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FERRY TOLLS.

tolls are

IT has been decided that ferry tolls are not when ferry rateable, unless the occupier reside in the rateable. parish, or be a holder of real property therein. For a person to be rateable to any township, he must, by the provision of the Act, be either an inhabitant or an occupier of visible property therein; and if the river divide two townships, the vessel cannot be said to be in either of them. But if a person employ a boat to convey passengers or goods across a river for hire, and occupy land on either side, he is rateable for his profits to the township in which he is an occupier; and if he hold land, on which he lands goods or passengers on both sides of the river, the rate of his profits is divided. A person occupying land on one side of a river in one township, and delivering passengers or goods on the highway

Ferry tolls are rateable

to annual value.

of another, is rateable for the whole of his profits in the former, and is not rateable to the parish to which the highway belongs. The highway cannot be termed property in the occupation of any person, but is common to all persons alike. Tolls are rateable when connected with any tangible or fixed property, such as towing paths, locks, wharfs, or warehouses; but when they are connected with no real property, they are exempt. Turnpikes are not rateable on account of the tolls being collected for the public; and if they were private property, the toll-house would only be rateable, and not the tolls on their own account.

Ferry tolls are rateable, along with the according ground to which they are attached, in the occupation of the ferryman, according to the average annual profits gained by the concern. This is ascertained by learning, or forming an estimate of, the rent that may be obtained for the privilege of working the ferry.

TITHES.

THE statute of the 43 Eliz. provides, that tithes impropriate, and propriations of tithes are rateable to the relief of the poor. Tithes impropriate are tithes payable to the laity; and propriations of tithes, or, more properly speaking, appropriations of tithes, are those which remain in the hands of the clergy, or which belong to some religious institution.

small tithes.

Tithes are either great or small. Great Great and tithes are those of corn, hay, and wood. Small tithes are those of milk, cheese, wool, lambs, calves, &c. The great tithes are generally paid to the rector, or person to whom they are let, and the small tithes to the vicar. Where there is no modus, or other grounds of exemption, tithes are due upon every thing which makes a certain annual increase; but not on minerals, deer,

Rate on tithe-free lands.

hawks, or things of a wild nature, the profits of which not being annual but casual. Tithe is due on the agistment of cattle, which is estimated, not by the profit of depasturing them, for that is uncertain, but according to the worth of their keep by the week. This arrangement removes the difficulty which would be unavoidable in gathering tithe according to the fluctuations of profit, or according to the good or bad skill displayed in the sale or purchase of cattle.

Gardens, orchards, and nursery grounds are titheable according to their produce, if sold in the way of trade.

The liability of land to the exaction of tithe varies considerably in different situations. Some lands are entirely tithe-free, and others are subject only to corn-tithes being exempt from the payment of haytithe and small tithes by a modus. Tithefree lands, or those which are partially so, are in the same proportion worth more rent to the proprietor of the soil; and the whole of the rate to the poor on tithe-free

land is payable by the occupier, and not divided, as on titheable land, betwixt him and the tithe-holder.

Parsonage houses and glebe lands are rateable, whether in the hands of the clergy or laity, as well as the tithes of the parish; it being intended by the framers of the statute to subject the occupiers of all property to contribute towards the relief of the poor according to the benefit they derive in the parish. The judges also decided, in 1633, that "the parson, or vicar presentative, shall bear according to the reasonable value of his parsonage, having consideration to just deductions." Moduses and agistment tithe are also rateable, according to their annual value, as near as they can be fairly ascertained, making allowance for the fluctuation in the value of the latter.

Parsonage glebe lands.

houses and

offerings,

Oblations, offerings, rectorial and vicarial Oblations, dues, and even a pension payable to the and dues. clergyman, are likewise rateable, but are subject to great deductions for trouble in ascertaining and collecting them. It is

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