Early Maryland County Courts.        xxxv


       nificance is the case of Robert Martin and wife. Martin filed in the Kent County
       Court a deed of gift to his wife Elizabeth, dated January 25, 1656, in which he
       listed livestock, various articles of women's wearing apparel, household goods,
       and grain. He also recorded on the same date a release disclaiming any inter
       est in these or anything else belonging to “my now lawful wife Elizabeth “.
       Under the same date his wife, signing herself” Elizabeth Martin—the aflected “,
       renounced all claims upon her “lawful husband—that I have in him or his
       Estat at present or for futer” (Arch. Md. liv, 81-82). What “ aflected” meant,
       or why this lead to what was possibly a separation from her husband, is not
       revealed.
         In addition to the minutes of the judicial activities of the county justices,
       or commissioners, and the record of their actions as administrators of the civil
       affairs of the counties, numerous entries of a very different character are to
       be found enrolled in the county court proceedings. Here are recorded various
       papers pertaining to land. We find patents, land rights, deeds, bills of sale,
       assignments, mortgages, leases, and alienation fines or fees, all of which by
       law or by custom might be recorded either in the county court where the land
       was situated, or in the Provincial Court at St. Mary's. More will be said later
       of these early land entries. Also recorded are letters of attorney, bills of
       debt, partnership agreements, servants' indentures, contracts with servants,
       apprenticeship indentures, findings of juries of inquest, records of births, burials
       and marriages, banns of matrimony, bonds to keep the peace and other bonds,
       proclamations by the Provincial authorities, writs for elections, commissions
       for justices, sheriffs, clerks, and other county officers, issued by the Governor,
       appointments by the courts of constables, and the registration of livestock
       marks. A record was also kept at this period in the minutes of the court, of
       various testamentary matters, including wills, inventory, accounts, guardian
       ship appointments, and matters relating to orphans' estates (p. xxxvii).
         Among the acts passed by the Assembly in 1638/9, but which failed to become
       laws because of the dispute between the Governor and the Assembly as to which
       had the right to initiate legislation, was one relating to the recording of con
       veyances of land from person to person. This was “an act for assuring the
       titles to land” which empowered the register of any court in the Province
       to record upon request conveyances, titles and successions to land (Arch. Md. i,
       61-62), but the recording of all instruments of this kind was not made obliga
       tory until the passage in 1674 of “an act for enrolling conveyances and secur
       ing the estates of purchasers” (Arch. Md. ii, 389-392). Under this act which
       required the recording of all conveyances affecting land, such papers might be
       recorded either in the Provincial Court, or in the court of the county where the
       land was located. Why an act similar to the last named, passed by the Assembly
       in 1663, received with many other acts the dissent of the Proprietary in 1669,
       and thus failed to become a law, is not clear (Arch. Md. i, 487-488). As this
       dissent was not made until six years after the passage of the act in 1663, in
       the interval it may have been considered in force and have been observed. An
       examination of the court records shows that the spirit of the abortive act of
       1638/9, which failed of passage, permitting the recording of conveyances, was