Divisions for Ecclesiastical, Legal, and Parliamentary Purposes.— The county is wholly in the diocese of Winchester, in which it consti• totes the archdeaconry of Surrey. By the Poor-Law Commissioners the county is divided into 21 Unions—Ash (a Gilbert'e Incorporation), Bermondsey, Camberwell, Chertsey. Croydon, Dorking, Epsom, Farn ham, St. George the Martyr, Goldstone, Guildford, Hambledon, Kingston, Lambeth, Newington (under a local act), St. Olave's, Reigate, Richmond, Rotherhitbe, St. Saviour'e, and Wandsworth and Clapham. unions include 154 parishes and townships, with an area of 471,466 acres, and a population in 1S51 of 679,003.
The county is in the Home Circuit, except that for criminal offences the parts of the county within 10 miles of St. Paul's cathedral are in the district of the Central Criminal Court. The spring assizes for the county are constantly held at Kingston ; the summer assizes alternately at Guildford and Croydon. The Epiphany quarter sessions for the county are held at the sersioua-bonse, Newington ; the spring sessions at. Reigate ; the Midsummer sessions at Guildford ; and the Michaelmas sessions at Kingston. County courts are held at Chartaey, Croydon, Dorking, Epsom, Farnham, Godalming, Guildford, Kingston, Lambeth, lteigato, and Southwark. There are county prisons at New ington (Horaemooger-lane), Kingston, Croydon, and on Wandsworth Common. Thera are, besides these, in the borough of Southwark, the Queen'. Bench and the Borough Compter. At Garrett, near Wands worth, is the County Lunatic Asylum, a very extensive and handsome edifice.
Before the Reform Act 19 members were returned to the House of Commons from the county of Surrey—two for the county itself, and two each for the boroughs of Southwark, Guildford, Haslemere, Gotten, Bleelliugley, and Reigate. By the Reform Act, Haslemere, Gattou, and Blechingley were altogether disfranchised, and Reigate au reduced to one member; but the conuty was formed into two divisions, each returning two members, and the borough of Lambeth was created, which returns two members, so that the present number of members sent from Surrey is 11—two for each division of the county, two each for Southwark, Guildford, and Lambeth, and one for Reigate.
history and the earliest historical period this county seems to have been, for the most part, included in the territory of the Regal, a nation probably of the Belgic stock, who occupied also the adjacent county of Sussex. In his second expedition, Quer advanced westward from Cautium, or Kent, through this county to the Thames, which he crossed probably at a ford at Coway Stakes, near Walton-on-Thames, though some fix his passage at or near Kingston. Several ancient eutreochments are still existing in the county : on Bagshot Heath, about four miles beyond Egham, there is a very large one, in form approaching a parallelogram; on St. George'.
Hill, between Weybridge and Cobham), is another of irregular form, following the shape of the bill on which It stands; on Wimbledon Com mon is a third, of circular form ; near Farnham, partly in this county and partly in Hampshire, is another, popularly called Caesar's Camp, of irregular form, following the brow of the hill on which it stands.
Surrey was included in the Roman province of Britannia Prima. No Antonine station is ascertained to Lave been in it; though Lon 'Holum (London) and Ponta (Staines) were close on the border, In Middlesex ; and Noviomagns, the capital of the Regei, was probably at Holmwood Hill, close on the eastern border, in Kent. It is pro bable that several Roman roads crossed this county : the most remark able and best known is that which ran from Londinium. It appears to have run over Mickelham Downs to Dorking, and thence by Ockley, beyond which it is known as Stone-street Causeway, Into Sussex. The Roman road from Londiniuna to Callus and Sorbioduuum (Silehester and Old Sarum) crossed the north-western border beyond Staines. Traces of Roman buildings have been found In various places, as at Albury near Guildford, at Guildford, where some Roman bricks have been incorporated in the castle walls, at or near Kingston, and on Walton Heath, Walton-on-the-Hill, north-east of Dorking.
Surrey was probably, in the earlier period of the Heptarchy, a part of the kingdom of Wessex—not, as is commonly supposed, of Sussex. Wibbandnne, where the battle which decided the war between Ethel bert of Kent and Coal win of Wessex was fought, is generally ',apposed to have been Wimbledon in Surrey. In the later period of the Hep tarchy the county appears to have constituted a detached principality governed by a sub-regulus or dependent king. In the middle part of the 7th century it was governed b7 Frithewald as sub-klug, under the supremacy of Wulfhere of Merest), who also conquered the Isle of Wight, and obtained the supremacy over Sussex. From this time Surrey appears to have depended on Wessex or Marcia, as the power of one or tho other preponderated. The inhabitants submitted willingly to Egbert in 823. Un the death of Egbert, in 837, his son Ethelwulf succeeded him as king of Wessex, and Athelatan, son of Ethelwalf, as sub-king of Kent. In the war of Ethelred, or Ethered with the Danes, the king and his brother Alfred were defeated at Mere-tune, probably Merton in Surrey, in 871, and Ethelred received a wound, of which he died soon after. In the struggle of Alfred with the Danish chieftain 'luting, the Danes were beaten by the king'a army at Farnham in 894. Some of the Anglo-Saxon kings were con secrated at Kingston. In 1012 the Anglo-Danish king Hardicanute died through excessive drinking at Lambeth. A little before this time Alfred, son of Ethelred 11., was seized at Guildford, his eyes put oat, and his followers massacred.