BOUNDS, BEATING THE, an ancient custom still ob served in many English parishes. In times when maps were rare it was usual to make a perambulation of the parish boundaries on Ascension day or during Rogation week. In the north of Eng land the latter is still called "gang week" or "ganging days" from this "ganging" or procession. The priest of the parish with the churchwardens and the parochial officials headed a crowd of boys who, armed with green boughs, beat with them the parish border stones. Sometimes the boys were themselves whipped or even violently bumped on the boundary-stones to make them remem ber. The object of taking boys was to ensure that witnesses to the boundaries should survive as long as possible. The custom is as old as Anglo-Saxon days, as it is mentioned in laws of Alfred and Aethelstan. It may have been derived from the Roman fes tival of Terminus, the god of landmarks, to whom cakes and wine were offered, sports and dancing taking place at the boundaries. In England a parish-ale or f east was always held after the per ambulation, which assured its popularity. Beating the bounds had a religious side in the practice which originated the term, Roga tion, the accompanying clergy being supposed to beseech (rogare) the divine blessing upon the parish lands for the ensuing harvest. This was prohibited by the Injunctions of Queen Elizabeth; but the perambulation continued as a quasi-secular function, so that evidence of the boundaries of parishes, etc., might be preserved (Gibson Codex juris Ecclesiastici Anglicani [1761] pp. 213-214) .