majority of _whites_. Mr. Fish himself testified before the Committee, that the church at Marshpee, in 1811, consisted of sixteen whites and but five colored persons. The church members were a majority of whites, so that even had the church voted to settle Mr. Fish, it would have been a vote of white men having no interest in the premises, and not of Indian Proprietors. Mr. Fish admits that the church passed no vote. It was asserted by one of the old Overseers, Mr. Hawley, that five Indians called on him, after Mr. Fish had preached there, and personally expressed a wish to have him stay with them, but there was no official act, and no vote of the church or society, and no assent of the Proprietors of Marshpee in any form. Who were the Congregational church, and who the society in Marshpee, in 1811? A regularly gathered Congregational church, is composed of several persons associated by covenant or agreement of church fellowship, (9th Mass. 277.) and a church cannot exist for any legal purposes, except as connected with a congregation or some regularly constituted religious society. (16 Mass. 488.) Where there are no special powers given to the church by the Legislature, the church cannot contract with or settle a minister, but that power resides wholly in the parish, of which the members of the church, who _are inhabitants_, are a part. (9 Mass. Reports, 277. Burr vs. First Parish in Sandwich.) We have seen that there was no legal parish in Marshpee, in 1811, and therefore the Congregational church, if there were such then, had no power to settle Mr. Fish, even had they done so, which they did not. A parish may elect a public teacher, and contract to support him, without the consent of the church, if he be ordained by a council invited by the parish; but in Mr. Fish's case, he was ordained by the request and under the direction of the President and Corporation of Harvard College, the Trustees of the Williams fund, with the assent of the Overseers. There is then no ground whatever for assuming that Mr. Fish ever was settled legally over a Congregational parish in Marshpee, so as to establish him a sole corporation, to hold the lands belonging to the Proprietors of Marshpee, under the dedication deed of 1783. If that deed and the subsequent act of 1809, conveyed any thing, the conveyance was for the use of the inhabitants as a parsonage, there being no parish in Marshpee, distinct from the Plantation. In such case, it would be held to be a grant to Marshpee, (that is the town,) for the use of its ministers, (14 Mass. 333.) The grant, therefore, could it be regarded as such, was to the whole Proprietors of Marshpee, and they must first settle a minister before he could claim the use of the grant as a minister of the parish.