62 Transactions. 



restored, and notwithstanding thereof sundry complaints 

 have been made that the poor do not keep within the 

 parishes to which they belong, and that vagrants, gypsies, 

 and sturdy beggars are going up and down the country and 

 become very burdensome, do therefor strictly enjoin the 

 riding constables to put the instructions in relation to the 

 poor, vagrants, and sturdy beggars into the strictest execu- 

 tion, and to take up and bring before some Justice of the 

 Peace any poor that shall be found begging without the 

 limits of the parishes to which they belong, to be by him 

 committed to the county jail, therein to remain and to be 

 fed on bread and water for such space as the Justice shall 

 think reasonable not under five days : the constables are 

 also enjoined to seize all vagrants, sorners, &c. If they are 

 negligent in their duty they will not only be dismissed 

 without payment of their salaries but otherwise punished. 

 Copies of this resolution were ordered to be made out by the 

 clerk, and read at the door of every church in the county by 

 the parish constable on Sunday. 



It would appear from this and previous passages that 

 much difficulty was felt in dealing with the poor, and that 

 no assessments were levied for the support of the parish 

 poor, the difficulty in regard to cumulo valuation not having 

 been got over. From the numerous entries of the appoint- 

 ment and swearing in of constables, some of whom were 

 invested with staffs of office for which they gave a receipt, it 

 would seem that the office was not coveted. 



No point has been more fruitful of difficulty and litiga- 

 tion in the management of the poor than that of settlement. 

 Under the old Scottish poor law the settlement was the 

 parish of birth, and if that was not known the parish where 

 " he has had his most common resort for the three years 

 iiamediately preceding his being taken up, or his applying 

 for the public charity." Here is a question which was raised 

 in 1758. John Dargavel, weaver, represented to the Quar- 

 ter Sessions that he Avas born in the parish of Penpont, 

 where he lived thirty years ; from thence he went to Glen- 



