president's address. 229 



I would next refer to the Parish. Accounts, both of the 

 churchwardens and the overseers of the poor, and likewise to 

 the Vestry Books. The accounts here mentioned have been 

 treated even worse than the parish registers, for, in many 

 instances, they have been regarded simply as waste paper. 

 Where they exist, however, of early date, they contain much 

 valuable and interesting information upon parochial polity, and 

 are illustrative of the social condition, manners and customs of 

 our forefathers in not very distant times. 



Then as concerning Wills. You are aware that consider- 

 able alterations have been made, as in many other things, with 

 regard to the Probate of Wills within the last 60 years. All 

 jurisdiction respecting wills before that time was vested in the 

 church, and in addition to the Provincial Court of Canterbury 

 and the Diocesan Court of Exeter (I shall confine my remarks 

 to Cornwall), there were divers other local jurisdictions in this 

 matter. In Cornwall there were 206 Old Parishes which fell 

 into the following jurisdictions respectively, viz : 176^ belonging 

 to the Archdeacon, 26^ (Padstow was the divided parish. The 

 urban portion of the parish belonged to the Archdeacon, and the 

 rural to the Bishop) Peculiars vested in the personal jurisdiction 

 of the Bishop and in certain Deans and Chapters, and three 

 parishes in the Deanery of St. Burian, viz : St. Burian, St. Levan, 

 and Sennan, which were under the jurisdiction of the Dean of 

 that collegiate church which had existed from a period prior to 

 the conquest, and that jurisdiction, as regards the proof of wills, 

 continued until quite recently. The Wills proved in this 

 Deanery are now deposited with the Archdeaconry Wills at 

 Bodmin. It should be observed, however, that in all cases ia 

 which the testator bequeaths money or goods of the value of £5 

 or over in another diocese, the Will must be proved in the court 

 of the Province, and that during the Bishop's Visitation the 

 Wills of all persons dying within the Archdeacon's jurisdiction 

 must be proved in the Diocesan Court ; and the Wills of all 

 beneficed clergymen, not having bona notalilia, must be proved 

 in the same court. The Pev. John Wallis, Vicar of Bodmin, 

 whose father was registrar of the Archdeacon's Court, writing 

 in 1838, states that there were then 70,000 Wills carefully 

 preserved in the Pegistry. 



