134 



The Twentieth General Meeting. 



back to the earliest date at which registers commenced, but it never 

 occurred to him to extract such a quantity of amusing and interesting 

 matter, as well as instructive statistics from them, as Mr. Plenderleath 

 had done from comparatively very modern registers. 



The President then called upon Mr. Cunnington to read a paper 

 on c< Ancient Assessments," which had been prepared by Mr. 

 Mullings, who unfortunately was unable to be present. 



ANCIENT ASSESSMENTS. 

 Mr. Cunnington said that he had before him five very interesting 

 and almost unique documents which had been presented to the 

 Libraay by Mr. Richard Mullings, of Cirencester. Mr. Mullings had 

 told him that many years ago he had saved these documents literally 

 from burning. They were assessments upon parishes in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Swindon, in the reign of William the Third, and con- 

 tained a list of a large proportion of the inhabitants of that period. 

 The papers had been bound by Sir Thomas Phillips, whose writing 

 was on the covers. Mr. Mullings had carefully analysed these 

 documents, and had prepared a short but very interesting paper upon 

 them. 



"The documents, to which the attention of the Society is invited, 

 consist of assessments made for the parish of Swindon and several 

 other surrounding ones in the time of King William the Third, 

 under the Acts for levying a poll tax on births, marriages, and 

 burials, and on bachelors. The papers were saved by me literally 

 from burning, very many years ago. Most of the assessments have 

 the signatures of Justices of the Peace of the district and the 

 assessors certifying their accuracy. They were deemed interesting, 

 curious, and instructive, by my late friend, the profound antiquary, 

 Sir Thomas Phillips, Bart., of Thirlestaine House, Cheltenham, by 

 whose care they were stitched and put in what he called e Middle- 

 Hill binding 9 — such as you now see them in. It may be proper to 

 preface the consideration of the documents with a few remarks on 

 the taxes they relate to. The poll tax of William the Third's time 

 differed from the mediaeval tax of that name with which our English 

 histories have made us familiar. They were alike in their object of 



