CHAPTER XVI. 



OBSERVATIONS ON PARISH REGISTERS, 



ACCORDING TO THE WAT PRESCRIBED BY THE HONBLE. SIR WM. PETTY, KNIGHT. 



[Tins chapter consists merely of memoranda for the further examination of those valuable mate- 

 rials for local and general statistics the parochial registers. Aubrey has inserted the number of 

 baptisms, marriages, and burials, recorded in the registers of Broad Chalke, for each year, from 1630 to 

 1642, and from 1676 to 1684 inclusive; distinguishing the baptisms and burials of males arid 

 females in each year. The like particulars are given for a period of five years from the registers of 

 Dunhead St. Mary. He adds, "In anno 1686 I made extracts out of the register bookes of half a 

 dozen parishes in South Wiltshire, which I gave to Sir Win. Petty." The following passages will 

 suffice to indicate the nature of his remarks. J. B.] 



MR. ROBERT GOOD, M.A., of Bower Chalke, hath a method to calculate the provision that is 

 spent in a yeare in their parish ; and does find that one house with another spends six pounds per 

 annum ; which comes within an hundred pounds of the parish rate. 



Sir W. Petty observes, from the account of the people, that not above halfe teeming women are 

 marryed ; and that if the Government pleased there might be such a multiplication of mankind as 

 in 1500 yeares would sufficiently plant every habitable acre in the world. 



Mdm. The poore's rate of St. Giles-in-the-fields, London, comes to six thousand pounds per 

 annum. [The sixth chapter of Mr. Rowland Dobie's " History of the United Parishes of St. Giles- 

 in-the-Fields and St. George, Bloomsbury," (8vo. 1829) contains some curious and interesting "his- 

 torical sketches of pauperism." Speaking of the parish workhouse, the author says, " It contains on 

 an average from 800 to 900 inmates, which is however but a small proportion to the number con- 

 stantly relieved, at an expense [annually] of nearly forty thousand pounds." J. B.] 



Dunhead St. Mary. The reason why so few marriages are found in the register bookes of these 

 parts is that the ordinary sort of people goe to Ansted to be married, which is a priviledged church ; 

 and they come 40 and 50 miles off to be married there. 



Of periodicall small-poxes. Small-pox in Sherborne dureing the year 1626, and dureing the 

 yeare 1634; from Michaelmas 1642 to Michaelmas 1643; from Michaelmas 1649 to Michaelmas 

 1650 ; &c. Small-pox in Taunton all the year 1658 ; likewise in the yeare 1670, &c. I would 

 I had the like observations made in great townes in Wiltshire ; but few care for these things. 



It hath been observed that the plague never fix't (encreased) in Bridgenorth in Salop. Also at 

 Richmond it never did spread ; but at Petersham, a small village a mile or more distant, the plague 

 made so great a destruction that there survived only five of the inhabitants. 1638 was a sickly and 

 feaverish autumne ; there were three graves open at one time in the churchyard of Broad Chalke. 



