which the new district with its church has become a separate and distinct parish.

It sometimes happens that although a new district is constituted, yet a church is not provided for or allotted to such district. In that case the ecclesiastical commissioners may, with the consent of the bishop of the diocese, submit to the Queen in council a scheme for the dissolution of such district, and for the reincorporation of its area in the parish or parishes, district or districts, out of which it was constituted, or for the addition of its area to some other parish or parishes, &c., as may appear most expedient to the commissioners. If an endowment has been provided for the district so dissolved, the scheme to which we have just referred must provide for its return to and revesting in the body or person who provided the same,

We have just used the word parishioners. It may be as well to define its legal meaning. It includes "not only inhabitants of the parish, but persons who are occupiers of lands, who pay the several rates and duties, although they are not resident nor do contribute to the ornaments of the church."

"Inhabitants" includes all "housekeepers, though not rated to the poor, and also all persons who are not housekeepers; as, for instance, those who have gained a settlement, and by that means become inhabitants." Persons staying casually for a few weeks in a parish do not come under either of the terms "parishioner" or "inhabitant."

9

CHAPTER II.

OF THE PARISH CHURCH AND CHURCHYARD,

THE freehold of the body or nave of the church is in the parson, and if any injury is done to it, he is the proper person to bring an action for damages. The "aisles" of the church frequently belong, either wholly or in part, to private families or individuals, or rather to particular estates within the parish, the owners of which, it is supposed, originally erected the aisle for the accommodation of themselves or their household. In support of such a claim, it is necessary not only that the right should have existed immemorially, but that the owners of the property, in respect of which it is claimed, should have repaired this part of the church from time to time. The freehold of the "chancel" is in the rector, who is charged with the responsibility of repairing it.

By the general law and of common right, all the pews in a parish church are the common property of the parish; they are for the use, in common, of the parishioners, who are all entitled to be seated orderly and conveniently, so as best to provide for the accommodation of all. They have indeed a claim to be seated according to their rank and station, but the churchwardens, who in this respect act as the officers of the bishop of the diocese, and subject to his control, are not, in providing for this, to overlook the claims of all the parishioners to be seated, if sittings

can be afforded them. Accordingly, they are bound, in particular, not to accommodate the higher classes beyond their real wants, to the exclusion of their poorer neighbours, who are equally entitled to accommodation with the rest, though they are not entitled to equal accommodation; supposing the seats not to be all equally convenient. And every parishioner has a right to a seat in the church without any payment, either for the purchase or as rent for the same; and if necessary, occupiers of pews, who are not parishioners (having no prescriptive right therein), may be put out by the churchwardens, to enable them to seat parishioners. And although such occupier has purchased the seat, and it was erected under a "faculty," containing a clause permitting the party erecting the same to sell it, this will not avail against the common-law right of parishioners, for such permission in the faculty is illegal.

An individual may, however, acquire such an exclusive right to a pew, that neither the churchwardens nor the bishop of the diocese can oust him. This arises either from a "faculty" having been issued by a bishop of the diocese, granting the pew to him, or to his ancestors and their heirs, or to the owners of property now held by him in the parish. A long-continued enjoyment and repair of a pew by a man, his ancestors, or the holders of particular land, whether within or without the parish, will be held to presuppose a "faculty," and will confer a prescriptive right to the pew in question. Whenever it is determined to pull down or enlarge the church, or to make a new distribution of the

i.e. A permission or grant from the bishop.

*

pews and sittings in the church, the consent of the inhabitants, in vestry assembled, should be first obtained. This having been done, the churchwardens should obtain a faculty from the bishop, empowering them to make the necessary alterations, and a commission is then issued to certain clergymen and laymen, authorizing them to allot the sittings. This they are generally directed to do in the following order: 1st, to those who had, before the issuing of the commission, seats by faculty or prescription, who are to have others allotted to them as near as may be to the site of their former seats; 2nd, to those who have contributed by their subscriptions to the building, enlargement, or repairs, or have actually occupied seats, though not by faculty or prescription, who are to have sittings according to the amount of their subscription, their quality, and the number of their families, but only so long as they continue to abide in the parish, and habitually resort to church; 3rd, to the rest of the inhabitants according to their station and requirements, and on the same tenure.

If any person erects any pew or seat in a church without a licence from the bishop, or without the con

*One of the churchwardens of a parish, accompanied by another parishioner, acting upon a resolution of the vestry, but against the expressed prohibition of the rector, and without any lawful authority from the bishop of the diocese, broke open with a crowbar the principal door of the parish church, and with the assistance of some workmen proceeded to alter the position of the pulpit, and to pull down and re-arrange certain of the seats within the church. Held, that all who took part in these proceedings had been guilty of a grave ecclesiastical offence. Dewdney v. Good, 7 Jurist N.S., 637.

sent of the minister or churchwardens, or in an inconvenient place, or if he make the sides too high, it may be pulled down by order from the bishop or his archdeacon, or by the churchwardens, or by the consent of the parson; but if any presume, without such authority, to cut or pull down any seat annexed to the church, the parson may have an action of trespass gainst the misdoer.

f sufficient funds cannot otherwise be provided for the endowment of the church of a "new parish," annual rents may (with the sanction of the ecclesiastical commissioners and of the bishop of the diocese) be taken for the pews or sittings. But half, at least, of the sittings must still be free, and it must be proved to the satisfaction of the commissioners that such seats are as advantageously situated as those for which a rent is taken. And by the New Parishes Acts and Church Building Acts Amendment Act, 1884 (47 & 48 Vict. c. 65, s. 4), the ecclesiastical commissioners may, with the consent of the bishop of the diocese, and of every patron and minister affected thereby, revoke, in whole or in part, or in any way alter as they may see fit, the deed or other instrument by which the taking of pew rents is sanctioned (in the manner we have just mentioned) as an endowment for the incum

bent.

The parish was by common law bound to provide everything necessary for the due and orderly celebration of the services of the church and the administration of the sacraments. Such area communiontable, a pulpit, a reading-desk, a font, a chest for alms, a chalice, wine, bread, &c., a bible, prayer-book,