organization of persons responsible as tax-payers for the maintenance of
the church building. In some places an assembly of these tax-payers met
periodically, chose officers, and voted money for the church edifice, the
poor, roads, and like local purposes. In other places a "select vestry,"
or corporation of persons filling its own vacancies, exercised the powers
of parish government. In such cases the members were usually of the more
important persons in the parish. The other wide-spread local organization
was the manor; in origin this was a great estate, the tenants of which
formed an assembly and passed votes for their common purposes.

[Sidenote: Towns.]

From these different forms of familiar local government the colonists
chose those best suited to their own conditions. New Englanders were
settled in compact little communities; they liked to live near the church,
and where they could unite for protection from enemies. They preferred the
open parish assembly, to which they gave the name of "town meeting." Since
some of the towns were organized before the colonial legislatures began to
pass comprehensive laws, the towns continued, by permission of the
colonial governments, to exercise extended powers. The proceedings of a
Boston town meeting in 1731 are thus reported:--

"After Prayer by the Revt. mr. John Webb,

"Habijah Savage Esqr. was chose to be Moderator for this meeting

"Proposed to Consider About Reparing mr. Nathaniell Williams His Kitchen
&c.--

"In Answer to the Earnest Desire of the Honourable House of