rulers or the influence of popularity. When power becomes right, it is of little consequence whether decisions rest upon corruption or weakness, upon the accident of chance or upon deliberate wrong."

In every well organized government, therefore, with reference to the security both of public rights and private rights, it is indispensable that there should be a judicial department to ascertain and decide rights, to punish crimes, to administer justice, and to protect the innocent from injury and usurpation. But, perhaps, this honorable body would better like an opinion still nearer home. That distinguished jurist, whose name every citizen of New York repeats with veneration, Chancellor Kent, said: "In monarchical governments the independence of the judiciary is essential to guard the rights of the subject from injustice of the crown; but in republics, it is equally salutary in protecting the Constitution and laws from the encroachments and the tyranny of faction. Laws, however wholesome or necessary, are frequently the object of temporary aversion, and sometimes of popular resistance. It is requisite that courts of justice should be able at all times to present a determined countenance against all licentious acts, and to deal impartially and truly according to law, between suitors of every description, or whether the cause, the question or the party, be popular or unpopular. To give the courage and the firmness to do it, the judges ought to be confident of the security of their station. Nor is an independent judiciary less useful, as a check upon the legislative power, which is sometimes disposed, from the force of party, or the temptations of interest, to make a sacrifice of constitutional rights."

But Judge Story was so imbued with the fear of legislative encroachments upon the judicial, that in another place, section 1585, he says, "that there is a great absurdity in subjecting the decisions of men, selected for the knowledge of the laws, acquired by long and laborious study, to the revision and control of men, who for want of the same advantage, cannot but be deficient in that knowledge. The members of the Legislature will rarely be chosen with a view to those qualifications which fit men for the stations of judges, and on this account there will be great reason to apprehend all the ill consequences of defective information; so on account of the natural propensity of such bodies to party divisions, there will be no less reason to fear that the pestilential breaths of faction may poison the fountains of justice." "These considerations," he says, "teach us to applaud the wisdom of those States who have committed the judicial power, not to a part of the Legislature, but to distinct and independent bodies of men."

This may, perhaps, suffice upon this point. But I approach another point, which is, to ask what is the duty of a judge, even if the question of privilege is before him for decision. This is, perhaps, one of the most important points in the case. Perhaps the opinion of Chief Justice Marshall might not be inappropriate to cite on this question. Surely no intelligent lawyer, no patriotic legislator, would hesitate to look up to such a source for advice.

In looking back upon my conduct as a judge in this matter, it is a source of sincere pride that I may call him, this profoundest of American jurists and noble

patriot, to my aid. In Cohen v. Virginia, reported in 4 Wheaton, 404, that illustrious jurist said, "The judiciary cannot, as the legislature may, avoid a measure because it approaches to the confines of the Constitution. We cannot pass by it because it is doubtful. With whatever doubt, with whatever difficulties, a case may be attended, we must decide it if it be brought before us. We have no more right to decline the exercise of deciding, than we have to usurp a power that is not given. The one or the other would be treason to the Constitution. Questions may occur which we would gladly avoid, but we cannot avoid them. All we can do is to exercise our best judgment, and conscientiously to perform our duty."

In another case this great judge said, "the legislative, executive and judicial powers of every well constructed government (9 Wheat. 818) are co-extensive with each other." If this is sound, where is the power of the one to call the other to account? In still another case (1 Peters, 814), Justice Johnson said, "in conflicts of power and opinion, inseparable from our very peculiar relations, cases may occur in which the maintenance of principle and the administration of justice may require different courses; and when such cases do come our courts must do their duty."

Mr. Speaker, I do not stand here to deny the power and authority of this house to punish, as for contempt, one who commits an act amounting to a breach of privilege of one of its members; but to deny that as an individual I have committed any such act, or intended to commit any. The act was that of a court, of which I was but one of its ministers, and that as such minister, I am protected by the sanctity of the position-by the fact that it was judicial action, that my decision was one in which duty called upon me to act, and I was bound to render such a judgment in the inatter, as a conscientious conviction of duty demanded. It is human to err. If I have mistaken the law, it is such an error as every other judge who has ever sat upon a bench has committed; and this is the first instance in the history of American jurisprudence in which a judge has been arraigned for having mistaken the law.

But, sir, have I even made a mistake? No court has ever adjudged it to be such. I trust none ever will. Suppose that in the opinion of your honorable committee it is a mistake, yet my convictions are otherwise, and since the passage of your resolutions I have the voluntarily offered opinions of distinguished jurists and lawyers, more in number than compose that honorable committee, who assure me I am right. The question, then, still remains undecided, which is right, with no high judicial court to pass upon it. Suppose I am right, after all, and this honorable house shall decide that I am wrong? It will not, therefore, be wrong. My opinion here may be disregarded. I cannot vote here on the question, or if I could, for aught I know, one hundred and twentyeight, or a majority of that number, men, perhaps, my superiors in legal knowledge, can outvote me. I have said this was an anomalous proceeding. It is so. My accusers are to be my judges. Under such circumstances, I have been told, there is no hope of the act being justified. It may be so. It would be so, it is true, if only the party feeling the spirit of wounded

dignity is to control — feeling that the exercise of their power is beyond control - with no power of appeal. But, sir, if you shall believe I am conservative, it would be magnanimity, it would be the spirit of patriotism, nay, it would be elevating, to divest the case of feeling and prejudice, and to look upon the case as a high court of law, uninfluenced by personal considerations, would look upon it. Sir, this spirit of magnanimity gives me hope.

I have already said there are high governmental reasons why the precedent now to be established should be a good one. That if the law is in doubt, you have the power to remove that doubt by legislation. The courts have no power to do so, because it has not been before them. If the theory of your honorable committee is right, conscientious judges who differ from them will repeat the error; thus they will stand, with the terror of legislative precedent suspended over them upon the one side, but with a more awful terror of Almighty vengeance, if they violate their consciences, upon the other. Can this be called, then, an independent judiciary when placed in that position?

One word more, Mr. Speaker. Your committee inform you that they have based their resolutions upon Parliamentary law, and have given you its antiquity and its evidence of wisdom. They have assumed that this law of privilege is uniform. I have demonstrated by the statutes and constitutions that it is not, and that their conclusions in this particular were in error. I have shown that the National Legislature have their privileges secured by the National Constitution -- that some of the independent States have their law of privilege secured by constitutions, and some by statutes, that the law of privilege of this State is qualified, and limited by the statute, and differs from that of the nation, of other States, and of Great Britain. If this honorable committee, as I insist, have been led into unintentional error in this, if they are equally in error as to the law of privilege in Great Britain, may not the resolutions based upon such opinions be also error?

Sir, I have read the cases referred to in that report upon the English law of privilege, and what will be found as most remarkable is, that not one of those cases were determined within the last century, nor since the year 1700. If that learned committee had extended their research to that year, which was the thirteenth year of the reign of William III, they would have found one English statute, limiting the privileges of members of Parliament, which is entitled "An act for preventing any inconveniences that may happen by privilege of Parlia ment." In that act, sir, the privilege was so limited that members of Parliament, including peers of the realm, were made liable to the service of any civil process which did not arrest their persons; and service of such process upon them was not void, as your honorable committee say of the subpoena, and as has lately been held in the case cited in the State of Maryland.

If that learned committee had extended their research still further down to the year 1770, just one hundred years ago, to the thirteenth year of the reign of George III, they would have found another statute, still further abridging the privileges of members of

Parliament; setting forth in its preamble, that it was to obviate the inconvenience and delay, by reason of privilege, to the king and his subjects, in prosecuting their suits, etc. What suits had the king, but suits in his name, which in this country are suits in behalf of the people?

In fact, sir, for the last one hundred years, the privilege of Parliament has not been such as your honorable committee report it to be, but has been, as it has been here, limited and restricted by statute, and confined to arrest in civil cases; and the English law of privilege now is not materially different from that of the State of New York.

When this last bill to limit privilege was before Parliament, that great light of English jurisprudence, Lord Mansfield, advocated its passage, and I quote the following most significant remarks from his speech, which may be regarded as judicial construction of that law. He says: "It may not be popular to take away any of the privileges of Parliament, for I very well remember, and many of your lordships may remember, that not long ago the popular cry was for an extension of privileges, and so far did they carry it at that time, that it was said that privilege protected members from criminal actions, and such was the power of popular prejudice over weak minds, that the very decisions of some of the courts were tinctured with that doctrine. * ** It was undoubtedly an abominable doctrine. The laws of this country allow no place or employment as a sanctuary for crime, and where I have the honor to sit as judge, neither royal favor nor popular applause shall ever protect the | guilty." *** Noble patriot! In another part of his speech he said, "that members of both Houses should be free in their persons, in cases of civil suits, for there may come a time when the safety and welfare of this whole Empire may depend upon their attendance in Parliament. God forbid that I should advise any measure that would in future endanger the State. But this bill has no such tendency. It expressly secures the persons of members from arrest in all civil suits. I am sure were the noble lords as well acquainted as I am with but half the difficulties and delays that are every day occasioned in the courts of justice under pretense of privilege, they would not, they could not, oppose this bill." The bill passed, and for one hundred years that is the law of privilege.

No case can be found like those cited by your honorable committee since the passage of that bill, even in the English courts. The cases cited are before that time, and, as that noble man declared, they contained a tincture of that abominable doctrine.

Mr. Speaker, have I not shown errors enough in the basis upon which your honorable committee have proposed action, to show that the law of privilege is not, in this State, what is claimed for it? There is not now even an approach to it, as laid down by your committee, in England. Why, sir, ten years before the passage of this last English statute, Lord Preston, a Peer of the realm, was committed by an inferior court for refusing to give evidence before a grand jury on an indictment for high treason. He obtained a habeas corpus before a higher court- the King's Bench. When Holt, Lord Chief Justice, said: "He had committed a great contempt, and had I been there

I would have fined him, and committed him till he paid the fine."

But, sir, I have done with English authority.

Now, sir, it only remains to give construction to the words civil process in our statute. If an attachment, issuing out of a criminal court, is civil process, then have I been misled by books of authority, then have I mistakenly erred in deciding the law. If it is not civil process, then my decision is law, and must stand approved, whatever this house may do. Oh! the peril to an independent judiciary! Would to God that a Marshall, or a Kent, or a Mansfield, had the decision of this great question! But, sir, I am not called upon to establish that the subpoena issued by the district attorney was criminal process, that burden is not put on me. No lawyer will say it was civil process. I did not issue that the statute makes it the duty of the district attorney to do that-and yet, in theory, it issues out of the Court of Terminer; and disobedience to its commands is regarded as contempt of that court.

But the question is not that. If regularly issued, its service was good, and not void. It was in the eye of the law a contempt to disobey it. And all the question that remains is, was the process issued upon that contempt a civil process? This honorable body is called upon to vote distinctly upon the meaning of those words. I am not unwilling to see that record of names. If with the light of intelligence of this day if with that love for judicial independence—if with a patriotic desire to avoid conflicts between the co-ordinate and co-extensive departments of the sovereign power- if you shall act with freedom from all spirit of wounded dignity - if with jealous care you feel that you are sitting both as accusers and judges; if you shall place yourselves upon that lofty plane of devotion to the Constitution and the best interests of

this noble State; if it shall be your just pride to guard and protect the rights of an independent judiciary from the terrors of aggression of a co-ordinate power; then, sir, I have no fears of the result. Invoking these noble, these elevating considerations to your honorable body, I leave the case in your hands.

I invoke these noble and elevating considerations to your honorable body. But, Mr. Speaker, I desire to say that my appearing here to-day is out of respect to this high department of the government - not waiving my right to protest against being brought here at all. Nay, sir, by the advice of my counsel I should not have appeared here at all, and have put in defiance the power of this body, and should have allowed your officer to execute the process of this house upon my person and held you responsible for the act. But my own judgment has dictated to me to come here out of courtesy, and without waiving my right of protest or acknowledging myself in your custody. Although I have appeared here and offered this defense, I do not say that I submit this case to you, though probably that will be the effect of your action; but, sir, I stand here protesting, earnestly protesting, that I am not here in obedience to your power, but here out of courtesy to an independent department of this government.

There are forty-four Common Pleas Judges in Ohio.

CURRENT TOPICS.

The argument of Mr. Justice Potter, before the Assembly, on the breach of privilege question, is lections of those who heard it, and we therefore give worthy of a more permanent place than in the recolit entire in this issue of the LAW JOURNAL. Though necessarily prepared in haste, it exhibits a vast amount of research and learning, and will prove of value should the same or a like question ever arise again in this or the other States. No one can fail to admire the firm and manly way in which he asserts the dignity of the Supreme Court, and the co-ordinate and independent position of the judicial branch of the government.

Mayor Hall, of New York, recently sent a communication to the Legislature, complaining of the difficulty experienced in getting intelligent respectable men to serve on juries, and asking for the passage of a law increasing the penalties for disobeying a summons to do jury duty. The evil, no doubt, needs remedying, but not in the manner proposed. The simplest and surest way to accomplish the result desired is to increase the pay of jurors so that men can afford to serve. The judges and other officers of the court are fairly remunerated for their services, and jurors should form no exception. The man who can make five dollars per day in his ordinary business will not be likely to exhibit much anxiety to serve on juries at the miserable pittance now allowed.

Our neighbors in Canada have introduced an experiment in the reform of legal procedure which is worthy of attention. An act was passed last year which dispenses with juries, in criminal cases, on request of the prisoner. The courts to which the act relates are given jurisdiction in nearly every case, except felonies punishable with death, and sit as occasion requires. The procedure is as follows: Within twenty-four hours after a prisoner is committed for trial, the sheriff notifies the fact to the judge, and so soon as the local prosecutor is ready to proceed with the case, the prisoner is brought up in open court under a judge's order, when the charge is read over to him. He is then offered the option of being tried by the judge forthwith, or by a jury, in the usual way, at the next sessions or assizes. If he accepts the former alternative, he is called upon to plead at once to the charge, and the trial then proceeds before the judge alone, but is conducted in all other respects in the ordinary way. So far, this method has been found to work well, and is highly approved by all engaged in the administration of justice. In addition to expediting the trial of persons charged with crime—a very important consideration both to the accused and the people-a tribunal is thus constituted whose findings of fact may be reviewed on appeal.

Drunkenness has never been a favorite defense to actions on contract in this State; but in some of the other States it has been frequently set up. A case of this character has recently been decided in Connecti

cut, as will be observed by turning to the Digest of Recent American Decisions, on another page. The action was brought by an indorser against the maker of a negotiable promissory note, and the latter set up the defense that he was intoxicated when he signed the note. The court held that nothing short of complete drunkenness, where the party is utterly deprived of the use of his reason and understanding, is available against a bona fide holder, but intimated that a less degree of intoxication would be a sufficient defense as against the payee. As long ago as Lord Ellenborough's time, that Judge held in Pitt v. Smith (3 Camp. 33) that an agreement signed by an intoxicated man is void on the ground that such a person "has no agreeing mind." Numerous cases sustaining this doctrine, more or less, are cited in 1 Parsons on Contracts, 384; also, in 1 Story's Eq. Jur. ?? 231-3. It is a defense which ought to be received with the utmost caution, and never unless it clearly appears that the drunkenness was known to the payee or other contracting party, and taken advantage of by him; or that it was complete, and suspended all use of the mind at the time.

The Judiciary Committee of the Senate have reported a bill establishing the nine circuits of the Supreme Court of the United States as follows: 1, The New England States; 2, New York; 3, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia; 4, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, and Arkansas; 5, North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Tennessee; 6, Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky, and West Virginia; 7, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin; 8, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri; 9, California, Oregon, and Nevada. It also provides that the Justices of the Supreme Court shall be residents of their respective circuits, and vacancies now or hereafter existing in said court shall, in every case, be filled by a resident of the circuit. The latter part of the bill should be stricken out. Impartiality next to integrity is requisite to the judicial office, and this will be more likely to be secured in a stranger than in a resident. The Chinese, from whom we might learn many things of advantage in the administration of public affairs, will not permit their judicial officers to either reside, marry, or acquire property in the district over which they have jurisdiction, and never appoint them to a district within which they were born or received any part of their education. A similar regulation in force here would, we do not doubt, be of benefit, and afford some protection against the dangers which now threaten the independence of the judiciary.

The Pall Mall Gazette, in speaking of the "law's delays," finds some consolation in the fact that Englishmen are better off than their brethren in foreign lands, and cites several instances of Dutch colonial justice to illustrate. The first is this: In 1864 two men were committed in Java for manslaughter. After nineteen months incarceration they were tried, found guilty and sentenced to four and six years penal servitude respectively, wholly exclusive of their term of previous imprisonment. These men, however, were guilty, and do not deserve much sympathy; but

that fact cannot be urged in mitigation of the cruelty of another case. In May, 1868, a father and son were committed in the same Dutch colony on the charge of purchasing a gun knowing it to have been stolen. Although the preliminary inquiry, which the Dutch system involves, was concluded in the following August, the accused did not receive the official notification of the charge on which they would be tried until April, 1869, and the actual trial did not take place till last September. No knowledge that the gun was stolen could be proved against the prisoners, and they were acquitted after an imprisonment of fifteen months- a period probably double that of the sentence they would have received had they been found guilty. Hard as the case is, it is further aggravated by the fact that the verdict of the inferior court requires confirmation by the Supreme Court of Java, and the two men are in prison at this moment awaiting the pleasure of the latter tribunal. Lamentable as are these examples we doubt not their parallel could be found in many counties in the State of New York. We have ourselves known of prisoners lying in jail for twelve or eighteen months before a trial was had. However, in such instances, the prisoner is usually the one who seeks delay.

OBITER DICTA.

During a divorce case in one of the Bloomington (Ill.) courts recently, the plaintiff interrupted her counsel's eloquent plea for provision for her child, with the remark addressed to the court, that "it was not provision she wanted, but would take whatever the court in its benevolence might allow her in money, be that much or little."

We are pleased to learn that Mr. Edmund H. Bennett, of Boston, is engaged upon a new edition of "Story on Bailments." Mr. Bennett is already well and favorably known as one of the authors of "Leading Criminal Cases," and also of the " Massachusetts Digest." He will bring to his work an extensive knowledge of the law, and great powers of analysis and discrimination.

Tilton, of the Independent, is altogether out-Heroded by the Nation. In that lively sheet we find the following intimation of the "Golden days of the American Bar" that are crowding in upon us: "We look forward to see the day when the tedium of every trial will be lightened by instrumental music, an occasional song or anecdote from the bench, and perhaps readings or recitations from female members of the bar, and the introduction of a baby or two to be passed round toward lunch time." The unfortunate collocation of "baby" and "lunch time" leads one to recall involuntarily the King of the Cannibal Islands.

Judges, as a class, are not wont to indulge in the classical, poetical, and metaphorical, but occasionally a refreshing exception is to be found. At a court of sessions recently held in one of the counties of this State, the presiding judge, in charging the jury on the trial of an indictment for arson in the third degree, elucidated one point in the following language: "Persons engaged in the perpetration of crime do not, Diogenes like, sally forth in the light of day, with lantern in hand, in search of honest men or women as witnesses of their nefarious performances, but rather like him who draws the curtain from pale Priam's couch, and would have told him half his Troy was burned, with stealthy pace and Tarquin strides, patrols the streets toward their design, at dead of night,

when over half the world Nature seems dead, and busy dreams disturb the curtained sleeper." It is needless to add that a verdict of "guilty" was found.

A lawyer sends us the following waif, and says: "I enclose a copy of some verses, cut from a newspaper, which smack so smartly of legal flavor, that I trust they find their way into your entertaining journal, where they will meet the eyes of those who will appreciate them." The said verses, though by no means new, are nevertheless good:

A LAWYER'S ODE TO SPRING.
"Whereas on certain boughs and sprays
Now divers birds are heard to sing,
And certain flowers their heads up raise,
Hail to the coming on of spring.

"The song of those said birds arouse

The memory of our youthful hours-
As green as those said sprays and boughs,
As fresh and sweet as those said flowers.

"The birds aforesaid - happy pairs

Love 'mid the aforesaid boughs enshrines
In freehold nest, themselves, their heirs,
Administrators, and assigns.

"Oh, busiest term of Cupid's court,

Where tender plaintiff's action bring-
Season of frolic and of sport
Hail, as aforesaid, coming spring!"

required to pay two per cent of their gross earnings into the city treasury. The agents of the companies prosecuted have neglected or refused to comply with the law. The first suit commenced is against the Astor Insurance Company of New York.

An interesting insurance case has just been decided by the law courts of Maine. The plaintiffs were H. W. Lancey & Co., of Portland, whose store was insured by the Phoenix Insurance Company of New York for $3,000. The store was burned in the great fire of 1866. The company refused payment on the ground that the store was situated on leased land and the agent of the company had omitted to state the fact in the policy. The court decided in favor of the plaintiffs, awarding the full amount of the insurance, with interest from 1866, with costs.

Considerable interest is manifested in the disposition by the United States Supreme Court of the case of the Lieutenant Governor of Florida, which comes up on a motion to dismiss an appeal from the decision of the State Supreme Court debarring him from holding the office because he had not been a resident of the State for three years, as required by the Constitution. It is held that the United States Supreme Court has no jurisdiction, as the right to the office existed under State and not Federal law; and also because the decision below does not violate the Constitution or any United States law or treaty.

LEGAL NEWS.

Chief-Justice Hinman, of the Supreme Court of Connecticut, died on the 22d inst., at his residence in Cheshire.

The Hon. Wm. Willis, a well-known and highly respected lawyer, of Portland, died in that city last week.

At a recent session of the Criminal Court in Nuoro, Sardinia, some malicious person set fire to the Judge's wig and robe.

A Georgia Justice has sent an entire Grand Jury to jail for contempt of court in censuring him for bailing a murderer.

A bill has been introduced in the Georgia Senate providing that the Senate shall pay counsel for accused persons in capital cases.

In Virginia there are over one hundred and twentyfive judges to be elected by the Legislature, and the candidates are multitudinous.

The Pennsylvania Senate has passed over the Governor's veto the bill allowing writs of error to the Supreme Court in criminal cases.

Gen. Stringfellow, of Atchison, has sued the Missouri Pacific Railroad Company for $10,000 for services in procuring legislation from the Missouri legislature.

Henry Black, son of Hon. Jeremiah S. Black, has commenced the practice of the law in Mercersburg, Penn., a country village about four miles from Stone Batter, the birth-place of the late ex-Pres. Buchanan.

It is now authoritively stated that Lieutenant Governor Cumback has declined the appointment of Minister to Portugal. The Indianapolis Journal says his law practice promises to be more remunerative than the mission would be.

The Maine Supreme Judicial Court has just tried a suit on a promissory note. The plaintiff claimed that the indorsement of the note was: "I back this note holden for debt and costs." The defendant claimed that the indorsement was: "I back this not holden for debt and costs," and that the letter "e" had been added. Verdict was rendered for the defendant.

The Chicago city attorney has brought suit against 21 foreign insurance companies doing business in that city. Under the laws of Illinois every foreign insurance company doing business there through agents is

BOOK NOTICES.

A Digest of New York Statutes and Reports, from January, 1867, to November, 1869. By Benjamin Vaughan Abbott and Austin Abbott. Comprising the Adjudications of all the Courts of the State, presented in Abbott's Practice Reports (new series), vols. 2-6; Barbour's Supreme Court Reports, vols. 46-53; Edmonds' Select Cases, vol. 1; Howard's Practice Reports, vols. 32-37; Keyes' Reports, vols. 1-4; New York (Court of Appeals) Reports, 34-39; Parker's Criminal Reports, vol. 6; Robertson's New York Superior Court Reports, vols. 1-5; Transcript Appeals, vols. 1-7; together with the Statutes, of general application, contained in the Laws of 1867, 1868 and 1869, being the Third Supplement to Abbotts' New York Digest. New York: Baker, Voorhis & Co. 1870.

This, the third supplement to Abbotts' New York Digest, brings the cases down to January, 1870, and embraces the decisions in forty-three volumes of reports. The plan and arrangement is the same as that of the previous volumes, with the addition to each title of an index to all the cases in that title or subject in the previous seven volumes. The mechanical execution of the work is a credit to the publishers- the type is clear, the paper of an excellent quality, and the binding unusually good. Indeed it is not too much to say that it is one of the handsomest books ever published in this country. Of the merits of the work it is hardly necessary for us to say more than that it is fully equal to its predecessors. Whatever the Messrs. Abbott do in the way of book making they do thoroughly and well; but we have ever regarded this digest as their masterpiece; and had they written nothing else they would justly have stood acquitted of that debt to the profession which Lord Bacon spoke of, and would besides have earned the thanks of those who were profited by the results of their labor. Their work is pre-eminently distinguished for comprehensiveness, arrangement and accuracy the three cardinal virtues in every digest. In this volume the inconvenience of using a work having several supplements has been admirably overcome by the index at the head of each subject. The work is one that no lawyer can afford to be without.

TERMS OF THE SUPREME COURT FOR FEBRUARY. Last Monday, Circuit and Oyer and Terminer, Tioga, Parker.

Last Monday, Circuit and Oyer and Terminer, Chemung, Murray.

Last Monday, Special Term, Monroe, J. C. Smith.