every person jointly liable with another for any debt, who shall himself pay such debt, shall be entitled to have the judgment or security assigned to him by the creditor. P., having consulted H, was informed that H. objected to the assignment, and that if they were assigned H. would apply in a partnership action which was then pending to wind-up the affairs or the old partnership of D., H., and N. for an injunction to restrain execution, upon which P. declined to assign the judgments. D. thereupon instituted proceedings to obtain contribution in respect of the sums which he had paid, and, upon an application to the judge in the partnership action, it was ordered that the account and inquiry in the partnership action should proceed on the footing that D. and H. were entitled to be indemnified for the payment.of the £5000 by the firm of D., H., and N., and an order was also made, by consent of the parties, that D. should be at liberty to sign judgment against H. for £586 78. 7d., but that no proceedings should be taken to enforce such judgment without the leave of the judge in the partnership action. D. then brought the present action against P. claiming (a) delivery of the judgment; (b) damages for the refusal to deliver; (c) a declaration that by reason of the refusal to assign D. was released from all liability to pay any future instalment. It of the Mercantile Law Amendwas contended that sect. 5 ment Act 1856 was applicable only to the prima facie liability at law between the parties, and was independent of any equitable rights or claims between them. Held, that the provisions of the section might be subject to the equitable relationship between the parties, and that, although P. was technically wrong in refusing to aseign, as D. could not have levied execution upon the judgment without consent of the judge of the partnership action and without taking into account the inter-partnership right Held, of himself and H., he had suffered no actual damage. further, that D. was not released from liability in respect of future instalments inasmuch as there had been no alteration of the original conditions as to the liability of the parties, and the failure to hand over the judgments would have only operated to release him in so far as the delayin handing over might have made them less valuable.

[Dale v. Powell; Powell v. Dale and Hood. Ch. Div.: Parker, J. June 13 and 14.-Counsel: Romer, K.C. and M. Macnaghten; Martelli, K.C. and J. W. Manning; H. Fletcher Moulton. Solicitors: Fowler and Co; Dale and Co.]

LAW LIBRARY.

Review of Alouin Club Tract No. VIII., by J. T. Tomlinson. Our English records contain no mention of the judicial proceeding with which the first pamphlet deals.

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Cohen on the Declaration of London. Hodder and Stoughton, Warwick-square, E.C. Price 59. net.

Phipson on Evidence. Fifth Edition. yard, Temple Bar. Price 188.

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Heywood and Massey on Lunacy Practice. Fourth Edition. Stevens and Sons Limited, 119 and 120, Chancery-lane. Price 30.

Rowsell and Moran on Betting. Butterworth and Co., 11 and 12, Bell yard, Temple Bar. Price 68.

Clemson on Office Procedure and Business Correspondence. Butterworth and Co.. 11 and 12, Bell-yard, Temple Bar. Price 2. net. Rahim on Muhammadan Jurisprudence. Luzac and Co., 46, Great Russell-street. W.C. Price 21s. net.

Hooper on Illegitimacy. Sweet and Maxwell Limited. 3, Chancerylane. Price 123. 61.

LEGISLATION AND JURISPRUDENCE. ANOTHER Old Age Pensions Bill, being No. 3 of the series, has been introduced by the Government, and is backed by Mr. HOBHOUSE, the CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER, and Mr. BURNS. It is not lacking in controversial matter in some respects, but in others is intended to clear away difficulties. It is proposed that in Scotland, England, and Ireland a person is to be deemed to have attained the age of sixty or seventy on the commencement of the day previous to the sixtieth or seventieth anniversary, as the case may be, of the day of his birth. Some doubts have arisen as to sect. 2 of the principal Act, the Old Age Pensions Act 1908, which sets out the statutory conditions fo the receipt of these allowances. Instead of the second paragraph o that section, it is suggested that the following conditions should attach. A person must satisfy the pension authorities that for at least twenty years up to the date of the receipt of any sum on account of a pension he has been a British subject, but this condition is not to attach to a woman who satisfies the authoritles that she would but for marrying an alien have fulfilled this condition, and that at the date of the receipt of any sum the alien is dead, or her marriage dissolved or annulled, or that she has for a period of not less than five years been legally separated from him or deserted by him. The person must also show that for at least twelve years in the aggregate out of the twenty years above mentioned he has had his residence in the United Kingdom. This computation of twelve years at once raises doubts, and for dispelling these to some degree the Bill suggests that the following absences should be counted as periods of residence: (a) Being abroad on Crown service paid out of Parliamentary funds, or as wife or servant of one so remunerated; (b) being resident in Channel Islands or Isle of Man where the person was born in the United Kingdom; (c) being abroad where during that absence the person has maintained any dependant in the United Kingdom; (d) absence on ships registered in United Kingdom by a person who before this absence was living in United Kingdom; and (e) there are to be allowed periods of temporary absence not exceeding three months in duration at any one time. As regards disqualifications, the Bill provides that any rule of law and any enactment the effect of which is to cause relief given to a relative to be treated as relief given to the person liable to maintain the relative is not to have any effect for the purposes of sect. 3 of the Old Age Pensions Act 1908. This same section is again mollified by the proposal that two years shall be substituted for ten years as regards persons convicted, where the term of imprisonment without the option of a fine does not exceed six weeks. Any person in receipt of an old age pension convicted of any offence mentioned or included in the 1st schedule to the Inebriates Act 1898 shall be disqualified for a period of six months after the date of his conviction unless the court shall otherwise direct. A series of amendments follow as to the calculation of means. No account is to be taken of the yearly value of any advantage arising out of the use of furniture and personal effects if their total value is not in excess of £30. The following is to be in brief a new version of par. (c) of sub-sect. 1 of sect. 4 of the principa Act: The yearly value of property (not personally used) invested or otherwise put to profitable use or when not invested or put to such use, the yearly value being taken to be one-tenth of the capital value. This, in accordance with the section, is to be taken into account in calculating means. Sums receivable in respect of the investment and property appropriated for current.expenditure shall not otherwise be taken into account. Again, it is suggested that the means of a person being one of a married couple shall be deemed to be half the total means of the couple. Sums on account of pensions are not to be payable to persons absent from the United Kingdom or

if not clain ed within three months. Clause 6 of the Bill raises a number of amendments as to determining questions as to old age pensions. They are at once too lengthy and technical for reproduction here, but they are exceedingly important. These changes are not to deprive existing pensioners of their allowances or reduce their amount. The Bill will require some detailed examination before it is possible to form any conviction upon its merits. It is scarcely likely that it will fail to add further to the financial burdens already not otherwise than weighty.

PARLIAMENTARY SUMMARY.

THE advancement of Lord Loreburn, in his first tenure of the Great Seal by steps, in the peerage, to an earldom is an unusual and a conspicuous honour. Lord Hardwicke, who was promoted from the position of Lord Chief Justice to the Lord Chancellorship, was not made an earl for upwards of eighteen years from his elevation to the Woolsack. Lord Eldon for two-and-twenty years and Lord Camden for three-and-twenty years were peers before they received earldoms. Lord Loughborough was one-and-twenty years a baron before he became Earl of Rosslyn. Lords Cairns, Selborne, and Halsbury were respectively barons for eleven, ten, and thirteen years before they were advanced to earldoms in their second tenures of the Great Seal. Lords Thurlow and Brougham were never advanced to -earldoms although they obtained peerages in special remainder. Lord Lyndhurst and Lord Cranworth, although three times Lord Chancellor; Lord St. Leonards, twice Lord Chancellor of Ireland and Lord Chancellor of Great Britain; Lord Campbell, Lord Chancellor of Ireland, Lord Chief Justice of England, and Lord Chancellor of Great Britain, were never given a step in the peerage.

'On the 20th inst. Mr. Asquith, in reply to a question addressed to him by Mr. Hunt, who asked whether, having regard to a statement made by the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs that the Declara. tion of London would not be ratified without the sanction of Parliament, the term "Parliament" meant both the House of Lords and the House of Commons, said: "No; it would make no difference to the action of His Majesty's Government whether the House of Lords approved or disapproved of it." Mr. Asquith, however, bluntly gave in this reply an accurate description of the extent to which the House of Lords, in accordance with constitutional practice, is debarred from exercising any authority in the State except in legislation. Mr. Gladstone in 1878 thus enunciated the relation of the House of Lords to the Cabinet: "The Cabinet," he wrote, "has a relation to sustain to the House of Lords, which need not, however, be one of entire unity, for the House of Lords though a great power in the State and able to cause great embarrassment to an Administration, is not able by a vote to doom it to capital punishment. Only for fifteen years out of the last fifty has the Ministry of the day possessed the confidence of the House of Lords. On the confidence of the House of Commons it is immediately and vitally dependent": (Gleanings of Past Years, i., pp. 235-236). Sir William Harcourt on the 24th Jan. 1894 thus described the position of the House of Lords to the Administration: "In the greater and, indeed, the most important affairs of the nation, the House of Lords has no right, no voice, no authority. It is the House of Commons, not the House of Lords, who decides who shall be charged with the govern. ment of our mighty Empire. If the House of Lords by a majority of 400 to-morrow voted want of confidence in the Government, no notice would be taken of it. If it censured a Minister no regard would be paid to such censure. In foreign affairs its voice 'has no weight."

THE promise made by Mr. Asquith on the 20th inst. to Mr. Neil Primrose, that, if notice of motion respecting the appointment of magistrates be put down, the Government would undertake to give a day for its discussion at the earliest possible date, will recall the fact to recollection that the motion indicated would, if carried, be regarded by the Lord Chancellor as a censure on himself which would involve his resignation of the Great Seal. The resignation of & Lord Chancellor owing to the action of the House of Commons is not without precedent. In 1865 Lord Westbury was forced by a resol tion of the House of Commons when Lord Chancellor to retire from office. Circumstances connected with the granting of a pension to a Mr. Edmunds, who, as clerk to the Commissioners of Patents, was found to have appropriated public moneys to his own use, and certain transactions with reference to appointments in the Leeds Bankruptcy Court had excited public indignation, and Lord Westbury was freely accused of having unworthily used his position to advance his

relatives. The two cases were separately examined by two Select Committees, who agreed in acquitting him of having acted from unbecoming motives, but found that he had shown himself lax and inattentive to public interests. A resolution of censure framed in moderate terms was moved in the House of Commons on the 3rd July 1865 by Mr. Bouverie, and, having been carried in spite of the defence made by the Government, Lord Westbury at once resigned the Great Seal, and announced his resignation in the House of Lords on the 5th July 1865 in a speech which created a profound sympathy with him. The motion in (reference to the Lord Chancellor only deals with his method of appointment to the magisterial bench, to which he has intimated his intention, in a letter read by the Prime Minister to the House of Commons, of rigidly adhering as long as he continues to be Lord Chancellor. The controversy is one purely of policy. It involves no reflection upon character, nor any imputation whatever on the elevation of motive and devotion to principle with which political opponents vie with friends in giving the Lord Chancellor most unreservedly credit.

THE very frequent references to the veto of the Crown and to the last occasion of its exercise in the reign of Queen Anne which have characterised discussions in Parliament and on the platforms regarding the merits or demerits of the Parliament Bill, may perhaps render it of interest to recall to recollection the all but forgotten fact that the last exercise of the veto of the Crown on legislation passed by both Houses of Parliament was not an act of arbitrary personal power on the part of the Sovereign, but, on the contrary, when rightly understood, an action, taken on the advice of Ministers, which it was assumed correctly would meet with the approbation of the Parliament itself, the product of whose deliberations had been thus rendered futile. The following is the history in outline of the exercise of the veto for the last time in 1707-8: In the first Parliament after the passing of the Scotch Act of Union, and, accordingly, the first Parliament of Great Britain, several measures consequent upon the Union with Scotland were introduced. Among them was a Bill "for settling the militis of that part of Great Britain called Scotland." This Bill seems to have occasioned little discussion in the House of Commons, and to have passed the House of Lords without amendment: (18 Lords' Journals, p. 481) But, when it was presented along with several other Bills for the Royal Assent, from it alone that assent was withheld. On that very morning, the 11th March 1707, news had arrived that the French admiral, Fourte in, with James Edward on board, had eluded the vigilance of Byng, and had sailed from Ostend towards Scotland. In the face of instant invasion, the Government thought it unwise to arm a population whose loyalty was at the time by no means well assured. No complaint respecting the exercise of the prerogative, although Parliament continued to sit for some months, seems to have been made at the time. On the contrary, when in the next session, after the danger had passed away, the question of the Scotch militia was recommended to the consideration of Parliament in the Speech from the Throne, the Bill which was accordingly brought in seems never to have reached its second reading: (see Hearn's Government of England: its Structure and its Development, pp. 60 61).

Professor HeaRN, writing in 1867, instances two occasions within a century in which Acts of Parliament, although they had duly received the Royal Assent, have failed to come into operation from the refusal of the Crown to perform some act which was necessary to give them effect. One was an Act passed in 1794 (34 Geo. 3, c. 4) to enable the Government to carry into effect Mr. Bentham's celebrated project of the Panopticon. It appears that whether, (as Bentham asserted) from personal dislike to the author or from some reason now unknown, George III. disapproved of the plan. Various inexplicable delays took place until at length all arrangements were approaching completion and nothing more remained except the purchase of one portion of ground. It appears that the King refused to sign the proper documents for the issue of the purchase money. Nothing further was done in the matter, but the Government was so much compromised that seventeen years after the first Act a second Act (52 Geo. 3, c. 144) was passed by which a different system was adopted and compensation for the breach of contract to the amount of £23,000 was paid to Bentham. In 1850 an Act (13 & 14 Vict. c. 72) was passed under the auspices of Lord Romilly to improve the system of registration of assurances in Ireland. The object which this measure contemplated was a somewhat elaborate system of the registration of deeds founded upon maps prepared by the Ordnance Survey. It contained 8 provision suspending its operation until certain indices were prepared and notice of its commencement consequent thereon was given by the Commissioners

of the Treasury. No such notice, however, has yet been published: (see Hearn's Government of England. pp. 61-62).

In the House of Commons, on the 20th ult, Mr. Perkins asked the Under-Secretary for War if it was proposed during the present session of Parliament to initiate any legislative proposals for the better protection of arsenals, military camps, powder magazines, and fortifications against aerial alien espionage.-Colonel Seely: The subject is receiving the consideration of the Government, and the measures required to provide the necessary security will be taken at the earliest possible date.

Mr. Primrose asked the Prime Minister whether a day had been fixed for the discussion of the appointment of magistrates.-Mr. Asquith was understood to say that if a notice of motion on the eubject were put down cn the paper, he would undertake to give as early a day as possible.

The House of Lords reassembled on Monday after the Whitsuntide vacation, which covered the period of the Coronation.

On the motion of Viscount Morley the Standing Orders were suspended to enable the committee stage of the Parliament Bill to be taken as the first order on Wednesday and the Consolidated Fund (No. 2) Bill to be passed through its remaining stages on that day.

In the House of Commons, Viscount Wolmer asked the Prime Minister whether he was going to introduce a Payment of Members Bill this session; and, if not, what adequate opportunity there would be for discussion of the conditions under which it was proposed that members should be paid.—Mr. Asquith: As I stated on the 18th May, an adequate opportunity for the discussion of this question will be afforded, and in order to meet the case we shall put down a Govern. ment resolution on the paper. The Government do not propose to introduce a Payment of Members Bill this session.

Mr. Pollock asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs which were the various Conventions drawn up at the Second Peace Conference, held at The Hague in 1907, that were referred to in the preamble to the Second Peace Conference (Conventions) Bill -Mr. McKinnon Wood The following are the Conventions alluded to in the preamble of the Bill. Their full texts are given in Parliamentary Paper No. 6, Miscellaneous, 1908: (1) Convention for the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes. (5) Convention respecting the rights and duties of Neutral Powers and Persons in war on land. (10) Convention for the adaptation of the principles of the Geneva Convention to maritime war. (13) Convention respecting the rights and duties of neutral Powers in maritime war.

Mr. Fell asked the Home Secretary what mechanical or other difficulty there was against compelling motor omnibuses to carry speedometers showing on large dials on the side of the vehicles the speed at which they were travelling; and whether he was aware that such speedometers could be obtained and, if kept in proper order, recorded the speed of the vehicle with reasonable accuracy.-Mr. Churchill: The difficulty is to procure instruments which will record and exhibit the maximum speed attained with such accuracy and regularity as would enable their readings to be used as legal evidence against a person charged.

The House went into Committee of Supply, this being the fourteenth allotted day, Mr. Emmott (Chairman of Committees) in the chair. On the vote to complete the sum of £234,517 for the salaries and expenses of the Home Office, Mr. Lyttelton, in discussing the relation of the Home Secretary to the administration of the criminal law in this country, said there was a very widespread feeling that what were called the inferior courts had not received, and did not receive, from the right hon. gentleman that consideration which the great traditions of his office led them to hope they would always receive from the ocoupant of it. The justices had, especially in the matter of sentences, very difficult and painful duties to perform. The Home Secretary might, perhape, hardly bel eve it, but they had the modesty to act, with regard to the eentences which they pronounced, in conformity with precedent, and he maintained-and he believed it was the opinion of the vast majority of the people-that their sentences were guided, on the whole, by humanity and good sense. He did not claim for them that the justices were infallible, but they had as against the Home Secretary the peculiar advantages of being able, before they passed sentence, to make full inquiry from the police as to the antecedents and conduct of the prisoner, to hear all the circumstances of the case, and to see the demeanour and bearing of the prisoner. If sentences so passed by men of such character were quashed without full reasons being given for setting them aside, and without full ascertainment from the justices of the reasons for passing the sentences, he thought a very great discouragement must necessarily fall upon them. If the Home Secretary used the prerogative which was intrusted to him without great care, without due courtesy, and above all without fully informing himself as to the whole of the circumstances, both of the law and the facts, before he reversed a sentence, the administra. tion of justice was necessarily brought into discredit, and the justices themselves were thrown into utter confusion and bewildered embarrassment in dealing with cases that came before them in the future. He was going to mention a few cases as samples. There might be a possible explanation of these cases, but, on the face of them, they did not appear to him to be free from, at any rate, the appearance of arbitrary action on the part of the Home Secretary-certainly not free from that which was not a characteristic of the Home Office, appeals to the gallery. There was what he would call the Pentonville group of cases-those in which the Home Secretary thought it expedient to release certain youthful offenders as he called them. He did not desire in any sense to gird at any prerogative which was used

in favour of youth, but what he did object to was that in four out of the seven cases there was no consultation whatever with the justices who passed the sentences, and, worse than that, the Home Secretary claimed that he was under no obligation to consult the justices, to ascertain the reasons which had influenced them, or to communicate with them in any way. He did not pretend that there was a legal obligation, but he insisted in the strongest way that, if it was wished to maintain the relations between the Home Office and the justices on the footing which had characterised them in the past, it was a primary obligation of good administration and good feeling that the Home Secretary should consult the justices and ascertain their reasons and carefully and courteously point out his reasons for deliberately setting their sentences aside. He was sorry to say that in one of the Pentonville cases the Home Secretary showed himself lamentably ignorant of the law which he was under duty to administer. This was the case in which, he said, there was a sentence of one month for loitering. The Home Secretary ought to be the first man in the House to know that there was no penalty for loitering. That was not a crime, but it was a crime for one who was a suspected person or a reputed felon to be loitering in a public place intending to commit a felony. The Home Secretary was, however, in such a hurry to quash the sentence that be did not even wait to make himself acquainted with the law of vagrancy. The right hon. gentleman also spoke in regard to another case, as if it was a very venial offence to use obscene language in a public place, and the Home Secretary discredited his office by making a joke of the offence and suggesting that, if the hon. member who brought the matter forward had been found guilty of it at echool or at the university, he would have suffered no consequences at all. His own experience was not that. His own opinion was that if at a public school a youth was guilty of using obscene language before respect. able women the probability was that he would be expelled. The Home Secretary's defence was a bad one, and there was an attempt to arouse a feeling of class against class and to play to the gallery. Then there was a certain London County Council case which was the subject of a penalty, and also a case at Guisborough in which the action of the Home Secretary was such as to provoke a protest from the justices. There was also the administration by the Home Secretary of the Act under which sentences of preventive detention could be given in addition to penal servitude. That Aot had largely been the result of tbe influence of the Commissioner of Prisons, Sir Evelyn RugglesBrise, a man who for fifteen years had given the closest interest to . the subject and whose authority on the subject was European, and, indeed, world-wide. The Home Secretary had not been strictly loyal to the legislation of his own colleague. A very short time after it was passed he criticised it and again used the prerogative of mercy apparently to make his views palatable and notorious throughout the Kingdom. The case that excited laughter owing to the ridiculous position in which the Government were placed was that of the old shepherd. The House would not think it altogether a laughable matter. That prisoner was sentenced after ten convictions to three years' penal servitude and ten years' preventive detention. He did not quarrel with the reduction of the sentence, but it was the method rather than the actual fact of which legitimate complaint must be made. Was there ever a case in which the court which passed the sentencǝ was more entitled to a respectful statement of the difference of opinion between itself and the Home Office and for a courteous explanation of the reasons upon which the Home Secretary thought fit to differ from them? The temptation, however, was too great to make a vulgar, inaccurate, and unscrupulous attack. He knew that these were strong words, but used them advisedly. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, who went with the Home Secretary to Dartmoor, thought it fitting and dignified to his high office to state to an audience of ignorant and excited men at election time that this man had been sentenced to thirteen years' penal servitude for stealing 23. That statement was absolutely inaccurate.-Mr. Chancellor: What was the sentence for ?-Mr. Lyttelton said that the sentence was in pursuance of a statute passed by the present Government and the Home Secretary's predecessor which entitled and obliged a judge to pass a sentence of preventive detention when a man was proved to be an habitual criminal. This man's life had been a long course of crime, and he was incorrigible. He asked for a certain restraint and decency in language in the administration of justice by high officials. While a strong case could be made for the relaxation of this sentence, the Home Secretary should have been scrupulous to see that the facts were truly known and were not unscrupulously represented to the public. He regretted to say that the right hon. gentleman, after the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer had conveyed a false impression to the country, said in reply to a question in the House that the facts as stated by the Chancellor of the Exchequer were, strictly speaking, accurate. Their ideas as to what were accurate statements differed, and he could not help regretting the statement of the right hon. gentleman. Alluding to the Home Secretary's action with regard to the riots at Tonypandy, Mr. Lyttelton said he would not go back on Mr. Churchill's exercise of his discretion in stopping the military, a decision which resulted in much destruction of property. He agreed that the position was a difficult one. The Home Secretary, however, in a subsequent debate, said he claimed the right as against the local authority of saying whether or not military should be employed. He (Mr. Lyttelton) had always understood that it was a matter between the local magistrates and the military themselves, and that the justices had the responsibility and the duty placed upon them of calling in the military when public safety required it. He should be glad if the Home Secretary would tell him upon what authority he interfered between the local authority and the military.-Mr. Churchill: I did not.-Mr. Lyttelton said that the order was given by the Home

Secretary which caused the military to stop on their way to Tonypandy with results which were deplorable. Another unfortunate incident related to what was known as the Battle of Stepney. What was the position of the Home Secretary? He (Mr. Lyttelton) was told by an eye-witness that the Home Secretary upon his arrival was received, as every incident of the day was received, with uproarious laughter. No orders he gave were taken the slightest notice of. Mr. Churchill: I gave none. Mr. Lyttelton said that the right hon. gentleman gave advice which was no doubt quite proper. In order to arrest or kill two criminals Guardsmen, Engineers, and Artillery were massed, and he should like to know why there was such a pointed difference between the attitude of the Home Secretary towards riots in South Wales and his attitude towards a riot of a serious character in East London. In South Wales the Home Secretary took a responsibility which was not altogether rightly assumed, and which resulted unfortunately. But in East London, when an event was going on of a serious character, and which he made of a melodramatic character, he deprecated taking any responsibility whatever. If that was so his presence there was merely a source of some what ridiculous embarrassment to those who were under the obligation of acting under difficult circumstances.-Mr. Churchill said that he thought the Home Office was entitled to congratulate itself that the time which had elapsed since the latest of the events referred to took place had afforded the right hon. gentleman no fresh material for criticism. What possible comparison was there between a trade dispute by Welsh miners and two foreign criminals resisting arrest with lethal weapons in London? So far as the right hon. gentleman's chaff about the photographer was concerned, he was sure Mr. Lyttelton did not suppose it was a branch of the Home Office work to organise the movements of photographers. As to the dispatch of soldiers in aid of the civil power, there was no change in the law as it had been always interpreted. A local authority could not get police from another district without paying for them, but soldiers could be obtained for nothing; and consequently there was an indacement to call in soldiers in trade disputes. He was in favour of some check being imposed on the use of soldiers in trade disputes. If people were compelled to pay for the use of soldiers he believed a check would be placed on their unnecessary employment. He hoped that before the session came to an end a small Bill making it necessary for local authorities to pay for soldiers required in aid of the civil power would be passed into law. The right hon. gentleman knew well that there was a very steady and constant use of the prerogative of mercy. It took place every week in the year. In 1909, the last year for which complete figures were available, it was exercised in no less than 436 cases. It was used in twelve cases on grounds affecting the original conviction, in seven on grounds of technical irregularities, in 160 on medical grounds, in thirty as a reward for information or assistance given by the prisoners, in 203 in simple mitigation of senterce, and in other cases which could not be classified. The committee would see that the use of the prerogative of mercy was a regular system which was administered from day to day. He had not the figures for the period during which he had been at the Home Office, but he would not be misleading the committee if he said that he had not gone beyond the limits of his predecessor. The exercise of the prerogative was in many cases a very difficult and painful function. He was not prepared to abrogate in any way the full freedom of the prerogative of mercy, or to attach to its exercise any obligation either to consult or to be bound by consultation. But in nearly every case the magistrates or judges were consulted. In the particular cases to which the right hon. gentleman referred the sentences were so short that it was not possible to consult the magistrates. It was true that he went to Pentonville and ordered the release of a number of youths who were under short sentences for minor offences. He did not mind admitting to the committee that he took this step with a view to drawing public attention in a sharp and effective manner to this evil. In the last year there had been a very marked decrease in the number of youths committed for small offences. He was speaking without the figures by him, but he thought the decrease was considerably over a thousand. In some of the prisons the decrease in the number of young boys who had been committed was as much as 30 per cent. There was an advantage in drawing public attention (to these facts. It showed that the courts were very ready to try to follow growing public opinion on this subject. The case of the very poor man who had not a licence for a dog was brought before him, and the fine of 208. was remitted to avoid sending the man to prison. He did not in that matter consult the London County Council before coming to a decision. Although he thought the exercise of the prerogative was quite justified, he did not wish to imply any censure at all upon the county council for the way in which they administered this particular Act. With regard to the sentence by the Guisborough Bench of magistrates of fourteen days' hard labour for vagrancy, that was 8 hard sentence. He fully agreed with the remission of the sentence, although he was not responsible for it. The Earl of Crewe was in charge of the Home Office during his brief absence from the country last year, and the noble earl decided that case in the regular way. He was quite sure that if the Guisborough Bench had only known that the decision was not that of the wicked Home Secretary, but that of the good Lord Crewe, no question would have been raised. As to the administration of the Preventive Detention Act, he frankly admitted that he had some misgivings when that Act was passing through the House, and that he was very glad to see the indeterminate sentence excluded from it. It was going too far to say that they might take a human being and lock him up for ever unless he managed to win the good opinion of those in charge of him. He did not think a caɛe had been made out in this country for increasing

now

the general severity of the penal code. Another thing was the disparity of sentences. He felt that the increasing standardisation of sentences must come before the judicial authorities in the future. The judges themselves had given a great deal of attention to this question, and it did not seem impossible that in the course of the next year or so there might be some authoritative pronouncement from the Judicial Bench as to what might be normal sentences under ordinary circumstances. They must exercise additional effort to prevent the disparity of sentences. With that view he had issued some new regulations governing prosecutions under the Preventive Detention Act. The Act prescribed that the offender must on attaining the age of sixteen years have been at least three times convicted on indictment of crimes set out in the schedule of the Act. He had instructed the police authority to add further provisions of a restictive character. In future the offender must be over thirty years of age, and he must bave undergone at least one sentence of penal servitude. He believed the additional restrictions he had proposed would add to uniformity and keep the number of persons under preventive detention within convenient limits. The language used by his predecessor, Mr., Viscount, Gladstone, showed that when a sentence was imposed it was intended to apply to the professional criminal, the criminal of dangerous character, rather than to ore who was merely a nuisance, and it was on that principle, among others, that he was guided in releasing an unfortunate old rascal who had received a very heavy sentence, and who, although he had all his life been a nuisance to society, had never at any time been a danger to it. That case was, however, still pending, and he would not therefore say more with regard to it. Mr. A. Henderson, in rising to move that the vote be reduced by £100, protested against the House having had to listen to stale arguments on subjects already debated instead of adhering to the custom, which had existed for some t'me, of using the day set aside for the Home Office vote to discuss the industrial conditions affecting millions of workers.Mr. Stuart-Wortley denied that there was any such custom.-Mr. Lyttelton also said that, as far as he knew, there was no such custom, and if there were the administration of justice and other questions affecting millions of people would never come under review at all. Mr. A. Henderson, continuing, said he deeply regretted the easy and light way in which the annual report of the Chief Inspector of Factories and Workshops dealt with the report and recommendations of the Accidents Committee. This serious omission was the less justifiable when they remembered the continuous increase in the number of accidents. The total number of all accidents for the past year was 129,550, which compared with 89,020 in 1900 and with 100,600 in 1905, an increase in 1910 over 1905 of 28,900, and over 1900 of 40,000. The reported accidents for last year were 28,135 in excess of the mean of the past ten years. These were very surprising figures. Fatal accidents had increased from 946 in 1909 to 1080 in 1910. It was still more pathetic that the number of accidents to children rose from 153 in 1909 to 240 in 1910, an increase for the year of more than 56 per cent., all these being due to machinery or explosions. He was very far from being convinced that the increases were due to better reporting of accidents. They were appalling, and they were the more regrettable because, as he and his colleagues believed, they were to a considerable extent preventable. The problem was one largely of proper and effective administration, and he feared that unless some protest was made the report was likely to become a dead letter.

In the House of Commons, on Tuesday, the Perjury Bill passed through committee without amendment, and was read a third time.

The Copyright Bill was further considered on Tuesday by Standing Committee A of the House of Commons, Colonel Griffith-Boscawen presiding. The committee adopted without discussion an amendment of clause 19, proposed by Mr. Sydney Buxton (President of the Board of Trade), who is in charge of the Bill. The amendment placed joint authors in exactly the same position as individual authors in regard to copyright. The committee also adopted a proposal of Mr. Carr-Gomm that where a married woman and her husband are joint authors of a work the interest of such married woman therein shall be her separate property in the same manner as if she were a feme sole. Clause 21 provides that where the work of an author is first published as an article or other contribution in a collective work such as a newspaper, review, or encyclopædia, and the proprietor of the collective work is not the owner of the copyright in the article, then, Bubject to agreement to the contrary, the owner of the copyright shall retain his copyright therein, but the proprietor of the collective work shall at all times have the right of reproducing the work as a whole. Mr. Buxton now moved to omit this clause, which, he said, had been subjected to considerable criticism. The omission of the clause was agreed to.-On clause 24 Mr. Joynson Hicks moved an amendment with the object of equalising the conditions in this country and in others where special conditions are attached to copyright. In the United States, he pointed out, a modified copyright was given, but it was qualified by the condition that the work should be printed and bound in the United States. If an English author desired to obtain copyright in the United States he had to have his book set up in type, printed, and bound there. The result was that many books by English authors were printed and bound in America to save two publications. This was a great hardship on English printers and publishers, and he proposed that any country whose laws contained this obnoxious clause should be subjected in this country to a similar clause.-Sir G. Parker opposed the amendment, which, he thought, might prove dangerous from many points of view. Formerly foreign

authors enjoyed no security whatever in the United States, and the present copyright law of the States, obtained only after a struggle, represented a compromise. If that compromise was broken it was certain that the copyright in British books in America would not exist for five years, and nothing but chaos would ensue. From the highest personage in the United States he had received a statement that the American Government could not save the copyright of British authors if the present arrangement was disturbed. Mr. Buxton also opposed the amendment, and said its acceptance would result in the American protection of . British interests with regard to copyright being withdrawn. It was rather hard, perhaps, that the Americana should have a printed clause and we should not, but returns showed that there had not been any large transference of printing from one side to the other. After further discussion the amendment was negatived and the clause was added to the Bill.-Before adjournment the commiteee had reached clause 36, having disposed of fifteen clauses during the sitting.

CRIMINAL LAW AND THE JURISDICTION OF MAGISTRATES.

BOROUGH QUARTER SESSIONS.

Abingdon, Thursday, July 20
Barnstaple, Tuesday, July 8
Bideford, Friday, July 7
Birkenhead. Tuesday, July 4

Birmingham, Monday, July 3, at 11.15
Bournemouth, Tuesday, July 11
Bradford, Yorks, Monday, July 3
Bridgnorth, Wednesday, July 12
Bury St. Edmunds, Monday, July 3
Carlisle, Wednesday, July 5, at 10
Chichester, Monday, July 24
Colchester, Thursday, July 27
Croydon, Monday, July 10, at 10
Devizes, Monday, July 17

Devonport, Saturday, July 1

Dudley, Monday, July 10

Folkestone, Saturday, July 8, at 12

Great Yarmouth, Monday, July 31, 10.30

Grimsby, Tuesday, July 4

Guildford Monday, July 3, at 10.15
Hvthe, Friday, July 7

Kingston-upon-Hull, Thursday, July 27

Leeds, Tuesday, July 4
Leicester, Tuesday, July 18
Maidstone, Saturday, July 1, at 10.45
Manchester. Monday, July 24
Merthyr Tydfil, Wednesday, July 5
Newcastle-under-Lyme, Thursday, July 6
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Friday, July 7
Norwich, Monday, July 10

Poole, Saturday, July 8, at 10 30
Portsmouth, Thursday, July 19
Richmond, Yorks, Friday, July 7
Saffron Walden, Wednesday, July 12, 11
Scarborough, Tuesday, July 11
Southampton, Monday, July 10, a 10.43
Stamford, Tuesday, July 11
Stoke-on-Trent. Friday, July 7
Sudbury, Suffolk, Friday, July 14

at Sunderland, Tuesday, July 11
Tewkesbury, Friday, July 14
Thetford. Friday, July 21
Wolverhampton, Friday July 7
York, Wednesday, July 5.

THE experiment in traffic regulation in the boroughs of Kensington, Hammersmith, and Westminster, to which reference has already been made in these columns, has now commenced, and it marks a new era in London management, for it implies the cordial co-operation of the councils of those boroughs with the police authorities, the Roads Improvement Association, and the Commercial Motor Users' Associa. tion. If magisterial backing is given to the police in their new instructions to warn horse-drivers against obstructing the flow of traffic, and if the summonses to be issued under the Highway Act 1835 upon a warning being disregarded are productive of punishment, the busy Londoner will find himself in possession of a great boon under a more sensible administration of the existing law without a preliminary struggle in Parliament for new legislation. Extra police are now detailed for the purpose of regulating the traffic in one great thoroughfare, and the success of the efforts now made will go far to educate the public in demanding a general reform in those slovenly methods of driving which have for so long marked our London streets.

A RECENT prosecution of a motorist before certain Surrey justices illustrates some of the causes which entail accidents, and it further shows the sort of treatment which is extended to a driver. One A. B. was driving along a main road, and arrived at a cross-road where a policeman was regulating the traffic. The policeman ɛaw a car in the side road, and signalled to A. B. to come on. Then, seeing that the car in the side road contained an owner known to him, he signalled to it to come on, and endeavoured to stop A. B. To make matters worse, he stepped somewhat across the road, and A. B., swerving suddenly on seeing the other car unexpectedly emerge. ran over the constable and severely injured him, the speed being about ten miles an hour. The corner is of an absolutely blind type, but, notwithstanding this, "witnesses" up the side road were prepared to swear that A. B. was moving at thirty miles an hour. The justices heard the case notwithstanding the injured constable was absent, and notwithstanding the plain fact that his cross-examination would prove a most important feature in the defence of A. B. Happily for the latter, the witnesses for the prosecution were too eager, and their tales would not hold together. The attitude of the Bench to A. B. was hostile throughout, and there was some considerable delay before it was announced that they dismissed the case. The position now is this: that A. B. has had{the worry and expense of travelling some twentytwo miles across country and the costs of his defence; that he has been prejudiced by paragraphs in the local Press, and witnesses, who

would, if they could, have ruined his prospects by reckless evidence suffer no punishment whatever, nor are they even reprimanded by the Bench. A. B. has driven cars for many years, and has never before had trouble, but those who saw the way his case was treated are best aware how near he came to ruin. The cost of insurance is prohibitive where a local agent has a few cars, and the prejudice comments of the local Press have already had their effect on his trade. Had he been fined by the Bench, as at one time seemed likely and been then sued by the policeman for damages, his downfa would have been due to nothing but false statements and insufficient capacity to weigh evidence.

COUNTY COURTS.

SITTINGS OF THE COURTS.

FOR THE WEEK ENDING SATURDAY, JULY 8.

Aberystwyth, Wednesday, at 10
Alcester, Wednesday, at 10
Alfreton, Monday (J.S. & A.O.), at

11

Alston, Tuesday, at 12

Andover, Friday, at 10.45
Axminster, Wednesday, at 10
Aylesbury, Thursday, at 9.30

Barry, Tuesday, at 10

Basingstoke, Monday, at 10

Bath, Thursday (By at 11), at 10 Bedford, Thursday, at 10 Birkenhead, Wednesday and Friday

Birmingham, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, at 10

Blackburn, Monday, at 9.30
Bloomsbury, Monday, Tuesday,
Wednesday, Thursday, and Fri-
day

Bolton, Saturday (J.S.), at 9.30
Boston, Tuesday (R. By), at 1.30
Bow, Monday, Wednesday, Thurs-
day, and Friday
Brackley, Tuesday, at 12

Bradford (Yorks), Monday (A.O.),

at 10.30; Tuesday, and Wednesday (R. By), at 10

Brentford, Friday, at 10

Bridport, Monday, at 10.30

Brighton, Friday (J.S. at 11.30),

Wednesday, Thursday, and Fri-
day

Clitheroe, Thursday, at 9.45
Consett, Wednesday, at 10.30
Crewkerne, Wednesday, at 10
Dartford, Saturday, at 9
Derby, Tuesday (County Courts
Act 1903, if necessary; R. By at
11), at 10.30; Wednesday, at 10;
Thursday (J.S. & A.O.), at 10.30
Devizes, Monday, at 10
Dewsbury, Tuesday (R. By),
Thursday, and Friday (J.S. at
9.30)

Doncaster, Wednesday, at 10
Dorchester, Friday, at 10
Droitwich, Saturday, at 10
Dudley. Tuesday, Thursday, and
Friday, at 10

Durham, Tuesday (R. By)
Eastbourne, Thursday, at 10
Farnham, Wednesday, at 9.30
Frome. Tuesday (By at 11), at 11
Grays Thurrock, Wednesday, at 11
Great Driffield, Thursday
Great Grimsby, Wednesday
By), at 10.30

(R.

Greenwich, Friday, at 10.30

Lincoln, Thursday (R. By), at 3 Liverpool, Monday (By at 11), Tuesday, Wednesday. Thursday, and Friday (B., A., & W.C.), at

10

Llandilo, Tuesday

Llanelly, Monday and Friday
Llanidloes, Monday, at 2

Lowestoft, Wednesday

Lynn, Thursday, at 10

Machynlleth, Tuesday, at 10
Maidstone, Monday, at 9

Manchester, Monday, Wednesday,

Thursday, and Friday, at 10 Mansfield, Monday, at 10

Marylebone, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, at 10.30

Midsomer Norton, Saturday, at 10.30

Neath, Wednesday and Thursday Newcastle-in-Emlyn, Saturday Nottingham, Thursday (J.S.) and Friday, at 10

Oldham, Thursday, at 9.30

Oswestry, Friday, at 10

Oxford, Wednesday, at 10

Penrith, Thursday, at 11

Peterborough, Tuesday, at 9.30

Pontypridd, Wednesday,

day, and Friday

Porth, Monday

Thurs

Portsmouth, Thursday, at 10.30
Rawtenstall, Tuesday, at 9

Reading, Saturday (R. By at 2), at 10

Redhill, Wednesday, at 10

Rhayader, Monday, at 10

Rochdale, Friday (J.S.), at 9.30

Romford, Monday and Tuesday, at

Selby, Friday

day

Weymouth, Tuesday, at 10 Whitchurch, Saturday, at 10 Wigan, Tuesday, and Wednesday (J.S.), at 9

Wincanton, Wednesday (Reg.), at

11

Windsor, Tuesday, at 10

Wisbech, Monday, at 10

Wrexham, Wednesday (By) and

Thursday

Yarmouth, Thursday and Friday
Yeovil, Thursday, at 10
Ystrad, Tuesday.

⚫ Other sittings are specially fixed if necessary.