was not positively criminal, in the sense that the law would punish it, while maintaining that it was still unlawful as being contra bonos mores. The decision is really no authority on a point of criminal law, as the matter was not fully argued; the Court merely refused an ex parte application for a rule nisi in a civil case in which only £20 was in dispute.

On the other hand, there is strong authority in favour of Lord Coleridge's statement of the law. His father, the late Mr. Justice Coleridge, directed the jury to precisely the same effect in the case of R. v. Pooley, tried at Bodmin Summer Assizes in 1857. And in the House of Lords he said (9 Cl. & Fin., at p. 539): "The only safe, and, as it seems to me, practical rule, is that which I have pointed at, and which depends on the sobriety and reverence and seriousness with which the teaching and believing, however erroneous, are maintained.” Mr. Justice Best gave a similar direction to the jury in the case of R. v. Mary Ann Carlile, 1821, 1 St. Tri. N. S., at pp. 1046, 1047. So did Mr. Justice Erskine in R. v. Adams and R. v. Holyoake in 1842. The law laid down by all the judges in Shore v. Wilson (Lady Hewley's Case, 1842, 9 Cl. & Fin. 355) is in entire accord with Lord Coleridge's view, and there can be no higher authority than this. The law laid down in Shore v. Wilson and in R. v. Ramsey and Foote is, therefore, it is concluded, at all events "the better opinion," and it is the only law on the subject which it is possible to enforce in the present daythe only law which is consonant with our modern ideas of universal toleration and religious equality.

See CHRISTIANITY, CURSING, HERESY, and NONCONFORMIST.

Bleaching and Dyeing.-Bleaching and dyeing works come within the statutory definition of non-textile factories (1 Edw. VII. c. 22, s. 149 (a) and Sched. 6). Such works are therefore subject to all the provisions of the Factory Acts applicable to non-textile factories (see FACTORIES AND WORKSHOPS), with certain exceptions here noted. The hours of employment and regulations for children, young persons and women, and the times allowed for meals, are to be the same as if the works were a textile factory (ibid. s. 28), except that nothing in the section shall prevent the continuous employment of a woman, young person or child in the works for five hours without an interval of half an hour for a meal. In the process of Turkey-red dyeing, young persons and women may be employed on Saturdays until 4.30 P.M., but the additional number of hours must be included in the week's limit, which must in no case be exceeded (ibid. s. 44); they may also be employed at any time to prevent any damage which may arise from spontaneous combustion in the process of Turkey-red dyeing, or from any extraordinary atmospheric influence in the process of open-air bleaching (ibid. s. 49, and Sched. 2).

Cleaning and dyeing processes are often carried on with the aid of chemicals liable to evolve noxious gases, and so are brought within the purview of the special legislation applicable to chemical works. It should be borne in mind that local authorities have the power to make by-laws regarding the employment of children, either in the nature of total prohibition, or of regulation. See Employment of Children Act, 1903 (3 Edw. VII. c. 45). See generally Redgrave's Factory Acts, 1904, 10th ed. See also CHEMICAL PROCESS.

Blended Fund.-A direction to sell real estate, coupled with the blending into one fund of the proceeds of the real and personal estates of a testator by his will, is regarded as a circumstance tending to indicate an intention to convert the whole in any event so as to make the whole pass under the will by the description of personal estate (see Lewin on Trusts, 9th ed., p. 167). Where realty and personalty are once for all blended together and directed to be converted, interests in the fund produced, which are undisposed of by the will, pass to the residuary legatee (see Theobald on Wills, 6th ed., p. 251). The leading cases for these propositions are Durour v. Motteux, 1749, 1 Ves. Sen. 320; 27 E. R. 1057; 34 R. R. 71n.; and Mallabar v. Mallabar, Ca. t. Talb. 78; 25 E. R. 672; 34 R. R. 68n. See the discussion of the former by Lord Eldon in his argument in Ackroyd v. Smithson, 2 White and Tudor's L. C., and the notes to the last cited case. See also Spencer v. Wilson, 1873, L. R. 16 Eq. 501; Court v. Buckland, 1876, 45 L. J. Ch. 214, and the cases there cited.

Definition and Introductory Observations. The blocking of a harbour, port, or sea-board by hostile ships, in order to prevent ingress or egress, and by stopping the supply of provisions or ammunition, compel surrender without bombardment (q.v.) or siege (q.v.) [cf. The Arthur, 1814, 1 Dods. 423-5].

The right of the belligerent (q.v.) to establish a blockade is based on the right of sovereignty which the belligerent exercises over the territory of the enemy wherever he can do so. In other words, he closes the enemy's port to everybody, including neutrals, as the enemy himself would be entitled to do.

It is therefore not permissible to blockade straits or international rivers which serve as the necessary means of communication between neutrals. Thus the blockade of the mouth of the Danube by the Russians during the war of 1877-78 was unjustifiable according to international law.

By art. 24 of the Treaty of San Stefano (March 3, 1878), it is specifically provided that the Bosphorus and Dardanelles shall remain open in time of war as in time of peace to the merchant vessels of neutral States on their way to or from Russian ports. It is also specifically provided by the Convention of Constantinople (1888) concerning the Suez Canal that it shall never be blockaded, and that no act of war shall be committed in it or its ports, nor within three miles thereof.

The practice of States as regards the mode in which a blockade must be exercised in order to be binding upon neutrals is not yet identical, though certain limitations in the exercise of the right of blockade are now universally acknowledged.

Thus the fourth article of the Declaration of Paris (q.v.), stating that "blockades, in order to be binding, must be effective, that is to say, maintained by a force sufficient really to prevent access to the coast of the enemy," and intended to give a final sanction to the abolition of "fictitious" or "paper" blockades, may now be considered as a universally admitted principle of international law. See, for history of paper blockades, Fauchille, Du blocus Maritime, 1882; Martens, Recueil des traités de la Russie, t. xi.; [Smith and Sibley, International Law as Interpreted during the Russo-Japanese War, pp. 321 et seq., 338.

"Paper Blockades," i.e. blockades either of a coast or of a line of ports, have not, however, been extinguished. Thus in the Spanish-American War of 1898 the United States blockaded by proclamation large portions of Cuba and the island of San Juan; and the recent Japanese blockade of Port Arthur and Dalny presents an example of an effective blockade of a line of ports.]

Conditions of Effective Blockade.-Jurists are practically agreed that a blockade to be in accordance with international law must fulfil the following conditions:

1. It must be ordered by the responsible authority of the belligerent power;

2. It must be brought to the knowledge of the neutral whom it concerns; and

3. It must be maintained with forces sufficient to prevent its being violated.

Blockade must be ordered by Competent Authority. The first of these conditions follows from the principle that States only know each other through their official representatives.

[But the power to order a blockade may be delegated (The Rolla, 1807, 6 C. Rob. 364, 366). Thus the blockade of Port Arthur by the Japanese was instituted by Admiral Togo " by command of the Imperial Japanese Government" (Lond. Gaz., May 31, 1904; Smith and Sibley, ubi sup., at p. 340.]

Notification of Blockade.-As regards the second, it is usual to give the notice to the local authorities of the blockaded place, and also through the diplomatic channel to the neutral Powers. [The English and American practice has been to give either diplomatic or special notification of a blockade, and sometimes both. In order that a blockade may be valid, it must" (according to English and American usage) "be either (a) a public or governmental blockade diplomatically notified, or (b) a de facto blockade, accompanied by notification on the spot given by a vessel of the blockading squadron. According to the opposed foreign usage, though not according to the theory of foreign jurists, there is no such thing as a diplomatically notified blockade, and therefore the only valid form of blockade is the de facto blockade" with special notification (Smith and Sibley, 351). "In the former case the onus probandi of proving that the blockade does not exist lies on the claimant, a notified blockade being presumed to exist till the notification is revoked. In the case of a de facto blockade there is no presumption as to continuance, and the captor must prove that it existed at the date of the seizure" (ibid. p. 353); and the ignorance of the master of the ship seized may be admitted as an excuse for sailing in a doubtful direction (The Neptunus, 1799, 1 C. Rob. 113.]

The question of what constitutes a proper general notification has given rise to controversy. In the Crimean War the notifications by

Great Britain were minute in all particulars. On the proclamation of the blockade of the coast of the Southern by the Northern States in the American Civil War, Lord Lyons, on behalf of Great Britain, pointed out to the United States Government "the extreme vagueness of the information" given, and asked if precise notices would be issued for each Southern port as soon as the actual blockade commenced. The United States Government replied that "the practice of the United States was not to issue such notices, but to notify the blockade individually to each vessel approaching the blockading port, and to inscribe a memorandum of the notice having been given on the ship's papers. No vessel was liable to seizure which had not been individually warned. The fact of there being blockading ships present to give the warning was the best notice and best proof that the port was actually and effectively blockaded." The "individual" notification of the blockade was also followed by France in the Franco-German War. The practice of France, [and a similar usage has prevailed in Italy, Spain and Sweden], is to consider (1) that a general notification is not sufficient of itself to warrant the conclusion that neutrals knew of the existence of a blockade; and (2) that in order that the blockade, with all its consequences, may become legally binding, the usual diplomatic notification must be completed in each particular case by a special notification to neutrals who present themselves at the line of the blockade; in other words, the diplomatic notification is considered neither essential nor obligatory, but the special notification is absolutely so. (Hautefeuille, Des droits et devoirs des nations neutres, 1858, 2nd ed., vol. ii. p. 223; Repertoire générale alphabéthique du droit français, 1891, vol. viii. "Blocus.") [The French proclamation of the blockade of Formosa, however, in 1884 contained no provision for special notification to neutrals.]

The view of jurists as laid down by the Institute of International Law seems to imply the necessity of a diplomatic notification, which "must not only define its limits in latitude and longitude, and the precise moment of its commencement, but also state the time granted to merchant vessels for unlading, relading, and leaving the port." (Règlement des prises, 1882, 1883, and 1887, arts. 7 and 36.)

"The commander of the blockade," adds the Institute, “must, moreover, give notice of it to the authorities and consuls at the blockaded place. The same formalities are necessary after the re-establishment of a blockade which may have ceased to be effective, or when the blockade is extended to new places. (Règlement des prises, art. 37.)

Period for Withdrawal of Neutral Vessels.-The period fixed by Great Britain and France in the notification for neutral vessels to withdraw from the blockaded ports during the Crimean War was fifteen days. This was also the time granted by the United States during the Civil War. That granted by France, when she blockaded the Baltic ports during the Franco-German War, was ten days. [On the blockade of Formosa by the French, however, in 1884, neutral vessels were only given three days to leave the blockaded ports.] Ten to fifteen days may, in fact, be considered the usual period in current practice, unless exceptional circumstances, as where the port is at some distance up a river subject to the blockade, require it to be longer. [See Hall, International Law, 5th ed., p. 707.]

Blockade must be Effective.-As regards the third point, a neutral vessel cannot be held liable to the penalties of violation of the blockade

if it at any time ceases to be effectively enforced. This follows from the Declaration of Paris (q.v.), and has been laid down as a principle in the articles of the Institute of International Law in the following

form:

"A blockade, after having been declared and notified, is effective when there exists an imminent danger in entering or leaving the blockaded port by a sufficient number of warships, either in station or only momentarily absent from their station.

"If the blockading squadron depart from their station for any motive other than exigencies of weather, the blockade may be considered as having ceased, and must then be declared and notified anew." (Règlement des prises, arts. 35 and 38.)

[The degree of proximity of the blockading squadron to the blockaded port necessary to constitute an effective blockade will vary with the growth of naval power. The Japanese blockaded Port Arthur from a distance of over twenty miles. The number of ships required for the constitution of a valid blockade will also vary with circumstances. Riga was blockaded in the Crimean War by a single ship in the Lysen Ort, which forms the only navigable entrance to the Gulf of Riga (The Franciska, 1855, 10 Moo. P. Č. 37; 14 E. R. 403); and in 1877-78 Turkey blockaded the coasts of the Black Sea by two ships in the Bosphorus.]

The British Government expressed its view of the meaning of the fourth article of the Declaration of Paris in two letters to the British minister at Washington during the American Civil War.

Her

"It appears," wrote Earl Russell on February 15, 1862, "from the reports received from Her Majesty's naval officers, that although a sufficient blockading force is stationed off those ports, various ships have successfully eluded the blockade; a question might therefore be raised as to whether such a blockade should be considered as effective. Majesty's Government, however, are of opinion that, assuming that the blockade is duly notified, and also that a number of ships is stationed and remains at the entrance of a port, sufficient really to prevent access to it, or to create an evident danger of entering or leaving it, and that these ships do not voluntarily permit ingress or egress, the fact that various ships may have successfully escaped through it (as in particular instances here referred to) will not of itself prevent the blockade from being an effective one by international law. [Cf. The Rolla, 1807, 6 C. Rob. 364, 374. But a large number of successful evasions of a blockade may destroy its efficacy (Hall, International Law, 5th ed., 701).] The adequacy of the force to maintain a blockade being always and necessarily a matter of fact and evidence, and one as to which different opinions may be entertained, a neutral State ought to exercise the greatest caution with reference to the disregard of a de facto and notified blockade; and ought not to disregard it except when it entertains a conviction, which is shared by neutrals generally having an interest in the matter, that the power of blockade is abused by a State either unable to institute or maintain it, or unwilling from some motive or other to do so."

The representative of the Confederate States having protested against this interpretation, Earl Russell wrote, on February 10, 1863, that he saw no reason to qualify the statements he had already made. It appeared "to H.M. Government to be sufficiently clear that the Declaration of Paris could not be intended to mean that a port must be so