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Hertfordshire side, and three for Cambs. The new local parliament was
made up of the following:--For Hertfordshire, George North,
churchwarden, Henry Andrews (the astronomer), and Wm. Cockett, the two
overseers; Tuttle Sherwood, churchwarden, and Thomas Moule and Thomas
Watson, overseers for the Cambs. side; and the following elected
members, viz., for _Herts._, John Phillips, Michael Phillips, Edward
Day, Wm. Nash, Samuel Coxall, Thomas Wortham, William Stamford, junr.,
and Thomas Watson; for _Cambs._, Joseph Beldam, William Butler and John
James.

The above Act of Union was passed as an experiment, and the Parliament
was to be a triennial one, at the end of which period either party was
at liberty to withdraw, but as a matter of fact it was formally renewed
every three years and continued at least until 1809. The first act of
the new local authority was to appoint Henry Watson as vestry clerk at
a salary of five guineas a year, to decide that no poor should be
allowed out of the Workhouse, only the casual poor, and also that

"All meetings to be at the Church at toll of Bell, and adjourn as they
think proper * * their expenses from the Overseer at each meeting not
to exceed a shilling."

If this meant a shilling each member it looked like "Rogersis'" bill
for "licker" going up, but if for all the members together it {35} was
decided retrenchment as well as reform. Among others who were parties
to the agreement, but not in the first committee, were:--John Cross,
John Warren, John Hankin, John Trudgett--what a lot of Johns they had
in those old days!--Peter Beldam, Robt. Leete and Danl. Lewer. The new
Local Parliament had not been in existence long before it began to set
its house in order for business and framed other rules for its conduct.
Instead of being a mere vestry with a chairman waiting for a quorum, it
became an active local body, and, thanks to its methodical five-guinea
clerk, actually had its meetings convened by sending out printed cards,
as appears by the following entry:--

"Ordered that 500 Printed Cards be got from the Printing Office at
Cambridge for the purpose of calling the Committee."

There was no printing office in Royston till the beginning of the
present century. Another innovation was more sweeping, and that was
that the custom of meeting at the inns of an evening was, at least for
a time, abandoned. The meetings were held at Whitehall, at the top of
the High Street, and to mak