xviii Introduction.

Doctor Mollins (post, 116). The same chirurgeon was called upon to cure a
man sick of a fever, and the sick man promised to give him what he should
reasonably deserve. Mollins came to see the man for a month or more, and
administered to him "divers potions Electuaries & other physicall meanes, and
did apply to him severall plaisters ..... for which he doth reasonably deserve
Seventeen hundred ninety & foure pounds of tobacco", (post, 29). Neither
the sick man nor his administrator paid the doctor, so he sued. Both plaintiff
and defendant put themselves upon the Court. And the Court awarded Mollins
1394 pounds of tobacco damages, and 536 pounds more for costs.

ORPHANS

Concerning orphans there were not many cases in the Provincial Court
now, for most such cases as arose, were heard and decided in the County courts.
When the Provincial Court did come to deal with orphans and their estates,
it showed much consideration, even tenderness. When Richard Chillman died,
November 1678, he left all his estate to his cousin, Thomas Loquer, a minor.
Gerard Slye was made Chillman's administrator, presumably because he was
Chillman's largest creditor, and it was for Slye to fight the cases against the
estate, and they were many. Yet the Court ordered the St. Mary's County
Court to pass no judgments against the estate "untill the said Thomas Loquers
estate be first secured for him by the said [St. Mary's County] Justices"
(post, 62).

Another case about an orphan can easily and clearly be quoted in full.
"George Reid aged fourteene yeares the sonne of George Reid late of Calvert
County dec^d Came into Court and complained of the bad usage of him by
M^rs Joane Waghob and desired that hee might have the Liberty of making
Choice of Hugh Johnson of Talbott County to bee his Guardian w^ch is accord-
ingly Ordered and allowed of by the Court here:" (post, 222). Young Reid's
father was the original grantee of Readbourne, the tract of land in Queen
Anne's County, on which the great house was built. Mrs. Waghob was the
wife of his guardian, John Waghob. If Joane (Mounten?) Reid Tylor Beale
was really his mother, as in her will she seems to say she was (Will Book 2,
fol. 346) she had children by all three husbands, and an illegitimate son to boot.

CONTINUING LITIGATION

Several cases treated in earlier volumes reappear at ttis time, and it seems
worth while to bring them up to date. The case or cases involving Mrs. Thomas
Letchworth and Bernard Johnson, cooper, both of Calvert County, seemed to
have come to a period in October 1678, when the Provincial Court ordered that
any two of the Calvert County commissioners should remove Johnson, by force
if necessary, from land the Court had awarded Mrs. Letchworth, and restore
her to possession. Johnson did not give up. He confessed that the Court had,
in October 1678 awarded Mrs. Letchworth possession of Gloucester Hall,
because it lay within the manor of Brook Court. But, he said, he had bought