1 



212 



(fcxtmcfa from % Dearta; of % ffi&dfpct 

 tyamivc Sessions. 



Communicated by R. W. Meeeiman, Clerk of the Peace. 

 (Continued from Vol. xxii., p. 



E[E system of quarterly presentments to the sessions must 

 have fostered habits of acute observation 1 in parish and 

 township : ordinary village life, no doubt, provided a censorious 

 inhabitant with frequent pretext for exhibiting such and such a 

 neighbour as a "haunter of taverns," or a "common swearer/' as 

 neglecting to scour his watercourses, or failing in his allotted task 

 of road repair. And men were not dependent on the hundred courts 

 in this respeet, they took the office of information into their own 

 hands, and addressed the court of quarter sessions direct as they found 

 occasion. . . . 



Thus, in 1604, the inhabitants of Sutton (which parish of that 

 name is not stated) felt constrained 



" To certifye your worships that this Goulde is a fellow of no dwelling . . 

 . . and never accounted as a parishioner of Sutton nor in any man's service 

 * . . . but accounted an idle fellowe, and a loyteringe, and a maker of 

 debate, and a stirrer up of sedition ; and in the time of the presses in Her late 

 Ma ties warres, some time flied into Dorst neare Cranbourne and some time 

 hither into Sutton." - 



From the Borough of Devizes came the following at the Easter 

 Sessions, 1604 : — 



Itm wee p'sent John Tylly of the Devizes Shoomaker for that hee the nine 

 and twenty day of March at night last paste dyd myssebehave himseallf towards 

 Edward Geant Sarvant to J ohn Sanysbery makinge him druncke in moste odyus 

 sorte in Mister Spenser's howse. 



" The first of November 1603 William Powell kept dising all night in his 

 house w th Roger Payn himselfe and otheres and the sayd William Powell got 

 away xxx 8 from the sayd Roger Payn." 



1 The inhabitants of Little Bedwyn begin a petition (Hilary, 1606-7) on be- 

 half of a sufferer by fire with the preamble, " Forasmuch as it is the p'te of 

 ev'ie good christian to testifie the truth upon just occasion," &c. 



