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dation to the parishioners of St. Austin's, in respect of which they were chargeable as between them and the parishioners of St. Faith's? It must be equally difficult to say, that, because the parish church of the united parishes happens to have been built in the parish of St. Austin's, the parishioners of St. Faith's can, for that reason, have an interest in the property devised by Burton.

The bill must therefore be dismissed with costs.

This record is an information, as well as a bill; and the next question is, What is to be done with the information? Though the bill is dismissed, the Court, it has been argued, must act upon the information; for though the relief prayed in an information be improper, yet the Court, if it sees that something ought to be done for the regulation of the charity, will take care that it be duly administered for the future. "As to the information," says Lord Hardwicke, in the Attorney-general v. Scott, "that is not to be dismissed, whether what is prayed is properly prayed or not; for though the particular relief prayed is wrong, the information by the Attorney-general is not to be dismissed, if the charity wants any direction." It was alleged, in reply to this principle, that here the relators had no interest in the administration of the fund, which has been devoted to purposes of charity. Whatever opinions may have been formerly entertained on this point, I conceive it to be now settled, that it is not necessary for relators to have any interest iu the subject of the suit. In the Attorney-general v. Bucknall, Lord Hardwicke says, "it is not absolutely necessary that relators, in an information for a charity, should be the persons principally interested, for the Court will take care, at the hearing, to decree in such a manner as will best answer the purposes of the charity; and therefore, any persons, though the most remote in the contemplation of the charity, may be relators in these cases." But I do not apprehend that it ever has been required of a relator to shew that he has any interest in the relief sought. Lord Redesdale says, "if the suit does not immediately

concern the rights of the crown, its officers depend on the relation of some person, whose name is inserted in the information, and who is termed the relator; and, as the suit is carried on under his direction, he is considered as answerable to the court, and to the parties, for the propriety of the suit, and the conduct of it. It sometimes happens, that this person has an interest in the matter in dispute, of the injury to which interest he has a right to complain. In this case, his personal complaint being joined to, and incorporated with, the information given to the court by the officer of the crown, they form together an information and bill, and are so termed." The character of relator, therefore, does not seem to require the least particle of private interest in the due administration of that charity.

The main object of having a relator is, to secure to the defendants the costs of the information, in case it should turn out that the information was improperly filed; whatever be the relief prayed, it is still the information of the Attorney-general; and the court must act upon it, if the due administration of the charity call for the court's interference.

This being so, the present suit, though dismissed as a bill, remains as an information; and the question is, does it disclose a sufficient ground for the interference of the court? It is stated, in the answer, that the mode in which the charity has been hitherto administered, is the following:-that there has not been a direct application of the whole of the revenues arising from Burton's devise to the repairs of the church, but that, after that purpose has been answered, there has been a surplus which has been applied by the churchwardens in aid of the parish rates, levied for the support of the poor and other parochial purposes. Now, although that may be considered eventually as a proper mode of applying the fund for the benefit of poor people, yet viewed in its direct tendency, it cannot be said to be the proper mode in which the surplus of a charity should be administered. Looking, therefore, at the state of this record, and to the principles on

which the court acts in the administration of charities, it seems to me, that there is here something to be regulated.

There is, however, a point, in reference to which it will be necessary to bring before the court some person to represent the crown; for it is to the crown that the portion of the funds belongs, which the restator appropriated to a superstitious use. It was said, indeed, that, as superstitious uses were abolished, the provision made for maintaining a burning taper before the altar would be applicable to the other purposes of the charity; but I apprehend that the law is not $0. The 5th section of the 1st of Edward VI. c. 14, vests in the crown all lands appointed to go wholly to

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the maintenance of a light or lamp in any church and the 6th section enacts, that where part of the revenues of any lands are appointed to be employed in that way, the sums of money destined to such a purpose shall be enjoyed by the king, his heirs and successors. With respect, therefore, to the small portion of the rents, which is directed to be applied in maintaining a taper, the interest of the crown must be duly represented.

At present I can only direct the information to stand over, that the Solicitor-general may be brought before the court, to sustain the rights of the crown; and when that is done, I shall refer it to the master to approve a scheme for the administration of the surplus of the fund.

MONTHLY REGISTER.

SOCIETY FOR THE PROMOTION OF CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE.

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Total....... 2,278,048

The receipts of the Society have been 72,630%. 14s. 11d. and those of the translation fund 73,2364. 12s. 2d.

At the close of March 1836, the Society's engagements with Messrs. Rivington are to cease, and a depository, to be under the care of a superintendent, is now erecting on a part of the Society's premises in Great Queenstreet. It is computed that this arrangement will save the Society 20007. per annum; besides that the books and tracts may be sold at less cost to the Society than before.

VOL. XVII. NO. XII.

The Society has deprived the Literary Committee of the privilege of publishing works directly religious; and has added to the permanent catalogue twenty-six tracts.

The Foreign Translation Committee have obtained much important knowledge concerning versions of the Bible and Liturgy. There is in preparation, a Sanscrit version, beside various other Indian versions; a French version is in progress, founded on a revision of the best existing versions; the Liturgy in Dutch, is in the press and Greek and Arabic versions of the same are in preparation.

The principal of the principal grants are: to the emancipated negroes, 10,000l. To New South Wales, 30007. To the Calcutta Committee, 1000/ Grants of books have been made to upwards of one hundred places.

India. Dr. Corrie is consecrated Bishop of Madras, and a commission has issued to consecrate a Bishop of Bombay. 500l. per annum are granted by the Society for two years to the Bishop of Calcutta, for general religious purposes. The Bishop has applied the Society's grants to schools at

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Penang, Jaffna, and Kandy; to assist in building a church at Sincapore; to the district Societies at Point de Galle, Trincomalee, and Columbo; to a divinity library for the missionaries, &c. at the last-named place. A school has been erected in the Chitpore road, and among a population (mostly Portuguese) of the most degraded description. Books to the amount of 1501. are granted to Penang, Sincapore, and Malacca. The Vepery mission press continues to print the Society's tracts for India. A Tamil translation of Dean Pearson's Life of Schwartz is in preparation, together with Stillingfleet's Catechism, and Archdeacon Robinson's Family Prayers. 7,000l. have been invested in a permanent native education fund. The seminary fund is advanced, and the students make good progress.

Australia.-The colony of New South Wales is in a state of miserable spiritual destitution. Archdeacon Broughton's letter will be read with fearful interest. In addition to their grant of 3,000l. the Society have memorialized government on the subject. In seventeen counties, equal to the same average in England, there are only five Clergymen nearly the whole of these districts are without schools; and the entire colony contains only eight churches. Nothing whatever has been done by the government of the mother country for the spiritual wants of the colony during the last nine years!

North America.-National, Sunday and Infant schools are increasing in Canada and Nova Scotia: and the demand for Bibles, Prayer - books, tracts, &c. advancing.

West Indies. In addition to the grant of 10,000l. Common Prayer-books to the amount of 1,000l. have been granted to the negroes. These were immediately disposed of, and on the representation of the Bishop of Barbados, 250l. additional were granted in furtherance of the same object. Nothing can be more cheering than the West Indian communications, which represent the negroes earnest in seeking the means of knowledge, and the planters eager to cooperate with the Society in supplying them.

There are short, but interesting accounts from Rio de Janeiro, Gibraltar, and Malta.

The sale of the Literary Committee's publications is,

Saturday Magazine... 4,553,767
Others...
193,420

Total...... 4,747,187

The Saturday Magazine is about to be regularly reprinted in the United States of America.

The Report contains some very interesting particulars relative to the state of education at home, by which it appears" that the number of children educated in infant and daily schools established by Dissenters, amounts only to one in twenty-four of the whole; but that the number in Sunday schools amounts to one half the entire number educated in all the Sunday schools in the thirty-three counties, from whence the returns were made.” This is inclusive of the Methodists; but what an alarm it sounds to the members of the Church of England to be up and be doing! They will find every encouragement to do so in the details of the interesting Report, which we have here very inadequately attempted to condense.

S.P.G.-Manchester Deanery Committee.

Ar a Public Meeting of the members and friends of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, held at the Town Hall, Manchester, on Monday, October 26, 1835, the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of Chester, President of the Manchester Deanery Committee, in the chair,

It was moved by the Right Hon. the Earl of Wilton, seconded by the Rev. James Slade, M.A. Vicar of Bolton-leMoors, and resolved unanimously,

1. "That The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, directed its chief attention, for a long series of years, to the fulfilment of the more immediate objects of its charter of foundation the maintenance of an orthodox Clergy, and the making of such other provision as seemed necessary for the propagation and support of the christian religion in the British

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plantations and colonies;' that through its agency it was, that the now flourishing Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States of America is, according to her own grateful acknowledgment, indebted, GOD, to the CHURCH OF ENGLAND, for her first foundation, and a long continuance of nursing care and protection;' -that since the separation of that portion of our ancient American dependencies from the mother country, the exertions of the Society, in the Western continent, have been carried on with unabated zeal, and under the Divine favour, in the extensive dioceses of Nova Scotia and Quebec;-and that, although struggling with the dif ficulties of most inadequate resources, it still continues its pious efforts to provide for the religious wants of our fellow-subjects in those quarters, whether the descendants of the aboriginal inhabitants and the early settlers, or that vast and accumulating population which the tide of emigration is yearly bearing to the American shores.'

It was moved by William Atkinson, Esq. Churchwarden of Manchester, seconded by the Rev. Oswald Sergeant, M. A. Fellow of Christ's College, Manchester, and resolved unanimously,

2. "That the Society has ever been ready, according to its means and opportunities, to enlarge the sphere of its evangelical labours; and that for a period of nearly half a century, the design of a more effectual provision for the dissemination of Christianity throughout our Indian empire has been constantly kept in view that

amidst the obstacles and discouragements which retarded the accomplishment of this purpose, the Society was consoled by the knowledge that her labours in that remote region were rendered the less necessary through the interposing care and unwearied benevolence of her venerable sister, the Society for promoting Christian Knowledge;'-that since the foundation of the Indian Episcopate, and the establishment of Bishop's College in Calcutta, the flourishing missions of that Society, pronounced by Bishop Heber as constituting the strength of the christian cause in

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It was moved by Robert Sharp, Esq. seconded by the Rev. R. Durnford, M. A. Rector of Middleton, and resolved unanimously,

3. "That the attention of the Society, from a very early period, has been directed with most lively interest, and its influence and opportunities unceasingly employed, to the promotion of the religious welfare of that unfortunate portion of the inhabitants of our West Indian possessions, so long and lamentably held in the condition of slavery; and most heartily does the Society rejoice in the prospects which are opened by the change of that condition, to the more successful prosecution of its objects amongst that class of our fellow-creatures : but that to render her exertions in any degree equal to the increased necessity which the emancipation of the negroes has laid upon them, a large original cost, amounting to not less than 100,000l. must be undertaken for the erection of churches and schools, and a proportionate additional charge upon her future annual expenditure will likewise have to be defrayed by the maintenance of Clergyman and schoolmasters."

It was moved by Hugh Hornby Birley, Esq., seconded by the Rev. C. D. Wray, M.A. Fellow of Christ's College, and resolved unanimously,

4.That it is the bounden duty of a christian nation, and not less the unquestionable interest of a commercial country like our own, to use whatever of influence or advantage a bountiful Providence has placed in her possession for the propagation of the gospel, and the diffusion of the manifold blessings of our holy religion; and therefore this meeting earnestly hopes

that the designs and labours of this ancient Missionary Society of the Church of England will not fail of receiving, through the Manchester Deanery Committee, such powerful encouragement and assistance as their magnitude and importance at this moment demand, and which may justly be expected from an enlightened, a liberal, and a religious community."

It was moved by George E. Marsden, Esq, seconded by the Rev. G. Dugard, M. A. Incumbent of St. Andrews, Manchester, and resolved unanimously,

5. "That these resolutions be communicated to the Clergy of the deanery, and to the members of the Committee, with a request that they will individually employ such means as they possess in advancing the interests and replenishing the resources of the

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Society; and that they be further published through the medium of the Manchester newspapers, the Chronicle, Courier, and Guardian, and in the Bolton paper of Saturday next."

The Lord Bishop having left the chair, it was taken by the Earl of Wilton; when it was moved by John Macvicar, Esq. Boroughreeve of Manchester, seconded by the Rev. Thomas Blackburne, M. A. Vicar of Eccles, and resolved unanimously,

"That the best thanks of this Meeting be presented to the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of the Diocese for his kindness in complying with the request of the Committee, to preside on the present occasion: and for the efficiency which he has given to the intentious of the meeting by his excellent conduct in the chair."

JOSHUA LINGARD, M.A. Secretary of the Deanery Committee.

POLITICAL RETROSPECT.

DOMESTIC. The present month terminates our labours for the year, 1. e. the literary year;-a year, it must be confessed, of most intense interest. Ushered in under the auspices of Sir R. Peel's Conservative government, we promised ourselves a succession of measures calculated to strengthen the bulwarks of our National Church, and defeat the machinations of the Popish faction, we fondly anticipated that the agricultural interests would have been fostered by the benignant aspect of the government; that our ships would have wafted the various productions of our manufacturing industry and skill to the remotest regions of the earth; that the voice of war would not again be heard: but that "peace and plenty," the sovereign-in-pocket and capon-inpot era of Mr. Canning, would have been realized. But, alas! scarcely had the first quarter transpired ere the hydrahead of faction dashed the cup from our very lips. The Whigs threw themselves into the arms of the Papists and Radicals-and Sir R. Peel was compelled to make way for the Melbourne Cabinet of imbeciles. The result was obvious. Instead of the

defences of the Church being regarded, her bulwarks and watch towers have been undermined or levelled with the ground, and Popery is de facto the only tolerated religion in Ireland. Instead of the interests of the farmers being consulted, or the manufacturing and commercial relations being strengthened and enlarged, we find too much the reverse: instead of peace, ten thousand British subjects are sent by the British government under the command of a mercenary adventurer, to shed buman blood in the Peninsula; and all this mischief has been effected in less than nine months.

If our language appears harsh, let any of our readers turn to the daily papers. What is the Papist O'Connell about? Does not he openly pronounce internecine war against Protestantism? What are the theoretical politico-economists driving at ?— a free trade in corn. What are Mr. Poulet Thomson's views of trade and commerce? Irish reciprocity-the ruin of England by the sacrifice of protecting duties. What is Lord Palmerston at?-sending British subjects to feed Spanish vultures,

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