Volume XIV. drawing up" of the orders, such as is pointed out in 1849. The QUEEN V. The Inhabit ants of CROWAN. sect. 7 of stat. 12 & 13 Vict. c. 45., which enacts" that no objection on account of any omission or mistake in any such order or judgment brought up upon a return to a writ of certiorari shall be allowed unless such omission or mistake shall have been specified in the rule for issuing such certiorari." The statute, it is true, received the Royal assent only on 28th July 1849 and the rule nisi to quash the orders on certiorari was obtained in November 1848 (a); and the rule for issuing the certiorari was of course carlier. But statutes which regulate procedure apply to proceedings pending at the time when the statute passes. [Coleridge J. The result of your argument would be that every rule, made before the statute came into operation, and pending after, would be quashed.] Mere formal objections would be put an end to. [Coleridge J. The words are "any omission or mistake."] The recital in sect. 7 shews that the omissions and mistakes pointed at are those which are the subject of "exceptions or objections to the form of the order or judgment, irrespective of the truth and merits of the matters in question." [M. Smith. By sect. 20 the act is to "come into operation" on 1st November 1849.] The question is, what the "operation" is to be. The legislature merely defines the time at which the Court is to act on the statute, naming the last day of the long vacation. Bills of costs incurred before stat. 6 & 7 Vict. c. 73. s. 37. are taxable under that statute, though not taxable at all before; In re Eyre (b). The exclusion of oral acknowledgments, under sect. 1 of the Limitations (a) Pashley pointed out that a similar provision in stat. 11 & 12 Vict. c. 31. s. 6. applied only to orders of removal. (b) 2 Phillips's Rep. 367. act of 9 G. 4. c. 14., was held applicable to acknow- Queen's Bench. ledgments made before the act took effect; Towler 1849. The QUEEN V. ants of CROWAN. v. Chatterton (a); even where the cause was at issue before; Hilliard v. Lenard (b): that section used the The Inhabit words "shall be deemed," which threw the operation on to the time of trial: so here the words "shall be allowed" refer to the action of the Court. The retrospective effect given to the five years' clause in stat. 9 & 10 Vict. c 66. s. 1. furnishes an analogy in support of the interpretation now contended for. Regina v. Christchurch (c), on the proviso in the same clause, goes farther still. So stat. 3 & 4 W. 4. c. 42. s. 31., subjecting executors to costs, was construed retrospectively (d): and so was the bankrupt act, 6 G. 4. c. 16. s. 108., respecting judgments by nil dicit; Cuming v. Welsford (e). [Coleridge J. It might be that, if all had been done rightly up to the time when the statute came into operation, the statute would have applied to omissions occurring afterwards in the same proceeding: but here all the defect, if it be one, existed before the operation of the statute, and herefore cannot be cured by it.] Secondly there is no fatal defect, even supposing the statute inoperative. The certiorari admits that those who made the order are justices: the question therefore is only as to their place of acting. The original order of removal has the venue " County of Cornwall;" that applies to the whole instrument. In Regina v. Casterton (g) such a venue was held to explain the words "in and for the said county" in 66 (d) Freeman v. Moyes, 1 4. & E. 338. 1849. Volume XIV. the body of the instrument; and there an objection much like the present, in support of which Baker v. The QUEEN V. ants of CROWAN. Bacon (a) was cited, must have been overruled, as apThe Inhabit pears from the note. In Regina v. Silkstone (b) this Court, to support an order of removal, construed the words "I" and "me" to refer to each of two justices who signed it. That the indorsed orders may be explained by the original order appears from Regina v. Ashburton (c), which is to a certain extent supported by Regina v. Stainforth (d). In the last mentioned case, the doctrine of looking for evidence beyond the instrument itself was upheld and it will apply very strongly here, where the indorsed orders are mere appendages to the original order. [Erle J. referred to Regina v. Totness (e).] The case ordinarily cited against this mode of interpretation is Regina v. Shipston upon Stour (g): but the authority of that case is much impaired by the decision in Regina v. Ashburton (c). “That construction which supports, and not that which destroys the instrument, may fairly be adopted;" per Holroyd J., in Rex v. St. Mary's, Leicester (h), where the words "said county" were interpreted by the margin of the order. That case and dictum were relied upon by Taunton J. in Rex v. Countesthorpe (i). [Coleridge J. We have no marginal words in the orders now in dispute: you endeavour to explain them by the venue of an order made, long before, by magistrates of whom one only makes the last two orders.] If these orders are to be construed like original orders of re 1849. The QUEEN V. The Inhabit. ants of CROWAN. moval, they cannot be supported. But they are no Queen's Bench. more than continuances of the first proceeding. At any rate the last two, being made simul et semel, will stand or fall together. Regina v. Stockton (a) may be cited as an authority against this: but there, as Patteson J. explained, no inconsistency would have been incurred by supposing that the complaint was made within the jurisdiction and the order made out of it. And, so far as that case applies here, it is overruled by Regina v. Goole (b). Lastly the Court will be unwilling to quash these proceedings on certiorari. In Regina v. Hatfield Peveril (c) they declined to quash a certificate of lunacy on certiorari. [Erle J. There the certificate was not in the character of a proceeding in foro contentioso.] Montague Smith, contrà. The disposition of the Court, last adverted to, will at any rate prevail only where there is jurisdiction: here none appears; and no presumption that acts have been properly done can be made for the purpose of establishing jurisdiction; per Holroyd J. in Rex v. All Saints, Southampton (d); because the presumption is raised only by assuming that jurisdiction exists. As to the suggestion that the venue will aid, the orders before the Court have no venue; and the fact that a previous order was properly made affords no inference that an order made two years later and by Volume XIV. 1849. The QUEEN V. The Inhabitants of CROWAN. considered as annexed to these orders, it would not aid. There was a venue in Regina v. Stockton (a); but it was held nevertheless that the order did not shew all to have been done in the place named. That case is conclusive against the orders here: and Regina v. Newton Ferrers (b) also shews that it must strictly appear that the persons who act are acting in the place where they have jurisdiction. COLERIDGE J. The rule must be made absolute on the objection to the orders. We intimated, in the early part of the argument, that we thought stat. 12 & 13 Vict. c. 45. s. 7. could not apply to these proceedings. |