then it would operate as a license to vagrancy,) there must be a particular parish in contemplation at the time of granting it (a).

Discharge of a Certificate and Abandonment.]-We come next to the consideration of the means by which a certificate may be wholly discharged.

They are various: as, apprenticeship, or hiring and service in any third parish (b); an order of removal by justices (c); desertion or abandonment of the certificate by the party certified (d); the renting of a tenement of the value of 101. per annum; the purchase of an estate for 301.; and also the acquisition of an estate by descent, marriage, or operation of law (e).

With respect to a certificated person becoming possessed of an estate by operation of law, the general comprehensive rule is, as has been noticed in a preceding page, that “ any person who has an estate of freehold, copyhold, or for years, by act of law (as descent, marriage, executorship, or administration) may dwell upon it as his own; and is not removable; and gains a settlement if he continue forty days, though under 101. per annum; but he must abide forty days in order to gain such settlement "(f).

And where a cottage was devised by will to a certificated person, "to live in during his life," it was held, with residence, to discharge the certificate (g).

And a purchase, which, if not pecuniary, is of itself sufficient to gain a settlement, is of course sufficient to discharge a certificate (h). A certificate may also be abandoned, though the party do not commit any of the acts which actually go to discharge it; as where a certificated person leaves the parish to which he is certificated for some permanent engagement, which manifests his having no intention of returning; for then the certificate is considered as having performed its office (i). And such cases are generally distinguishable from those, in which the manner of a person's departure conveys an intimation that it is only for a temporary purpose, as where his business is of a mere occasional nature, or where he leaves his family behind him, as in his domicile (j).

What Persons are Comprehended in a Certificate.]-If a certificate be not either discharged, or abandoned by any of the modes above pointed out, its general operations are "that it extends to poor of all denominations; to legitimate children born of certificated persons after the granting thereof; to a second wife taken after, and to her children born after, the granting thereof" (k). It does not, however, extend to a bastard born after, except in the case of the mother being pregnant with it at the time of granting the certificate, such certificate referring specially to such child in ventre sa mere (1); nor to grandchildren (unless specifically under the protection of, and part of the family of, the grandfather, or themselves being individually named); nor to children grown to maturity, and emancipated (m).

To expatiate on points established by a long succession of determinations, to be found in all the books which treat of the duties of justices, is not within the design of this work. A very few decisions, which relate rather to considerations arising out of certificates, than to the direct operations of certificates themselves, or to the voluntary dereliction of them, must conclude this subject.

In April, 1790, M. B. father of pauper J. B., being resident in Leek Wootton, went from thence with his family, of which J. B. the pauper was one, to reside with M. B.'s father, at Milverton, who rented a tenement there at 61. per annum, but of the value of 107. per annum. M. B.'s father died, leaving a will, by which he devised his interest in the tenement to his son M. B. and appointed him executor. M. B. remained in this tenement many years. In 1791, and while he was so in possession, he applied to Leek Wootton for a certificate, which the parish officers granted him, acknowledging himself, his wife, (J. B. the present pauper, then about twelve years old,) and other children by name. J. B. continued to reside with his father M. B. at Milverton on this tenement five years after the death of his grandfather, but never gained any settlement in his own right.

The question for the court was, whether, M. B. the father, having gained a settlement at Milverton by his occupation of the tenement of 101. per annum value, subsequent to being certificated by Leek Wootton, his son (the present pauper J. B.) could gain a derivative settlement from his father, having been inserted by name in the certificate, and therefore resident under it suo jure, and not as part of his

(*) Burr. S. C, 182, 314; 2 Bott, 580, 593.

(1) R. v. Mathon, 7 T. R. 362; Burr.

S. C. 650.

(m) R. v. Darlington, 4 T. R. 797.

father's family. All the preceding cases were commented on in the course of the discussion. The judgment was in substance as follows.

After remarking upon some discrepancies among the former determinations, Lord Ellenborough, C. J., said, "There is nothing in the statute which requires the nomination of the constituent parts of a family. It is mere artificial reasoning which makes the distinction between such of the children as are, and such as are not, named in the certificate; a distinction which the act itself does not make. Then as the child, though named, was still to be considered only as a constituent part of the family, it brings it to the question, Whether he was ousted of his derivative settlement from his father? Upon that point the language of Lord Mansfield is founded in reason, and not opposed by the act, viz. that the children of all parents must have the settlement of the father, until they acquire another for themselves. I think, therefore, the pauper in this case was not repelled from his father's settlement by the circumstance of having been named in the certificate."

Le Blanc, J. "The cases of Testerton and Batheaston have not decided that the son coming into a parish, and continuing as part of his father's family under a certificate, is not capable of having his derivative settlement shift with his father's settlement; but only that the settlement of a child named in the certificate, who had ceased to be part of his father's family, should not shift with that of his father. Here the pauper continued part of his father's family, and had gained no settlement of his own. His being named in the certificate, therefore, does not prevent the shifting of his settlement with his father's."

Bayley, J. "It is said, indeed, that by the words of the act, the settlement of a certificated person can only be acquired in the certificated parish by two modes, and that this is not one of them. But the fallacy of that argument is this-that the children do not come into the parish under the certificate suo jure, but only as part of the father's family, and under his protection” (n).

A certificate acknowledged paupers, with all their children, born, or to be born. One of them (already born) afterwards became the head of a separate family, and resided in the certificated parish. Such child so certificated under the general words, and so becoming the head of a family apart from his father, can communicate a settlement to his apprentice in such certificated parish (0).

(n) R. v. Leek Wootton, 16 East, R. 118. (0) R. v. Thwaites, 1 M. & S. 669.

Pauper certificated as part of his father's family, but not by name; put out apprentice in the certifying parish, leaving his father's house and serving for seven years, then returning and serving with his master's consent the remainder of his term in the certified parish, but not returning to his father's house, arriving at twenty-one years of age, and hiring himself for a year, and serving the same in the certified parish, is emancipated, and gains a settlement in such certified parish by such hiring and service (p).

Relief, how far Evidence of Settlement.]-Before closing the subject of settlement, it is necessary to say a few words on a species of evidence, which has not unfrequently been adduced, for the purpose of raising an acknowledgment of settlement by inference; viz. the fact of a pauper, or his family, having been relieved by the officers of a particular parish while resident in it, in order to found upon that fact the inference, that such relieving was an acknowledment of settlement there. But though such an occurrence may operate occasionally by way of confirmation of other evidence, of itself, singly, it is none (q).

Relief, indeed, given by the officers of a parish, to a pauper resident in another parish, is prima facie evidence of settlement in the former (r) for in such an instance, it cannot have been as casual poor, that they relieved him; and, therefore, especially where the relief has been frequently or systematically given, it amounts to that sort of admission, which must be rebutted by strong evidence of an opposite tendency, to overturn the obvious presumption. In one case, evidence of birth was offered to rebut it, but the court observed, that birth was, of all evidence of settlement, the weakest (s)..

"It is important on subjects of this kind that there should be one uniform rule, so far as is consistent with law; and the rule having been once laid down, that the bare fact of giving relief to a pauper within the parish was no evidence of his settlement there, because it might be given to him as casual poor, it is proper to abide by it. If relief were offered in this manner for any length of time, it might give occasion to different inferences; either that the party receiving was a settled inhabitant, or merely that his settlement could not be known.

(p) R. v. Morley, 2 M. & S. 417.

(q) R. v. Coleorton, 1 B. & Adol. 25. (r) R. v. Edwinstone, 8 B. & Cr. 671. There relief had been once given, and though it was refused afterwards, the sessions held the settlement gained,

and the court, though of a different opinion, refused to disturb their decision.

(s) R. v. Wakefield, 5 East, R. 335; R. v. Stanley, 15 East, R. 351.

That would bring it to an alternative case, on which the session might draw their own conclusion, and the difficulty would still exist. Upon the whole, therefore, it is the better rule to adopt, to say, that it does not amount to evidence of the settlement. There would be great impolicy in allowing it to have weight; for if parish officers, by giving relief, were to make evidence against themselves, as to the settlement of the pauper, they would perform their duty to casual poor with great reluctance" (t).

Order of Removal unappealed against.]-Acquiescence in an order of removal has also the effect of acknowledging the pauper's settlement to be in the parish to which the removal is made, in a more extensive degree than the above instances of like acknowledgment. But as such acquiescence does not of itself constitute the settlement, and is, more properly, evidence of it only, it will be considered hereafter (u).

SECTION XIII.

OF THE TRIAL AND DETERMINATION OF APPEALS AGAINST ORDERS OF REMOVAL; AND HEREIN OF AMENDMENTS BY THE SESSIONS.

THE first step on the hearing of appeals against orders of removal is to prove the service of the notice of appeal, and of the statement of the grounds of appeal by the appellants; unless they are admitted. The appellants should then produce the original order, unless it is already filed; or, if a copy only has been served on them, they should, having given notice to the respondents to produce the original, produce and prove their copy. The order or the copy is then read; and any preliminary objections may be taken to its form.

Amendment of Judgments or Orders of Justices.]—It is enacted (v), "that on all appeals to the sessions against the judgments or orders of any justices of the peace, the sessions shall cause any defect of form that shall be found in any such judgments or orders to be rectified and amended, without any costs to the parties concerned; and, after such amendment, shall proceed to hear, examine, and consider the truth and merits of all matters concerning such judgments or orders; and to

(t) Per Lord Ellenborough, in R. v. Chatham, 8 East, 498.

(u) Post, p. 824.

(v) 5 G. II. c. 15.