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TITHE CITY GOVERNMENT 107 currence of the aldermen they elected Thomas Juvenal to be " common serjeant.” The "common clerk,’ now called "town clerk,” was first appointed about the same time. Finally, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth (1570) it was found necessary to appoint an officer to conduct the ordinary correspondence of the corporation; he was called the Kemembrancer, and was for a short time a kind of private secretary to the Lord Mayor. So far we have neglected the aldermen, yet, perhaps, of all the city officials they are the oldest. We cannot tell why the title has remained with them when it has been discarded everywhere else; but to understand its meaning we must first go back to a time very near that of Alfred, under whom an alderman was a magistrate and something
