f so many men at
frequent intervals is not easily accomplished and the bodies do not
assemble ordinarily more than the four times a year prescribed by law.
The mass of business devolving upon them is transacted largely through
the agency of committees. Of these, some, as the committees on
finance, education, and asylums, are required by law; others are
established as occasion arises.

[Footnote 264: At the elections of 1901 there were
contests in but 433 of 3,349 divisions. P. Ashley,
Local and Central Government; a Comparative Study
of England, France, Prussia, and the United States
(London, 1906), 25, note.]

The powers and duties of the council are many and varied. In the main,
though not wholly, they represent the former administrative functions
of the justices of the peace. In the act of 1888 they are enumerated
in sixteen distinct categories, of which the most important are the
raising, expending, and borrowing of money; the care of county
property, buildings, bridges, lunatic asylums, reformatory and
industrial schools; the appointment of inferior administrative
officials; the granting of certain licenses other than for the sale of
liquor;[265] the care of main highways and the protection of streams
from pollution; and the execution of various regulations relating to
animals, fish, birds, and insects. By the Education Act of 1902 the
council is given large authority within the domain of education. It
must see that adequate provision is made for elementary schools, and
it may assist in the maintenance of agencies of education of higher
grades. The control of police within the county devolves upon a joint
committee representing the council and the justices of the peace.
Finally, the council may make by-laws for the county, supervise in a
measure the minor rural authorities, and perform the work of these
authorities when they prove remiss.[266]

[Footnote 265: Liquor licenses are granted by the
justices of the peace.]

[Footnote 266: Lowell, Government of England, II.,
274-275.]

*194. The Rural District.*--Within the administrative county are four
kinds of local government areas--rural districts, rural parishes,
urban districts, and municipal boroughs. Of rural districts there are
in England and Wales 672. They are coterminous, as a rule, wi