that he would have decided Sayre v. Hughes in the same way as the Vice-Chancellor did upon the evidence, but not irrespectively of the evidence. The judgment of Vice-Chancellor STUART in the former case contains some statements of the law to which it is improbable that the MASTER of the ROLLS would assent. Thus he says: "One is at a loss to understand upon what intelligible principle a mother should be presumed less disposed to benefit her child than a father." He thought there was no sense or meaning in the distinction. And again, he says: "In the ordinary case of a purchase, when the conveyance is made to one person and the purchase-money is paid and the rents received by another, it would generally be presumed that the person who has paid the money is the direct owner of the property. Between father and son, however, in such a case, an intended benefit to the son might be presumed from the relationship. The same doctrine extends to a purchase by a person in loco parentis." This is quite opposed to the view taken by the MASTER of the ROLLS in Bennet V. Bennet, where he says that in the case of a father you have only to prove that he is the father, whereas in the case of a person in loco parentis you must show that he took the obligation on himself. It may seem strange that no reference was made either in the arguments or the judgment to the 14th section of the Married Women's Property Act 1870, which provides that a married woman having separate property shall be subject to all such liability for the maintenance of her children as a widow is subject to for the maintenance of her children. No surprise, however, will be felt when it is considered that this enactment has no further effect than to place women having separate property on the same footing with widows so far as the maintenance of children is concerned. In spite, however, of the decision of the MASTER of the ROLLS, and his agreement with that of Vice-Chancellor STUART, some uncertainty will doubtless be felt as to the true ratio decidendi until the Court of Appeal has definitely settled the question.

THE CONTRACT OF SURETYSHIP.

THE appeal in the case of Duncan, Fox, and Co. v. The North and South Wales Bank (40 L. T. Rep. N. S. 373) was, as the Master of the Rolls intimated, one which raised a question of great practical importance as regards commercial law, and more especially that part of it which is concerned with the position of sureties. From the facts which were given in evidence before the ViceChancellor of the County Palatine of Lancaster, from whose decision the appeal was brought, it appeared that one of the partners in a firm, who were customers with the defendant bank, deposited with the bank the title deeds of real estate, his separate property, to secure the balance for the time being owing to the bank from the firm for discounts and advances, and for all other moneys in or for which the firm, whether alone or jointly with any other person, were or might thereafter be or become liable to the bank, or the bank was or might be liable on their account, or which the bank might at any time claim against the firm. After the security had been given to the bank, the plaintiffs received, in payment for goods which they had sold to the firm, certain bills of exchange accepted by the firm. These bills the plaintiffs indorsed to the bank, and the bank discounted them for the plaintiffs. Before the bills matured, the firm had executed a deed of inspectorship for the benefit of their creditors, and the plaintiffs, having become liable to pay the amount of the bills to the bank, brought an action claiming a declaration that they were sureties to the bank for the payment of the bills, that the security abovementioned extended to the bills, and that on paying the amount of the bills, and whatever else might be due to the bank on this security, they were entitled to have the security handed over to them. The Vice-Chancellor held that the plaintiffs were entitled to the relief which they claimed. Hence the present appeal. For the appellants it was urged that the respondents were principal debtors to the bank in respect of the bills, and not sureties, and that the security did not extend to the bills. If such was the case, then the respondents would have no right to the security to the exclusion of the other general creditors of the firm. Of the cases which were cited it will suffice if we refer to the more important.

The statement of the law relating to the contract of suretyship made by Vice-Chancellor Wood, in Newton v. Chorlton (10 Ha. 646), is full and explicit. That contract entitles the surety to require that his position shall not be altered by any arrangement between the creditor and the principal debtor, or from that in which he stood at the time of the contract, and it therefore entitles him absolutely to the benefit of all securities for the debt which the creditor held at the time of the contract. It also entitles the surety, at any time, to require that the creditor shall enforce against the principal debtor not only all his remedies and all the securities for the debt which he has at the time of the contract, but also any securities for the debt which the creditor may have acquired subsequently to the contract, and which he holds at the time that the surety requires him to proceed. Again, as a person paying off a debt for which he is liable is entitled in equity to stand in the place of the creditor, and to have the

benefit of the securities held by the creditor for such debt; so the surety, on paying off the debt of the principal debtor, is entitled to require from the creditor the benefit, not only of the securities for the debt which the creditor had at the time of the contract of suretyship, but also of all the securities which he holds at the time he is paid off. There is, however, no implied duty in the contract of suretyship which requires the creditor to retain, for the benefit of the surety, securities for the debt which he might subsequently receive from the principal debtor, and which, while the creditor holds them, the surety does not call upon him to enforce. Hence a creditor who after the contract of suretyship, having taken a further security from the principal debtor, subsequently parts with that security, does not thereby, either wholly or pro tanto, release the surety.

Vice-Chancellor Shadwell decided in Wade v. Coope (2 Sim. 155) that a surety for part of a debt is not entitled to the benefit of a security given by the debtor to the creditor, at a different time, for another part of the debt: "The doctrine laid down by Lord Chancellor Eldon in the case of Mayhew v. Crickett (2 Swanst. 185), not then for the first time, but the result of a long series of cases, is, that where a man becomes the surety for a debtor for the payment of a debt, he has, if he pays the debt, a right to avail him self of all the securities which the creditor has." This doctrine, however, his Honour was careful to explain, never applies to a person who became surety at one time, and a security was given to the same creditor either for another debt, or, what was the same thing, for a distinct portion of the debt for which the first security was given. This case was touched upon in the judgment in Newton v. Chorlton in reference to the argument that there is an engagement as between the surety and the principal debtor that if the principal debtor at any time thereafter placed securities in the hand of the creditor, the surety, as against the principal debtor, was entitled to the benefit of those securities, and therefore that the creditor, knowing that to be the surety's equity against the principal debtor, is bound by that knowledge and understanding, and is bound also to retain for the surety's benefit such securities as come into his hands. "It is a nice question," observed Vice-Chancellor Wood, "and it is the real question and difficulty in this case [Newton v. Chorlton], whether that additional equity will or will not be imported into the contract of suretyship. I do not find that any such case has yet arisen [1853). There is the case of Wade v. Coope which is adverse to it; the doctrine there is carefully laid down, as it always has been, by Lord Eldon."

In Pearl v. Deacon (24 Beav. 186) the plaintiff was surety upon a promissory note, to the defendants, for a sum lent by them to their tenant; and the defendants also took a mortgage of the tenant's furniture for the same debt. They afterwards, under a distress, took the same furniture for arrears of rent. Lord Romilly held that, as regarded the plaintiff, the produce of the furniture was first applicable to the payment of the promissory note, and that the landlords could not, as against the surety, apply it in payment of the rent. "In the judgment of Vice-Chancellor Wood in Newton v. Chorlton," said his Lordship, "there is a statement in every word of which I concur. He says, as regards the creditor, He is bound to give to the surety the benefit of every security which he holds at the time of the contract-every security which he then holds; and he is not allowed in any way to vary the position of the surety with reference to those securities.' The same doctrine was enunciated by Lord Eldon in Mayhew v. Crickett (2 Swan. 191), where the principle is stated that sureties are entitled to the benefit of every security which the creditor has against the principal debtor, and that whether the surety knows of the existence of those securities or not is immaterial."

The short report of Ex parte Overend, Gurney and Co. (20 L. T. Rep. N. S. 296) states the principle that the rule laid down in Ex parte Waring (19 Ves. 345) is restricted to cases in which securities have been deposited to meet a specific debt or to secure a specific bill, and does not extend to cases where the deposit has been made to secure moneys advanced on a current

account.

These and other cases were referred to during the argument in Duncan, Fox, and Co. v. The North and South Wales Bank, the result being that the appeal was allowed with costs. The Master of the Rolls pointed out that there were two grounds, each of which sufficed to support the decision of the Court of Appeal. In dealing with the first ground his Lordship reasoned as follows: When the respondents discounted the bill and applied the proceeds in payment of the debt due to them, the transaction was an ordinary discount transaction. They were principal debtors as regarded the bank who advanced the money, although they were in the position of sureties as regarded the acceptors or prior indorsers of the bill. "Then what was their position as between the bank and Duncan, Fox, and Co.," asked the Master of the Rolls. "Is it to be tolerated that without the consent of the bank they should be treated as sureties for all purposes as between the bank and the discounters of the bill so as to prevent the bank at any time thereafter dealing with these securities? The consequences of such a doctrine would, in his Lordship's opinion, be alarming, and would paralyse the business of dis

counting bills of exchange, for no bank which held a security either by way of suretyship or by way of deposit from its customers would venture to discount a bill with a number of names on it, without examining carefully to see if any one of the names was the name of a debtor of the bank who had given them security; if they did they might be incapacitated from carrying on their dealings with their customers by varying the securities given by their customers to the bank. Secondly, the deposit made by the member of the firm was itself a deposit in the nature of a suretyship, and was security for the balance for the time being owing from the firm to the bank. The respondents had no right, as between themselves and such depositor, to call on the bank first of all to apply the property to that for which the respondents were primarily liable. As a matter of mercantile law, Lord Justice James stated that "the equities of principal and surety cannot arise accidentally and promiscuously from the position of names on the face or on the back of a bill of exchange which a man handed to his bankers or to a merchant in the ordinary course of his business, and that where a man takes a bill of exchange to a banker or bill broker, and asks him to lend money on it, which he does, he is still the principal debtor, and he has no right to ask, nor has the banker or bill broker any right to tell him, whether any of the other names on the bill are customers of his, or what security he holds from any of them, or anything of the sort." The value of this decision is enhanced by the fact that the Lords Justices have stated the appropriate principles with great clearness and fulness.

ON COVENANTS WHICH RUN WITH THE LAND AT LAW.

Ir is not a little remarkable that, of the cases which Lord Coke proceeds to cite immediately after giving the resolutions in Spencer's case, there is not one which has anything to do with the principal case, and only one which has anything to do with the resolutions. As the language of the resolutions is of an antiquated type, and the learning which is required to make them completely intelligible is not now very fashionable, we will give here a brief abstract of them put into plain speech:

:

1. A covenant [by a lessee] affecting something already in being and parcel of the demise, binds the assignee [of the lessee], even though not named in the covenant.

2. A covenant which affects in like manner something which is not yet in being, but which, when it is in being, will be parcel of the demise, binds the assignee, if named; secus, if not named.

3. A covenant by a lessee of personal chattels will not bind the assign of the chattels.

4. The assign of freeholds cannot avail himself of an implied warranty of which his assignor could have availed himself; but the assign of leaseholds can avail himself of an implied covenant of which his assignor could have availed himself.

5. Tenant by the curtesy or any other who comes in [to freeholds] in the post (i.e., who takes an estate or interest paramount to the regular sequence of the title, by operation of law and not by the act or assignment of the parties) cannot avail himself of a right to warranty vested in the previous tenant; but otherwise of leaseholds.

6. A covenant by lessee for years to keep in repair is within the terms of the first resolution (i.e., binds the assign without mention of him).

7. In any case where the assignee takes the benefit of a covenant, there also his assignee shall take it in turn, and so on, whatever the number of the successive assignments.

Now consider the cases which follow after the resolutions. In the first, where the prior with assent of his "covent" covenanted to sing in the "chappel" parcel of the manor, we find the benefit of a covenant, taken by a tenant in fee simple from a mere stranger to the land, held to run with the land after it had been passed on to another tenant in fee simple. (Note that Lord Coke's words, "for the elder brother was heir," are quite irrelevant and superfluous, because the privity by blood had been already broken earlier, when the grandfather "did enfeoff one of the manor in fee," even though the "one" was his own son, as the son did not come in by descent, but by purchase.) Here we have a case which, as we have said, is quite beyond the scope both of Spencer's case and of the resolutions. We only learn by the latter that the benefit of a warranty would not run with freehold land, though it would run with leasehold lands; and there is nothing to suggest that the benefit of a covenant would run where the benefit of a warranty would not.

Then comes the case related by Finchden, where it was held that the benefit (note that, while the principal case turns upon the burden of a covenant, all these cases turn upon its benefit) of a covenant made by one of two co-parceners (who made partition) to indemnify the other against arrears of suit, was held to pass with the land to the assign. This is more obviously foreign to the resolutions than the former case.

Last comes Simpkin Simeon's case, which really is an example of the 5th resolution; namely, that the husband of a deceased woman, to whom a grant of ward (which was

chattel-real interest) had been made before marriage, had on being evicted the right to vouch to warranty the original grantor.

Certain it is, either that the resolutions in Spencer's case are of a much less exhaustive nature than Lord Coke treats them as being, or else that some extraneous and false doctrine has got foisted in upon the principle which pervades them. And they do disclose a principle so very reasonable and plausible, that we incline to believe that it originally was the law, and that it would be the law still, if it had not been corrupted and extended by a certain confusion in the minds of the judges. This principle is privity of estate in respect of the same land subsisting between the Covenantor and the covenantee, as a sort of condition precedent to the covenant running either with the land or with the reversion. Privity of estate having been postulated (for they suppose the case of lessor and lessee for years), the first three resolutions settle what covenants will, and what will not, run with the land as regards the burden.

The next three resolutions exhibit some vagueness and incoherency of speech; but it is very observable that where there is no privity of estate between the parties to the covenant (or the warranty, as the case may be), they deny that the assign gets the benefit of the covenant; as, for example, where a grant is made in fee simple, no privity of estate remains between the grantor and grantee (nor even any tenure, unless the grantor happens to be chief lord of the fee); and therefore the assignee of the grantee could not vouch the grantor to warranty, though the grantee himself could. But where there is privity of estate, as between the grantor and grantee of a lease for years, they affirm that the benefit of the covenant or warranty does pass to the assignee.

The reversion upon a term of years is of course not the only kind of reversion which would create such a privity of estate between the reversioner and the tenant as that above mentioned. The reversion upon any estate of freehold falling short of an estate of fee simple would come under the same head. So also, it is conceived, would the tenure subsisting between the chief lord of the fee and his tenant in fee simple. In the last-mentioned case, upon an alienation in fee made by the tenant in fee, the tenure would by the statute of Quia Emptores be transferred to the assign who had newly acquired the fee. But the benefit of a covenant must not be confused with the right to the services, which were incidental to the tenure, and did not rest upon any basis of covenant.

We think that the essential features of the theory which originally underlay the old cases are included in the following question: Suppose that two persons having privity of estate in respect of the same land subsisting between them, enter into a covenant relating to that same land: when and why would the rights and obligations of covenantee and covenantor respectively descend to their respective assigns (not being privies by blood or (as the executor) by legal representation? The most usual case of such privity of estate arose from the relation of lessor and lessee for years; and the most usual case upon which the question of liability arose concerned the liability of the assign of the lessee to perform his predecessor's covenants at the suit of the reversioner himself. Here, the question to be asked was: When does the burden of the covenant run with the land? If the same covenant were sought to be enforced at the suit, not of the reversioner himself, but of his assign, we must have asked also the further question: When does the benefit of the covenant run with the reversion?

In order to exhaust the whole subject we must therefore examine the four following questions:

1. When does the burden of a covenant run with the land? 2. When does the benefit of a covenant run with the land? 3. When does the burden of a covenant run with the rever sion?

4. When does the benefit of a covenant run with the reversion?

These four questions do not exhaust the law; for there are, as we saw in the case of the prior and his covent, some covenants which are held to run with the land when there is no such privity of estate subsisting as that which we have men tioned. But covenants of the latter sort are certainly anomalous, inasmuch as they do not, admit of being reduced to any definite principle upon which they can be seen to depend. We believe that when judges had once got hold of their definition of a covenant which was, in Lord Coke's words, "quodammodo annexed and appurtenant to the thing demised "—and it is noteworthy here that his language balances between the covenant being annexed and the thing to be done by the covenant being annexed -they began to extend it to cases where no privity subsisted, without clearly seeing what they were doing. And thus cases came to be decided which cannot be logically explained without getting rid altogether of Lord Coke's cautious quodammodo, and supposing that the covenant was truly and in the fullest sense of the words appurtenant to the land. But this notion of an appurtenant covenant is quite foreign to the theory of a covenant in English law, nor do we believe

that it would ever have been maintained in so many words. Everybody who has read it must have been perplexed by that astonishing medley to be found in the notes to Spencer's case in Smith.

We propose in a subsequent article to examine the state of the law upon the basis of a mutual privity of estate subsisting between the covenantor and the covenantee; and afterwards to give some account of those more anomalous covenants which have been held to "inhere" in the land without the aid of any such privity.

DECISIONS RELATING TO COUNTY COURT PRACTICE AS AFFECTED BY THE JUDICATURE ACT. In the present article we propose to give a brief summary of the cases which have been decided since the passing of the Judicature Acts upon questions of practice in relation to the County Courts as affected by those Acts. In the case of Brown v. Shaw, judgment had been given in the County Court for the plaintiff on the 8th May 1876. Upon the 12th May, a day on which the Court of Appeal from inferior courts sat, a judge in chambers ordered that the plaintiff should on the first day of the next sitting of the Court of Appeal from inferior courts, show cause why this judg. ment should not be set aside and judgment entered for the defendant. The Court of Appeal did not sit again till the 18th May. A preliminary objection was taken before the Court of Appeal to the hearing of the case upon the merits, that the order to show cause was made upon a day upon which the court sat, and that a judge in chambers has power to act under the County Courts Act 1875, s. 6, only when a person "aggrieved by the ruling, order, direction, or decision" of the judge of a County Court has no opportunity to apply to this court within the prescribed period of eight days, and that the defendant ought to have moved the court itself. For the defendant it was contended that, even if the order of the judge in chambers was invalid, a general power to enlarge the time for doing an act is conferred upon all the divisions of the High Court of Justice under the Judicature Act 1875, Order LVII., rule 6, and that the court could therefore dispense with the provision as to the period of eight days, and hear the defendant's application as an original motion. The Court, however, held that a judge of the High Court_of Justice, sitting at chambers, has no power to make, on a day when the Court of Appeal from inferior courts sits, an order under sect. 6 of the County Courts Act 1875, to show cause why the judgment given in a cause in a County Court should not be set aside. Further, that when an appeal from a County Court is struck out on the ground that the order giving leave to appeal has been granted by a judge at chambers without jurisdiction, the Court of Appeal from inferior courts has no power to grant costs to the party who appears to show cause against it.

In this case Baron Bramwell remarked that he doubted whether, under the Judicature Act 1857, Order LVII., r. 6, under any circumstances, of mistake or otherwise, the court had power to enlarge a period of time fixed by a statute for doing an act; and that at all events an application for that purpose ought to be made on affidavit showing how the mistake occurred, which had not been done here: (Brown v. Shaw, 1 Ex. Div. 425.)

In the next case the question arose as to how far the rule 22 a of Order XXVI., and rules 1, 3, and 7 of Order XL. affected the practice in regard to actions remitted to the County Court under sect. 26 of 19 & 20 Vict. c. 108. That section amongst other things provides "And after such hearing (of the cause remitted) the registrar shall certify the result to the master's office of such Superior Court, and judgment in accordance with such certificate may be signed in such Superior Court." Judg. ment having been signed in accordance with the above enactment, it was argued that judgment ought to be entered and signed in accordance with the rules above mentioned; but the Court held that when an action has been sent down to be tried in a County Court under sect. 26 (supra), judgment may still be signed as provided in that section, and it is not necessary, before signing judgment, to obtain the order of the court or a judge, nor to set down the action on motion for judgment, as sect. 26 is not repealed or affected by the rules of the Judicature Act: (Scutt v. Freeman, 2 Q. B. Div. 177; 25 L. T. Rep. 939.)

In the case of Clarke v. Roche (36 L. T. Rep. N. S. 727) the Court of Exchequer Division having discharged a rule nisi calling upon a County Court judge to show cause why he should not sign a case under 19 & 20 Vict. c. 108, s. 43, defendant appealed to the Court of Appeal, and, at the hearing, a preliminary objection was taken that to allow this appeal would be to allow an appeal to one Superior Court from the refusal of another to grant an order contrary to the provisions of sect. 44 of the County Courts Acts Amendment Act 1856 (19 & 20 Vict. c. 108). The Court, however, decided that under sect. 19 of the Judicature Act 1873 the appeal should be allowed; Lords Justices Bramwell and Brett observing that the decision was not contrary to the principle laid down by the court in a previous case on another statute, that general provisions in an Act of Parliament do not repeal a provision in a former Act, when the general provisions are not

inconsistent with the particular one, because, since the Judicature Act, the new practice, unless it is otherwise specially provided for, is to prevail. Lord Justice Brett thought that there was no appeal in such a case before the Judicature Act.

In the case of Swan v. Inglis (36 L. T. Rep. N. S. 114) it was decided that where an action is commenced in the High Court of Justice, and is remitted for trial to a County Court, the division of the High Court in which it was instituted still retains it for purposes of further directions. In this case the action was remitted from the Queen's Bench Division, and an appeal from the decision of the County Court judge was brought to the Common Pleas Division.

Where a plaintiff commenced a suit in the County Court, which at the hearing was transferred to the High Court of Justice because the subject-matter exceeded in amount £500, defendant having given notice that she would rely on several defences, one of which was that the estate to which the suit related exceeded £500 in value, the plaintiff, though he succeeded and obtained the general costs of the suit, was ordered to pay the costs of the hearing in the County Court: (Ward v. Wyld, 5 Ch. Div. 779; 37 L. T. Rep. N. S. 68.)

By sect. 27 of the County Courts (Admiralty) Act 1869, no appeal shall be allowed unless the instrument of appeal be lodged in the registry of the High Court of Admiralty within ten days from the date of the decree or order appealed from, but the judge of the High Court of Admiralty may, on sufficient cause being shown to his satisfaction allow an appeal to be prosecuted after that time. The Court of Appeal held that they had no jurisdiction to interfere with the discretion of the judge of the Admiralty Division, who had refused leave to appeal after the ten days had expired, the appeal to them being made on the ground that by sect. 19 of the Judicature Act the provisions of the County Courts (Admiralty) Act 1869, ss. 26 to 29 were overridden (The Amstel, L. Rep. 2 P. Div. 186; 37 L. T. Rep. N. S. 138.)

In the case of Crush v. Turner (38 L. T. Rep. N. S. 595), the effect of sect. 20 of the Appellate Jurisdiction Act on sect. 45 of the Judicature Act was considered. The action was brought in the County Court, and judgment given for plaintiffs. On appeal to the Exchequer Division the two judges were divided, and the judgment of the County Court judge accordingly affirmed. Leave was given to appeal if the Court had power to give such leave. Before the Court of Appeal the objection was taken that the court below had no such power. The appeal from the County Court judge was under 13 & 14 Vict. c. 61, s. 14, which, amongst other things, provides that the order of the Superior Court to which the appeal is brought shall be final. Now sect. 45 of the Judicature Act provides, with regard to appeals from County Courts, that the decision of the Divisional Court shall be final unless special leave to appeal be given as was the case here. Subsequently the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876 was passed, which, by section 45, provides that "where by any Act of Parlia ment the decision of any court or judge, the jurisdiction of which court or judge is transferred to the High Court of Justice, is to be final, an appeal shall not lie in any such case from the decision of the High Court of Justice, or of any judge thereof to Her Majesty's Court of Appeal." The Court held that the Act of 1876 was not to be read as one with the Act of 1873, and that the latter was a separate independent Act, by virtue of sect. 45 of which, at the time of the passing of the Act of 1876, there was no Act in existence providing that the decision of the divisional court should be final, and that therefore where leave is given an appeal will lie from the decision of a divisional court upon an appeal from a County Court.

Order XXXIX., r. 1., provides that, where in an action in the Queen's Bench, Common Pleas, or Exchequer Division, there has been a trial by a jury, any application for a new trial shall be to a divisional court; and where the trial has been by a judge without a jury, the application for a new trial shall be to the Court of Appeal. By rule la the application must be made within four days. In London v. Roffey (3 Q. B. Div. 6) it was decided that these rules do not apply to motions for new trials in actions remitted to the County Court under 19 & 20 Vict. c. 108, s. 26; and that, therefore, a motion for a new trial in such an action must be made within the time limited by the old practice. In the more recent case of Davis v. Godbehere (40 L. T. Rep. N. S. 358) this decision was confirmed by the Court of Appeal upon motion for a rule nisi for a new trial, the court holding that the word judge in the rule does not include County Court judges.

In Ex parte Martin (27 W.R.431) the Court of Exchequer Division held that the Judge of a County Court has power in actions within the jurisdiction of the court to grant an injunction and commit to prison for disobedience to such injunction, by virtue of the Judicature Act 1873, sect. 25, sub-sect. 8, which gives a court power to grant an injunction; and sect. 89, which gives every court having equitable jurisdiction the same power to grant relief as would be given in a like case by the High Court of Justice, and by Order XLII., r. 5, which provides that a judgment requiring any person to abstain from doing anything may be enforced by committal.

LAW LIBRARY.

The Student's Guide to Stephen's New Commentaries on the Laws of England. By E. H. BEDFORD, Solicitor. London: Stevens and Sons.

The Student's Guide to Smith on Contracts. By H. W. PURKIS. London: Amer.

The Student's Guide to Williams on Personal Property. By H. W. PURKIS. London: Amer.

EACH of these guides has one common characteristic. In each the endeavour to teach is made by means of questions and answers. It is scarcely creditable to the large class of articled clerks that books of this kind should be in great demand. Their effect is in our opinion pernicious in the extreme, inasmuch as they tend rather to create a parrot-like habit than to develop a capacity to think. Students should be taught that no abstract of a book which they are supposed to study is of much value to them unless it is the result of their own labour. Mr. Bedford occasionally makes use of slipshod English. Thus he asks at p. 194, "Of what judges are the High Court of Justice constituted ?" Similarly Mr. Purkis, in his Guide to Smith's Contracts, p. 1, lays himself open to criticism when he asks, "What is a contract

LEGISLATION AND JURISPRUDENCE.

HOUSE OF COMMONS.

Monday, May 19.

COURTS OF JUSTICE.

Sir H. SELWYN-IBBETSON stated, in reply to Mr. HERSCHELL, that the sum levied under the Courts of Justice Building Act would be approximately £30,000 a year; but he could not say what the percentage of increase of fees would be, because that would be spread over a larger area than under the law as it now stands.

SUPPLY.

In committee on Supplementary Civil Service Estimates £26,765 for law charges was agreed to. On £162,444 for criminal prosecutions, Sir H. SELWYN-IBBETSON, in reply to Lord F. CAVENDISH, stated that the recommendation of the Commission of 1874 had not been lost sight of. The vote was agreed to. £143,168, Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice, and £22,809 for Queen's Bench, were agreed to.

Votes of £78,228 for the Probate, &c., Registries (High Court of Justice), £9375 for the Admiralty Registry, £10,110 for the Wreck Commission, and £31,842 for the Bankruptcy Court, London, were agreed to without discussion. On £366,279 to complete the vote for County Courts,

The ATTORNEY-GENERAL, replying to Mr. WHITWORTH, stated that a Bill relating to County Courts had come down from the other house, and would be introduced almost immediately. If it should be seriously opposed he was afraid that it would have very little chance of passing this session; but he was advised that it would receive, not perhaps universal, but at any rate consider able support.

The vote was agreed to. On £4518 to complete the vote for the land registry, Sir W. HARCOURT remarked that no more work was received at the land registry than could be done by one registrar, and as there was a chief registrar at £2500 a year, it was absurd to keep an assistant registrar also at £1500 a year. A land registry would be almost useless until registration was made compulsory.

The ATTORNEY-GENERAL stated, in reply, that a committee which had been sitting upon this subject would shortly publish a report, when the Honse would be able to judge whether the land registry could be made more effectual. In his opinion in would be difficult to make any scheme effective unless it involved the compulsory registration of land; and he was not at all prepared to make it compulsory, because to compel a man to disclose to the world the title which he had to his property when perhaps he did not wish to disclose t savoured of tyranny. He did not think there would be any great difficulty in providing a scheme for the registration of deeds. His hon. friend the member for Oxford was mistaken in thinking that O little work was done by the land registry. According to a return which he held in his hand, it

appeared that between the 21st Feb. 1878 and the 14th March 1879, 608 mortgages, transfers, charges, and so on, had been placed on the register, under the Act of 1862, the value of the property involved being £1,238,000; and under the Act of 1875 six registrations had taken place, the value of the property being over £57,000.

Sir G. BALFOUR asked why the office had not been utilised for other work?

Sir W. BARTTELOT was bound to say that literally nothing was done by this office. Mr. RYLANDS moved that the vote should be reduced to the extent of £1000.

Sir H. SELWIN-IBBETSON opposed the amendment, pointing out that the report of the committee upon the subject was about to be issued, which he expected would contain some recommendations which would have the effect of reducing

the vote.

After discussion, in which Mr. Whitwell, Mr. Gregory, Mr. Childers (who supported the amend ment), Mr. J. L. Bell, Sir W. Harcourt, Mr. Lowe, Mr. Ramsay, Mr. M. Lloyd, Sir H. Holland, Mr. Hankey, and Sir G. Bowyer took part, the committee divided: for the reduction 88; against 140-majority 52. The vote was then agreed to.

A vote of £18,690 for revising barristers was also agreed to.

OFFICES OF THE SUPREME COURT.

THE Lord Chancellor proposes to establish a central office of the Supreme Court of Judicature, to be under the control and superintendence of officers to be called Masters of the Supreme Court." The Bill that he has for this purpose introduced into the House of Lords enumerates the following offices as those to be concentrated in this central office:-Those of the Record and Writ Clerks, of Enrolment, of the Masters of the Queen's Bench, Common Pleas, and Exchequer Divisions, including the Bills of Sale Office, also of the Associates of those three Divisions, the Crown Office of the Queen's Bench Division, also the offices of the Registrar of Certificates of Acknowledgments of Deeds by Married Women, and of the Registrar of Judgments. Provision is made for rules of court being from time to time issued directing other offices of the Supreme Court also to be amalgamated with the central office. The first "Masters of the Supreme Court" will be those who at present hold the following offices:-Masters of the Queen's Bench, Common Pleas, and Exchequer Divisions, the Queen's Coroner and Attorney, the Master of the Crown Office, the Record and Writ Clerks, and the Associates of the three Common Law Divisions. The number of masters will ultimately be eighteen, it being provided that no vacancy is to be filled up until that number is reached. The appointment of the masters will vest in the Chief Justice of England, the Master of the Rolls, the Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, and the Chief Baron in rotation, with the exception that the Chief Justice of England will have the right of filling up any vacancy in the offices of Queen's Coroner and Attorney, and of Master in the Crown Office, and the persons so appointed will become masters

of the Supreme Court. The qualification for a mastership is the having been a practising barrister or solicitor of five years' standing, and the tenure of office is to be during good behaviour. The business of the central office is to be subject to the direction of rules of court, it being expressly provided that all the officers are to be interchangeable and liable to perform any duties in any department. On this point there is a saving clause that tho duties required to be performed by any officer now transferred to the central office shall, except as far as they are modified with his consent, be the same as or analogous to those which he has hitherto performed. Though the Clerk of Enrolments is not made a master, the present clerk is to retain his control and superintendence over the business heretofore performed in his office. The clerks to be employed in the central office are to be classified as principal, first-class, second-class, and copying, or in such other manner as the Lord Chancellor, with the concurrence of the Treasury, directs. In carrying out the scheme the following offices are to be abolished as from the commencement of the Act: Record and Writ Clerks, and Masters and Associates in the three Common Law Divisions. The clerkships of Enrolments and of Petty Bag are to be abolished on the next vacancy. With regard to the offices of Queen's Remembrancer, Registrar of Certificates of Acknowledgments of Deeds by Married Women, and Registrar of Judgments, they are, as they be come vacant, to be held by the senior master of the Supreme Court, with some addition of salary. Several of the clauses of the Bill relate to salaries and pensions, all of which it is proposed to pay out of money provided by Parliament. regard to salaries, those of the first masters are to be on the present scale of the masterships of the Common Law Divisions. With this excep. tion, the salaries of all officers are to be fixed by the Lord Chancellor, with the concurrence of the Treasury. Every one may hereafter be appointed an officer of the Supreme Court will, unless he be attached to the person of a judge, or the terms of his appointment otherwise provide, be entitled to a pension just as if he were a permanent civil servant. The Lord Chancellor is empowered to declare as to any office that it is such as to be to the interest of the public that persons be appointed thereto at an age exceeding that at which public service ordinarily begins, and therefore a number of years, not exceeding twenty, may, in computing the pension, be added to the length of the officer's service. Another authority given to the Lord Chancellor is that of removing disabled officers and giving them pensions. One of the conditions of obtaining pensions is, as regards officers ap. pointed hereafter, a certificate from the Civil Service Commissioners on admission to office. With respect to the existing officers a saving clause of the Bill secures to them their present rank, tenure of office, salaries, rights of pension, &c. But if any doubt arises as to their status, it will be determined by rules of court; and if any of them deems himself aggrieved by reason of any right or privilege being prejudicially affected by this Act or the Courts of Justice Building Acts, the Lord Chancellor will decide whether

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