1 48 HI ST OR V OF COHASSE T. 



man lived upon them. It seems ridiculous to us nowadays 

 to think that votes in Cohasset should be based upon 

 house lots instead of upon persons, but the English method 

 of land representation, instead of person representation, 

 was evidently in vogue. 



December 27, 1669, they passed the rule "'that no one 

 house lot shall have above one man in voting about divi- 

 sion." 



Another town meeting on January 10 ordered a list of 

 house lots and a committee to adjust grievances. The 

 hard-working citizens who had not acquired land were 

 being crowded to the wall ; but the majority had mercy 

 enough to vote that " if any poor man is oppressed by this 

 way of dividing, there may be some consideration of such 

 persons." 



Then followed a week of sharp and hot arguing over the 

 division of Cohasset. Around their firesides, at the little 

 old meeting-house,* in the barns where cattle were 

 munching Cohasset hay, anywhere men could get together 

 on those winter days, the absorbing theme was discussed. 

 A conclusion was reached on January 17, 1669 (new style 

 1670), at a special town meeting. All previous measures 

 were voted null and void ; they determined to throw the 

 whole of their undivided lands into seven hundred shares, 

 and then to distribute those shares by an open vote, and 

 afterwards to survey the land, giving pieces to each share- 

 holder according to his number of shares. 



By this plan every one would be provided for, as they 

 need not feel bound by any one rule of division. Loose 

 as it was, the various amounts coming to each by this plan 

 were quite definitely determined in the minds of the voters. 



The town clerk, Daniel Cushing, received the largest 

 number of shares, thirty-five, probably in compensation 

 for his clerical services. Apart from him, the pastor was 

 the most liberally remembered, twenty-five shares. Then 



*The present meeting-house was not built until twelve years later, 1681. 



