OBITUARY.

SIR JOHN BUCKNILL.

SIR JOHN BUCKNILL, Puisne Judge of the Patna High Court since 1920, died suddenly on October 15 at his home at Patna.

John Alexander Strachey Bucknill was born on September 11, 1873, and was educated at Keble College, Oxford. Called to the Bar by the Inner Temple in 1896, he went the Midland Circuit until 1902, when he was given his first overseas appointment-that of Commissioner of Patents in the Transvaal. He soon entered the Legislature of the province, served as chairman of more than one of its committees, and became Legal Adviser to the Government.

Later he went to Cyprus as King's Advocate, and became a member of the Legislative and Executive Councils. Five years in the island were followed by two years as AttorneyGeneral of Hong-kong. He compiled the Imperial Ottoman Penal Code, published in 1914. Early in that year he went to Singapore as Chief Justice of the Straits Settlements. Many extra-judicial tasks fell upon him in the difficult war period, including the chairmanship of the Military Service Advisory Committee, and later the presidency of the Straits Settlements, Kedah and Johore Military Service Tribunals. He was also president of the Commission which investigated the administration of the State of Trengganu. In 1920 he went to Patna as judge and became president of its Law College, as also of its Museum Committee and of several learned societies. He was knighted in 1916.

MR. W. D. GAINSFORD.

MR. WILLIAM DUNN GAINSFORD, of Skendleby Hall, Lincolnshire, died on October 4 at the age of 83. He was descended from John de Gaynesford, who held the Manor of Crowhurst, Surrey, in the reign of Edward III. The elder son of Mr. R. J. Gainsford, of Darnall Hall, Sheffield, he was born on December 24, 1842, was educated at Oscott, and was called to the Bar by Lincoln's Inn in 1880. For many years past he had lived on his Lincolnshire estate. He was a magistrate for the West Riding and for Lindsey (Lincolnshire), and for a long period was chairman of the Spilsby Bench, resigning that position in 1913.

MR. P. J. HIBBERT, J.P.

MR. PERCY J. HIBBERT, J.P., of Hampsfield, Grangeover-Sands, died on September 29. He was the only son of the late Sir John T. Hibbert, P.C., K.C.B., M.A., D.L., the first, and for many years, chairman of the Lancashire County Council. He was born in 1850, and was educated at Cambridge. He afterwards studied for the Bar, and was called by the Inner Temple in 1878.

Mr. Hibbert was a justice of the peace for the county, and a member of the Lancashire County Council. He was formerly an auditor to the Local Government Board. He took a deep interest in the Volunteer and Territorial movements, and was captain in the 4th Batt. Border Regiment from 1891 to 1911. He wore the Territorial distinction.

On the death of Mr. E. B. Dawson, Mr. Hibbert was elected chairman of the Lancaster Quarter Sessions. He has taken an active part in the local government and administrative life of North Lancashire and the county. He was appointed chairman of the North Lonsdale magistrates in 1920; he was a member of the Ulverston Board of Guardians and the Ulverston Rural District Council, and a member of the Lancashire County Council.

Mr. Hibbert was always keenly devoted to sport. He rowed for Cambridge in 1874 and 1875, he rowed" head of the river" in 1872, won the pairs in 1873, and for the Leander R.C. won the grand challenge cup at Henley in 1875.

APPOINTMENTS.

JUDICIAL APPOINTMENTS.

THE KING has been pleased to approve the following appointments :

The Honourable SIR PAUL OGDEN LAWRENCE, one of the Justices of His Majesty's High Court of Justice, Chancery Division, to be a Lord Justice of Appeal.

Sir Paul Ogden Lawrence has been a Judge of the High Court, Chancery Division, since 1918. He was called to the Bar by Lincoln's Inn in 1882, took silk in 1896, and was made a Bencher of his Inn in 1900. From 1913 to 1918 he was chairman of the General Council of the Bar, and from 1917

to 1919 chairman of the Incorporated Council of Law Reporting for England and Wales.

MR. ALBERT CHARLES CLAUSON, C.B.E., K.C., to be one of the Justices of the High Court of Justice, Chancery Division. Mr. Albert Charles Clauson, C.B.E., K.C., was born in 1870, and was educated at Merchant Taylor's School and St. John's College, Oxford. He took a first-class in Moderations in 1889, and later took a first in Literae Humaniores, and became Senior Scholar in 1894. He obtained the Tancred Studentship at Lincoln's Inn in 1889, and was called to the Bar two years later, being elected a Bencher of his Inn in 1914. For the last three years he has been counsel to Oxford University, and standing counsel to the Royal College of Physicians. He is a magistrate for Hertfordshire, and a past master of the Merchant Taylor's Company. He married in 1902 Kate, daughter of Mr. T. J. Hopwood, and widow of Mr. L. Thomasson. He was made a C.B. E. in 1920.

LORD JUSTICE WARRINGTON.

THE KING has been pleased to confer a Peerage upon LORD JUSTICE WARRINGTON on his retirement from the Court of Appeal.

Sir Thomas Rolls Warrington, who was 75 last May, has been on the Bench for 22 years-11 years as a Judge of the Chancery Division and 11 years in the Court of Appeal. The retiring Lord Justice was educated at Rugby and Trinity College, Cambridge, was called to the Bar by Lincoln's Inn. In April, 1904, he was raised to the Bench, and in April, 1915, to the Court of Appeal.

OPENING OF THE LAW COURTS.

THE Law Courts reopened on Tuesday after the Long Vacation. The Lord Chancellor and most of the Lords Justices and the High Court Judges attended a service at Westminster Abbey, at which a number of County Court Judges, King's Counsel, and members of the Junior Bar were present. The customary Red Mass was also held at Westminster Cathedral.

The Judges and King's Counsel afterwards breakfasted with the Lord Chancellor at the House of Lords, and the Courts were then opened with the usual procession. A new note of colour was struck by the khaki uniforms of the Guard of Honour, which was provided by the Inns of Court Officers Training Corps.

A notable figure in the procession was that of Sir Edward Clarke, the senior King's Counsel, who, in the uniform of a Privy Councillor, walked alone behind the Law Officers of the Crown and was received with hearty cheers.

THE CENTRAL CRIMINAL COURT.

was

THE October Sessions of the Central Criminal Court opened by the Lord Mayor at the Sessions House, Old Bailey, on Tuesday.

The Recorder, in charging the Grand Jury, said the calendar contained the names of 91 persons, which was a number rather below the average, having regard to the interval which had elapsed since the beginning of the last session, and, generally speaking, the cases were not of a very serious character. There was one charge of murder, one of manslaughter, and four of attempted suicide.

A special session of the Court was held for the purpose of appointing the days for holding the sittings for the jurisdiction of the Court in the judicial year just begun. The Lord Mayor attended in state

and the Judges present were Mr. Justice McCardie, Mr. Justice Greer, Mr. Justice Finlay, and Mr. Justice Wright. Sir Herbert Austin announced that the sittings would begin on the following days: Wednesday, November 10; Tuesdays, December 7, January 11, February 8, March 8, March 29, April 26, May 17, June 28, July 19, September 6, and October 11.

RESIGNATION OF THE CHIEF JUSTICE OF BENGAL.

THE Governor-General of India in Council has accepted the resignation of Sir Lancelot SANDERSON, K.C.. as Chief Justice of the High Court of Judicature at Calcutta, with effect from November 6.

Sir Lancelot, who is in his sixty-third year, is the eldest son of the late John Sanderson, of Ward House, Ellel, near Lancaster.

For many years Sir Lancelot, as Mr. Sanderson, K.C., was a prominent figure at the Liverpool Assizes. His work as an advocate took him mostly to the Nisi Prius Court, where he was briefed as leader in many important commercial cases. From 1801 to 1915 he was Recorder of Wigan, and from 1910 to 1915 Unionist M.P. for the Appleby Division of Westmorland.

CITY UNDER-SHIEVALTY.

MR. THOMAS HOWARD DEIGHTON, of the firm of Timbrell and Deighton, solicitors, 90, Cannon Street, E.C.4, has again, for the eighth time, taken office as Under-Sheriff for the City of London, having been appointed by Mr. Sheriff H. P. Shepherd, C.C.

Mr. Howard Deighton is one of His Majesty's Lieutenants of the City of London, a member of the Court of Common Council, and Deputy Alderman of the Ward of London Bridge.

THE CONCEPTION OF SOVEREIGNTY.

PROFESSOR J. E. G. DE MONTMORENCY, the Quain Professor of Comparative Law at London University, delivered his inaugural lecture for the new session on "The Conception of Sovereignty" at University College, Gower Street, on October 7.

He declared that the new freedom of modern civilised communities had altered in conception of human status. We no longer thought in terms of feudalism. The process of the abolition of feudal lordship was practically complete. It was a process which began about the same time as the doctrine of State sovereignty began to be formulated. In the heyday of feudalism, in the 13th century, the King was part of the feudal complex, and was what Professor Maitland called " below the law." The feudal complex itself was the ultimate sovereign body. It was not a matter of theory, but of fact, and we were entitled to search back into the history of community life to seek the origin of a state of things which could be expressed in terms of a juridical doctrine of sovereignty.

In the Cromwellian period Sir Robert Filmer made a step in this direction in his fruitless effort to bolster up the decaying theory of the Divine right of Kings. Locke attacked Filmer, but at the same time asserted the "instinct of self-preservation" and this, no doubt, was the true historical basis of sovereignty. The deeper aspects of Filmer's attempt to deal with the historical aspect of organised society should yield a definite conception of sovereignty. The doctrine of natural law was being placed on a historical foundation to-day, and the examination of successive phases of community life seemed to show that true sovereignty resided not only in the feudal complex, but in all tribal groups that had not yet reached the feudal stage.

The history of early institutions showed that obedience to custom was the condition precedent to the survival of the group, and this obedience involved complete control over the tribal area and all within this area by the group as such. The group, in all cases, possessed a custodian of tradition; that was to say, a custodian of the customs handed down from the ancestors. The custodian, as representative of the group, exercised sovereign powers. Professor de Montmorency gave a number of instances, in successive grades of society, of the exercise of this representative sovereign power having behind it a sanction derived from ancestral spiritual persons. Originally, the custodian was neither a priest, nor a chief, nor a leader in war, but merely an elder or elders, who, by the consent of the community, declared and made operative the custom or law and exercised the universal custom to alter custom if the need arose. The lecturer found in this person or persons the germ of legislative, judicial, and executive sovereignty representing the Sovereign Will of the community or group of communities. In the long run, that Sovereign Will always found expression, and the processes of the law of Nature overcame all the inhibitions of slavery, ignorance, and tyranny.

MLLE. JEANNE CHAUVIN.

THE Correspondent of the Manchester Guardian in a message from Paris of the 2nd inst., says :-The death of Mlle. Jeanne Chauvin, the first woman barrister, at the age of 64, has been the cause of numerous reviews of woman's position as regards the law. The country which still refuses votes to women passed a law admitting women to the Bar as early as 1900. Mlle. Chauvin was already a woman of ripe experience when she achieved what was considered a great triumph in the cause of women. She further distinguished herself by the unusual step of neglecting the criminal in favour of the civil side of the law. Decorated with the Legion of Honour, she received a good deal of recognition of her learning and her clearmindedness. Yet to-day Frenchwomen have few prospects of really succeeding at the Bar. The general preference is still for the man barrister, and the woman barrister has more often than not to make her living by side issues. Mlle. Chauvin herself for a time gave up work at the Bar and taught law in a girls' lycée. While a breach was made in French tradition by her admission to the Bar, there is no doubt that by comparison with other countries it has been very little enlarged. The woman doctor only came into her own through the shortage of doctors during the war, and she is far less firmly established than is the case in England or America. The letter has been given to Frenchwomen, but not the spirit, and until they have obtained a political status their desire to choose freely in the world's work is likely to be hampered at all points.

LAWYERS' ESTATES.

SIR JOHN WALKER CRAIG, K.C., of The Drive, Hove, Recorder of Belfast and County Court Judge of Antrim, 1911-1919, who died on July 21 last, aged seventy-nine, left unsettled property of the gross value of 14,6141., with net personalty 14,1341.

MR. JOHN WILLIAM RAWSON-ACKROYD (seventy-one), The Grange, Dean, Bed., solicitor (net personalty 63,131.), 80,5291. INCORPORATED SOCIETY OF AUCTIONEERS AND LANDED PROPERTY AGENTS.

THE following were elected to membership of the above Society at the Council meeting held on October 8, at the Society's head offices, 26a, Finsbury Square, London, E.C.2:

Fellows F. T. Major (Richmond, Surrey), H. Mitchell(Rochester), F. C. Jeffery (London), C. H. Jones (Wrexham), H. Platt (Streatham Common), S. T. Wyand (London), L. G. Pugh (Nuneaton), L. R. Pugh (Nuneaton), C. O. Lockey (Withernsea), F. G. Moore (Ilford), F. H. Spencer (Ilford), A. E. Ashworth (Rochdale), A. J. Carter (Clacton-on-Sea), G. P. Guyer (London), H. C. Rowse (St. Austell), J. P. Bradford (Masham), B. R. Fairfax (Sydney, New South Wales), J. Dixon, J.P. (N. Walsham), W. V. Swift (Truro), H. P. Antcliff (Crouch End), W. A. R. White (Bristol), J. Milton (Leeds), P. G. Kavanagh (Dublin), R. Rankin (Glasgow), E. G. W. Harmer (London), D. M. Sampson (Bristol), I. W. Lewis (Torquay), F. N. Hornby (Grimsby), A. G. Freebody (Portsmouth).

Associates: P. Houghton (Ashton-in-Makerfield), C. M. Payne (Stourbridge), G. W. Nevill (London), E. T. Bowen (London), G. A. Bloom (Glastonbury), B. Bond (Wisbech), D. W. Dann (London), G. W. Turnham (Newport, Mon.), J. Ellis (Knaresborough).

THE PERFECT PRISON.

The Times reports an amusing story from Versailles prison. A certain warder named Masset was on night duty outside the main entrance, and found himself becoming so bored and chilly that he could not resist the temptation to visit a café over the way. Being of a gregarious nature, the warder fetched out of a cell-in order to accompany him to the café-a man awaiting trial on a charge of murder, and asked a convict serving a sentence of five years for burglary to take his place at the door.

All would have been well had not a policeman passed while Masset and his friend were away, and observed the strange spectacle of a convict smoking a quiet pipe on the pavement outside the prison. He at once arrested the amateur warder, and when Masset returned he found the Commissioner of Police awaiting him. Seeing that all was discovered, Masset at once tendered his resignation, and made a dignified exit before the Commissioner could recover from his indignation and astonishment sufficiently to discharge him.

MESSRS. ERNEST BENN, LTD., now issue a new batch of sixpenny poets nearly every month. The October batch includes Algernon Charles Swinburne, Edward Shanks, Sir Walter Scott, J. Chapman, Tea Time (a nursery anthology), and Dora Sigerson Shorter.

President:

ESTABLISHED 1921.

Fire

£11,839,056.

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 23, 1926.

OBITER DICTA.

THE LAWYER'S LIFE.

WE have pleasure in calling attention to the Address delivered to the Hampshire Law Society by their President, Mr. E. Gulliford, of Southampton. The address is printed on another page. No one need go to it for a solution of his difficulties under the Law of Property Acts. These and other details of the Law Mr. Gulliford leaves severely alone. His address deals with the moralities and humanities of a profession which he traces, almost unchanged, from the days of the monarchs whose relics Layard discovered in Nineveh. To add any observations of our own is needless. The address is its own recommendation.

THE LATE MR. W. R. SHELDON.

THE Equity Bar will have seen with great regret the announcement of the death of Mr. W. R. Sheldon. Illness in a distressing form compelled Mr. Sheldon's retirement a few years ago, but he had long been a familiar figure at Lincoln's Inn. A scholar of Winchester and of Lincoln College, Oxford, he was called at Lincoln's Inn in 1882. Associated at the beginning of his career with Lord Haldane in an edition of Dart's Vendors and Purchasers, and with Sir Fortescue Brickdale in his work on the Land Transfer Acts, he attained a great reputation as a sound and capable lawyer, and became one of the foremost members of the Equity Bar. His abilities were recognised by his appointment as Junior Equity Counsel to the Board of Inland Revenue, and other Departments, and later by his election as a Bencher of his Inn. He was popular with the Bar, and beloved by his many friends. He missed the higher prizes of the profession, though they might not unfittingly have been conferred on him, but his name will not soon be forgotten in Lincoln's Inn.

usually marked by retirements and new appointments amongst the Judiciary. On the present occasion Sir Lancelot Sanderson has retired from the Chief Justiceship which he has held for about fourteen years; and he has been succeeded by Sir George Claus Rankin, one of the judges of the High Court of Calcutta. This succession had been generally anticipated, since Sir George is not only a very learned and sagacious lawyer, but earned his title to promotion seven years ago by the courageous skill with which, as judicial member of Lord Hunter's Commission which inquired into the Punjab Riots and their repression, he insisted on probing the massacre of Amritsar to the bottom, refused to let evidence be ignored or atrocities hushed up, and drafted the statesmanlike report which, steering clear between pro-Nativism and Imperialism, summed up with eminent fairness the exact degree of responsibility and the exact amount of excuse which might reasonably be pleaded in respect of each of the chief actors of that tragic drama. Sir George Rankin was a very distinguished student, first of Edinburgh University, and afterwards of Cambridge, where he was president of the Union, as well as a first-class in Moral and Political Science. At the English Bar he entered the chambers of Lord Sterndale, and enjoyed a large junior bankruptcy practice until the war called him to service as an Artillery officer. Shortly before demobilisation he was offered and accepted an Indian judgeship at the instance of Sir Lancelot Sanderson, then Chief Justice, who had known and greatly admired Rankin's form at the English Bar. He is certainly one of the most intellectual and scholarly judges who ever have served in India, and notwithstanding nearly nine years of judicial service, is still on the right side of fifty.

THE retirement of Sir Lancelot Sanderson will be generally regretted in India. Sir Lancelot is a young man for a retiring Chief Justice of fourteen years' standing; for he is only a little over sixty, THE but age in India is not the same RETIREMENT OF thing as age in England, and no SIR LANCELOT white man who values his health SANDERSON, K.C. or his reputation for efficiency cares

to remain in India after he has entered his seventh decade. Sir Lancelot at the English Bar was in chambers for many years with the late Lord Sterndale, and had enjoyed a very large practice as a junior, both in the Commercial Court and on the Northern Circuit. It was a matter of surprise at the time that one who seemed to have so fair a future before him in England should have been tempted by the offer even of one of the highest judicial appointments in India; but after taking silk Sir Lancelot had suffered a considerable diminution in practice, probably only temporary, and felt that in the circumstances it was his duty not to reject the great prize rather unexpectedly offered him. His appointment is understood to have been due to an instruction contained in a minute of Lord Morley to the effect that on the next vacancy in any high legal appointment in India an effort should be made to secure for the Indian Service some lawyer of first-rate practice and prospects in England. Lord Morley was deeply opposed to the practice, somewhat too common in earlier days, of regarding Indian patronage as a means of rewarding brilliant University men or second-rate politicians who had failed at the Bar. The more modern system, under which only men of standing are selected for the Indian Bench, is the result of Lord Morley's strong views. Certainly in the case of Sir Lancelot Sanderson and Sir George Rankin the principles of that great politician and man of letters have abundantly justified themselves.

THE LATE MR. W. M. KNIGHT.

WHILE we are referring to India it may not be out of place to add a word in memoriam of a famous advocate at the Indian Bar who has just died. Mr. W. M. Knight, distinguished alike as a traveller and a lawyer, settled at the Calcutta Bar a generation ago and rapidly attained to the largest and most varied English practice. Unlike some other Englishmen of promise who settle in India, he did not regard that country as merely a place in which to make money so rapidly as possible and then return home, but felt a genuine affection for the land and the people, and possessed a remarkable form of Anglo-Indian patriotism which showed itself in steady efforts to promote the standing and the direction of English legal practitioners in India. He much deplored the recent tendency of promising Englishmen to leave that country alone. under the impression that only a native can succeed in India: his view was that the English-trained lawyer possesses special qualities of straight dealing and sportsmanlike advocacy which commend themselves to the better natives, and, moreover, help to raise and keep up the standard of rectitude and honour amongst native practitioners gradually emerging out of centuries of Oriental guile. He always advised young barristers and young solicitors without much prospects of a career in England to try their fate in Calcutta, Madras, or Bombay : these Presidencies, he thought, will afford a forensic career to the right sort of European for a good many generations to come. In the lesser Indian Presidencies, he considered, the case is different; there the native has got and will keep the bulk of the practice. An Englishman of a very fine type, the death of Mr. Knight will be generally regretted in the Temple and in India.

REFUSAL TO ANSWER INCRIMINATING QUESTIONS.

EVERY advocate is acquainted with the peculiar rule of the English Law of Evidence which allows a witness to refuse to answer any question if the answer either discloses a defect in his title or the possible commission by himself of a criminal offence. A dramatic illustration of the rule and of the limitations which hedge it around, however, has just been afforded on a grand scale by the American proceedings which have led up to the indictment of Mr. Henry M. Daugherty, formerly Attorney-General of the United States, and of Colonel Miller, formerly Alien Property Custodian in the same country. Certain charges of fraud and conspiracy to defeat the interests of the public were made in Congress last year against private companies and minor officials. A prosecution against certain defendants followed, as the result of which the Grand Jury before finding a true bill. desired to hear the evidence of Mr. Daugherty. He declined to appear voluntarily, but was summoned as a witness by subpoena. He then refused to give evidence on the remarkable ground that his evidence might be used against himself in a criminal charge. The Court, however, took the view that such a plea does not avail to excuse a witness from going into the box and being subjected to questions; it is only available as a plea for refusing some particular question which has been asked after he has entered the box. Mr. Daugherty was, therefore, under the necessity of giving evidence, and of taking separate objection to each question. The result was that he has now been indicted in connection with the matters to which his testimony, thus compelled under a threat to commit him for contempt, related. The case is remarkable not only as illustrating in a very clear way an important limitation on the plea, but also because this is the first recorded case of a prosecution for an indictable offence

of any member of an American Cabinet. Of course, it must not be assumed that Mr. Daugherty is guilty of the complicated offences charged against him merely because he refused to answer questions for the reason mentioned above. Such a plea may be taken by a witness merely ex abundanti cautelâ, and is not to be deemed conclusive of guilt, nor, according to the better opinion of practitioners at the Criminal Bar, is it available to the prosecution as evidence of such.

OF

AN interesting little point of technical law came. before a Divisional Court, consisting of the Lord Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Avory and Mr. Justice Salter, on a preliminary objection in Leyton THE FORMALITIES Urban District Council v. Wilkinson (Times, October 20). Where JusRECOGNIZANCES. tices in Petty Sessions state a case for the High Court, it is required by s. 3 of the Summary Jurisdiction Act, 1857, that the appellant-prior to statement and delivery to him of the case-shall enter into recognizances before a Justice of the Peace to prosecute the appeal without delay and to pay costs if awarded against him. In the present case the appellant was an urban district council which had taken proceedings under the Public Health Acts: and when Justices agreed to state a case for appeal they accepted the recognizances of the Clerk to the Urban District Council, although the recognizance neither purported to bind the Council nor was authorised to be entered into by the officer on its behalf by special resolution of the Council. This appears to conflict with the requirement of the statute as interpreted in such old cases as Rex v. Abergele (5 A. & E. 795) and Southern Counties Deposit Bank v. Boaler (11 T.L.R. 568). Again, there is a dictum of Mr. Justice Bayley in Cortes v. Kent Waterworks (7 B. & C. 314 at p. 330), where that learned judge suggested that a corporation might appoint an attorney to enter into the recognizances on its behalf; this dictum was uttered in 1829, but, if good law, certainly implies that the only way in which a Corporation can enter into recognizances is by appointing in due ceremonial form an attorney to execute the bond. In the present case no such appointment had been made, and the Court took the view that, in appeals of this kind, strict compliance with statutory requirements must be observed. The preliminary objection was upheld and the appeal dismissed.

therefore

interesting book. He would have been advised that a highly respectable firm of family solicitors, who have been in communication with the defendant's solicitors, would not have sent a clerk to watch in front of her husband's house in order to effect personal service of the writ, without inquiring whether her solicitors would accept service. And Mr. Galsworthy would not have said that no one was so apt as Sir James Foskisson, K.C., the leading counsel for the defendant, at getting a co-respondent non-suited. At the trial, Bullfrey, K.C., who led for the plaintiff, did not allow his junior to examine any of her witnesses, although two of them were only called to prove the libels. We may note that, in the opinion of Sir Chartres Biron, who discussed the conduct of the trial in an interesting article in T. P.'s and Cassell's Weekly, (2nd inst.) it was very badly conducted by the counsel for the plaintiff.

SOME readers may remember that in another instalment of the Forsyte Saga, "To Let," Mr. Galsworthy has made use of the Rule against Perpetuities. Timothy Forsyte's will was drawn so as to THE PERPETUITIES tie up his property for the longest RULE IN THE SAGA. possible period, the residue being given

"in trust for that male lineal descendant of my father Jolyon Forsyte by his marriage with Ann Pierce who after the decease of all lineal descendants whether male or female of my said father by his said marriage in being at the time of my death shall last attain the age of 21 years absolutely it being my desire that my property shall be nursed to the extreme limit permitted by the laws of England for the benefit of such male lineal descendant as aforesaid."

We must leave to readers of the Saga the calculation which Gradgrind, Soames Forsyte's clerk, made of the possible result. In the state of the family, the period might well be a hundred years, and Timothy's fortune was 150,000l. "Why in a hundred years it'll be twenty millions! And we shan't live to see it! It is a Will!" He reduced the amount on recalculation to eight millions,

remembering that Timothy was in Consols. "Still, that's a pretty penny." But Soames replied that anything might happen. The State might take the lot. "They're capable of anything in these days." We suppose they are, or capable of passing another Thellusson Act-retrospective this time if such a case occurred. Perhaps some conveyancing expert will see if he can pick as many holes in this will as Sir Chartres Biron does in the Trial Scene.

*

IN "Dr. Thorne," Anthony Trollope says: "It has been suggested that the modern English writers of fiction should among them keep a barrister, in order that they

NOVELISTS' LAW.

may be set right on such legal points as will arise in their little narrations, and thus avoid that exposure of their own ignorance of the laws, which now, alas, they too often make." He doubts, rightly, whether his construction of Sir Roger Scatchard's will is correct. In that case, he says, that will must have been described wrongly. At present the issue of fiction is so large that a large staff of barristers would be required to carry out his suggestions. If it had been, some inaccuracies would have been avoided in Mr. Galsworthy's description of the libel action in "The Silver Spoon," which, however, do not detract from the merits of that

TRUSTS FOR SALE.

WE are informed that Mr. Justice Clauson on Wednesday in Re Jenkins Settlement followed the decision of Tomlin in Re Leigh's Settlement (ante p. 31; W.N. 1926, p. 191), and held that a trust for sale within the meaning of the Property Acts is a trust for sale which binds all interests in the land, whether arising under the trust or paramount to it. Hence land which has been devised subject to a jointure on trust for sale is settled land, and this is so, notwithstanding the express provisions of the Amendment Act that land held on trust for sale is not settled land. We think it is generally agreed that Mr. Justice Tomlin's decision was inconsistent at once with the notion of a trust for sale and with the scheme of the Acts, and threw their working into confusion, and the present decision, if we state it correctly, is open to the same observation. But it will be sufficient to consider it further when it is reported.