182 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. [1692. 



Court was called." This tribunal was also charged with various 

 duties, that would be rather onerous upon Orphans' Courts of 

 the present day. The inventories and accounts of Executors and 

 Administrators were brought into Court for personal examina- 

 tion by the Justices, and, as " father of the poor," they put out 

 apprentices. An instance occurs this year, in which two minors, 

 a boy and a girl, were put out till they were twenty-two years 

 of age. 



Making base coin appears to have been a common offence dur- 

 ing the early settlement of the Province. At the last Court of 



this year, of Haverford, was presented, not only for 



making base pieces of coin, but " for making stamps for others." 



A road had been laid out from Marple to Chester. In 1691 

 the Grand Jury extended this road from a point not very distant 

 from Rhoads' tan-yard in Marple to a point near Radnor meet- 

 ing-house. As nearly as can now be ascertained, the route of 

 this road passed along the present Springfield road to the road 

 that passes the Drove tavern ; thence by the Presbyterian meet- 

 ing-house to Darby Creek, through a valley, the jury says, 

 " called the dry hollow." The road then occupied the bed of the 

 present direct road to the meeting-house; the route does not 

 appear to have been varied in the least on account of hills. The 

 Grand Jury also laid out a road, "from the King's road in Darby 

 township to the landing place at Calcin Hook." 



In 1691, the three lower counties were separated from the 

 Province, much to the regret of the Proprietary. He appears, 

 however, to have yielded his assent to the separation, by com- 

 missioning Thomas Lloyd as Governor of the latter, and William 

 Markham of the former.^ 



As serious as has been the disagreements between those with 

 whom the government had been entrusted, and which brought 

 about its division, the elements of discord of a still more serious 

 character, had gained a footing in the religious society to which 

 a very large proportion of the inhabitants of the province were 

 attached. This doctrinal feud was introduced into the Society 

 of Friends by the teachings of George Keith, a man of ability 

 and education, who had been an eminent minister amongst them. 

 The Quakers of this county, always alive to every thing that 

 affected the interest of the Society, took an active part in the 

 controversy, and though many took sides with Keith, there was 

 no division that resulted in the establishment of separate meet- 

 ings within our limits. 



In June, 1692, a meeting of Public Friendn^ in Philadelphia, 

 issued the famous Testimony against George Keith, which was 

 confirmed by the Yearly Meeting at Burlington, held in Septem- 



' Proud's Hist. Penna. i. 357. 



