occur in old constable's accounts
which are governed by no principle ever yet laid down by scholars, with
the {47} result very often that it would be impossible to settle what
the word intended could be but for the comparative study of it, as it
turns up in a variety of literary dress in different documents always
with the same context. Here is the result of a little investigation
into the handling of one of the commonest of the long words which found
their way into the old Parish Constable's bills:--Diblegrates,
dibcatkets, dibelgrates, dibhegrats, dipplatakets, dibicits, diblicits,
dibblegats, dublicits, duplicates.

It took the Parish Constables of Therfield 37 years to solve the
problem of spelling that word of three syllables! and the honour of
spelling "duplicates" correctly belongs to one, John Groom, who was
Parish Constable for Therfield in 1801.

One of the most frequent items in the Churchwardens' accounts for
parishes in this district, during the last half of the eighteenth
century, was that of vermin killing, and entries for polecats and
hedge-hogs were jumbled up with items for bread and wine for the
communion, &c.! Why the farmers should have had such an antipathy to
hedge-hogs I am not aware, considering the amount of good the modern
naturalist finds them doing. About the middle of the last century any
person killing a hedge-hog in Therfield and taking it to the
Churchwarden received 4d. for his trouble, and 21 hedge-hogs were paid
for in 1788. The price after this went down to 2d. for a hedge-hog and
4d. for a polecat, but at Barkway the price of a hedge-hog was still
4d., while at Nuthampstead the price for sparrows, as appears by "the
sparrow bill," was 3d. a dozen.

CHAPTER V.

DOGBERRY "ON DUTY."

There were two other officials besides the Overseer and Church-warden,
the dignity of whose office entitles them to a place of honour in these
sketches--viz., the old Parish Constable, and the Parish Beadle.

To understand what the old Parish Constable was in relation to the
public peace we have to consider him as embodying most of the functions
of the present county policeman, and a variety of other matters, some
of which now fall upon the Relieving Officer, the Recruiting Sergeant,
and Overseer. All this helped to place him in a position of some
dignity and importance, which he conceived entitled him to advise even
magistrates and parsons on their duty! Over the Parish Constable was a