invest the collector with any of the powers of an overseer. The parish council may appoint a clerk, who may be either one of their own number without payment, or the assistant overseer, rate collector or some other fit person, with remuneration. Powers and duties of parish councils. Among the duties transferred to parish councils may be mentioned the provision of parish books and of a vestry room or parochial office, parish chest, fire engine or fire escape, the holding or management of parish property, other than property relating to affairs of the church or held for an ecclesiastical charity, the holding or management of village greens or of allotments, the appointment of trustees of parochial charities other than ecclesiastical charities in certain cases, and certain limited powers with reference to the supply of water to the parish, the removal of nuisances, and the acquisition of rights of way which are beneficial to the inhabitants. Among the most important of the matters which concern a rural parish is the administration of what are commonly called the adoptive acts. These include the Lighting and Watching Act, the Baths and Washhouses Acts, the Burial Acts, the Public Improvement Act and the Public Libraries Acts. The Lighting and Watching Act. Baths and Washhouses Acts. Burial Acts. Lighting and Watching Act was formerly adopted for a parish, or part of a parish, by the inhabitants in vestry, who elected lighting inspectors, of whom one-third went out of office in every year. The inspectors took the necessary steps for having the parish lighted (the provisions as to watching having been obsolete for many years), and the expenses of lighting were raised by the overseers upon an order issued to them by the inspectors. The owners and occupiers of houses, buildings and property, other than land, pay a rate in the £ three times greater than that at which the owners and occupiers of land are rated and pay for the purposes of the act. Now this act, like the other adoptive acts, can only be adopted by the parish meeting, and where adopted for part only of a parish, must be adopted by a parish meeting held for that part. After the adoption of the act it is carried into execution by the parish council, if there is one, and if not, by the parish meeting, and the expenses are raised in the same manner as heretofore. The Baths and Washhouses Acts have already been referred to in dealing with district councils, and it is sufficient to say that they are now adopted and administered in a rural parish in the manner pointed out with reference to the Lighting and Watching Act. The same may be said of the Burial Acts, but these are sufficiently important to require special notice. These acts contain provisions whereby burials may be prohibited in urban districts, and churchyards or burial grounds already existing may be closed when full.