y is practically a nullity. It is
too cumbrous, it meets at too great a distance, and its powers,
after all, even when at last set in motion, are too limited to have
any appreciable effect in ameliorating the condition of village
life. But even if this nominal body were actively engaged in
prosecuting offenders, the desired result would be far from being
attained. One of the most serious matters is the supply of water for
public use in villages. At the present moment there exists no
authority which can cause a parish to be supplied with good drinking
water. While the great centres of population have received the most
minute attention from the Legislature, the large population which
resides in villages has been left to its own devices, with the
exception of the three measures, the first of which is unsuitable
and strenuously opposed, the second a dead-letter, and the third
cumbrous and practically inoperative.

Let us now examine the authorities which act under ancient
enactments, or by reason of long standing, immemorial custom. The
first of these may be taken to be the Vestry. The powers of the
vestries appear to have formerly been somewhat extended, but in
these latter times the influence they exercise has been very much
curtailed. At the time when each parish relieved its own poor, the
Vestry was practically the governing authority of the village, and
possessed almost unlimited power, so far as the poor were concerned.
That power was derived from its control over the supply of bread to
the destitute. As the greater part of the working population
received relief, it followed that the Vestry, composed of the
agriculturists and landowners, was practically autocratic. Still
longer ago, when the laws of the land contained certain enactments
as to the attendance of persons at church, the Vestry had still
greater powers. But at present, in most parishes, the Vestry is a
nominal assembly, and frequently there is a difficulty in getting
sufficient numbers of people together to constitute a legal
authority. The poor rate is no longer made at the Vestry; the church
rate is a thing of the past; and what is then left? There is the
appointment of overseers, churchwardens, and similar formal matters;
but the power has departed. In all probability they will never be
resuscitated, because in all authorities of the kind there is a
suspicion of Church influence; and there seems to be almost as much
dislike to any shadow of that as ag