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 be quashed for informality, nor shall be removed or removable by certiorari or otherwise, nor subject to any appeal whatever.

XI. And be it further enacted, That if any action shall be brought against any person or persons for any thing done in the execution of any of the powers or duties by this act given or required, the defendant or defendants may in every such suit plead the general issue, and give this act and the special matter in evidence; and in every case where the plaintiff or plaintiffs in such suit shall fail, the court in which such suit shall be carried on shall award costs to the defendant or defendants.

14 Geo. 3. c. 49.

An Act for regulating Mad-Houses.

Whereas, many great and dangerous abuses frequently arise from the present state of Houses kept for the reception of Lunaticks, for want of regulations with respect to the persons keeping such houses, the admission of Patients into them, and the Visitation by proper persons of the said Houses and Patients: And whereas the law, as it now stands, is insufficient for preventing or discovering such abuses; may it therefore please your Majesty that it may be enacted; and be it enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, That, from and after the Twentieth day of November One thousand seven hundred and seventy-four, if any person or persons, in that part of Great Britain called England, the dominion of Wales, or town of Berwick upon Tweed, shall, upon any pretence whatsoever, conceal, harbour, entertain, or confine, in any house or place, kept for the reception of Lunaticks, more than one Lunatick, at any one time, without having such Licence for that purpose as is herein-after