threatened to cause, a subsidence of the plain. tiffs laad; and this action was brought to restrain him from such working. In considering the law applicable to the case, the Master of the

Rolls, starting with the proposition that a land

owner is entitled to have his land, in its natural state, supported by the land of his neighbour,

said:

"Who is his neighbour? The neighbouring owner for this purpose must be the owner of that portion of land-it may be a wider or a narrower strip of land-the existence of which in its natural state is necessary for the support of my land. That is my neighbour for that purpose; as long as that land remains in its natural state, and it supports my land, I have no right beyond it, and therefore it seems to me that that is my neighbour for this purpose. There might be land of so solid a character, consisting of solid stone, that a foot of it would be enough to support the land. There might be other land so friable, and of such an unsolid character, that you would want a quarter of a mile of it; but whatever it is, as long as you have got enough land on your boundary which, left untouched, will support your land, you have got your neighbour, and you have got your neighbour's land to whose support you are entitled. Beyond that, it would appear to me that you have no rights." It appearing, however, that the intervening strip would have afforded, if left in its natural state, a sufficient support to the plaintiff's land, the court said :

"The plaintiffs have no right as against the

landowners on the other side of that intervening space, and they acquire no right, whatever the owner of the intervening land may have done. If the act of the intervening owner has been such as to take away the support to which the first landowner who complains is entitled, then, for whatever damage occurs from the act which he has done, the first owner may have an action; but an action against the intervening owner, not an action against the owner on the other side; and it appears to me that it would be really a most extraordinary result that the man upon whom no responsibility whatever originally rested, who was under no liability whatever to support the plaintiff's land, should have that liability thrown upon him without any default of his own, without any misconduct or any misfeasance on his part. I cannot believe that any such law exists, or ever will exist."

The Court of Appeals sustained the decision of the Master of the Rolls, BRETT, L. J., saying:

Although, therefore, this is a case of first impression, that is to say, a case in which we have, after the Master of the Rolls, for the first time, to decide what is the proper definition of 'adjacent lands, I think the Master of the

Rolls has given a very happy definition of them, and one which we ought to accept."

UNITED STATES.

MRS. LOCKWOOD'S VICTORY.-The bill which

passed the House yesterday, by a vote of 169

yeas to 87 nays, entitled "A bill to relieve certain legal disabilities of women," was the B. A. Lockwood, and argued by her before the bill recently introduced by Mr. Glover for Mrs. House Judiciary in the early part of the session. It is a modification of the same bill which has been introduced each session for the last four years, or ever since Mrs. Lockwood was refused admission to the Court of Claims on the ground that she was a married woman. The highest vote ever reached before in the House on this

question was on Butler's bill, in 1874, when the yeas stood 91.

The bill was unanimously recommended by the committee for its passage at the last Congress, and committed to Mr. Hoar, who was soon after made one of that august tribunal who settled the Presidency, and no time or opportunity was afterward found to take it up.

Mrs. Lockwood was refused admission to the

United States Supreme Court last year, although she was entitled under the rule, on the ground that there was no English precedent, and was told that she must wait for a more extended

public opinion or for the enactment of a special law to admit her. That lady is able to cite several notable instances of women jurists in England, duly appointed, and will do so in her forthcoming brief before the Senate Judiciary, where the bill is now pending, as introduced by Senator Sargent.

This bill does away with the disability of sex, and opens the door for any other woman who is willing to qualify herself for admission.

It would seem to the casual observer as though the ordeal were hard enough without having any more obstacles thrown in the way. - Washington Union, Feb. 22.

A JUDGE IN TROUBLE.-The House of Representatives of the State of Minnesota on Wednesday, by a vote of 71 to 30, decided to prefer articles of impeachment against Judge Sherman Page, one of the Circuit Judges of that State. The charges are upon his alleged misconduct in office, involving "tyrannical conduct towards citizens, litigants and others, and interfering in the administration of justice to gratify personal

malice." It is really strange, considering the great number of Judges in this country, that there are so few cases of impeachment. America, taken all in all, may well be proud of the honesty and ability of her judiciary. When a judge does administer the affairs of his office for personal ends, he should receive no mercy at the hands of the law makers. We hope, if Judge Page is guilty of the charges alleged against him, that he may receive just punishment at the hands of the General Assembly of Minnesota; but if he is innocent, that he may be vindicated by the members, without fear or favor. There is no place in America where a man can act the tyrant more than on the Judge's bench, if he is so disposed. He may abuse a lawyer, witness, or client, and if the party abused and injured even undertakes to say a word in his own behalf, he can commit him to jail for contempt of court, beyond the reach of a habeas corpus, and that, too, without a jury trial-Chicago Legal News.

WOMEN AS LAWYERS.The House of Representatives, on the 21st ult., passed, by the decisive majority of 169 to 87, a bill providing that when a woman shall have been a member of the bar in the highest court of any State or Territory she shall, on application, be admitted to practice before the United States Supreme Court. The Senate will probably indorse the bill, and we may expect in the course of the coming year, to hear female counsel arguing causes before the highest tribunal in our land. The bill is, however, a partial one, in that it opens the Supreme Court to the women of those States and Territories only where no distinction is made on account of sex in admissions to the bar. The great body of female aspirants for forensic honors will be still excluded from an opportunity to place their names upon the roll of the Supreme Court. We trust this circumstance will be considered when the bill comes before the Senate. But why not leave the whole matter where it belongs-with the courts? When any considerable number of the States permit women to practice at the bar, the Federal courts will give them the same opportunity, and no objection will be raised. Because two or three States and Territories and the District of Columbia have made the experiment of admitting women to the bar is no reason why the dozen or so female lawyers who

have taken advantage of the privilege shall be given a favor which is denied to their sisters residing in other parts of the country.-Albany Law Journal.

THE FISHERIES AWARD.-The American Law Review, in concluding a notice of the Fisheries Arbitration, says: "It is no secret that the opinion of each of the counsel for the United States is, that there is more money-value in the guaranty the British receive against all duties on fish, than in all that the Americans receive from the extension of rights to fish inshore; and that the amount awarded, nearly four hundred and sixty thousand dollars a year, is nearly equal to the average annual market value of all the mackerel caught by Americans in British waters, inside and outside together, and taken at their value in barrels, cured and pickled, on the wharf in Boston or Gloucester, ready for sale.”

BENJAMIN F. WADE. - Benjamin Franklin Wade died on the 2nd inst. at his residence at

Jefferson, Ohio. He was born near Springfield, Mass., October 27, 1800. He received a com

mon school education. He came to Ohio in

1826, and in 1828 was admitted to the bar of that State. In 1835 he was chosen prosecuting attorney of Ashtabula county. In 1837 he was elected to the State Senate, and was twice re-elected. In 1847 he was elected presiding judge of the third judicial district of Ohio,

States Senate in 1851, which place he held for several terms. His last official position was that of commissioner to investigate affairs in St. Domingo, which he held in 1871. reputation as a lawyer was very high, but it was overshadowed by the eminent place in political life occupied by him.-Albany Law

which office he held until chosen to the United

Journal.

His

amendment of the Constitution of Wisconsin SUPREME COURT OF WISCONSIN.-By a recent that State is to be increased from three to five. the number of judges of the Supreme Court of The two new judges will be elected by the popular vote in April next.

ITALY.

DEATH OF AN EMINENT ITALIAN JURIST.-Paolo Frederigo Sclopis di Solerano, an eminent Italian jurist, died on the 8th inst. at Turin. He was born in 1798, and received his diploma as doctor at law when twenty years of age. He

presided at the Geneva Court of Arbitration, and achieved great credit for his conduct on that occasion. He was considered as one of the foremost international lawyers of the age.

GENERAL NOTES.

TESTATE AND INTESTATE.-In the year 187677 "Probate or Inventory Duty was paid on property left by will, estimated at £120,628,580 and on £11,118,800 on persons dying intestate In the former the cases numbered 30,498 and in the latter 10,408. Last year in England 8,664 persons died intestate leaving property worth £9,208,175; in Scotland, 629, worth £768,730; and in Ireland, 1,115, worth £1,141,895.-London Times.

THE LAW'S DELAYS.-The London papers are greatly concerned over the law's delay, and are asking, is there no cure? It is claimed that the knowledge of a disease is half its cure; that more than one-half the law's delays are caused by the judges wasting their time, and their want of dispatch in disposing of business. Comparisons are being made between the judges and the time it takes them to dispose of

cases. It is claimed that in one court, the judge will be engaged a whole day in hearing a motion, talking and joking with the counsel, and that if a case goes over the motion day, it is equivalent to a continuance for three months, and that when a case is heard, he often takes it under advisement for months, which sometimes operates as a perpetual injunction. It is said of another judge, that he never takes any case under advisement, but decides all cases that come before him as soon as the evidence is heard; and that on motion day he will dispose of twenty or thirty motions in an hour; that he will not listen to the discussions of counsel which do not relate to the questions in issue; that he says but very little himself, and that little to the point; and that as a consequence his docket is kept up, and what is known as the law's delay is not allowed to obstruct the course of justice in his court. The London Courier devotes three columns to describing these judges, and the way they dispose of their business. The first it calls Judge Slow, the last Judge Quick. Much that it says applies as well to the way justice is administered in America as in England. We have no doubt much more

judicial labor could be performed by the courts of America if our judges would more fully realize the importance and cost of their time to the people. Our courts are not the places to discuss politics or war news, but to try cases in the least possible time consistent with justice. A judge can accomplish a great deal in the course of a year, if he will do no unnecessary talking himself, and allow the bar to do none. Talking judges are always unpopular with the bar. There are no class of men that like to see despatch in business more than lawyers. If any judge who is considered slow by the lawyers, will follow the above suggestions for a month,he will be astonished at the amount of judicial labour performed within the month. Few of us realize how much time we waste. This is especially so with judges.-Chicago Legal News.

SERVING THE DEAD.-Some Wisconsin sheriffs seem to have but faint notions of decency and propriety. The following is a verbatim copy of a summons and return of the sheriff thereon in a justice's court in a suit in Sparta, Wis.: MONROE COUNTY, Town of Sparta.}

SS.

The State of Wisconsin to the Sheriff or any Constable of said County:

Weigand, if he shall be found within your You are hereby commanded to summon A. county, to appear before the undersigned, one of the Justices of the Peace in and for said county, at my office in said town, on the 10th day of September, A.D. 1875, at 9 o'clock in the forenoon, to answer to Isaac Tuteur, plaintiff, to his damage two hundred dollars or under. Hereof fail not at your peril.

Given under my hand, this 3rd day of September, 1875.

MONROE COUNty, ss.

SAMUEL HOYT, Justice of the Peace.

I, Geo. B. Robinson, Deputy Sheriff of said county, do certify that I have been to the dead, and so I left a copy at his last and final defendant's usual place of abode, and find he is abode in my county, to wit: on his grave in the town of Ridgeville, he not leaving any family or funds behind. He leaves this world without sell him whisky. a cent, and has gone where the plaintiff can't Alas! Tuteur is out, and Weigand is dead!

C. W. MCMILLAN, Sheriff. By GEO. B. ROBINSON, Deputy.

We reproduce in the present issue an article from the London Law Times, on the inconveniences resulting from requiring unanimity in juries. The case of Regina v. Truelove, referred to by our contemporary, was one in which no determination was reached, simply because one of the jury would not accept from the Court the law applicable to the case, but preferred to act upon his own view of what it ought to be. This is an incident by no means of rare occurrence, though it seems on the present occasion to have excited more than usual attention. Possibly the result may be a modification of the existing law. We notice that a bill has been introduced in the Legislature of New York, providing that the verdict of nine jurors shall be sufficient in civil cases. It may be interesting to our contemporaries in that State to know that a similar law has long existed in Lower Canada, now the Province of Quebec. The verdict of nine jurors is received, and as soon as that number are agreed, the jury return into Court. We are not aware that this modification of the English rule has occasioned any particular inconvenience or dissatisfaction. But it must be remarked that the profession of the Province do not favor jury trials at all as a mode of getting their cases decided. Jury trials are only allowed by law in matters of a commercial nature or in actions for personal wrongs, or injuries to moveable property. Yet, although thus restricted, members of the bar are by no means eager to avail themselves of the option permitted in these classes of actions. As a rule they prefer to leave their cases to the determination of a single Judge of the Superior Court, who has both to find the facts as a jury would do, and to lay down the law applicable to the facts so found. The exceptions are actions against insurance companies, and actions for the recovery of damages resulting from personal wrongs, such as breach of promise and the like. In these classes of actions there seems to be a strong conviction that a jury is more generous than a Judge, and the plaintiff usually declares

his option to have his case tried by jury. Yet, so few are the cases which actually come to trial, that in Montreal, the commercial metropolis of Canada, the jury trials, during the last twenty years, have not amounted to half a dozen per annum, and in the country districts jury trials in civil cases are almost unknown.

Reason seems to dictate that unanimity ought not to be required in civil cases. Why compel twelve citizens to be unanimous in their appreciation of damages, when, as in this Province, three or five Judges, having to pass upon the same facts, are permitted to differ, and to state their reasons of difference at length? We are curious to know on what grounds such an anomaly could be defended. Where the jury have to award a specific sum of damages, there is much greater probability of a fair award if the verdict of nine is sufficient. For where unanimity is exacted, one obstinate and ill-disposed juror can override the votes of the other eleven, or else prevent a determination. But where nine can give a verdict, the voice of such a man, or of two or three such men, sinks into insiguificance. They are rendered harmless, and the majority are generally able without much delay to arrive at a figure which meets their views, and gives as much satisfaction as can be hoped for in litigated matters.

ASSAULTS UPON JUDGES.

It appears that Dodwell, the disappointed suitor who attempted to assassinate the Master of the Rolls a few weeks ago, is a clergyman. According to the Solicitors' Journal, he is the ex-chaplain of a workhouse in Sussex, who was dismissed from his position by the guardians. He presented a petition of right with a view to his being reinstated, but this was summarily dismissed by Vice-Chancellor Malins, and also by the Court of Appeal. Soon afterwards he was heard of at Bow Street Police Office, where he made application for a summons against Lord Justice James and other Judges for calling him "a perjured man.”

Judges, as a matter of every day duty, have to give decisions which involve perhaps the whole fortunes of suitors, or at least materially affect their prospects. It is creditable to the gentlemen discharging this responsible duty, and creditable also to human nature, that so few disappointed litigants are moved to wreak

vengeance upon those whose words have go important an influence upon their fortunes. Although police magistrates and others filling subordinate positions are from time to time menaced or actually assaulted by refractory prisoners, serious attacks upon Judges holding high judicial office are almost unheard of. One has to go back to the seventeenth century for precedents. In the year 1616, Sir John Tyndal, one of the Masters in Chancery, was killed by a shot fired at him while entering his chambers at Lincoln's Inn, the assassin being a man named Bertram, against whom Sir John had given a judgment. Bertram shortly afterwards committed suicide. This is the only instance of assassination on record. In 1631, Chief Justice Richardson, who was holding the Assizes at Salisbury, was assaulted by a convict who threw a brick bat at him. Those were days when prompt justice was meted out. The right hand of the prisoner was forthwith struck off, and affixed to a gibbet, on which he was afterwards hanged in presence of the Court. These two cases seem to be the only instances furnished by the judicial history of more than two centuries. Anonymous letters of a threatening character have probably been more common.

DOUBLE APPEAL.

SHOULD UNANIMITY BE REQUIRED IN JURY TRIALS?

The case of Reg. v. Truelove, tried in the Queen's Bench the week before last, raises this much debated question once more to that prominent position amongst questions of legal reform which it has often before occupied. So much has been written and spoken in praise of the institution of trial by jury, that it has become a sort of habit to look upon it as it now exists as an institution almost free from imperfection, and one to meddle with any part of which would be a dangerous tampering with those liberties, the possession of which we in a great measure attribute to it. None indeed of our institutions have been described by writers in terms of such unbounded panegyric as this, from the time of the authors of our earliest law books down to that of Blackstone, who, in reverence for what he declares to be "the palladium of British liberty, the glory of the English law, and the most transcendent privilege which any subject can enjoy or wish for,” stands foremost of all. The effect of all this has been to cause attempts at reforming any part of the institution to be looked upon with disfavor and suspicion, however apparent the necessity for improvement may have shown itself; and such few reforms as have been made have been of such slow growth as to have been brought about almost imperceptibly. Still, however, it has not remained in all respects unchanged from its commencement. fact, the rule requiring unanimity is one which came into existence long after trial by jury became an established fact. According to Lambard, in a jury of twelve the verdict of eight was to prevail, and from Bracton and Fleta it would appear that the practice in their time was for the judges, when the jury could not agree, to add to their number until twelve out of the entire number could be got to concur in a verdict. In the time of Edward I., the judge exercised the option of doing this or of compelling the original twelve to agree by starving them into it. Later it would appear that the option was always exercised in one way-the latter-and so the practice of starving a jury into unanimity became established. A note to Hale's Pleas of the Crown, vol. 2, p. 296, states that the ancient practice

In