assistant overseer, to make out the poor rate and procure its allowance, and to make all subsequent entries in the rate books, and to give the notices thereof required by law. To prepare and issue the necessary process for recovering arrears of such rates, and to procure the summons to be served, and to attend the justices thereon, and to advise the churchwardens and overseers as to the recovery of such arrears. To keep and make out the churchwardens' accounts, and to present them to the vestry or other legal authority to be passed, and to examine the church rate collector's accounts, and returns of arrears. To assist the overseers in making out their accounts (whenever required by them), and, subject to the rules of the Poor-law commissioners, to examine the accounts of the assistant overseers and collectors of poor rates and their returns of arrears. To attend the audit of overseers' accounts, and conduct all correspondence arising therefrom. To assist the churchwardens and overseers in preparing and making out all other parochial assessments and accounts, and in examining the accounts of the collectors of such assessments. To ascertain and make out the list of persons liable to serve on juries, and to cause them to be duly printed and published and returned to the justices. To give the notices for claims to vote for members of parliament, to make out lists of voters and get them printed and published and duly returned according to law, to attend the revising court, and to prepare, make out, and publish the business lists and lists of constables. To make all returns required of the churchwardens or overseers by law or proper authority. To

advise the churchwardens and overseers in all the duties of their office, and to perform such other duties and services of a like nature as the Poor-law commissioners from time to time, at the request of the churchwardens or overseers, or otherwise, may prescribe and direct." By sect. 9 it is declared, however, that nothing in that act is to exempt or discharge any churchwarden or overseer from the performance of any duty required of him by law, or to oblige him to avail himself of the assistance of the vestry clerk unless he thinks fit to do so.

Vestry clerks not appointed under the 13 & 14 Vict. c. 57, are removable at any vestry meeting, and no salary is attached to their office.

Vestry clerks appointed under the act to which we have just referred, are not removable from office, except by a resolution passed at a vestry called for that special purpose, and with the consent of the Local Government board; or by an order under the seal of such board. The salary of such clerks is fixed by the order directing their appointment, and is charged upon the poor rate. On the other hand, they must give such security as the Local Government board order.

A "

CHAPTER VIII.

SELECT VESTRIES.

SELECT vestry consists of a certain number of persons chosen annually to manage the concerns of the parish. In some parishes, the establishment of

such a body is the result of immemorial usage, which in that case fixes also its constitution and mode of election; the latter in some cases being that worst of all kinds of election-self-election. When it is sought to support by custom the existence of a select vestry in a parish, and thus to exclude the parishioners from the direct—or it may even be the indirect-management of their own affairs, the said custom must be shown1. To have existed immemorially.* 2. To have existed continuously; i. e. as to the right. For a mere interruption in the exercise of the right will not destroy the custom. 3. To have been acquiesced in peaceably by the parishioners.

4, 5, and 6. To be reasonable, compulsory, and consistent.

The existence of a custom for a select vestry must, ir contested, be tried before one of the common-law courts.

In addition to the select vestries by custom, such bodies often exist in virtue of private and local acts relating to particular parishes. Those acts, of course, regulate their constitution and mode of election.

There are also the select vestries under the 59 Geo. 3, c. 12 s. 1 (commonly called Sturges Bourne's Act). These do not, however, replace the open vestry in the general government of the parish. Their duties are entirely confined to the administration of the poor laws,

* A custom is said to have existed "immemorially" when it cannot be shown to have commenced since the beginning of the reign of Richard I.: and in the absence of such proof a jury are entitled to infer the existence of an "immemorial custom" from the usage of the previous twenty years.

with which the "parish vestry," whether open or select,

has no concern.

The 1 & 2 William IV. c. 60 (commonly called Hobhouse's Act) enables parishes, being part of a city or town, and containing a population of more than 800 persons rated as householders, to adopt that act if they think fit, and elect under its provisions a select vestry for the general management of all such their local affairs as would otherwise be within the jurisdiction of the open vestry. If it be desired to adopt the act, one-fifth of the ratepayers, which must be at least fifty in number, must deliver a requisition (in a form given in the act) to the churchwardens between the 1st December and the 1st March requiring them to ascertain whether a majority of the parishioners wish the act to be adopted. Then on the first Sunday in March the churchwardens are (by a notice fixed on the doors of all the churches and chapels in the parish) to notify the time and place where the ratepayers are to vote. The act can only be adopted by the vote of a majority consisting of two-thirds of those polling, and being at the same time an absolute majority of the ratepayers of the parish.

CHAPTER IX.

METROPOLITAN VESTRIES.

THE election and powers of the vestries in the metropolis are now regulated by the 18 & 19 Vict. c. 120, commonly called the "Metropolis Local Management Act," and by the 25 & 26 Vict. c. 102, "the metropolis" being defined therein to consist of the city of

London, and parishes and places comprehending an area from Hampstead on the north to Woolwich and Lewisham on the south, and from Stratford-le-Bow on the east to Hammersmith on the west.*

The vestry in every parish included in this area is to consist of-18 vestrymen, where the number of rated householders does not exceed 1000;† 6 additional (i. e. 24 vestrymen) where the number exceeds 1000; and 12 additional (i. e. 36 vestrymen) where the number of rated householders exceeds 2000; and so on, in the proportion of 12 additional vestrymen for every 1000 rated householders. In no case are the elected vestrymen to exceed 120. To them are to be added the incumbent and churchwardens of the parish, and any district rector who is a member of the vestry of such parish at the time of the passing of the act. Parishes which, at the time of the act passing, contained upwards of 2000 inhabitants, are to be divided into wards, none of which must contain fewer than 500 rated householders; the secretary of state for the home

* The act also empowers the Queen in council, upon the application of the metropolitan board of works, whose powers are now vested in the London county council, to order the provisions of the act to be extended to any parish adjoining the metropolis containing not fewer than 750 inhabitants rated to the relief of the poor.

+ If there are not eighteen persons in a parish qualified to be vestrymen, the vestry is to consist of as many as are qualified.

The qualification requisite for a vestryman is, under ordinary circumstances, an assessment to the relief of the poor upon a rental of not less than £40; but in case the number of such assessments is not equal to one-sixth of the whole assessments in any parish, the qualification of a vestryman for that parish is reduced to £25.