WHEREAS by an Act 2 William IV, cap.42, the trustees of lands allotted under enclosure Acts or otherwise appropriated for the benefit of the poor of any parish, together with the churchwardens and overseers of the poor in parish vestry assembled, are required to let portions of such lands in quantities of not more than one statute acre to any one individual, according to their discretion, as a yearly occupation from Michaelmas to Michaelmas, and at such rent as land of the same quality is usually let for in the said parish, to industrious cottagers of good character, being day labourers or journeymen legally settled in the said parish, or dwelling within or near its bounds :

And whereas the provisions of the said Act, from its limited application and other causes, have been only partially carried out:

And whereas it is expedient that having regard to the present Poor Law, the benefit thereof should be extended to all the irremovable poor, and that the same should be extended to all lands, whether cultivated or uncultivated, held for the benefit of the poor as herein-after described, and that a summary remedy should be afforded:

Be it therefore enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows :