_Marriage Tithe in Wales_ (Vol. v., p. 29.).--It is well known to your
readers that the whole of the tithes in England and Wales have recently
been commuted for rent-charges; and the present writer can confidently
affirm that, throughout the commutation, no tithe of marriage goods has
been admitted to be valid, nor does he believe that any such tithe has
been claimed. Tithes in Wales have not differed in any material respect
from those payable in England: an excessive subdivision of ownership
being the only circumstance which is remarkable in regard to them. As
each article of titheable produce is capable of becoming a separate
property, and this property may again become divided amongst an
indefinite number of owners, the complexity occasioned by such minute
interests may be imagined. The bee, for instance, produces three
distinct titheable articles,--honey, wax, and swarms,--and a case
actually occurred in Wales, in which the honey belonged to one class of
owners, and the wax and swarms to another class, one of the classes
owning in undivided eighty-eighth parts. There have also been some
curious cases of modus in Wales, of which the following may be taken as
a specimen:--In a parish on the sea-coast in Pembrokeshire, an estate
was exempt from tithes by a modus of a cup of ale and an egg, rendered
by way of refreshment to the parson, whenever, in consequence of the
state of the tide, he was compelled to pass the house of the landowner
on his way to perform divine service in the parish church.