1 Edward VI., cap. 3, recites the increase of idle vagabonds, and enacts that all persons loitering or wandering shall be marked with a V, and adjudged a slave for two years, and afterward running away shall become a felon. Impotent persons were to be removed to the place where they had resided for three years, and allowed to beg. A weekly collection was to be made in the churches every Sunday and holiday after reading the gospel of the day, the amount to be applied to the relief of bedridden poor. 5 and 6 Edward VI., cap. 2, directs the parson, vicar, curate, and church-wardens, to appoint two collectors to distribute weekly to the poor. The people were exhorted by the clergy to contribute; and, if they refuse, then, upon the certificate of the parson, vicar, or curate, to the bishop of the diocese, he shall send for them and induce him or them to charitable ways. 2 and 3 Philip and Mary, cap. 5, re-enacts the former, and requires the collectors to account quarterly; and where the poor are too numerous for relief, they were licensed by a justice of the peace to beg. 5 Elizabeth, cap. 3, confirms and renews the former acts, and compels collectors to serve under a penalty of L10. Persons refusing to contribute their alms shall be exhorted, and, if they obstinately refuse, shall be bound by the bishop to appear at the next general quarter session, and they may be imprisoned if they refuse to be bound. The 14th Elizabeth, cap. 5, requires the justices of the peace to register all aged and impotent poor born or for three years resident in the parish, and to settle them in convenient habitations, and ascertain the weekly charge, and assess the amount on the inhabitants, and yearly appoint collectors to receive and distribute the assessment, and also an overseer of the poor. This act was to continue for seven years. The 18th Elizabeth, cap. 3, provides for the employment of the poor. Stores of wool, hemp, flax, iron, etc., to be provided in cities and towns, and the poor set to work. It empowered persons possessed of land in free socage to give or devise same for the maintenance of the poor. The 39th Elizabeth, cap. 3, and the 43d Elizabeth, cap. 2, extended these acts, and made the assessment compulsory. I shall ask you to compare the date of these several laws for the relief of the destitute poor with the dates of the enactments against evictions. You will find they run side by side. [Footnote: The following tables of the acts passed against eviction, and enacting the support of the poor, show that they were contemporaneous: