triennial visitations of the bishop, the mode of procedure, the class
of offences, the parish officers summoned, the discipline
exercised--all were the same, the bishop's court being simply
substituted for the time being for that of the archdeacon.

There were other visitations: those of the Queen's High Commissioners,
and those of the Metropolitan. There were a very great number of other
courts, but for the purposes of the every-day ecclesiastical
governance of the parish the two classes of courts or visitations
above mentioned are all that need concern us. It is, however,
important to state, that while churchwardens and sidemen were
_compelled_ to attend the two general courts of the archdeacon (and of
course the bishop's court) and to write out on each occasion formal
lists of offenders and offences ("presentments" or "detections") these
parish officers might also at any time make _voluntary_ presentments
to the archdeacons. Those functionaries, in fact, seem to have held
sittings for the transaction of current business, or of matters which
could not be terminated at the visitation, every month, or even every
three weeks. Others may have sat (as we should say of a common-law
judge) in chambers.[5] Before each general visitation an apparitor or
summoner of the court went about and gave warning to the churchwardens
of some half-dozen parishes, more or less, to be in attendance with
other parish officers on a day fixed in some church centrally located
in respect of the parishes selected for that day's visitation.

The church of each parish was, indeed, not only its place for worship,
but also the seat and centre for the transaction of all business
concerning the parish. In it, according to law, the minister had to
read aloud from time to time articles of inquiry founded on the
Queen's or the diocesan's injunctions, and to admonish wardens and