of estates, funds, and incomes. Inspectors may examine witnesses on oath. Board may sanction building leases, working mines, reforms, improvements, or, in special cases, order sale or exchange of estates, or redemption of rent-charges, s. 25. By s. 28, where the appointment or removal of a trustee, or any other relief, order, or direction is desirable, relating to any charity, of which the gross annual income exceeds £30, the master of the rolls and vice-chancellor, upon application to them at chambers, to have the same jurisdiction as the lord chancellor has upon informations, &c., under the 15 & 16 V. c. 80. In the city of London, the provision as to charities exceeding £30 to extend to charities not exceeding £30, s. 30. By s. 32, district courts of bankruptcy and county courts have jurisdiction in cases of charities, the incomes of which do not exceed £30, but the deputy sitting for county court judge not to exercise jurisdiction, s. 33. Order of district or county court for removal of a trustee or approval of scheme not valid till countersigned by the board. Reservation of the rights of the church of England; and the act does not extend to the universities, or to charities partly supported by voluntary contributions. Charities applicable exclusively to the benefit of Roman Catholics were exempt from the act for two years, and this term was extended by 19 & 20 V. c. 76, to Sept. 1, 1857.

CHARTA, the ancient word for a deed or a statute. See Deeds, p. 412.

CHARTER, a royal grant or privilege.

CHILDWIT, under the feudal system, a fine or penalty on a bondwoman begotten with child without the consent of the lord. The term is not yet obsolete in some parts of Essex.

CHIMNEY-SWEEPER. By 3 & 4 V. c. 85, to compel or knowingly to allow any person under the age of twenty-one years to ascend or descend a chimney or enter a flue for the purpose of cleaning or curing it, or for extinguishing a fire therein, subjects to a penalty of £10, or not less than £5. No child can be apprenticed to the trade under the age of sixteen years, and current indentures of children under sixteen may be cancelled. The act prescribes the construction of chimneys, subjecting builders to penalties for neglect. Under 4 & 5 W. 4, c. 35, hawking or calling in the street is prohibited, and the ill-treatment of apprentices made liable to a penalty between £2 and £10. These acts were extended, in 1864, by 27 & 28 V. c. 39, so that no child under the age of ten years do, or assist in any way about, the business of chimneysweeping elsewhere than within the house or place of business of the employer. Chimney-sweeper entering house or building, to clean, core, or extinguish a fire in any chimney or flue, not to bring with him any person in his employ, or under his control, under the age of sixteen. Contravention of either of these enactments subjects to a penalty not exceeding £10. Where, under the act of 1840, a sweeper is convicted of knowingly allowing a person under

the age of twenty-one years to ascend or descend for the purpose there mentioned, he may, instead of the pecuniary penalty, be adjudged to be imprisoned for any term not exceeding six months, with or without hard labour, s. 9. Proof of the age of any person in question to lie on defendant.

CHOSE, in French, signifies a thing; and a chose in action is a thing of which a man has not the possession or actual enjoyment, but floating or pending, and which he can claim by action at law.

CHURCH is a building consecrated to the service of religion, and anciently dedicated to some saint whose name it assumed; and if it has the administration of the sacraments and of the rites of

burial, it is in law adjudged a church. The term is also applied to a body of persons, united by the profession of the same Christian faith. The church of England is that church recognized by the state, and endowed, and comprising, in its doctrine and discipline, the national faith. The laws and constitutions which govern the church of England are,-1. Divers immemorial customs. 2. Provincial constitutions, and the canons made in convocations, especially those in the year 1603. 3. Statutes, or acts of parliament, concerning the affairs of religion, or causes of ecclesiastical cognizance, particularly the rubric in the Common Prayer Book, founded upon the Statute of Uniformity. Lastly, the Articles of Religion, drawn up in the year 1562, and established by 13 Eliz. c. 12. No person can succeed to the British Crown who shall not join in communion with the church of England, as by law established. By the coronation oath the sovereign is bound to maintain the protestant or reformed church established by law, and to preserve to the bishops and clergy all rights and privileges as by law do or shall pertain to them.-Church Building Act. By 58 G. 3, c. 45, commissioners under this act are empowered to grant money for the building of churches in parishes or extra-parochial places in which there is a population of not less than 4,000 persons, and in which there is not accommodation in the churches and chapels of the establishment already erected for more than one-fourth part of that number, or where there are 1,000 persons situated more than four miles distant from such places of worship; and also to make advances in places where the inhabitants are able to bear part of the expenses of such erections, and to pay such advances by instalments. The interest of these loans and a sinking fund, to the amount of one-twentieth part of the principal, to be charged on the church rate. But the 59 G. 3, c. 134, requires that no application to build or enlarge any church or chapel, either wholly or in part, shall be made by means of rates upon the parish, in any case in which one-third part or more in value (such third part to be ascertained by the average rate for the relief of the poor for the three preceding years) shall dissent therefrom. A rate, however, not exceeding 1s. in the pound in any one year, or 58. in the whole, upon the annual value of the property in the parish, may be raised

for building or enlarging a church or chapel by two-thirds of the persons exercising the powers of vestry in the parish, and of which vestry meeting notice has been given upon two successive Sundays preceding, and this notwithstanding the dissent of one-third of the ratepayers. By 9 G. 4, c. 42, the practice of raising money by church briefs, under authority of 4 Anne, c. 14, is abolished; and all voluntary contributions collected by letters patent for the purpose of building and enlarging churches are be applied by the Church Building Commission. By the 19 & 20 V. c. 55, the powers of this commission were transferred to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners of England.

CHURCH RATES. Rates assessed for the repair of parochial churches, by the parishioners in vestry assembled. The reparation of the body of the church belongs to the parishioners, and the power of taxing themselves for that purpose is vested solely in them. The churchwardens, as such, have no power to impose a church rate; but if they give notice of a vestry for that purpose, and if no other parishioners attend, they may alone make and assess the rate. It has been decided that it is incumbent on a parish to impose a rate for the maintenance of the church; but as the payment can only be enforced by ecclesiastical censures, it may be resisted with impunity; and since the Braintree case, such has been the result in many parishes. For some years previously church rates had ceased to be collected in many parishes, owing to the opposition to them, and in others the levying of them had given rise to ill feeling and litigation. For the prevention of these evils by the 31 & 32 V. c. 109, the power to compel the payment of church rates by any legal process is abolished. By s. 2, there is a saving of rates called "church rates," where by any local act rates called church rates have by any general or local act been made applicable to secular purposes.

CHURL, in the Saxon times, was a tenant at will, but of free condition.

CINQUE PORTS are Dover, Sandwich, Romney, Winchelsea, and Rye; and to these may be added Hythe and Hastings. They are under the government of a lord warden, and, prior to the continuance of the Duke of Wellington in the office, the wardenship was usually an adjunct of the premiership. The Cinque Ports enjoy various privileges as to pilotage, the issuing of writs, and other judicial matters. They are supposed, by Schultes, to have been incorporated previous to the Conquest, by the grant of privileges made to the barons (freemen) by Edward the Confessor.

CIRCUITS. England and Wales, with the exception of Middlesex, are, for judicial purposes, divided into circuits, which the fifteen judges visit twice or thrice a year, in pairs, to adjudge civil and criminal charges. The criminal charges for the county of Middlesex and city of London, and parts adjacent, are adjudged at sessions which are held monthly at the Central Criminal Court; and the

judges of the superior courts sit during term for the adjudication of civil cases only in Westminster Hall, and, before and after term, in the Guildhall of the city of London. The lord chancellor and vice-chancellors, also, sit out of term at Lincoln's Inn.

CITY, a term introduced about the period of the Conquest, and not limited, as Blackstone conjectured, to episcopal towns. It appears to be derived from civitas, and applied to all towns of eminence, signifying that they were places subject to municipal government. Long after the conquest, city is used synonymously with burgh, as appears in the charter of Leicester, it being called both civitas burgus, which shows the commentator is mistaken in confining the term to a town which "either is or hath been the see of a bishop." But, on this point, Mr. Woodeson, the Vinerian professor, has adduced a decisive authority. It is that of Ingulphus, who relates, that at the great council assembled in 1072, to settle the claims of two archbishops, it was decreed that bishops' sees should be transferred from towns to cities.

CIVIL LAW is the municipal law of the Romans, comprised in the code, the pandects, or digests, the institutes, and the novels, or authorities. It is allowed, under certain restrictions, to be used in the ecclesiastical, military, and Admiralty courts, and in the courts of the two universities.

CIVIL LIST. Since the revolution of 1688, it has been the practice, at the commencement of a new reign, to enter into a specific arrangement with the sovereign, by which the ancient hereditary revenues of the crown are placed at the disposal of parliament, in exchange for an equivalent annuity for life. The annual sum so granted in lieu of the crown revenues is denominated the civil list, which is yearly set apart from the general revenue of the kingdom for the personal maintenance of her Majesty, and to support the honour of dignity of the crown. The sum so granted by 1 V. c. 2, amounts to £385,000, to be applied as follows:For her Majesty's privy purse, £60,000; salaries for the household and retired allowances, £131,260; expenses of the household, £172,500; royal bounty, alms, and special services, £13,200; pensions to the extent of £1,200 per annum; unappropriated moneys, £8,040. The reduction in the income of the queen below that of her predecessors, has been effected by the transfer of various charges, heretofore paid out of the civil list, to the consolidated fund.

CLEAR DAYS. In a lawsuit there are several steps in the proceedings which must be taken within a specified number of clear days. In reckoning these days, the day on which the process is served and the day of hearing are not counted.

CLERK is, strictly, a person in holy orders, but it is now generally applied to any person whose chief occupation is writing, in a court of law or elsewhere. Officers in courts of law were, formerly, often clergymen; and hence, to this day, their successors are de

nominated clerks. Kings were anciently called clerks, Dav. 4. In Moss v. Heavyside, a clerk in a mercantile house, described in the notice of justification by the addition of " ' gentleman," was rejected, from inaccurate description, as bail. Clerks are a superior sort of servants, and the customary rule in domestic service of a month's wages or a month's notice does not apply to them. It does not appear settled what warning they are entitled to. Mr. Chitty suggests a quarter's notice on either side would be probably deemed sufficient.

CLERK OF THE ASSIZE is he that records all things judicially done by the judges of the circuits.

CLERK OF THE PARLIAMENT ROLLS is the name of an officer in each house of parliament, who records proceedings in parliament, and engrosses them on parliament rolls, for their better preservation.

CLERK OF THE PEACE. An officer belonging to the quarter sessions, whose duties are to read the indictments, enrol the proceedings, draw the processes, and transact other business incident to the quarter sessions.

CLUB-HOUSES, in London, are associations to which individuals subscribe for purposes of mutual entertainment and convenience, the affairs of which are usually conducted by a steward or secretary, who acts under the immediate superintendence of a committee. It is now settled, Flemming v. Hector, that they have no legal character similar to commercial partnerships or joint-stock companies, and that the members of such societies are not liable for the acts of their secretaries, stewards, or committees.

COALS. These may be exported free of duty in any English ship; and the duty on all descriptions of coal exported in foreign ships is reduced to 48. per ton. The 1 & 2 W. 4, c 76, regulates the vend and delivery of coals in London and Westminster, and parts of the counties of Middlesex, Surrey, Kent, Essex, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, and Berkshire. All coals sold from any vessel within the port of London, or at any place within twenty-five miles of the General Post-office, to be sold by weight, not by measure. Selling one sort of coals for another subjects to a penalty of £10 for every ton sold, and so in proportion for any similar quantity: but the penalty not to be levied for any greater quantity than 25 tons. With every quantity of coals exceeding 560 lbs. the seller must send a ticket, informing the buyer of the quantity and sort of coals sent, the weight in each sack, and that he is authorized, if he think fit, to require the carman to weigh, gratuitously, in the weighing machine the carman brings the whole or any sack of such coals; penalty on the carman refusing or obstructing such weighing, not exceeding £20. Seller or carman not delivering the ticket to the purchaser or his servant, to forfeit not exceeding £20; but coals may be delivered at the coal market without ticket. Coals sold in any quantity exceeding 560 lbs. to be delivered in sacks of 112 or