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sioners shall subdivide each euch district into two or more electoral divisions, to be called the upper or fresh water and lower or tidal electoral divisions of such districts, and upon the maps aforesaid the said commissioners shall cause to be delineated the limits and boundaries of such electoral divisions; and the said commissioners from time to time, may alter any such district or electoral division and fix other boundaries for the same, duly publishing and describing the same as herein-before provided.

4. That for each district conservators of fisheries shall be annually elected and appointed as herein-after provided.

5. That the said commissioners shall be authorized and empowered to determine and declare the number of conservators not less than three nor more than nine, which shall be elected and returned from each such electoral division to represent the same, and the persons so to be returned for each electoral division shall be the elected conservators of fisheries for the district until the next annual election.

6. That if in any district one or more persons shall possess a several or exclusive fishery or fisheries therein, as owner, lessee, or occupier, valued under the acts for the relief of the poor in Ireland at £100 yearly or upwards, he or they shall be entitled to sit with the elected conservators for such district, and shall be deemed er officio a conservator or conservators for the same, so long as he or they shall possess such fishery or fisheries, and shall vote, and have all the powers and privileges under this act which the said elected conservators may individually possess: provided that where a fishery so rated shall be held by several persons as owners, lessees, or occupiers, one person alone shall sit and act as a conservator in respect of such fishery. 7. That the elected conservators shall be elected annually by the persons who shall have paid licence duty and been licensed within each electoral division, under this act, in the manner herein-after mentioned.

8. That after the 1st of January, 1849, all engines, nets, instruments, devices used for the taking of salmon, trout, pollen, or fish of the salmon and trout kind, or for the taken of eels, and all fixed salmon, trout, or eel fisheries within any district, or on or off the sea-coast, shall before the same be used in the said year or any subsequent year, be duly licensed and rated in the manner herein-after prescribed, upon payment of the licence duty or rate, as the case may be, herein-after provided.

9. That every person who shall have paid licence under this act, within and for any such electoral division within any year, shall be entitled to vote at the election of the conservators to be chosen for such division held for such current year, either in person or by proxy, according to such regulations and forms for the election as shall be fixed by the commissioners, such proxy being a qualified elector, and shall have a vote or votes according to the following scale: (that is to say,) if the licence duty so paid by such person shall not amount to two pounds, one vote; if the same shall amount to two pounds, and not to five pounds, two votes; and if the same shall amount to five pounds, and not to ten pounds, three votes; and if the same shall exceed ten pounds, four votes.

10. That for the purposes of the first meetings in each and every electoral division under this act for the election of conservators, the said commissioners shall fix and determine the scale of licence duties and rates to be paid in respect of all engines, nets, instruments, or devices whatsoever used for the taking of salmon, trout, pollen, or fish of the salmon or trout kind, and for the taking of eels, and for all fixed salmon, trout, or eel fisheries within each district, or on or off the sea-coast thereof, and shall give public notice of the same within each electoral division, and such scale of licence duties and rates shall remain in force until the same shall be altered under this act : provided that such licence duties and rates respectively shall not exceed the amount of the respective licence duties and rates specified in the schedule to this act.

11. That the said commissioners shall appoint the places and times at which all persons who shall have paid the licence duty as herein provided in each electoral division of each district for the year 1849, shall assemble in the month of July in that year, the commissioners giving two week's

notice thereof by hand-bills and advertisements in two or more newspapers circulating in such district; and all persons who shall have paid any such licence duty for such year within such electoral division shall vote at such respective meeting, and shall choose a chairman to preside thereat: provided that the said commissioners, or any one or more of them, may attend and preside at any such first meeting, instead of such chairman.

12. That the persons so assembled in each electoral division at such first meetings, and at all annual meetings for such elections, and who shall be qualified to vote under this act, shall have power to elect the appointed number of persons to represent them as conservators of the fisheries for the ensuing year; and the chairman as aforesaid, or the said commissioners, may receive the votes of the persons so assembled, and may declare the persons who shall have received the greater number of votes to be the elected conservators; and the chairman of such meeting, or the said commissioners, shall certify under his or their hand the election of each conservator. and furnish him with a certificate, which shall be sufficient authority for him to act as such conservator, and shall also within four days after such election cause a list of such conservators, with a statement of the residence and post town of each, to be transmitted to the office of the said commissioners; and the persons so elected for each electoral division of a district shall conjointly form, with any such ex officio conservators as aforesaid, a board of conservators of fisheries for such district, until the formation of a new board in like manner in the ensuing year, and so in like manner in each succeeding year.

13. That after the first board of conservators of fisheries for any district shall have been formed, the board of conservators for each such district shall be and are hereby empowered, from time to time, to fix and determine the amount of licence duty to be paid for each year after the year 1849, for every engine, net, instrument, weir, or device set forth in the schedule to this act, used for the taking of salmon, trout, pollen, or fish of the salmon kind, and for the taking of eels, within each such district, or on or off the sea-coast thereof, and for every engine, net, instrument, weir, or device which may be proposed to be used, and which is not enumerated in the said schedule; and the board of conservators may fix and determine the rate per centum to be paid for each year after the year 1849, upon the poor-law valuation, in the cases of fixed and established salmon, trout, or eel fisheries, which are designated several fisheries, as herein-before mentioned, within each district, or on or off the sea-coast thereof; provided that no licence duty or rate to be fixed by the said conservators shall exceed the respective amount of duty specified in the said schedule, or the rate of ten per centum on the poor law valuation of established or several fisheries; and that any alteration in the same so to be made shall commence and have effect on and from the first day of January in the then succeeding year.

14. That the board of conservators in each district shall fix and determine and duly publish notice of the times and places for the general meetings of such board, and also the times and places for the then next annual meetings of electors in each electoral division for the election of conservators for the same.

15. That if the persons entitled to meet and elect such representatives or conservators in any one or more electoral division or divisions of a district shall fail or neglect for any year so to do, the representatives or conservators of any other one or more electoral division or divisions of such district for which conservators shall have been elected shall be empowered to act in all matters and things relating to such district under the provisions of this act.

16. That if no one electoral division in a district shall in any year elect conservators, the previously-existing board of conservators for such district may continue to act as conservators for such district for that year.

17. That for the purposes of this act, at all district meetings of the board of conservators, three of the persons entitled and empowered to act and vote thereat, shall form a quorum, and all matters and things shall be determined and decided by the majority of such persons so assembled; and if on any matters upon which a difference may arise the votes

shall be equal, the chairman shall, in addition to his original vote, be edtitled to give a casting vote.

18. That any such board of conservators assembled at a district meeting may fix time and place for holding a general annual meeting, and hold adjourned meetings; and any three conservators may call special meetings, provided that notice of the place and time of each such special meeting, subscribed by three or more conservators, or by the clerk of the board, on their requisition to him, shall be inserted at least twice in some two newspapers circulating in the county or counties in which such district shall be situate, at least ten days before such meeting shall be held, or that the clerk of such board shall give ten days notice in writing of such meetings to each conservator entitled to act within such district.

THE LATE PETER BURROWES, ESQ.

APRIL, 1849. Contents:

THE DUBLIN UNIVERSITY MAGAZINE for
Nineveh.-Sympathies. By Speranza.-The Sacking of Seville-Our
Portrait Gallery, No. LIL-Peter Burrowes, Esq.,
With an Etching-
My First Legacy.-Ceylon and the Cingalese. The Times," Lord
Brougham, and the Irish Law Courts.-The Seamen of the Cyclades; a
Tale of Modern Greece. Conclusion.-Sir Robert Peel on Confiscation,
-Northern India.-The Tuscan Revolution.

Dublin: JAMES MCGLASHAN, 21, D'Olier-street. Wm. S. Orr &
Co., 147, Strand, London. Sold by all Booksellers.

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Esplanade, Hamburgh.

INSTITUTED IN THE REIGN OF QUEEN ANNE, A. D. 1714.

FIRE, LIFE, ANNUITIES.

LONDON UNION LIFE OFFICE, 8!, Cornhill, 9th February, 1849.

The Life Bonus of the Year 1818, of two-thirds of the Profits of the LIFE DEPARTMENT, has been this day declared; and, with the exception of a Reserve of £20,000 (to accumulate towards the next Bonus, in 1855) ia pavable upon and with the Sum Insured, on Policies effected in Great Britain, Ireland, and Germany respectively, upon the Profit System, and

19. That the board of conservators for each such district at the annual general meeting or some other meeting specially appointed by them before the first day of October 1849, and in each subsequent year, when may be necessary to appoint a clerk or clerks, with reasonable salary or salaries, as the said board may think necessary, and to appoint some bank to act as treasurer or treasurers of such board, and also to appoint as many inspectors and water-bailiffs as may be necessary, with reasonable salaries, but only to the extent which the funds at their disposal will admit of, for the pro- decorting to the number of Annual Premiums paid on each since the last tection of the fisheries in the district, and for generally enThis BONUS, including the previous additions, may be applied either forcing the fishery laws within the same: provided that no by adding the amount to the Sum Insured; OR, the value thereof may be by having the Annual Premiums reduced for the next Seven Years; or, elected or other conservator shall be eligible to hold any ap-received immediately in Money, at the option of the original holders of pointment under this act from which any salary or emolu- writing, within Three months from the above date, the BONUS will be the respective Policies, and unless such parties signify their preference in ment shall be derived; and it shall be lawful for the board added to the Sum Insured. of conservators from time to time to remove any such clerks, inspectors, or water bailiffs, and to nominate others.

20. That the board of conservators of any district shall be and are hereby empowered to apply from time to time, any portion of the funds in the hands of the treasurers to the credit of such district which they may think fit, for the purpose of making passes in or over weirs, or removing or making passes in or over natural obstructions in any river in such district, subject to the sanction of the said commissioners, under the provisions of the 5 & 6 Vic. c. 106; and upon obtaining the sanction of the said commissioners the said board of conservators may place to the credit of the said commissioners such sum of money as shall have been for that purpose approved by them, and the said commissioners thereupon may construct such works and make such alterations in the bed of any river as shall effectually secure a free and uninterrupted passage for fish, or to direct and cause such alterations to be made in any weir, dam, or dyke erected in or across any river frequented by salmon, for affording a free and uninterrupted passage for fish, pursuant to the powers and provisions of the said last-recited act. (To be continued.)

Charles Tuthill, Plaintiff.
John Kirwan and Others,
Defendants.
By Original Bill.
Charles Tuthill, Plaintiff.
James Scott Molloy,
Defendants.

IN CHANCERY.

PURSUANT to the final Decree

in these Causes, bearing date the 14th day of July, 1849, I will, on Tuesday, the 17th day of April next, at the hour of One o'Clock in the Afternoon, at my Office on the Inns Quay, in the City of Dublin, Set up and Sell to the highest and fairest bidder that can be had for the same, ALL THAT By Supplemental Bill. and THOSE, the Fee.Simple of the Town and Lands of GLANN, alias BEAGH, and Charles Tuthill, Plaintiff. of the Lands of CARROWREA, alas John Kirwan and Others, CARROWREAGH, situate in the Barony Defendants. By further supplemental Bill of Dunmore, and County of Galway: Also the Life Estate of the said Defendant, John Kirwan, in ALL THAT AND THOSE, that part of the Lands of ROCKVIEW, alias SHESSERAKEALE, in said Decree mentioned, situate in the Barony of Lower Ormond, and County of Tipperary, or a competent part thereof, as by said Decree directed.

Dated this 3rd February, 1849.

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written application to the Secretary.
Further particulars can be obtained at the Offices, as above, or by

The total BONUS on policies effected in Ireland for £1000, of the and date of the Insurances.

longest duration, amounts to £285, and varies in proportion to the amount
THOMAS LEWIS, Secretary.

JOHN GOLD, Stock Broker, Agent, 17, COLLEGE GREEN,
Dublin.

Notice is hereby given, that Receipts for renewal of Fire Insurances, due on the 25th of March, are now ready for delivery at the Company's Office, and the respective Agents in the Country; same should be renewed on or before the 9th of April next.

An Engine aud body of Firemen are in constant readiness to attend Fires, at the Company's Engine-house, No. 10, Crown Alley, rear of the Commercial Buildings.

NEW LAW BOOKS.

A TREATISE ON THE LAW OF PROPERTY, as

administered by the HOUSE OF LORDS. By Sir E, B. SUGDEN, 1 vol. royal 8vo. £1 11s. 6d. boards. THE LAW OF HUSBAND AND WIFE. A Treatise

on the Law of Husband and Wife as respects Property, partly founded upon Roper's Treatise, and comprising Jacobs' Notes and Additions thereto, By J. E. WRIGHT, Esq. of the Inner Temple, Barrister-at-Law. 2 vols. royal 8vo. £2 10s boards.

EDWARD J. MILLIKEN, Law Bookseller and Publisher, 15, College Green, Dublin,

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Orders for the IRISH JURIST left with E. J. MILLIKEN, 15, COL LEGE GREEN, or by letter (post paid), will ensure its punctual delivery in Dublin, or its being forwarded to the Country, by Post, on the day of publication.

TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION-(payable in advance): Yearly, 30s. Half-yearly, 17s. Quarterly, 98

Printed by THOMAS ISA AC WHITE, at his Printing Office, No. 45, FLEET-STREET, in the Parish of St. Andrew, and published at 15, COLLEGE GREEN, in same Parish, by EDWARD JOHNSTON MILLIKEN, residing at the same place, all being in the County of the City of Dublin. Saturday, March 31, 1849.

Erish Jurist

No. 23.-VOL. I.

APRIL 7, 1849.

PRICE

SPer Annum, £1 10s. Single Number, 9d.

The Names of the Gentlemen who favour THE IRISH JURIST with Reports in the several Courts of Law and Equity in Ireland, are as follows:

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FOR nearly four years we have been afflicted with famine-throughout three of them, fever, of an aggravated character, has raged. A worse thing has now come upon us-cholera has again found its way to our shores-our western and southern population have starved in their own homes, emigrated to other countries, died in poor-houses, or live, in daily destitution, unprofitable paupers !

Our western and southern proprietary are ruined-thousands of acres, cultivable, and hitherto cultivated, lie waste, adding yet more of unproductive surface to the large extent of reclaimable, yet unreclaimed, lands of Ireland. When thus good land is consigned to barrenness, we wonder not at the announcement, that the Waste Land Improvement Society has dissolved. Agriculture retrogrades there is grief in retrospect-gloom in prospective an unequal poor law paralyses exertion, checks the expenditure of capital, and threatens to engulf the country in one mass of ruin.

To remedy some of the evils we have enumerated the removal of others rests with ProvidenceLord John Russell trusts to a voluntary emigration and the chance of a good harvest. He explains the origin of the laissez faire principle; seems to think it applicable to the existing state of things, and to have satisfied himself that "there are some evils totally beyond the reach of any government." Sir Robert Peel, more equal to the present emergency, has shadowed forth- -as yet, but dimly-a plan to extirpate poverty, and make the wildernesses of Munster and Connaught to "blossom as the rose," and which, if successful, will conduce more to his fame, as a statesman, than any measure of his long public life. Ireland has hitherto been his "difficulty" let him make it the foundation of that posthumous fame for which he yearns, and of a solid reputation achieved by an honourable and useful triumph over difficulties, and by which the

Court of Exchequer (JOHN BLACKHAM, Esq., and
A. HICKEY, Esq., Barristers-at-
Law.

Chamber.......

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happiness of four millions of human beings may be promoted, and half this island made prosperous and contented.

Nor is the time unfavourable for the introduc

tion of a great change in the social condition of this country. "The darkest wave has bright foam near it." The very depression under which we have laboured has abated, if not expelled, the fever of party heat and political animosity. The different classes of society have been more drawn together, and the opportunity seems golden for a happier amalgamation, and for the permanent improvement of the people of Ireland.

Sir Robert Peel seems disposed to grasp the favourable juncture, and he has within him one of the elements of success. Hopeful himself, he infuses hope in others; he looks the evil undismayed in the face, and "takes courage from its magnitude."

And

Omnia possibilia sunt iis volentibus. in truth, no one who looks at the great natural, advantages of Ireland-her fine rivers, capacious harbours, and fertile soil, teeming with a hardy and industrious population-but must see, that except man deliberately thwarts the bountiful dispensations of Providence, her resources are amply sufficient to secure to her inexhaustible supplies of wealth and plenty, and that though calamities may temporarily suspend her prosperity, they cannot eventually extinguish it.

Amongst other measures which possess no novelty, he looks to one which will facilitate the transfer of property, and contribute to its better management when transferred. With this view, he proposes a Government Commission nearly absolute, with power to purchase, and to re-distribute to an improved proprietary the lands so purchased. The plan, as stated on Friday se'nnight, though sufficiently vast, yet, in some degree, dwindles from the size to which, when first stated, it appeared to extend itself.

As we understand it, he proposes, in substitution

for the machinery of the Court of Chancery, that Government Commissioners may be empowered to sell the fee, discharged of all incumbrances, where poor rate, inclusive of the present arrears, is unpaid.

Now, whether much land will thus be confiscated, will depend on its future liability to poor rate. If the premier's plan of a maximum rate be made law, a great transfer of property will, in all probability, not change hands for default in poor rate; if, on the other hand, electoral divisions be taxed to support the amount of destitution existing upon them, the fee of Munster and Connaught will be sold for poor rate alone. But this would be too glaringly unjust to proprietor and incumbrancer, as it would cast all the burden of a visitation of Providence on them, and would sell them out under an expost facto law, which neither contemplated at the period of their respective loans and purchases. A change in that law would also be essential, to induce purchasers to come forward, who would stand aloof whilst the amount of poor rate was indefinite, except, indeed, the Commissioners were prepared to occupy until they had cleared the land of their living incumbrances, and assumed a management, for which no staff would be strong enough, and no revenue sufficiently ample.

The Commissioners should be empowered to purchase up districts, without making the nonpayment of poor rate the only test of purchase.

Incumbered estates, and estates in Chancery, should be sold. As we have already shewn, all the properties under our Courts of Equity-except those of minors and lunatics-are placed there for purposes of sale, and a great portion of them are ripe for transfer.

Sir Robert Peel's last speech manifests how entirely his views bear out those which we have, from time to time, enunciated, as to the evils of the present system of Equity estate management.

Incumbrancers are ill paid, owners are ruined, occupiers discouraged, and the country suffers. Receivers and lawyers are said to be the only parties benefitted, but the former find the office irksome, and the latter would be much better satisfied to have that class of professional business which springs from prosperity, than that which is the result of acute national distress. In the first case, they are better paid and better pleased. Their profession is an honourable and useful one, and not dependant for support on that branch of the system of the Court of Chancery which is vicious. They lose more by national adversity than they gain by the litigation, the product of it.

Sir Robert Peel observes

"All your measures of drainage, of local improvement, of increase of fisheries, of emigrationall will be ineffectual, unless you can cure, in some way or other, those monstrous evils arising out of that condition of landed property to which I adverted the other night. If those estates, producing £800,000 a year, with arrears annually accumu-. lating, are not to allow more than £2,000 to be applied to the permanent improvement of the landif there are certain principles and forms of Equity sanctioned by the Court of Chancery, which throw

obstacles in the way of any improvement in that respect, you may feel assured that all your exertions will be ineffectual. I think it would be an inestimable benefit to every insolvent, and to every nominal owner, and to every incumbrancer who is receiving nothing, that it would, in short, be an advantage to everybody, except the receivers under the Court of Chancery, and the lawyers who are dividing the sums received from those estates amongst themselves-if by some process which should not be inconsistent with the principles of equity, and of fair dealing, you could relieve those estates from the control of the Court of Chancery, and permit them to be possessed by men of capital, who would embark in their cultivation with new hopes and fresh vigour, in my opinion, you would do more by that act for the advancement of Ireland than by any other act that can at present be adopted."

Here then, we have a statesman of Sir Robert Peel's sagacity, pronouncing the system adopted in the management of estates, under our Courts of Equity, the master evil of this country.

To extirpate the Court of Chancery altogether, would certainly be an alteration in our constitution; but not an improvement. To vest its powers, except temporarily in a commission, would be to transfer them to a more incompetent tribunal. The Irish Court of Chancery has been very well abused; we have ourselves not spared it where we thought its practices deserving of reprobation;— but it cannot be dispensed with; there must be a controlling power somewhere, and no where can it, under ordinary circumstances, be better placed than at present. It has indeed, in many instances, failed in its mission, it has not kept pace with the railroad age in which we live, old practices and inveterate usages have clung to it with too much tenacity; it has not used the power of adaptability, which its happy constitution has invested it with sufficiently-but true wisdom will be best employed, not in superseding, but in remodelling it.

The proposed plan of a Commission is but temporary and local, it does not combat with the evils of a system of receiverships which will be perennial and universal. It is impossible to predicate that within any given time, this country will become so prosperous that no estates will be placed under Courts of Equity, and if not, there must be receivers over those estates, whether situate in Leinster, Ulster, Munster or Connaught. That such receivers, may do as much good and as little injury as possible, the present order of things must be changed. Sir Robert Peel's plan for the settlement of the distressed districts does not provide for this; in devising a scheme for one portion of the country, the interests of the other must not be overlooked.

Public attention is directed to the subject; its gaze should not be withdrawn, until the object on which it has looked with such pain, has been so remodelled, that the public eye can rest upon it with content, if not with complacency. A little thought will shew, how susceptible of improvement is the present system, (which nothing but habit could

have reconciled us to endure,) and without in- | pose, will be always improperly exercised; at least, jury to creditor, owner, or occupier, but benefit it thinks it better to guard against the possibility to all three. of such an occurrence, and admits of no examinaBefore we conclude, we wish to advert to ation, as to free will or free agency, however matter of detail, which we do not remember to respectable or above suspicion this may be. There have before stated. A tenant cannot take a lease are cases, no doubt, in which she can waive her under the Court of Chancery, except at an exor-equity to a settlement by a separate examination bitant rate. We do not exaggerate, when we and consent, but the late Master of the Rolls, in state, that in every advertised letting-and lettings the case of Box v. Jackson (6 I. E. R. 182), always are advertised, when the farm is of any thought it would be a perversion of that practice extent the expense to the tenant will be near to extend it to any subject but that which is well £10. and the estate suffers as great expense, and known as the wife's equity, "her right to her be it observed, this lease is only for seven years choses in action, and her reversionary equitable pending the cause. Seven years pending the right to personal chattels not reduced into possescause !! sion during the coverture rest in her by law without her consent; and the same law which gives her the property, disables her from disposing of it. To receive and act on her consent here, would be to defeat her right, and the policy and reason of her disability. But her equity is the creature of this court, and is governed altogether by rules applicable to it, and to no other species of right; it is not founded on contract, it owes its existence to the arbitrary interference of this court......I may say that it is anomalous, wanting many of the incidents of property, and that it would be subversive of the established policy of the law to make this peculiar and qualified right of waiving a benefit preferred to her by this court, an argument or precedent for enabling her to defeat those rights with which the common law has, while she is married, inalienably invested her."

How can estates under the controul of our Equity Courts be improved by the occupier, where the tenure is so insecure and so short?

And, on the other hand, the established practice accounts for the absence of all improvement by the court'; acted on by two conflicting interests, its agency has become utterly neutralised. The owner, if he has a hope of retaining his estate, or does not lose his sense of benevolence with his sense of power, is desirous that the receiver should have money to expend in permanent or any useful improvement; the creditor effectively interposes. "Permanent improvements are worse than useless to me, if made with the money primarily liable to repay my debts." The receiver is listless, he is not paid to superintend improvements, and the court between two antagonistic forces, and a supine officer, does nothing.

The remedies suggested for the sad social state of Ireland, we make no doubt, will be many and various; we have glanced at one which high authority pronounces to be necessary, and sober thought to be practicable.

THE recent case of Whittle v. Henning (18 L. J. 51, S. C., 12 Jur. 1079) has decided-overruling the decisions of the Vice-Chancellor of England in Hall v. Hugonin (14 Sim. 595, S. C., 10 Jur. 941), Creed v. Perry (14 Sim. 592), Wilson v. Oldham (ib. 594)—that there is no case in which a Court of Equity will assist a married woman in alienating, or reducing into possession for the purpose of alienation, her reversionary chattel interest during the lifetime of her husband.

It is not a little singular, that personalty should be thus invested with the attribute of inalienability, whilst a married woman, during coverture, can disclaim or dispose of any interest or estate in land. The spirit of legislation has changed. Our forefathers thought personal property of little consideration, and not capable of being trammelled, from its want of fixity, with the same laws against alienation as real estate; but the modern doctrine of a Court of Equity guards, as to personalty, the rights of married women, with more jealousy than the common law as to realty. In the one case, the policy of the law is to consider the security of the married woman as paramount to every consideration of subsequent family convenience, under the apprehension of her being too accessible to marital influence, which it is assumed, we sup

The distinction which has arisen in the policy of the law, we apprehend, also, to have been occasioned by the fact of the supply of land being limited, and the difficulties of transfer sufficiently great. It was, therefore considered inexpedient, in a national point of view, to tie up real estate, and throw an impediment in the way of its changing hands, even though the interests of married women should in some degree suffer, and a safeguard be removed, the national convenience preponderating over individual interest. In personal property, the same public grounds were not supposed to exist; and it may have been considered just, even in these palmy days of free trade, to leave one relic of protection.

Whatever may have been the origin of the rule, it is now settled, whether the interest came to the wife by contract, or independently of contract, that she cannot by any contrivance, reduce her contingent reversionary chose in action into possession. Bor v. Jackson, (6 Ir. Eq. 174), decides that she cannot do so by consent in a Court of Equity, even though the contingency does not depend upon her surviving her husband; the decision was contrary to Sir E. Sugden's first impression, who thought that the consent of the wife could be taken "whenever the contingency on which her interest depends, is not that of her surviving her husband; and that with that exception, the property may be dealt with in the same manner as if the interest were immediate." In that case the reversionary interest was expectant upon the decease of the lady's mother. In Nixon v. Nixon, (8 I. E. R. 254), the fund was vested in trustees, as to the interest for the lady's separate use for

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