§ MR. READsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, If he has any objection to issue the forms of the Church Rate Returns at Easter (at which time the Churchwardens make up their books and change office) with a request that the Returns should be made within twenty-eight days, and not "in the month of June," as hitherto ordered by the Government?
§ SIR GEORGE GREY, in reply, said, the forms of the Returns might, no doubt, be issued at Easter, but the Secretary of State could not desire that they should be made up within twenty-eight days, and not in the month of June, as the Act of Parlia- 420 ment providing for these Returns expressly required that they should be made in the month of June. The forms were at one time sent out about Easter, but the consequence was that, owing to the change of Churchwardens, the Returns were very imperfectly made. Lately they had not been sent out till after Easter, and the Returns had come in better than before, being made by the same Churchwarden by whom the form was received.