'Any document or certificate in this section mentioned purporting to be signed by an officer authorised to act under the Schedule to this Act for carrying into effect the convention, shall be admissible in evidence without proof of such signature, and if purporting to be signed by any other person shall, if certified by any such officer to have been so signed, be deemed, until the contrary is proved, to have been signed by such other person.

'If any person forges the signature of any such officer to any such document as above mentioned, or makes use of any such document, knowing the signature thereto to be forged, such person shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, with or without hard labour, and on conviction on indictment to imprisonment with or without hard labour for a term not exceeding two years.'

By the Lunacy Act, 1890 (53 Vict. c. 5), sec. 144, 'Every office copy of the whole of an order or report confirmed by fiat purporting to be signed by a Master and sealed or stamped with the seal of the Masters' Office, and every office copy of a certificate in lunacy, shall at all times, and on behalf of all persons, and whether for the purposes of this Act or otherwise, be admitted as evidence of the order, report, or certificate of which it purports to be a copy, without further proof thereof.' (x)

By the Commissioners for Oaths Act, 1889 (52 Vict. c. 10), sec. 6, 'Any document purporting to have affixed, impressed, or subscribed thereon or thereto the seal and signature of any person authorised by this section to administer an oath (y) in testimony of any oath, affidavit, or act being administered, taken, or done by or before him, shall be admitted in evidence without proof of the seal or signature being the seal or signature of that person or of the official character of that person.'

By the Inland Revenue Act, 1890 (53 & 54 Vict. c. 21), sec. 24, 'All regulations, minutes, and notices purporting to be signed by a secretary or assistant secretary of the Commissioners and by their order, shall, until the contrary is proved, be deemed to have been so signed, and to have been made and issued by the Commissioners, and may be proved by the production of a copy thereof purporting to have been so signed.

In any proceeding the letter or instructions under which a collector or officer or person employed in relation to inland revenue has acted, shall be sufficient evidence of any order issued by the Treasury or by the Commissioners, and mentioned or referred to therein.

'Evidence of a person being reputed to be or having acted as a commissioner or collector or officer or person employed in relation to inland revenue shall, unless the contrary is proved, be sufficient evidence of his appointment or authority to act as such.'

(r) As to forging the seal or signature, see vol. ii. p. 692.

(4) Every British ambassador, envoy, minister, chargé d'affaires, and secretary of embassy or legation, exercising his func

tions in any foreign country, and every British consul, general consul, vice-consul, acting consul, pro-consul, and consular agent exercising his functions in any foreign place.

By the Merchant Shipping Act, 1894 (57 & 58 Vict. c. 60), secs. 694 and 695, provision is made for the proof of documents made admissible (z) in evidence by that Act, and of examined copies of such documents.

Records. Records are proved either by producing the record itself, or by an exemplification, or by a copy. (a) As a general rule,when nul tiel record is pleaded, the record, if a record of the same court, is produced and inspected by the Court; if a record of an inferior court, it is proved by the tenor of the record certified under a writ of certiorari issued by the superior court; if a record of a concurrent superior court, it is proved by the tenor certified under a writ of certiorari, issued out of chancery, and transmitted thence by writ of mittimus. (b) The issue of nul tiel record seldom occurs in criminal cases, except in the instance of a plea of autrefois acquit, &c. (e)

Wherever it was necessary to prove the finding or the trial of an indictment, the record must formerly have been regularly drawn up, and either produced, or an examined copy of it produced and proved. Where, therefore, an indictment for a conspiracy alleged that at a Court of Quarter Sessions an indictment was preferred against A. B., and found by the grand jury, the Court of King's Bench held that the indictment endorsed a true bill, but without any caption to it, and the minutes made by the clerk of the peace containing the style of the sessions, and the minutes of the business done at it, were not sufficient evidence of the finding of the bill, and that the record itself or an examined copy was the only legitimate evidence to prove it. (d) And so it has been held that a plea of autrefois convict cannot be supported by the indictment with the finding of the grand jury upon it. (e) So where the prisoner was in fact confined in Abingdon gaol, and the governor of that gaol proved that he was present in Court when the prisoner was tried for housebreaking, and heard sentence passed upon him, and he produced the calendar of the sentences passed at those assizes signed by the clerk of assize, and stated that there was not any other authority for carrying into execution the sentences of the Court at the assizes, even in cases of murder; Maule, J., held that this was not evidence of the prisoner

(2) By sec. 719, all documents purporting to be made, issued, or written by or under the direction of the Board of Trade, shall under certain conditions be admissible in evidence under the Act.

(a) 1 Stark. Ev. 388.

(b) Tidd. 801, 804. Rosc. Ev. 73. Before the 14 & 15 Vict. c. 99, s. 13, where a record of a court of quarter sessions was pleaded in a court of oyer and terminer, or the converse, it ought, in strictness, to have been proved as above stated: but the practice, it is said, was to apply simply to the clerk of the peace, or clerk of assize, who would make it out for you without writ, or would attend with the record itself at the trial. Arch. Cr. Pl. 124. See now the above Act, noticed, post, p. 450, which it seems applies in the cases mentioned in it, where there is an issue of nul tiel record.

(c) In which case it seems the 14 & 15

Vict. c. 99, s. 13, post, p. 450, applies. Upon this plea, the proof of the issue lies on the defendant, and he will have to prove the record of acquittal; and also, it has been said, the averments of identity in his plea. 1 Arch. Cr. Pl. 89. But this seems doubtful, for if the replication is nul tiel record, it should seem to admit the identity. See vol. i. p. 38 et seq.

(d) R. v. Smith, 8 B. & C. 341.

(e) R. v. Bowman, 6 C. & P. 101. See the cases collected in note (h), vol. i. p. 49, and Porter v. Cooper, 6 C. & P. 354, and R. v. Thring, 5 C. & P. 507, where Gurney, B., held that the minute-book of the Court of Quarter Sessions was not admissible in evidence on an indictment for perjury to prove the trial on which the perjury was alleged to have been committed; and R. v. Bellamy, R. & M. N. P. R. 171.

being in lawful custody, as the sentence of the Court at the assizes could only be proved by the record. (f) Where on an indictment for the non-repair of certain highways, upon the trial of which the question was, whether a parish was bound to repair all the highways in it as a parish, or the several townships the highways situate in each of them, in order to prove the conviction of the parish upon a similar indictment in 1806, a witness proved that he went to the house of the clerk of assize for the Oxford circuit, in London, and there saw him and his son, and asked for the record, and received a written paper, which he produced, which he and the son of the clerk of assize compared with a document then produced as the record, and which the witness stated he thought was on paper, but he was not sure whether it was on paper or parchment, but it was much torn, and the son of the clerk of assize stated that he could not recollect the particular transaction; but the practice was, when a record was required, to make it out from the minutes and the indictment on an original parchment roll, which was signed by the clerk of assize, and a copy was then made on paper and compared with the roll, and stamped with the Oxford circuit stamp, which copy was given to the party applying for it, and that, as far as his own experience went, the roll was drawn up from the indictment and minutes, without any paper draft in the first instance being made, and that he never knew of a paper-copy having been kept; and that the paper produced was signed by his father and stamped with the circuit stamp; Coleridge, J., held that the paper was admissible as an examined copy of the record. (g)

The minutes of a court of oyer and terminer may be received, where the matter to be proved by the minutes has occurred before the same Court sitting under the same commission; as upon the trial of Horne Tooke, where the minutes of the Court were received as proof of the trial of Hardy. (h) So the indictment with the officer's note upon it of a verdict of not guilty is sufficient evidence during the same assizes, upon a plea of autrefois acquit, that the prisoner was acquitted upon such indictment. (i) And so the caption of the general gaol delivery of the Central Criminal Court, the indictment with the note of the prisoner's plea, the verdict and the sentence entered thereon, together with the minutes of the trial entered by the officer of the Court in the minute book, are sufficient evidence at a subsequent session of the Central Criminal Court. (j)

But although it was once held, on the trial of an indictment for perjury alleged to have been committed on the trial of an appeal against an order of removal, that the sessions book produced by the clerk of the peace was not sufficient to prove the trial of the appeal; (k)

yet where on an appeal against an order of removal the book containing the proceedings at the sessions was proved to be the original sessions book, regularly made up and recorded after each sessions by the clerk of the peace, from minutes taken by him in Court, and the minutes of each sessions were headed by an entry containing the style and date of the sessions, and the names of the justices in the usual form of a caption, and no other record was kept of the proceedings of the sessions than the said sessions book, and it had always been received in evidence in the Court of Quarter Sessions, for the purpose of proving them; the Court of Queen's Bench held, that such book was properly received in order to prove the quashing of an order of removal on the trial of a former appeal between the same parishes. (1)

When nul tiel record is not pleaded, but it is necessary to prove a record in support of some allegation in the pleadings, the record may be proved either by an exemplification or a copy. Exemplifications are either under the great seal or under the seal of the Court in which the record is produced, and are admissible without proof of the genuineness of the seal. (m) A record may also be proved by an examined copy, except upon the issue of nul tiel record. (n) The copy must be proved by some witness who has examined it line for line with the original, or who has examined the copy while another read the original. (o) It ought to appear that the record from which the copy was taken was seen in the hands of the proper officer, or in the proper place for the custody of such records. (p) So an office copy in the same Court in the same cause, is equivalent to a record; but in another court, or in another cause in the same Court, the copy must be proved. (q) In order to prove a verdict, a copy of the whole record, including the judgment, is necessary, for otherwise it would not appear but that the judgment had been arrested, or a new trial granted. (r) Where an indictment for perjury alleged that Burraston was convicted upon an indictment for perjury, upon the trial of which the perjury in question was alleged to have been committed, and it appeared by the record when produced that Burraston had been convicted, but the judgment against him reversed upon error after the finding of the present indictment, it was held that the record produced supported the allegation in the indictment. (s)

By the 14 & 15 Vict. c. 99, s. 13, Whenever in any proceeding whatever (t) it may be necessary to prove the trial and conviction

(1) R. v. Yeovely, 8 A. & E. 806, and see per Patteson, J., in R. v. Nottingham Old Water Works Company, 6 A. & E.

355.

297.

(m) Tooker v. Duke of Beaufort, Sayer,

(n) Upon this issue the record in certain cases can be proved in the mode pointed out by the 14 & 15 Vict. c. 99, s. 13, infra.

(0) Reid v. Margison, 1 Campb. 469. It is not necessary for the persons examining to exchange papers, and read them alternately. Gyles v. Hill, ibid. n. As to the examination of the whole of the rules of a

or acquittal of any person charged with any indictable offence, it shall not be necessary to produce the record of the conviction or acquittal of such person, or a copy thereof, but it shall be sufficient. that it be certified or purport to be certified under the hand of the clerk of the Court or other officer having the custody of the records of the Court where such conviction or acquittal took place, or by the deputy of such clerk or other officer, that the paper produced is a copy of the record of the indictment, trial, conviction, and judgment or acquittal, as the case may be, omitting the formal parts thereof.' And see the 14 & 15 Vict. c. 100, s. 22. (u)

By 34 & 35 Vict. c. 112, s. 18, a previous conviction may be proved in any legal proceeding whatever against any person by producing a record or extract of such conviction, and by giving proof of the identity of the person against whom the conviction is sought to be proved with the person appearing in the record or extract of conviction to have been convicted. A record or extract of a conviction shall in the case of an indictable offence consist of a certificate containing the substance and effect only (omitting the formal part of the indictment and conviction), and purporting to be signed by the clerk of the Court or other officer having the custody of the records of the Court by which such conviction was made, or purporting to be signed by the deputy of such clerk or officer; and in the case of a summary conviction shall consist of a copy of such conviction purporting to be signed by any justice of the peace having jurisdiction over the offence in respect of which such conviction was made, or to be signed by the proper officer of the Court by which such conviction was made, or by the clerk or other officer of any court to which such conviction has been returned. A record or extract of any conviction made in pursuance of this section shall be admissible in evidence without proof of the signature or official character of the person appearing to have signed the same. A previous conviction in any one part of the United Kingdom may be proved against a prisoner in any other part of the United Kingdom, and a conviction before the passing of this Act shall be admissible in the same manner as if it had taken place after the passing thereof. A fee not exceeding five shillings may be charged for a record of a conviction given in pursuance of this section. The mode of proving a previous conviction authorised by this section shall be in addition to and not in exclusion of any other authorised mode of proving such conviction.'

The several statutes which afford facilities for proving a previous conviction by means of a certificate of the clerk of assize, or clerk of the peace, are made for the more easy proof of such convictions, and do not prevent the proof of the previous conviction by an examined copy of the record. (v)

(u) vol. i. p. 332.

(v) R. v. Henry Saunders, Gloucester Spr. Ass. 1829, MSS. C. S. G. The prisoner was indicted under the 15 Geo. 2, c. 28, s. 2, for uttering base coin after a previous conviction, and Parke, J., held that an examined copy of the record of the previous conviction was sufficient evidence

thereof; for the statute, by giving an easier means of proof under sec. 9, did not exclude the proof by means of an examined copy. See also R. v. Carter, 1 Den. C. C. 65. Northam v. Latouche, 4 C. & P. 140. Edwards v. Buchanan, 3 B. & Ad. 788, R. v. Manwaring, D. & B. 132.