facie evidence that every one whose name appears therein as a solicitor is qualified to practise.

5. Special Agreement.-If a special agreement (valid under the 33 & 34 Vict. c. 28) was made between the plaintiff and the defendant, by which the plaintiff undertook to do the work for a less sum than he is now claiming, the defendant may plead the special agreement as a defence; no action can be brought on such an agreement (sec. 8 of the last cited Act). Or the defendant may plead that the plaintiff undertook the cause gratis (Ashford v. Price, 1823, 3 Stark. 185; 25 R. R. 787). An agreement with the client "to charge him nothing if he lost the action, and to take nothing for costs out of any money that might be awarded to him in such action," need not be reduced into writing (Jennings v. Johnson, 1873, L. R. 8 C. P. 425). A solicitor is prima facie entitled to be paid for professional services, but he cannot recover any remuneration if the defendant proves that he undertook to do the work gratuitously (Hingeston v. Kelly, 1849, 18 L. J. Ex. 360; In re Stretton, 1845, 14 Mee. & W. 806). See SOLICITOR: Solicitor's Remuneration.

6. Negligence. It will be a defence to the action if the defendant can show that through the default of the plaintiff he has derived no benefit whatever from the plaintiff's services. If through the plaintiff's negligence all steps taken prove useless (e.g. where the solicitor, through culpable ignorance, brought the action in a Court which had no jurisdiction in the matter), he can recover no part of his bill. But if the plaintiff's negligence has not been such as to deprive the defendant of all benefit, it is only a defence pro tanto to portions of the bill (Shaw v. Arden, 1832, 9 Bing. 287; 35 R. R. 526), or it may be ground for a counterclaim, as in Slater v. Cathcart, 1891, 8 T. L. R. 92. See SOLICITOR, Negligence of.

7. Interest.-A solicitor is entitled, after taxation of his bill, to interest at 4 per cent. on the amount of the bill as taxed from one month from the date of its delivery (In re Strother, 1857, 3 Kay & J. 518, 528), the mere delivery of the bill being a sufficient "demand" (Blair v. Cordner, 1887, 19 Q. B. D. 516). By the Solicitors Act, 1870, the taxing officer is also empowered to allow interest at such rate and from such times as he thinks fit, on disbursements made by a solicitor for his client (33 & 34 Vict. c. 38, s. 17). But this provision only applies to dealings between solicitor and client, and not to a case where costs are to be paid out of a fund in Court belonging in part to others (Hartland v. Murrell, 1873, L. R. 16 Eq. 285; Withington v. Neumann, 1889, 40 Ch. D. 475), nor to disbursements made by a London agent on behalf of a country solicitor, the latter not being a "client" within the Act (Ward v. Eyre, 1880, 15 Ch. D. 130).

[See Johnson's Bills of Costs, 1901, and AGENCY TERMS; SOLICITOR ; TAXATION; TAXING MASTERS.

Bill of Credit.-A letter whereby one person requests another to advance moneys to a third person named therein for a certain amount, and promises to reimburse the person making the advance. It is more usually termed a LETTER OF CREDIT (q.v.); and see CIRCULAR NOTE.

Bill of Entry.-A certificate delivered to the Customs authorities by importers of goods, giving particulars of such goods, and the port or place from which they have been imported. The term is 13

VOL. II.

likewise applied to a somewhat similar certificate given on the exportation of goods. See the Forms in Schedule B to the Customs Consolidation Act, 1876.

Bill of Exceptions.-See ERROR, WRIT OF.

Bill of Indemnity.-A bill introduced into Parliament to legalise transactions which, when they took place, were illegal, or to exempt particular persons from punishment for breaches of the law. Before the abolition of tests for municipal offices, an Indemnity Act was regularly passed to relieve dissenters from penalties for having accepted office. Such Acts have also invariably been passed after a suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act; and not infrequently to relieve peers from penalties for having voted in Parliament before taking the oath.

Bill of Pains and Penalties.-A bill introduced into Parliament, usually in the House of Lords, with the object of inflicting punishment on a person without a trial in the usual way in a Court of law. In this respect a bill of pains and penalties resembles a bill of attainder (see ATTAINDER); but while the latter imposes the punishment of death, the former inflicts some lesser penalty. The procedure in passing such bills is the same as that followed in ordinary legislation, but the parties affected by the proceedings are permitted to defend themselves by counsel and witnesses in both Houses (May's Parl. Practice, 10th ed., p. 632).

In general, bills of pains and penalties have been introduced and passed into statutes for the punishment of persons guilty of treason or other high crimes and misdemeanors, see for example the Act inflicting pains and penalties on Atterbury, Bishop of Rochester, given in Howell's State Trials, vol. xvi. p. 644. By that Act, Atterbury, on the ground of his treasonable correspondence with the Pretender, was deprived of all his offices, rendered incapable of holding any office in future within His Majesty's dominions, and condemned to perpetual banishment. At one time such bills were occasionally had recourse to in less grave offences; see a number of instances in Hatsell's Precedents of Parliament, vol. iv. pp. 307 et seq. The last instance of a bill of pains and penalties being before Parliament was in the case of Queen Caroline in 1820.

Bill of Parcels.—An account of the items and price of the goods consigned by a seller to his buyer.

Bill of Rights.-The Declaration of Rights was drawn up by the Lords spiritual and temporal and Commons convened at Westminster by William Prince of Orange. It was presented to and was accepted by William and Mary on the 13th February 1688-89. They thereupon were proclaimed king and queen. Later in the same year the Declaration of Rights was embodied in a bill, but was dropped owing to differences between the Lords and Commons as to the need of limiting the settlement of the Crown in the event of heirs failing to William, Mary, and Anne. In the second session of the Convention Parliament, though in the same year, the bill was again introduced. By that time a son had been born to Anne; the question of a further settlement of the Crown was thought to be less important; and the bill became law on the 16th December 1689.

The Acts of the Convention were confirmed as soon as that assembly became a full Parliament by the accession of William and Mary; while for further assurance the Acts of that Parliament were confirmed by its successor (1 Will. & Mary, c. 1, and 2 Will. & Mary, c. 1).

The Bill of Rights embodies the Declaration, with the addition of provisions designed to secure that no king or queen should be or should marry a papist, and to forbid the exercise of the prerogative in dispensing with the operation of statutes.

The Act consists of three clauses. The first contains: (1) A recital of the misdeeds of James; (2) a recital of his abdication, of the vacancy of the throne, and of the summons of the Convention by William of Orange; (3) a declaration of constitutional rights and liberties; (4) a tender of the Crown to William and Mary upon certain conditions as to the exercise of regal power, the limitation or settlement of the Crown, and the oaths of allegiance and supremacy; (5) an acceptance of the Crown by William and Mary, an expression of their wish that the two Houses should continue to sit, and of their readiness to affirm the rights and liberties of the people; (6) a declaration that William and Mary were king and queen, upon the conditions aforesaid; (7) securities against a king or queen being, or marrying, a papist.

The second clause forbids the exercise of the dispensing power, except as may be permitted by statute; and the third contains savings for dispensations granted in a certain form before the 23rd October 1689.

The novelties in the Bill of Rights are few. Unlike the Act of Settlement (q.v.), it does not ostensibly enact new law. But it states facts, and incidentally lays down principles which give a new character to the Constitution. These are to be found in the statements that James had abdicated, and that the throne was vacant, and in the subsequent conditions upon which the Crown was offered to William and Mary and accepted by them.

The statement that James had abdicated the throne, following, as it did, upon a recital of his misdeeds, is equivalent to a statement of his deposition. The Constitution had no machinery for cases in which the king was morally or physically unfit to govern, and the abstract character of the discussions on the use of the word "abdicate" show that its opponents considered that the whole theory of Divine Right was at stake. When the Convention agreed that James, having misgoverned, had abdicated, this view of kingship received its deathblow. See ABDICATION.

The

In declaring that the throne was vacant, another theory was overthrown, an outcome of the feudal land law, the theory that the Crown was a hereditament which, like the seisin of an estate in fee, could never be in abeyance. Thus the reign of Charles II. does not date from his accession, but from the moment of his father's death. The two theories together came to this: there must always be some one entitled to the Crown, and that title carries with it a divine sanction. Convention Parliament upheld, and the Bill of Rights confirmed, the view that a king who misgoverns may be deposed, and that the nation is then free to seek for the most suitable person to take his place. When to this statement of constitutional theory we add the conditions which William and Mary undertook to observe when they accepted the Crown, we find the principle established that monarchy in this country exists for the benefit of the people, and exists not because of a divine

right inherent in A. or X., but as a form of government which the people find to be for the common good.

Other noticeable features in the Bill of Rights are

(1) The account of the mode of summons of the Convention Parliament. The Prince of Orange, "by the advice of the Lords spiritual and temporal, and divers principal persons of the Commons," caused letters to be written to "the Lords spiritual and temporal being Protestants, and other letters to the several counties, cities, universities, boroughs, and cinque ports, for the choosing of such persons to represent them as were of right to be sent to Parliament." The Convention was a Parliament in everything but the formalities of the writ and the absence of a king to declare the causes of summons.

(2) The tender of the Crown to William and Mary was accompanied by a determination as to the exercise of the royal power as between the two sovereigns. William had declared that he would not be a king-consort, and so it was enacted that "the sole and full exercise of the royal power be only in and executed by the said Prince of Orange in the names of the said prince and princess during their joint lives."

(3) The forms of the oaths of allegiance and supremacy (q.v.) were altered and shortened. Another Act of 1689 amended the coronation oath, and removed from it some ambiguities of expression. This re-statement of the mutual obligations of sovereign and subject is illustrative of the new and practical aspect from which the monarchy was regarded.

(4) The Bill of Rights is mainly important as a re-statement of the relations of king and subject in such a form as to set aside the monarchical theories of the past two hundred years, and to form the starting-point of the modern constitution; but in three matters the Bill introduced new law.

(a) The raising or keeping a standing army within the kingdom in time of peace without consent of Parliament was declared to be against law. This was a definite prohibition. The previous check on royal action had, apart from money, been limited to the difficulty of using military law to enforce discipline. A king might have kept a standing army if he could pay for it, and if he could maintain discipline by such sanctions as the common law supplied. Now the military forces of the Crown were brought under the control of Parliament.

(b) It was stated in the Declaration that "the pretended power of suspending and dispensing with laws or the execution of laws, as it hath been assumed and exercised of late, is illegal." This left an opening for distinctions between the dispensations of James and those which his successors might choose to make. The Bill of Rights, s. 2, forbade altogether any dispensation "by non obstante of or to any statute, except a dispensation be allowed of in such statute," and except in cases to be provided for by subsequent legislation. This legislation did not take place. Sec. 3 contained a saving of charters, grants, or pardons made before the 23rd October 1689.

"Every

(e) A condition was imposed on the tenure of the Crown. person that is or shall be reconciled to, or shall hold communion with, the See or Church of Rome, or shall profess the popish religion, or shall marry a papist," is to be excluded from inheritance or possession of the throne. The people are absolved from their allegiance, and the Crown is to go to the next Protestant who would succeed if the person so reconciled to Rome were dead.

The statute does not indicate the evidence which would be sufficient, under this enactment, to vacate the throne. The only test of conformity with the requirements of the statute is that which is imposed on the reigning king or queen, who must, either at the time of coronation or on the first day of meeting of his or her first Parliament, make the declaration against transubstantiation. No test is imposed on the king or queen consort, nor does the Bill of Rights require that the reigning sovereign should be a member of the Church of England. As to the sense in which the term "Protestant" is applied to the Church of England, see CHURCH OF ENGLAND.

Bill of Sight.-A document signed by the importer of goods (or his agent) where he is unable for want of full information to make a perfect entry of the goods. This document gives the best available description of the goods, and when delivered to the collector of customs is a warrant for the provisional landing of the goods. Before actual delivery to the importer, however, a perfect entry must be made (see ss. 58-61 of the Customs Consolidation Act, 1876, and Form No. 4 in Schedule B).

Bill of Store.-A document used on the reimportation into the United Kingdom within five years of their exportation of goods which, if foreign, would be liable to duty. Such goods are entered by a bill of store which gives full particulars regarding them; the goods are then delivered free of duty (s. 6 of the Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1879).

Bill of Sufferance.-A licence formerly granted at the custom-house to a merchant, suffering him to trade from one English port to another without paying custom dues.

Billeting. In early times troops were quartered under an order from the king to the civil magistrate of the district, requiring him to provide quarters and provisions. Owing to the abuses to which it led, billeting was declared to be illegal by the Petition of Right (3 Chas. I. c. 1). In 1679, by the Act 31 Chas. II. c. 1, s. 32, it was again declared to be illegal. James II., however, issued orders for billeting. One of the grievances in the Bill of Rights (7.v.) (1 Will. & Mary, sess. 2, c. 2) was that soldiers had been quartered contrary to law. The practice of billeting, except under statutory authority, was discontinued.

When a standing army was authorised by Parliament after the Revolution, it became necessary to make legal provision for the accommodation of the army, as the barrack accommodation was insufficient; and, accordingly, in the year 1689, the second Mutiny Act (1 Will. & Mary, sess. 2, c. 4) authorised billeting in certain places, but not in private houses. The power thus conferred was subsequently re-enacted in every Mutiny Act, until it was embodied in Part III. of the Army Discipline and Regulation Act, 1879, now replaced by Part III. of the Army Act (44 & 45 Vict. c. 58). The Army Act is only kept in operation by virtue of an Act passed annually (see ARMY); billeting therefore continues illegal, except to the extent expressly allowed by the Army Act, and so long only as that Act is kept in operation. Billeting now is hardly ever resorted to for the regular forces, except when actually moving, and the introduction of railways has greatly diminished its necessity even on those occasions.