of John Johnson in the official's court in Durham city forms an excellent commentary on the whole system. He was presented as suspected of incontinency. After repeated citations and a threat of excommunication, he appeared, denying the charge and alleging that a churchwarden with others had falsely concocted it. At the petition of an apparitor, who acted as public prosecutor, seven of Johnson's fellow-parishioners were cited to swear not to the fact of his guilt, but to the general belief in it. Articles were then drawn up upon which depositions were taken and published. The case was adjourned repeatedly so that the many formalities of procedure might drag out their weary length. The oath ex officio was forced on Johnson, but he denied all guilt. Finally, he was enjoined to procure three compurgators. These swore that they believed "in animis suis" that Johnson had sworn to the truth. Though pronounced innocent, Johnson was condemned to pay the costs of all the formalities that the apparitor had set in motion against him, and a last time was dragged into court in order to be admonished under pain of excommunication to pay these fees, amounting to L1. 3s. 4d., within a month! The case had extended from 11th June, 1600, to 22nd May, 1601. Surtees Soc., lxxxiv (1888), 359-362. Cf. also the following: "payed for annswerynge dyuerse faulse vntrothes suggested by [five names] to the sayd Commyssyoneres vj s. viij d." Minchinhampton, Gloucester, Acc'ts, s.a. 1576 (archbishop's visitation), Archaeologia, xxxv. "pd. for our charges to lycoln when we were p[re]sented by the apparytor unjustly for that our church should by [be] mysvsed vs. vjd." Leverton, Lincoln, Acc'ts, s.a. 1579, Archaeologia, xli, 365. Under 1595 the Leverton wardens have the entries: "pd. to the apparitor for fallts in the churche ijs. viijd.," and: "for playing in the churche iijs. viijd." The last is explained by a third entry: "to the apparator for suffering a plaie in the church." (Op. cit., 367.) This looks like bribery, or blackmail, or both. For examples of bribery see Wing Acc'ts, s.a. 1561, Archaeologia, xxxvi ("to ye S[um]m[o]ner to kepe us ffrom Lincoln for slacknes of o[u]r auters"). Abbey Parish Acc'ts, s.a. 1600, Shrop. Arch. Soc., i. 65 ("paid to Cleaton, the Chauncelor's man for keeping us from Lichfield"). Great Witchingham Acc'ts, Norfolk and Norwich Arch. Soc., xiii, 207 ("Simp the sumner for his fees for excusing us from Norwich"). St. Mary Woolchurch Haw, London, Acc'ts, s.a. 1594 ("more unto the paratour and Doctor Stanhopes man for their favours"). Hale, Crim. Prec., 202 ("Fassus est that he gave xs. to ... the apparitor to thend that he might not be called into this corte." 1590). For examples of fees paid for absolution from an unjust excommunication see Minchinhampton Acc'ts, s.a. 1606 ("layd out [at] Gloucester when we wer excommunicated for our not appearinge when wee were not warned to appeere, vj s. viij d"). St. Clement's, Ipswich, Acc'ts, East Anglian, in (1890), 304 ("Payed for owr Absolution to the Commissary, being reprimanded for that we did not give in our Verdict, where as we nether had warning nor notice given us of his Corte houlden, ijṣ xḍ:" and: "Payed more ffor the discharg of his boocke, viijd." 1610). Churchwardens accounts are pretty reliable evidence, for they were subject to the scrutiny of those who had to foot the bills.

[184] See Mr. Andrew Clark's Shirburn Ballads (Oxon. 1907), 306 ff. Mr. Clark's notes and illustrations drawn from other contemporary sources are most valuable.

[185] A number of broadsides and pamphlets were published in 1641 upon the abolition of the spiritual courts. Consult Mr. Stephen's Catalogue (1870) for those in the British Museum. One of them is entitled The Proctor and Parator their Mourning ... Beinge a true Dialogue, Relating the fearfull abuses and exorbitances of those spirituall Courts, under the names of Sponge the Proctor and Hunter the Parator. In the spirited dialogue between the two Hunter tells of his ways of extorting money from recusants, seminary priests and neophytes, "whose starting holes I knew as well as themselves"; also, he adds, "I got no small trading by the Brownists, Anabaptists and Familists who love a Barne better than a Church." "Poor Curates, Lecturers and Schoolmasters ... that have been willing to officiate their places without licences" are also his special prey. As for minor offenders "against our terrible Canons and Jurisdiction ... had I but given them a severe looke, I could ... have made them draw their purses ..." "I tell you," he concludes, "the name of Doctors Commons was as terrible to these as Argier [Algiers] is to Gally-slaves." Sponge admits that he has made many a fat fee by Hunter's procurement. For more serious documents in corroboration see Whitgift's circular to his suffragans in May, 1601, and also his address to his bishops a few months later in Strype, Whitgift, ii, 447 ff. Among many other and grave abuses he refers to "the infinite number" of apparitors and "petty Sumners" hanging upon every court, "two or three of them at once most commonly seizing upon the subject for every trifling offence to make work to their courts." Cf. Canons of 1597, can. xi (Multitude of apparitors and their excesses) in Cardwell, Syn., i, 159. Also Canons of 1603/4, ibid. Most of the Elizabethan and Stuart metropolitan and diocesan injunctions call for the presentment of the abuse of apparitors and other court officials. See Cardwell, Doc. Ann., ii, passim. Also Appendix to 2nd Rep. of the Com. on Ritual to Parliament (1870), where a large number of injunctions from Parker to Juxon (1640) are gathered together.

[186] By this system, if the accused could get together a certain number of his neighbors (3, 4, 6 or more) to act as oath-helpers, i.e., who would swear that they believed him on oath, he was acquitted. It seems to have been no concern of the judge to weigh the evidence on the facts themselves.

[187] The churchwardens accounts are full of items for horse hire and other expenses for long journeys, for ecclesiastical courts were held at all kinds of places at the pleasure of the judges. See Mr. Bruce's remarks on the Minchinhampton Acc'ts, Archaeologia, xxxv, 419 ff. Cf. the Ludlow Acc'ts, Shrop. Arch. Soc. 2nd. ser., i, 235 ff.—in fact any of the accounts of the period that have been printed in detail.

[188] Archdeacon Hale in Crim. Prec., introd., p. lx.

[189] Hale, Crim. Prec., 205 (1591). In Warrington deanery, at the bishop's visitation in 1592, one Grimsford is cited for not living with his wife. On a later occasion he appeared and affirmed that his wife had run away with another man, "whereupon the Judge, having regard to the poverty of the man," absolved him. Warrington Deanery Visit., 190. An ecclesiastical judge in Durham city made this decree in 1580: "Dominus ... decrevit scribendum fore Aldermanno ... to whip and cart the said Rowle and Tuggell in all open places within the city of Durham, for that they faled in their purgacion, and therefore convicted of the crime detected." Barnes' Eccles. Proc., 126.

[190] A most important piece of evidence—because coming from such a source—is Whitgift's circular and (later) his address to his bishops, already alluded to (note 185) given in Strype's life of him. Whitgift mentions the frequent keeping of officials' or commissaries' courts and the multitude of apparitors serving under them, so that "the subject was almost vexed weekly with attendance on their several courts." He adds that "what with Churchwardens' continual attendance in these courts, which in many places came to more than was by a whole parish for any one cessment made to her Majesty, the poor men who were chosen Church wardens ... were in their estates hindered greatly in leaving their day labor for attendance there." These and like complaints, the metropolitan continued, were daily brought to him "with a general exclamation against Commissaries' and Officials' courts." In prophetic language he warned his suffragans that if they were not more zealous for reform all their courts might be swept away. We have further the unceasing complaints and the numberless petitions that were presented in every Elizabethan parliament from 1572 onwards. Some of these are given in Strype, Annals, etc., some in his Whitgift. Mr. Prothero has conveniently gathered some, with references to others, in his Statutes and Constitutional Documents (1st ed.), pp. 209, 210, 215 and 221. See also Heywood Townshend, 110, et passim; D'Ewes, 302, et passim, and the canons and injunctions of the time. Peculiars were doubtless most subject to abuses, as being often exempt from the oversight and corrective discipline of the diocesan. Offenders sometimes fled to these for protection. See Strype, Ann., iii, Pt. ii, 211-12 (Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield complaining in 1582 of peculiars, some of which belonged to laymen, as holders of abbey lands, in the matter of recusants). Cf. Blomefield, Hist. of Norfolk, iii, 557. Camden Miscellany, ix (1895), 41 (Letters from bishops to Privy Council in 1564. Recusants flying to exempt places). On the scandalous neglect of duty of some holders of peculiars see Dean of York's Visit., 199, 201 ff., 324, et passim. See also Mr. W.E.B. Whittaker's article "On Peculiars with special reference to the Peculiar of Hawarden," in Archit. Arch. and Hist. Soc. for Chester and N. Wales, n.s. xi (1905), 66 ff. and records there given. See also Eccles. Courts Com. Rep., 1830-2, printed as appendix to Vol. i of Eccles. Courts Com. Rep. of 1883, p. 198. Lists of peculiars will be found in the above authorities.

[191] Though they were reestablished in 1660 they were forever shorn of their ancient glory.

[192] The names of some of these broadsides, pamphlets, etc., have already been given. To these may be added, The Spiritual Courts epitomised in a Dialogue betwixt two Proctors, Busie Body and Scrape-all, and their discourse of the want of their former imployment. Others will be found in Mr. Stephen's Catalogue.

[193] That is, a portable stone altar which had been consecrated and could be set up anywhere for mass.

[194] See order of the Wilts justices issued against such offenders, Oct., 1577. Hist. MSS. Com. Rep. on MSS. in Var. Coll., i (1901), 68.

[195] See indictment of an Essex jury at quarter sessions in 1585 against one Glasscock who spoke lightly of the ceremony of baptism, and rent out of a prayer book certain leaves where the ministration of baptism was set forth. Hist MSS. Com. Rep., x, Pt. iv, 480.

[196] Presentment to the Wilts justices, loc. cit. supra, 69 (1588), For excessive zeal of the justices of assize in Suffolk see State Papers Dom. Eliz., 1591-4, P. 275 (Address of Suffolk gentry to Privy Council in 1592. They complain of indictments against ministers on very trivial pretexts). For the answer of the Council to this petition see Strype, Ann., ii, Pt. i, 268-9 (Lords write to judges to consult the spirit not the letter of law, and add their own suspicions that informers are mainly to be blamed if justice has miscarried).

[197] State Pap., loc. cit.

[198] Indictment of Essex jury, Hist. MSS. Rep., loc. cit. supra.

[199] Ibid.

[200] Information of the Wilts justices against one Dearling, parson of Upton Lowell, loc. cit. supra, 68 (1585). Cf. Chelmsford Acc'ts, Essex Arch. Soc., ii, 212 (An item paid the clerk of assizes for framing the indictment of Chelmsford Hundred "against Puritisme." 1592).

[201] These would be—to cite the principal—the ordinary upkeep of the church with its services and all its appurtenances whatsoever (see previous chapter); the finding of clerk and sexton; the care of the poor; maintaining of the local roads and bridges; purchasing and repair of parish armor, and mustering of parish contingents; contributions for prisoners and maimed soldiers; the keeping of the parish butts and the stocks; the destruction of frugivorous birds and animals (the statutory "vermin"), etc.

[202] The act-books are full of "detections" for being an "uncharitable person," for "not giving to the poor," etc. See pp. 41 ff., supra.

[203] Reference is here made to the occasional seizure of parish lands or funds by the Queen's commissioners for concealed lands. See Strype's strong language in his Ann. of the Ref. (Oxon. ed.), ii, Pt. i, 310. He speaks of the unjust oppressions of courtiers and other griping men, 'harpies' and 'hell-hounds,' who, under the pretense of commissions, "did intermeddle and challenge land of long times possessed by churchwardens, and such like, upon the charitable gifts of predecessors ... yea and certain stocks of money, plate, cattle and the like. They made pretence to bells, lead [etc.] ..." Strype's words are none too strong, being amply confirmed by much evidence aliunde. See, e.g., the determined attacks in 1567 and subsequently on the Melton Mowbray school lands in Leicest. Archit. (etc.) Soc., iii (1874), 406 ff. Thanks to powerful neighbors the Meltonians won their case. Less fortunate were the parishioners of St. Mary's, Shrewsbury, the revenue from whose lands supported church fabric, the poor, etc. For proceedings against them, and the vain appeal by the parish to the lord chief justice in 1572 ff., see Owen and Blakeway's Hist. of Shrewsbury, ii, 350-2. For confiscation of parish gild property and parish lands on a large scale, see examples given in Cambridge and Hunts Arch. Soc., i (1904), 330 ff. We are here told that during Elizabeth's reign at least twelve commissions for concealed lands were sent down into Cambridgeshire (p. 332). See also ibid., 370 ff. for a sale of forfeited lands to Jones and Grey in 1569. The list of lands is very long and only a sample of many such. For attacks (1587) on All Saints, Derby, lands, whose revenues went to church repairs, etc., see J.C. Cox and W.H. St. J. Hope, Chronicles of All Saints, Derby (1881). For informers involving Lapworth, Warwick, in a suit about its parish lands see Robt. Hudson, Memorials of a Warwickshire Parish (1904), 104. The churchwardens acc'ts occasionally allude to the Queen's commissioners, e.g., the Great Witchingham Acc'ts, where they are dubbed by the right name: "for my expenses when I was before the quenes inquisitors for lands and goods" (1559). Norf. and Norw. Arch. Soc., xiii, 207.

[204] Jas. Copeman in Norf. and Norw. Arch. Soc., ii (1849), 64. The Loddon Acc'ts cover the period 1554-1847, some of the donations, or endowments, being made in the 16th and some in the 17th centuries.

[205] Robt. Dymond in Devon Assoc. for Advanc. of Science (etc.) Tr., xiv (1882), 407. These acc'ts run from 1425-1590. For a list of parish properties in 1565, see pp. 460-1. Their yearly rent then amounted to L9 14s. 2d.

[206] Sam'l Barfield, Thatcham, Berks, and its Manors (1901), i. 121.

[207] R.W. Goulding, Records of the Charity known as Blanchminster's Charity, Stratton (1898), 64-5.

[208] In 1562 it is said to have contained only 48 families. John Amphlett, Churchwardens Acc'ts of St. Michael's in Bedwardine (ed. for Worcester Hist. Soc., 1898), introd., p. iii.

[209] Op. cit., 142-3. See ibid., and for the year named, the receipts from these properties. Thus L4 is paid for one and a half years' rental of parish land lying in Severn Stoke parish; 44s. for two years' rent of parish houses in St. Peter's parish, Worcester city, etc.

[210] Op. cit., pp. xxx-i.

[211] Hudson, Memorials, etc., 85 ff. Consult Mr. Hudson's map of the parish lands.

[212] Notes and Queries for Somer. and Dorset, v (1897), 94.

[213] Somerset Arch. and Nat. Hist. Soc. Tr., xxiii, Mr. Pearson's introd., p. iii, and op. cit., vol. xxvi, 106-9. Cf. A.G. Legge, North Elmham, Norfolk, Acc'ts (1891), 5-6 (Long list of lands managed by wardens in 1549). Also J.H. Butcher, The Parish of Ashburton (Devon), 49 (1580). Owen and Blakeway, Hist. of Shrewsbury, ii, 342 (St. Mary's parish lands with 32 tenants and rental of L6. 7s. 8d. in 1544. The churchwardens were here called "Lady Wardens" as managing the "Rentall of our Lady").

[214] St. Michael's Acc'ts, op. cit., vol. xxvi, 129. The wardens of this parish record among their expenditures many items for the repair of the parish tenements and other property. In early times they received 12d. as a salary for management. Later this was changed into an honorarium of varying amount "pro bono servicio suo." Op. cit., vol. xxiii, intro., p. ii.

[215] Thus at Lapworth, Warwickshire, a trust of parish lands was re-created in 1563 with twenty-two feoffees; and one Collet in 1567 enfeoffed seventeen men of a field of only three acres, fourteen perches, to parish uses. Hudson, Memorials (etc.), 85-6.

[216] E.g., the Grasswardens of St. Giles, Durham, who managed the common lands of the parish, and accounted yearly for them. They made disbursements for many parish expenses which elsewhere churchwardens usually paid out (e.g., for bridges, houses of correction, poor prisoners, armor and musters), yet were themselves distinct from the churchwardens. See Surtees Soc., xcv, I ff. Cf. the bridge wardens of Loughborough, Leicester (W.G.D. Fletcher, Hist. of L., 1883, pp. 40 ff). Also the townwardens of Melton Mowbray, Leicester Archit. (etc.) Soc., iii, 61-2, note.

[217] Hudson, Memorials, etc., 88.

[218] That is (apparently) holdings returning L4 of rent annually.

[219] Pasture.

[220] Surtees Soc., lxxxiv, 15.

[221] Editor's (Mr. Barmby's) introd., ibid., 4.

[222] (Dean) G.W. Kitchen, The Manor of Manydown, Hants Rec. Soc., 1895, 171. For other examples both of parish cows and sheep: see Hale, Crim. Prec., 221 (40 parish sheep of Billericay, Essex, for the relief of the poor. 1599). Littleton, Worcestersh. Acc'ts, Midland Antiquary, i (1883), 107 (Purchase of cow for parish in 1556). Ibid., 108 (Wintering of a church heifer). Morton, Derbysh., Acc'ts, The Reliquary, xxv, 17 (Same as above. 1593). Owen & Blakeway, Hist. of Shrewsbury, ii, 342 (St. Mary's had in 1544 ten cows and three sheep renting for L1 1s. 8d. yearly). Rotherfield Acc'ts, Sussex Arch. Coll., xli, 26, 46. St. Michael's, Bath, Acc'ts, Somerset Arch. (etc.) Soc., xxiii, introd., et passim. Great Witchingham, Norf. and Norw. Arch. Soc., xiii, 207 (Cows in 1604). Hartland, Devon, Acc'ts, Hist. MSS. Com. Rep., v, Pt. i (1876), 573a (Custom circa 1601 for poor to leave sheep to church by will). Hudson, Memorials, etc., 106-10 (Parish meeting about renting out of cows. Surety bonds given by hirers in 1580 ff.). Many other examples will be found in the wardens acc'ts and elsewhere.

[223] See Hudson, op. cit., supra, 106. In 1595 two cows were bequeathed to Lapworth to be rented out at 20 d. yearly. The proceeds of one to mend a certain parish road, of the other to support the poor (ibid., 109).

[224] Art. xxv, Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 189 ff. So in the Visitation Articles of the same year (ibid., 213) we read: "Item, whether the money coming and rising of any cattle or other movable stocks of the church [etc.] ... have not been employed to the poor men's chest."

[225] In North Elmham the term "office land" seems to have been used for lands set apart for the remuneration of parish servants. See A.G. Legge, North Elmham Acc'ts, 81, s.a. 1566: "It[e]m for office Land of the ten[emen]te fost[er] ... vij d." Cf. Mr. Legge's note (p. 129). He cites other examples in Norfolk parishes, viz., "Constable Acre" in Stuston, "Constable Pasture" in Fralingham, "Dog Whipper's Land" in Barton Turf. Cf. J.L. Glasscock, Records of Bishop Stortford, 55 ("sexten's meade," 1563). In an early year temp. Henry VIII one Jesop left two tenements to Mendlesham, Suffolk, "to ye fyndyng of a clarke to pley att ye organys for a p[er]petuite." Hist. MSS. Com. Rep., v, Pt. i (1876), 596a. See also Shrop. Arch. and Nat. Hist. Soc., iii, 3rd ser. (1903), 315 (26s. and 8d. and 12 bushels of rye issuing annually out of Idsal rectory for the poor and the maintenance of a clerk). E. Freshfield, St. Christopher-le-Stocks' Acc'ts, 38 (Bequest of a perpetuity of 20s. annually for clerk and sexton. 1602).

[226] Swyre, Dorset, Parish Acc't Book in Notes and Quer. for Somer. and Dorset, iii (1893), 293 (Lands allotted by parish for support of a blind man).

[227] E.g., St. Christopher-le-Stocks' Acc'ts, 38 (Yearly perpetuity of L3 4s. in bread and money to poor. 1602). St. Michael's in Bedwardine Acc'ts, 99 (House left to parish, 12s. of whose rental to go to poor, and 1s. to the churchwardens. 1590).

[228] Butcher, Parish of Ashburton, 46 (Land given to buy shirts and smocks for the poor. 1575).

[229] T.P. Wadley, Notes on Bristol Wills (1886), 230 (L20 for a stock of money to remain for ever "in the howse of correction" for the maintenance and "settinge on work of such people as shalbe therevnto co[m]mitted for their mysdemeanors." Thos. Kelke's will. 1583).

[230] Wills and Inventories, Pt. ii, Surtees Soc., xxxviii, 83 (Keyper school of Houghton and its endowment of L240. 1582).

[231] Examples among many are the Edenbridge, Kent, lands. These bridgewardens held lands in three parishes. Arch. Cant., xxi (1895), 110 ff. Also Burton's Charity lands at Loughborough. The "bridgmasteres" here in 1570 collected L33 18s. 6d., and disbursed L16 12s. 11d. Fletcher, Hist. of Loughborough, 41-2. Also Hayward bridge lands, Notes and Quer. for Somer. and Dorset, iv (1895), 205-7.

[232] Legge, North Elmham Acc'ts, 87-90. So too at Eltham, Kent, where the "Fifetene peny Lands" have special wardens who account for their revenue. Archaeologia, xxxiv, 51 ff.

[233] Statutes of the Realm, iv, Pt. ii, 968-9.

[234] Cardwell, Doc. Ann., i, 189 ff.

[235] Dr. Pilkington's will, Surtees Soc., xxii, Append., p. cxxxviii. For a few other examples of bequests for parish utilities see ibid., p. ciii (George Reyd's will, 1559). Ibid., p. cx ff. (William Birche's will of 1575 in which are many bequests to poor artificers, to prisoners—a very frequent bequest—to "needfull briggs or highe waies," etc.). See also Benefactions to Dorset Parishes, Churches, etc., in Notes and Quer. for Somer. and Dorset, x, 164 ff. Also T.P. Wadley, Notes on Bristol Wills, passim (e.g., Thos. Kelke's will of 1583, on p. 230. He leaves L13 to Newgate prisoners, a frieze gown to 12 women and 12 men—a frequent bequest—6s. 8d. each to 52 poor maidens for their marriage, etc.). Also Wills and Inventories, Surtees Soc., xxxviii, Pt. ii, passim. Surrey Wills in Surrey Arch. Coll., x (1891), passim.