AND LAW PROFESSOR AT GRESHAM COLLEGE, LATE REGIUS PROFESSOR OF LAWS SECOND EDITION, REVISED AND CAMBRIDGE: DEIGHTON, BELL, AND CO. PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. times of Ayala and But it must be ac THE science of International Law has never lacked able and eloquent exponents from the Alberic Gentili down to our own. knowledged that, among modern authors at all events, there are three whose learning and labour, as judges and writers, have shed glory over the legal literature of the United States, and have earned the singular distinction of being recognized as authorities on International Law throughout Europe. I need scarcely say that I speak of the honoured names of Story, Wheaton, and Kent. Of these three, the expressed views and opinions of the first on public International Law have not been put forth in any regular connected shape, but are to be found in short essays, and in those admirable judgments which have made his name a household word among English lawyers. The second has indeed published an able, a learned, and an impartial treatise, but the notes that now accompany the author's text, laborious and exhaustive as they are, render the work too large and unwieldy for the student, and too discursive and fatiguing to the general reader; in addition to which they are open to the charge of strong prejudice and partial judgment. The third, Mr Chancellor Kent, has given us the result of years of professional |