20 Extracts from the Records of the 



Clifford, Vicar of Overton, against a member of an unruly family, 

 Dismer by name, who, on Christmas Day, 1605 : — 



" Standinge by lawe excommunicat presumptiouslie entered into the Churche 

 of Overton in the time of divine service myselfe being enteringe to the Com- 

 munion, there sate in his seate, who being required by the Churchwardens to 

 depart did verie obstinatlie there continewe usinge manie unsemelie speeches to 

 my disturbance whereby I was constrained to forbeare thexecucon of my dutie 

 untill he was departed in his great malice" 



" Shortlie after upon another Saboth daie,^' Dismer repeated this 

 piece of contumacious conduct, " wherby," so the Vicar reports, " I 

 was constrayned to depart leaving him in the churche and the people 

 without service for that tyme." 



The execution of a writ de excom^nunicato capiendo (5 Eliz., cap. 23) 

 comes under notice at the Michaelmas Sessions in the first year of 

 the reign. One Katharine Butler was on this occasion the object 

 of the bayliff's quest, apparently at Corsham, but neither she nor 

 her friends at all acquiesced in the capture. Nineteen persons, of 

 whom six were women, are indicted pro riottd et roidosd rescussu. 

 Three of them pleaded guilty and were fined 205. each, a penalty 

 which was subsequently reduced to 2*. Qd. This they promptly 

 paid and went their way. Another of the accused appeared and 

 pleaded not guilty. And for the rest warrants were ordered for 

 appearance at the next sessions. 



Of current religious controversy the transactions of quarter 

 sessions cannot be expected to yield many illustrations. A more 

 systematic presentment of recusants seems to have been, so far 

 as Wiltshire was concerned, the chief result of the events of the 

 famous 5th of November. These presentments have no special 

 interest or importance; they do not furnish, as in Yorkshire, a 

 census of the families still clinging to the old faith. They come, 

 in Wiltshire, indifferently from all the hundreds, and the few names 

 returned seem to have been written down in a rather perfunctory 

 manner. 



Three dwellers in the regions of Box were (Easter, 1603) pre- 

 sented "for scandalous words concerning the Book of Common 

 Prayer and the ministers of the English Church " : one delinquent 



