The subject matter of this article must be suggestive, rather than affirmative. Even at this time of day, it would be presumptuous to take up a commanding or decided position. The old system was rotten. The good it contained was choked up with weeds; the pruning-knife has been applied unsparingly; and it is to be feared that good wood has been cut away. New arrangements have been devised with practical shrewdness, to displace clearly recognised evils; but, with these practical improvements, certain economic theories have been speculatively, tried; and it is likely that evils have sprung up; so that those who proclaim so loudly that every part of the new arrangements is either naught or vicious, and those who affirm that the old methods were all good, are both remote from the truth, which, probably, lies somewhere between the two.
The subject being set apart for inquiry, the question arises--How can a subject which has so many phases be advantageously considered; to whom must we go for information; and to what matters should the attention be chiefly directed? It is to these questions this article will attempt to provide answers. To the first question--To whom must we go for information?--the answer is obvious. To all who are engaged in the administration of the law, and chiefly to those who have to do with those departments where evils may be supposed to exist. And, in order to answer the second, the subject must be divided into classes, and the mode of operation of the law in each must be sketched. The reader will then be able to see for himself, and judge whether the matters referred to are not those which most imperatively demand inquiry.
The several parishes, townships, chapelries, and hamlets of England and Wales, whether grouped into Unions or not, may be usefully distributed into three classes.
_The First Class_ includes "parishes, townships, chapelries, and hamlets," grouped into Unions, in which the _population bears a small proportion to the number of acres they comprise_.
_The Second Class_ includes small populous parishes, grouped into Unions, in which the _population bears a large proportion to the number of statute acres they cover_.
_The Third Class_ consists of _large single parishes_, in which the _population bears a large proportion to the number of acres_.