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II BROWN.
POWELL v. R. [1728]

of the bringing the said writ of error, it was ordered, that the consideration of costs should be reserved till the next Tuesday, at which time the parties on either side were at liberty to be heard, by one counsel of a side, touching the matter of costs only, and that all the Judges in town should then attend. (Jour. vol. 22. p. 624.)

This matter accordingly came on at the time appointed, being Tuesday the 22d of March 1725; when one counsel of a side [298] being heard, the two Lord Chief Justices delivered it as their opinion, "That costs did not lie in this case." (Jour. vol. 22. p. 626.)



Case 3.—Hugh Powell,—Plaintiff; The King,—Defendant (in Error) [3d March 1728].

[Mew's Dig. iv. 575; vi. 158.]

[The acceptance of a charter, whereby the election of Burgesses is directed in a manner different from what had obtained by ancient usage, the usage being inconsistent with the charter, can no longer subsist, but is determined by the acceptance of the charter, which must afterwards be the only measure by which the election of burgesses is to be governed.]

In Hilary term 1723, au information, in the nature of a quo warranto, was granted by the Court of King's Bench against the plaintiff, for him to shew by what authority he claimed to be a capital Burgess and Common Council-man of the borough of Brecknock, and why he claimed all the liberties, privileges, and franchises, belonging to the said office of a capital Burgess and Common Council-man of the said borough.

To this information the plaintiff pleaded; and in his plea set forth, that the said borough of Brecon, alias Brecknock, is an ancient borough, known and called as well by the name of the borough of Brecon, as by the name of the borough of Brecknock; and that the Burgesses of the said Borough, from time immemorial, unto the 20th day of March, in the second and third year of the reign of King Philip and Queen Mary, were a corporate body, and in divers times known and called by the several names of Burgesses of the town of Brecon, Burgesses of the borough of Brecon, and Bailiffs and Burgesses of the borough of Brecon; and that all the time aforesaid and hitherto, there were and as yet are within the said borough, Burgesses of the said borough, who from time to time, and at all times during the time aforesaid and hitherto, were eligible, and were elected out of the most substantial persons, inhabiting as well within as without the said borough.—That King Philip and Queen Mary, by their letters patent under the great seal of England, bearing date the said 20th of March, in the said second and third year of their reign, reciting, among other matters, that their borough of Brecknock in South Wales, was an ancient incorporated borough, and that the inhabitants thereof, and their predecessors inhabitants of the said borough, had enjoyed within the said borough divers liberties, privileges, jurisdictions, and customs, which their said subjects then inhabitants of the said town, and their predecessors hitherto had and held; the said King and Queen for themselves, and the heirs and successors of the said Queen, did order, constitute, and grant, that the said borough of Brecon should be and remain always for the future a borough of itself, and that the Burgesses of the said borough from thenceforth always for the future should be and remain one corporate and politic body, by the name of Bailiff, Aldermen, and Burgesses [299] of the borough of Brecon; and that there should be in the said borough, one Bailiff and two Aldermen, and fifteen men of the most substantial and most discreet Burgesses of the said borough, (whereof the said Bailiff and two Aldermen to be three), who should be called and named capital Burgesses and Councellors of the said borough, and who from thenceforth should be a Common Council of the said borough; and from time to time should be aiding and assisting to the Bailiff and Aldermen of the said borough for the time being, in all matters and causes touching or concerning the said borough. And the said King and Queen did further order, that whensoever it should happen that any of the said fifteen capital Burgesses or Counsellors of the said borough for the time being should die or be removed from their said places, that then and so often it should be lawful for the other remaining and surviving capital Burgesses and Counsellors, or the major

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