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ing laws; but says not one word as to a repeal of any of the former laws. He farther instanced two similar cases decided by him, where sentence of fine and imprisonment was pronounced, and no objection was made in either case. Therefore, said he, I suppose it was taken for granted, as it is at this time by the goldsmiths' company, that the statute was still in force. We are all of opinion that it is in force, and consequently that the indictment is good. The rule for arresting judgment was discharged.

And moreover, by 24 Geo. 3. c. 53. § 1.5. all plate shall be marked with a new mark of the king's head, beside the old marks, and the duties shall be paid previous to the marking thereof. And by § 8. no gold or silver plate shall be sold or exchanged until marked, on pain of 50l.

And an

But by § 7. 10. the duties shall be returned for all plate defaced for being coarser than the standard (if no fraud appear). allowance of one fifth part shall be made for goods sent to be assayed in a rough state.

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And by 9. the said duties shall not extend to any jeweller's Goods exwork other than mourning rings nor to any jointed night earrings cepted. of gold, or gold springs of lockets, or to goods excepted by

12 Geo. 2. c. 26. § 6.

By 55 G. 3. c. 185. all former duties upon plate (except arrears,) 55 G. 3. c. 198. are repealed and the following substituted in lieu thereof:

Plate of gold made or wrought in Great Britain, and which shall or ought to be touched, assayed, and marked in Great Britain, for every ounce thereof, and so in proportion for any greater or less quantity, 17s. per ounce.

Exemption.

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Gold watch-cases.

Plate of silver made or wrought in Great Britain, and which shall or ought to be touched, assayed, or marked in Great Britain, for every ounce thereof, and so in proportion for any greater or less quantity, 1s. 6d. per ounce.

Exemptions. All watch-cases, chains, necklace-beads, lockets, philligree work, shirt buckles or broaches, stamped medals, and spouts to china, stone, or earthenware tea-pots, of silver, of any weight whatsoever:

continued.

Tippings, swages, or mounts, not weighing ten pennyweights Exemptions of silver each, and not being necks or collars for castors, cruets, or glasses appertaining to any sorts of stands or frames, wares of silver not weighing five pennyweights of silver each, but this exemption not to include necks, collars, and tops, for castors, cruets, or glasses, appertaining to any sort of stands or frames; buttons to be affixed to or set on any wearing apparel, solid silver buttons, and solid studs, not having a bezelled edge soldered on, wrought seals, blank seals, bottle tickets, shoe clasps, patch boxes, salt spoons, salt ladles, tea spoons, tea strainers, caddy ladles, buckles, and pieces of garnish, cabinets, or knife cases, or tea chests, or bridles, or stands, or frames.

§ 7. "If any person shall forge or counterfeit, or cause or procure to be forged or counterfeited, any mark, stamp, or die, which shall have been provided, made, or used in pursuance of this or any former act, relating to any duties on gold or silver plate made or wrought in Great Britain, for the purpose of marking or stamping any such gold or silver plate, in the manner directed by any such act, or shall forge, counterfeit or resemble,

Forgery of gold and silver plate duty marks, &c

to be felony.

55 G. 3. c. 185. or cause or procure to be forged, counterfeited or resembled, $ 7. the impression of any such mark, stamp, or die, upon any such gold or silver plate, with intent to defraud his majesty, his heirs, or successors; or if any person shall mark or stamp, or cause or procure to be marked or stamped, any such gold or silver plate, or any vessel or ware of base metal, with any such forged or counterfeited mark, stamp, or die as aforesaid, or shall transpose or remove, or cause or procure to be transposed or removed, from one piece of gold or silver plate to another, or to any vessel or ware of base metal, any impression made with any mark, stamp, or die, which shall have been provided, made, or used in pursuance of this or any former act, for the purpose of marking or stamping of any such gold or silver plate as aforesaid; or if any person shall sell, exchange or expose to sale, or export out of Great Britain, any such gold or silver plate, or any vessel or ware of base metal, having thereupon the impression of any such forged or counterfeited mark, stamp, or die, as aforesaid, or any forged, counterfeited, or resembled impression of any mark, stamp, or die, so provided, made, or used as aforesaid, or any impression of any such mark, stamp, or die, which shall have been transposed or removed from any other piece of plate as aforesaid, knowing the same respectively to be forged or counterfeited, or transposed or removed as aforesaid; or if any person shall wilfully and without lawful excuse (the proof whereof shall lie on the person accused) have or be possessed of any such forged or counterfeited mark, stamp, or die, as aforesaid, or shall privately and secretly use any mark, stamp, or die, so provided, made, or used as aforesaid, with intent to defraud his majesty, his heirs, or successors; then every person so offending, and every person knowingly and wilfully aiding, abetting, or assisting any person or persons in committing any such offence as aforesaid, and being thereof lawfully convicted, shall be adjudged guilty of felony, and shall suffer death as a felon, without benefit of clergy." [For the Licence for dealing in Plate, see Excise, tit. Plate.]

10 G. 2. c. 28.

players.

[10 G. 2. c. 28. - 28 G. 3. c. 30.]

BY 10 Geo. 2. c. 28. § 1. Every person who shall, for hire, gain, or reward, act, represent, or perform, or cause, &c. any play or other entertainment of the stage, or any part therein, if he shall not have any legal settlement where the same shall be acted, &c. without authority by patent from the king, or licence from the lord chamberlain, shall be deemed a rogue and vagabond within the 12 Ann. (which act is repealed, but the same is re-enacted by the 17 Geo. 2. c. 5.) and liable as such to the penalties in that behalf imposed by the said statute.

§ 2. And if any person not having a legal settlement as aforesaid, shall without such authority or licence as aforesaid, act, &c.

stage within

or cause to be acted, &c. for hire, &c. any interlude, &c. (as above) he shall forfeit 50/.; and if the said 50l. be paid, levied, or recovered, he shall not suffer the abovementioned penalties. Or other entertainment of the stage.] Rex v. Handy, 6 T. R. 286. Tumbling is The defendant was convicted in the penalty of 507. under 10 Geo. 2. not an enterc. 28. for acting, representing, and performing a certain enter- tainment of the tainment of the stage called Tumbling, &c. at Birmingham; 10 G. 2. c. 28. which conviction was removed by certiorari, in order to take the opinion of the court whether this offence came within the statute. Ld. Kenyon Ch. J. (inter alia) said, I do not think that tumbling is an entertainment of the stage within the meaning of the act; it might equally be said, that fencing on a public stage is. By the 3d section of this act a copy of the piece to be represented is to be sent to the lord chamberlain for his approbation, previous to the acting; but no copy could have been given of this entertainment. This is a penal act, and cannot be extended to entertainments which did not exist when the act was made.

By 10 Geo. 2. c. 28. §7. If any interlude, &c. &c. (as before) be 10 G. 2. c. 28. acted in any place where wine, ale, beer, or other liquors shall be

sold or retailed, the same shall be deemed to be acted for gain, hire, and reward.

3. No person shall, for hire, gain, or reward, act or cause to be acted any new play or any part therein, or any new part added to an old play, or any new prologue or epilogue, unless a true copy thereof be sent to the lord chamberlain fourteen days before the acting, together with an account when and where it is intended to be acted, signed by one of the managers.

The lord chamberlain may prohibit the same as he thinks fit; and if any such person shall for hire, &c. act or cause to be acted, without such copy being sent, or against such prohibition, he shall forfeit 501. and the licence of the playhouse shall be void.

5. And no person shall be authorised to act, except within the liberties of the city of Westminster, and where the king shall reside.

But by the 28 Geo. 3. c. 30. § 1. it shall be lawful for the jus- 28 G. 3. c. 30. tices at the general or quarter sessions, at their discretion to grant a licence to any person making application for the same by petition for the performance of any such tragedies, comedies, interludes, operas, plays, or farces, as are or shall be represented at the patent or licensed theatres in Westminster, or have been submitted to the inspection of the lord chamberlain as aforesaid, at any place within their jurisdiction, or within any city, town, or place situate within the limits of the same, for any time not ex-ceeding sixty days, to commence within the then next six months, and to be within such four months as shall be specified in the said licence, so as there be only one licence in use at the same time within the jurisdiction so given, and so as such place be not within twenty miles of London or Westminster, or eight miles of any patent or licensed theatre; or ten miles of the residence of the king; or of any place within the same jurisdiction, at which, within six months preceding, a licence under this act shall have been had and exercised; or within fourteen miles of either of the universities; or within two miles of the outward

28 G. 5. c. 50. limits of any city, town, or place, having peculiar jurisdiction; and so also as no licence under this act shall have been had and exercised at the same place within eight months then next preceding.

10 G. 2. c. 28.

§ 2. But no such licence shall be granted to be exercised within any city, town, or place having peculiar jurisdiction unless proof be made that the majority of the justices acting for such place have at a public meeting signed their consent; or unless an express condition be therein inserted, that the same shall not be valid until approved by the majority of the justices of such place at a meeting holden expressly for that purpose.

§ 3. Nor shall such licence be granted by the justices within any city, town, or place, unless notice shall have been given by the person applying for such licence three weeks before such application to the mayor, bailiff, or other chief civil officer of such place, of such intended application.

By 10 Geo. 2. c. 28. § 6. All pecuniary penalties, inflicted by this act, may be recovered in the courts at Westminster, or before two justices, by the oath of one witness, or confession to be levied by distress; and for want of sufficient distress, the offender to be committed to the house of correction, for a time not exceeding six months, there to be kept to hard labour; or to the common gaol, not exceeding six months, without bail or mainprise: Persons aggrieved by order of the justices may appeal to the next sessions: The said penalties to be distributed, half to the informer or person suing, and half to the poor.

7. Prosecution to be within six calendar months.

But by special acts of parliament, Playhouses are permitted to be erected in particular places.

Poisoning. See Homicide.

Bigamy and polygamy.

Polygamy. (a)

[1 J. 1. c. 11.-26 G. 2. c. 33.-35 G. 3. c. 67.]

BIGAMY is, where a man has two wives successively; Polygamy, where he hath several wives at the same time: but they are commonly confounded one with the other.

See also
20 Howell's

St. Tri. 362.

(a) In the appendix to Sir Samuel Romilly's "Observations on the Criminal Law of England," published in 1813, (note M.) page 105, are the following very judicious remarks on this offence.

"The crime of bigamy (which is made felony by the statute 1 Jac. 1. c. 11. and which by the 35 Geo.3. c. 67. is punishable with transportation for seven years or imprisonment) comprehends two species of offences, differing greatly from each other in their character and effects, and in their degree of moral guilt; and the circumstances which mark the distinctions between these different offences are clear and unequivocal. If the atrocity of a crime is to be measured by the

By the 1 Ja. 1. c. 11. § 1. If any person or persons within his 1 J. 1. c. 11. majesty's dominions of England and Wales, being married, or which hereafter shall marry, do at any time marry any person or persons, the former husband or wife being alive, every such offence shall be felony, and the person and persons so offending shall suffer death as in cases of felony; and the party and parties so offending shall receive such and the like proceeding, trial, and execution in such county where such shall be apperson or persons prehended, as if the offence had been committed in such county where such person or persons shall be taken or apprehended.

2. Provided, that this shall not extend to any person whose Exceptions. husband or wife shall be continually remaining beyond the seas by

the space of seven years together;

Or whose husband or wife shall absent him or herself the one from the other by the space of seven years together, in any parts within his majesty's dominions, the one of them not knowing the other to be living within that time.

§ 3. Provided also, that this act shall not extend to any person or persons that are or shall be at the time of such marriage divorced by any sentence had or hereafter to be had in the ecclesiastical court;

Or to any person where the former marriage hath been or hereafter shall be by sentence in the ecclesiastical court declared to be void and of no effect;

extent of the wrong done to the person who is the victim of it, few crimes can be more atrocious than that of a married man, who by representing himself to be a bachelor, prevails on a modest woman to become his wife, he possesses himself by fraud of her person, knowing that he may at any moment dismiss her as a prostitute from his bed, and nothing can exceed the horror she must feel, whenever, the secret of his first marriage being divulged, she shall be awakened to her real situation and shall find herself despoiled of her honour, and that the children she has borne are bastards and outcasts. The real nature of this crime is that of a fraudulent and most aggravated seduction effected under colour of law, with all the solemnities of religion, and under such circumstances that no prudence or caution could effectually guard against it. But he who before his second marriage apprises the woman that he is already a husband does her no wrong. His offence is one to the state alone and consists in nothing but the public scandal it affords. The bigamist who had concealed his first marriage from his victim is equally guilty of this outrage on public decency, and has besides done one of the greatest possible injuries to an individual.

"It results from these considerations, that in a woman the crime of bigamy can never be so heinous as in a man, and that in a man the heinousness of the crime consists altogether in the concealment of the former marriage. Mr. Justice 4 Blac. Com. Blackstone, however, not adverting to those distinctions, tells us that bigamy 163. " has been made felony by reason of its being so great a violation of the public economy and decency of a well-ordered state. "It is that," he says, "which never can be endured under any rational civil establishment; and in northern countries," he observes, "the very nature of the climate seems to recoil against it." But he does not even glance at the injury done to the woman who suffers from the crime; and even the more philosophical author of the "Principles of Penal Law, page 105., defines polygamy only to be a gross species of adultery, aggravated by the profanation of a religious rite."

Although, as has been already observed, this is, in women, a crime of much less magnitude than in men, yet, until the stat. of 3 and 4 W. & M. (which extended the benefit of clergy to women) passed, it was punishable in female offenders with death, but in males only with burning in the hand and a year's imprisonment.

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