nd of
the Archbishop of York. Occasionally the cognisance of offences was
retrospective. Thus, in November, 1620, it was resolved by the Bench of
Magistrates, then composed of the Aldermen of the town, that such as had
been "faltie for bastardes" should be carted about the town and
afterwards "ducked in the water for their faults, for which they have
hitherto escaped punishment." At a little later period, in England, in
the days of the Commonwealth, it was enacted on May 14th, 1650, that
adultery should be punished with death, but there is not any record of
the law taking effect. The Act was repealed at the Restoration. About a
century before this period, namely, in 1563, in the Scottish Parliament,
this crime was made a capital offence. In New England, in the year 1662,
several men and women suffered for this crime.

Resuming our notes on the Hull ducking-stool, we find, according to
Hadley, the historian, that in the year 1731 Mr. Beilby, who held the
office of town's husband, was ordered to take care that a ducking-stool
should be provided at the South-end for the benefit of scolds and
unquiet women. Six years later, John Hilbert published a view of the
town of Hull, in which there is a representation of the ducking-stool.
Mr. Wildridge has found traces of another local ducking-stool. He states
that in some accounts belonging to the eighteenth century there is a
charge for tarring a ducking-stool situated on the Haven-side, on the
east side of the town.

At the neighbouring town of Beverley are traces of this old mode of
punishment, and in the town records are several notes bearing on the
subject. Brewers of bad beer and bakers of bad bread, as well as
scolding women, were placed in the ducking-stool.

The Leeds ducking-stool was at Quarry Hill, near the Spa. At the Court
of Quarter Sessions, held in the town in July, 1694, it was "ordered
that Anne, the wife of Phillip Saul, a person of lewd behaviour, be
ducked for daily making strife and discord amongst her neighbours." A
similar order was made against Jane Milner and Elizabeth Wooler.

We find in the Session records of Wakefield, for 1602, the following:

"Punishm^t of Hall and Robinson, scolds: fforasmuch as Katherine
Hall and M'garet Robinson, of Wakefield, are great disturbers and
disquieters of their neighbours w'thin the toune of Wakefield, by
reason of their daily scolding and chydering, the one w'th the
other, for reformacon whereo