Massachusetts General Laws Part I. Administration of the Government (Ch. 1-182) Ch. 36, § 28

Each register shall annually, at the expense of the county, cause competent persons to make copies of the indexes of the preceding year, in which the grantors and grantees shall be classified by their respective surnames in alphabetical order, and arranged thereunder in the order in which the deeds and other conveyances to which they refer were left for record. He may also cause the Christian names of the grantors and grantees, as well as their surnames, to be arranged in alphabetical order in such lists. Such copies shall in other respects be in the form required for the original indexes.