practitioner, if not enough to compete with a Hargrave, a Bell, or a Sugden. Still it is a remarkable circumstance that not a single allusion to any individual law book is to be found in the narrative, the letters, or the diary; though he must have read several which might fairly claim a place in Mr. Hallam's Literary History or any other work which professes to trace the intellectual progress of mankind. Neither Coke's fullness, nor Fearne's subtlety, nor Blackstone's elegance and clearness of outline, elicit a remark!

Whilst the courts were sitting, he was occupied ten hours a day upon the average in the House of Lords, before the Chancellor, or in the Rolls. He had also to attend parliament; but Lord Brougham says that he found time to read every new publication of interest, whether French or English, and so far as books on politics or legislation are concerned, the diary bears testimony to the fact. This again is no slight praise in one whose political education was, in the common meaning of the term, completed at an epoch when Fox and Lord Ellenborough were boasting that they found it impossible to read Adam Smith; a boast which brings down Fox-wherever it may place the chief justice-to the level of an accomplished intellectual gladiator.

Romilly is said to have been fond of works of fiction as a relaxation, and in one of his early letters we find him recommending Charlotte's Smith's novels to a friend. The reflections were sufficiently obvious-but it is worthy of remark that his reflections on Sheridan's funeral are a literal prose version of part of Moore's monody:

"How proud they can flock to the funeral array

Of one whom they shunned in his sickness and sorrow,
How bailiffs may seize his last blanket to day,

Whose pall shall be held up by nobles to-morrow."

In all the relations of private life Romilly was unexceptionable: nothing can be more beautiful than the mingled feeling of fondness and veneration with which his family regarded him; and the select circle of friends who were admitted to his intimacy, still speak of his Saturday parties as always made pleasing by his polished ease of manner and sometimes gladdened by his playfulness. He never saw company on Sundays,

and Lady Romilly told a friend that every week-day except Saturdays he had papers to read on his dinner-table, which he left at eight at farthest for his chambers, the House of Commons, or the Rolls Court. He always returned, if practicable, to a light supper with her, and she seldom went out for fear of missing him.

Besides betraying occasional symptoms of his constitutional irritability, he was somewhat reserved and formal in his intercourse with the bar, but they still cherish his memory, and dwell with pride upon his name, as one of those which have most contributed to elevate the character of the profession with the world at large.

He died Nov. 1st, 1818. It can serve no useful purpose to dwell on the concluding scene. The death of Lady Romilly (Oct. 28, 1818,) was too much for his sensitive affectionate disposition, and he destroyed himself.

H.

ART. IV. ON THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF JUDGES OF INFERIOR

COURTS.

A CASE has recently occurred before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council upon this subject, which it peculiarly behoves the several judges of Vice-Admiralty Courts to be apprized of, and which will not be uninteresting to the public in these days of attachment for alleged contempt. We allude to the case of an appeal from the Vice-Admiralty Court of Gibraltar to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, which, as our readers are aware, is now by act of parliament substituted as the appellate tribunal from such courts, instead of the High Court of Admiralty, and which succeeds therefore to all the powers and duties of that learned and famous court, and no more.1

It is not necessary to enter into the nature or merits of the cause. The judgment of the Vice-Admiralty Court in question has subsequently been reversed (Lushington, judge of the Admiralty, diss.) though without costs; but the question to which we desire to call the reader's attention is consequent

1 See the case of Chesterton v. Farlar, 7 Adolph. & El. 713.

upon

the following interlocutory order of attachment against the judge, registrar and marshal of that Court:

“Extracted from the Registry of Her Majesty's High Court of Admiralty and Appeals.

"Present

"On Saturday the Seventh day of December, in the year of our Lord 1839, before the Judicial Committee of Her Majesty's Most Honorable Privy Council, at the Council Chamber, Whitehall.

LORD BROUGHAM,

SIR JOHN BERNard Bosanquet, Knt.
THE HON. THOMAS ERSKINE,

SIR HERBERT JENNER, KNT.

DR. STEPHEN LUSHINGTON.

In the presence of

H. B. Swabey,
Dy Registrar.

Barton and others
against

Our Sovereign Lady the Queen
and

Shirreff and others.

Ship Winwick. Wm. Hodge, Mr.
Gostling.

Nicholl.

The Certificate of the monition to transmit the balance of the net proceeds of the ship and cargo is continued.

"In pain of the Worshipful Barron Field, Esquire, the Judge; James Ross Oxberry, Esquire, the Registrar; and Edward Prichard, the Deputy Marshal of the Vice-Admiralty Court of Gibraltar, not having complied with the tenor of the monition personally served on them respectively, to transmit the sum of nine hundred and fiftyfive pounds, ten shillings and tenpence (£955: 10s. 10d.) into the Registry of this Court, the said sum being the balance of the net proceeds of the said ship or vessel Winwick, her tackle, apparel or furniture, and the goods, wares and merchandizes laden therein, as mentioned in the said monition: their Lordships, at the petition of Gostling, on motion of counsel, decreed them to be attached for such their contumacy and contempt; but direct the attachment not to issue for two months from this day. (Signed)

"ARDEN, "Registrar."

The history of this alleged contempt is as follows. On the 20th July, 1838, the judge of the Vice-Admiralty Court of Gibraltar pronounced the ship Winwick to have been, at the time of her seizure, employed in the illegal transporting,

removing, carrying away, or conveying of slaves or persons as or in order to their being dealt with as slaves, under the Slave Trade Consolidation Act, and condemned the same accordingly as forfeit to the crown, and also condemned the master, first mate, and owners in costs of suit. On the 3rd August following the claimants asserted an appeal from this decree, and entered into a bail bond with sureties in the sum of £100 to prosecute the appeal and answer the costs thereof, as they were required to do by the rules and regulations made in pursuance of an act of parliament of 2 Wil. IV. c. 51, and established by order in council of 23d June, 1832; but appellants (and this it is important to observe) are not required to give any security for the performance of the judgment of the Vice-Admiralty Court, or for the payment of the costs in that Court. On the 9th Janurary, 1839, the judge and registrar of the court received the usual inhibition from the appeal court, inhibiting them from doing or attempting any thing to the prejudice of the parties appellant as long as the cause should remain undecided. On the 8th February following, the appellants, not being able to procure sufficient bail for the ship (which was in the hands of the marshal of the Vice-Admiralty Court) to be surrendered to them, the counsel for the seizors moved the Court for the sale of it, upon a ship builder's affidavit of perishability; this was accordingly decreed by the Court, and the ship was sold by auction at Gibraltar on the 14th March, for the sum of 7050 dollars, being 550 more than her appraised value.

The counsel for the seizors then moved the court that their costs, including the judge's, registrar's and marshal's fees and expenses, should be paid out of the proceeds of such sale; and no monition having at that time been issued to transmit any proceeds into the registry of the High Court of Admiralty, and the judge,considering that, in Courts of Admiralty, the proceedings are in rem, that the res when condemned is liable to pay the costs of the suit in the first instance, that the appellants were not within the jurisdiction of the Vice-Admiralty Court, and were not required by the rules and regulations, before referred to, to give any security for the payment of the costs of that court,-believing also the practice of the High Court of Admiralty, and knowing that of the Vice-Admiralty Court of

Gibraltar,1 to be to allow of such deductions from the produce thereof, where the thing in question has been condemned to the seizors with costs,-granted the motion as of course, and the costs and fees and expenses were taxed and paid by the registrar out of the net produce of the ship, that is to say, the costs on the part of the crown and the seizors at 2146 dollars, the judge's fees at 100 dollars, the registrar's fees (including poundage upon paying the money out of court) at 499 dollars, and the marshal's fees (including 1126 dollars, money out of pocket, paid to ship keepers, &c.) at 1748 dollars.

It was not until the 19th April following that the first monition, dated at London the 3d April, to transmit any proceeds, was served upon the judge, registrar and marshal at Gibraltar, that is to say, a month after the costs had been paid. In obedience to this monition, the registrar, on the 22d May following, transmitted into the registry of the High Court of Admiralty the balance of £607: 3s. 8d. But on the 3rd July following, the judge, registrar and marshal were served with another monition, monishing them or one of them to transmit the sum of £955. 10s. 10d., being the sum deducted and retained as the amount of costs incurred on behalf of Her Majesty, and the fees of the judge, registrar and marshal, in proceeding to condemnation of the ship. To the last mentioned monition, they all three made a special return in writing of the foregoing facts, and concluded such return by stating, that, if the judge had committed any error in the case, such error proceeded solely from a mistake of the practice of Courts of Admiralty, not from any intention of disobeying the inhibition of the superior court, and that the registrar and marshal merely acted in obedience to the orders of the Vice-Admiralty Court. They all submitted that none of them could be answerable in their persons or property for a judicial error, and they therefore prayed that the Judicial Committee would, under all the circumstances of the case, at least reserve this question till after the hearing of

1 The same practice was pursued in this Court in 1836, in the case of the Spanish brig Cazardor and cargo, which were condemned under the same act of parliament, having been seized by the then Governor of Gibraltar, Sir Wiliam Houstoun, who was paid his costs out of the proceeds of the cargo, pending an appeal to the same tribunal, excepting that in that case there happened to be no monition to transmit proceeds, either after such payment or before, but there was the usual inhibition, and such monition might at any time afterwards have issued.