and the defendant was compelled to pay over to the assignee the value of the goods. Nothing daunted, he now filed his bill in Equity, and the Lord Chancellor decided that the transfer was valid, and compelled the plaintiff to refund the money which he had received under the judgment of the Exchequer Chamber. Had there been no divided jurisdiction, or had that division restricted each Court to its own department of Law, the parties would have been spared one of these two expensive lawsuits, and justice would have been saved the scandal of seeing the decisions of two Courts of Law overruled by a single Judge in Equity. 5. The Existence of Two Codes of Procedure. The multiplication of labour without any corresponding result is always to be deprecated. One of these systems must be superior to the other, or each must contain parts out of which a system superior to either may be constructed. The double system impedes the division of labour by limiting the practitioner to that Court with whose procedure he is conversant, and by substituting this artificial division for the natural division which would obviously obtain with reference to the subject matter, instead of to the procedure of the suit. 6. Imperfect Power of Decrees. The peculiar nature of a Court of Equity which acts in personam, in order to avoid a conflict with the Courts of Law, renders it necessary to make the parties themselves the means of carrying out its decrees, and thus loads them with the expense of stamps and conveyances which they are compelled to pay and execute, and which are only required on account of the refusal of a Court of Law to notice a decree in Equity as conferring any title. The Remedy. It remains to consider what remedy can be devised to meet these numerous and glaring evils. As they have all been shown to spring from the division of jurisdictions, it is manifest that the remedy is to be sought in their amalgamation. This may be done in three ways: By adopting the Equitable Procedure. By adopting the Legal Procedure. Passing by the first proposition, which would imply the adoption of a procedure needlessly cumbrous and expensive, the Committee observe, that the second was the plan which was attempted by Lord Mansfield in the latter half of the last century, when he sought to take notice of equitable claims and defences in a Court of Law. The principal objection which was urged by Lord Kenyon and other opponents of this plan was, that Courts of Law being incapable of doing complete justice between the parties, ought not to interfere between them on equitable questions. If a legatee were permitted to sue the executor at law, a husband, it was contended, might obtain possession of a legacy without making a settlement on his wife. This was Lord Kenyon's favourite argument, and it was said to have had much influence in converting Mr. Justice Buller. But these learned judges forgot that the anomaly existed already in the case of a debt due to the wife dum sola, which the husband might recover at law, without being forced by law to settle it on the wife; and indeed, the argument, if pushed to its full extent, would oust a Common Law Court of all its jurisdiction; because, in exercising it, it cannot do complete justice when collateral rights are involved. The main evil to be apprehended from allowing a Court of Common Law to notice equitable suits and defences, would be that, as Equity never recedes from a jurisdiction once assumed, the concurrent jurisdiction, and consequently the power of contesting the decisions of Law in Equity, and making the latter virtually a Court of Appeal from the former, would be much increased. If, then, it be not advisable to keep up and extend the concurrent jurisdiction, could we abolish Courts of Equity and give their jurisdiction to Courts of Law? This question will be best answered by reference to the experience of Pennsylvania. In that state there is no Court of Equity, but the principles of Law and Equity are administered as one code, by Courts of Law, the legal principle, in cases of conflict, always yielding to the equitable. Thus, specific performance is enforced by finding large contingent damages to be released if the contract be performed; specific chattels are recovered in replevin, and equitable claims and defences are admitted in ejectment and assumpsit. But the Courts admit that they have no means to enforce the maxim, that he who seeks equity must do equity; and they cannot deal with more than two interests in the same suit. It is the less necessary to dwell on the defects of this system, as it rests on the extension of the ancient forms of action which the Committee presume to be destined. to great modification or to extinction. It will therefore suffice to observe, that the experience of Pennsylvania has clearly shown that Equity cannot be administered in Courts of Law without losing many of her most valuable qualities. The third and only remaining course is to treat the principles of Law and Equity as a single code, and to administer that code by means of a new procedure, taking from each of the existing rules of pleading and practice whatever specific merit they respectively possess. This has been the attempt of the State of New York. The new code of procedure of that State has shown the possibility of such a reform, and suggested hints from which the Committee have no doubt that one uniform system of pleading and practice may be framed for all cases at Law and in Equity. It is, therefore, the unanimous opinion of the Committee that, excepting the administration of the estates of deceased persons, which they think, in accordance with the Report of a former Committee, should be transferred to the Bankruptcy Courts; and excepting the Common Law jurisdiction of the Chancellor, and his jurisdiction as representative parens patriæ, the whole jurisdiction of Law and Equity ought to be vested in the same Court; that the distinction between the two should be abolished, the equitable principle in cases of conflict replacing the legal; and that this single code can and ought to be carried out under an uniform system of procedure. The Committee recommend to the Society the following resolutions; M 3 Resolved, with reference to the separate jurisdiction of Law and Equity as recognised in this country: 1. That justice, whether it relate to matters of Legal or Equitable cognisance, may advantageously be administered by the same tribunal. 2. That where the principles of Law conflict with those of Equity, the latter shall prevail, to the exclusion of the former. 3. That all litigation, whether it relate to matters of Legal or of Equitable cognisance, may advantageously be subjected to the same form of procedure. 4. That the rules of procedure be embodied in a code. ART. IX. THE IRISH BENCH AND BAR. Curran and his Contemporaries. By C. PHILLIPS, Esq. Blackwood & Son. Second edition. 1851. WE have little hesitation in affirming that, since the appearance of the justly celebrated "Life of Johnson," by Boswell, there has appeared no biographical work so interesting as this. Of course we cannot be supposed to deny the great merits, in particular respects, of such Lives as those of Byron, Scott, Campbell, Southey, in one department; nor of Eldon, Romilly, Pitt, and Wilberforce, in another. But without instituting any comparison between the literary merits of the present work and of those and other biographies - merits of extreme originality, especially as regards the ones we have just named we mean to assert that the peculiar plan of Mr. Phillips's book brings it more into a comparison with Mr. Boswell's than any other that has appeared since the date of that memorable publication. For, as Johnson was the centre of the groups around which his friend gathered all the eminent personages of his time, so Curran is the centre around which Mr. Phillips gathers all the great lawyers and statesmen of his day; and hence we have before us, not merely the man, but his age. It is true that one peculiar charm of Boswell is here wanting. As was said of Mr. Phillips's early edition, now trebled in bulk, we have Boswell's Life of Johnson, minus Boswell. It is equally true that we have by no means the minute details, which form a still greater charm of Boswell's inimitable work; the reports, so to speak, of the very conversation heard and partaken by the biographer. But we have numberless anecdotes, and much dialogue recorded either by an eye and ear witness, or by one who from eye and ear witnesses known to himself, obtained the particulars; and there runs through the whole work such a just appreciation both of the relative importance of topics, the relative value of men, and the relative value of testimony, such an undeviating candour, and manifest impartiality as at once gives entire confidence in the author, and lends an enduring interest to his narrative. The original work, or rather sketch, now so greatly enlarged, appeared in 1825, and obtained so ample a share of public favour, that it has, we understand, been very long out of print. Mr. Phillips was induced, therefore, to give a new edition, but this he so altered and enlarged as to make it really a new work; and the present or fourth edition contains many most valuable additions, even to the last. Some of these additions, containing sketches of Curran's contemporaries, have enriched our pages; but others of greater interest are entirely new. The most remarkable of these are Grattan, Plunkett, Bushe, O'Connell, and, in the present edition, the Duke of Wellington figures, claimed by the author's national spirit and natural affection for his country as an Irishman. One great value of this work is that it opens up to us an age gone by, and depicts the manners and habits of a people almost strangers, though in such near proximity. The reader will scarcely wonder at the destitution to which the present generation in Ireland are reduced, when he reads of the reckless improvidence of their forefathers. Nothing seems to have occupied their minds except the amusements (so called) of the moment. Racing, drinking, and, above all, duelling, appear to have constituted the chief staple of their social enjoyment. Barristers, heads of colleges, embryo chancellors, |