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thefe, as well as fome others which vary from the Reports already in Print, are diftinguished by the words "EDITOR'S MSS." and relate principally to two periods, namely, from the reign of Quec Anne to the end of the reign of George the Second; and from Michaelmas Term in the twenty-fecond year, to Michaelmas Term in the twenty fixth year of George the Third.

DURING the time this work has neceffarily taken in paffing through the prefs, fome points were decided in the Courts, and two Acts of Parliament were paffed by the Legislature, on the fubject of the Poor Laws, which it was too late to infert in their proper places; they have therefore been placed. in AN APPENDIX at the end of each Volume; but in THE DIGEST, prefixed to the Work, thefe Cafes are claffed under the feveral titles to which they refpectively belong.

To render the Work as full and complete as poffible, the ftatute of 22. Geo. 3. c. 83. which gives

gives authority to incorporated Societies to maintain and provide for their own poor, in the par

ticular method described in the Act, is fubjoined to the First Volume.

ADVERTISEMENT

PREFIXED TO THE

FIRST EDITION.

T may not be improper to give fome account of the reafons for undertaking the following Compilation, and the manner in which it has been executed.

THE number of Collections already published might, indeed, render any publication of this nature useless; but the want of method and accuracy, evident in a greater of a lefs degree in all of them, may preclude any further APOLOGY for making this Collection. Add to this, that the number of years elapfed fince the publication of the latest of them, caufes an unavoidable infufficiency in them. A great number of very nice and important questions upon THE POOR LAWS have been lately determined by the Court of King's Bench. Of those MR. BURROW has favoured the world with an excellent Report; but from the fize of that Collection, it is rendered too expensive for the purchase of Parish-officers, and inconvenient for Gentlemen who attend at the Seffions. DR. BURN deserves the highest respect for his “Justice Peace;" but as only the Laft Edition of that excellent Work

Work is enriched by extracts from MR. BURROW'S Reports, all the former editions fall fhort of that perfection which their ingenious Author would now have been able to bestow upon them. DR. BURN'S "Justice of Peace" contains likewife information upon a great number of matters which are not the objects of the jurifdiction of the Quarter Seffions, and of the attention of Parish-officers, for whofe ufe this prefent Compilation is more particularly intended. The fame obfervation likewife may be applied to MY LORD WARD'S "Country Justice." I flatter myself, therefore, that this Compilation will correct the errors, fupply the defects, and, as far as it extends, more fully affift the Practitioner than any of the former COLLECTIONS.

REPORTS Only of unexceptionable authority have been confulted in forming this Compilation; which has likewife been improved by a great number of extracts from a Manufcript Collection of Cafes, by the late JOHN FORD, Efq. The Cafes marked MSS. in the following fheets are all of them taken from that Manufcript.

obferva

THE Compiler has very feldom hazarded any tions of his own, nor ventured to make any alterations in the ftyle of the Reporters, however uncouth it might appear to him.

He has diftributed under their proper heads fome Notes of Cafes which have been determined in the Court of

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