some ceremonious delay. And in this they were probably right, and it will do no harm to international law if the course which they pursued shall become a precedent of weight. It is well to remember that sympathy frequently outweighs reason, or is blind to it. Honest Balafré cries, "Saint Martin! there is, I think, some difference between the execution of a criminal and the slaughter of my own nephew," and stands ready to risk his life upon his logic. Much should be forgiven to a belligerent nation or individual. War is a dangerous and exciting business. It calls for promptness and vigor, and does not always give time for reflection. In war, God is forgotten, says Sydney Smith, and the rules of morality are reversed. But it is too much to expect of a mere mortal that he shall invariably remember his Creator in his dealings with A., and forget them with B.; that he shall fire upon a ship on one side of him, and not omit the courtesies of friendship with a vessel on the other; that he shall be a Viking in the morning, and a Quaker towards night; that he shall defend himself by force on the east of a headland, and ask the protection of neutral authorities on the west. The case of The General Armstrong, an American ship captured by a British squadron in Portuguese waters, well illustrates the perplexities which may embarass a naval commander. The book before us states this case very correctly in the main, but does not, like Mr. Lawrence in his note to Wheaton (page 720), mention that the facts as stated by the arbiter are somewhat different from what might be deduced from the documents laid before him. The advantage of fixing the facts is one which belongs to the judge, and is frequently helpful. But in the matter of Martin Kosstza, our author is neither accurate nor modest. He has no hesitation in stigmatizing as "the worst modern instance an act which the Congress of the United States deliberately ratified; and he omits, innocently doubtless because ignorantly, to state the vital fact, that the Turkish authorities protested against the act of the Austrians in seizing Kosstza, and were quite willing that the American captain should rescue him. The Austrians complained bitterly enough of what they characterized as an offence against Turkey; but Turkey was satisfied that Austria had been the first offender, and was undoubtedly glad she had been snubbed. This instance of carelessness occurs in the earlier part of the book of Mr. Hall, - a portion which is generally accurate as well as luminous. The author seems to get somewhat weary towards the close of his work; but it is always readable, and frequently felicitous both in statement and illustration. It would be valuable to the student and convenient to the naval officer. It is very strange, however, that, at this period of time, a writer on the subject of the duties of neutral states should leave wholly out of sight the question how far a neutral government can recognize a people in rebellion as belligerent without recognizing them as a state, and what are the limits and qualifications of such partial recognition. It reminds one somewhat of the woodcutter, who, having occasion to pursue his calling at a distance from his home, was very careful to carry his luncheon with him, but forgot his axe. The subject is ably and learnedly discussed in one of Mr. Lawrence's notes upon Wheaton, to which we refer the curious reader (ed. 1863, p. 40). Mr. Hall shows very clearly how recent is the history of the greater part of what is now called the law of nations. His plan, however, does not require him to refer to ancient history, although that throws much light on the general subject. Philip of Macedon had got so far in political morality as to offer to refer an international dispute to the arbitration of a neutral power; and he probably was a much more enlightened monarch than his namesake of Armada memory, in whose time the English Drake in the Pelican, which oddly enough as well as appropriately had an alias, and was otherwise called the Golden Hind, could go upon a piratical expedition with the sanction of Queen Elizabeth and many of her chief men (with a pious chaplain on board, too), and be received on his return with almost universal respect and admiration: when the very religious Hawkins could fire upon a Spanish town, and compel its governor by force to permit him to sell negro slaves to its inhabitants; and when, also, in a time of what was then called peace, the same doughty hero could delude poor Phillip into releasing English sailors, and giving them clothes and money in consideration of Sir John's guileful promise to betray to him the English fleet. These sailors had been kept by Phillip in very vile durance, more because they were Protestants than because they were pirates, though most of them were both. Piracy seems indeed to have been at that time very decidedly a national failing with our ancestors of the fast-anchored isle. And international law was a thing then hardly known beyond its merest rudiments. The Great Mogul of the day, Mohammed Baber, was probably as well instructed in it as the Duke of Parma, and the Mogul was indeed quite the equal in most respects of his European cotemporaries of the royal sort; and it is very well for those of us who are apt to think our own race and our own time alone worth regarding, to read and consider his charming autobiography, however little it may illustrate the subject we are professing to discuss. The gallant and witty Henry IV. of France could not have written his own story more agreeably; and if he had written it, would not have described a very different person. The Mogul, at the age of thirty odd, writes (we quote from memory): I have made up my mind that after the age of forty I shall entirely abandon the use of intoxicating liquor: consequently I am now drinking very freely." Can any thing sound more like Christian speech than that? Perhaps no study shows more clearly than that of international law how far inferior the body of a nation may be to its leading men, at particular periods, and how a humane and philosophic man may, in his capacity of a ruler, be forced to act in a manner which he inwardly revolts at and perhaps openly condemns. The mechanical execution of the book which has furnished our text is excellent; but the addition to it of nearly fifty pages of advertisements is discreditable to the publishers and offensive to the reader, even if he be not also a purchaser. A Treatise on Extraordinary Legal Remedies; embracing Mandamus, Quo Warranto, and Prohibition. By JAMES L. HIGH. Chicago: Callaghan & Co. MR. HIGH has already won the favor of the profession by his valuable work on Injunctions, published a year ago. The present admirable book increases our obligations to him. We commend it for the great care with which the authorities are corrected, their systematic and convenient arrangement, and the clearness and precision with which the doctrines deduced from them are stated. The book cannot fail to prove of great service. In examining the authorities cited, we are struck with the fact that the "extraordinary remedies" named in the title are involved much more commonly in the new states than in the old. Contested elections, and disputed seats, and obstinate officials, are a fruitful source of litigation at the West. With us in the East the courts are rarely asked to command the performance of official duty, or to determine the comparative rights of claimants to office. At the same time, we are bound to commend the sound sense, freedom from partisan views, and general uniformity which characterize the decisions of western courts, on questions where it would be natural to infer, from the fact that the judges are almost universally elected, there would be great danger of the judicial discretion being exercised with reference somewhat to personal interests and wishes. Among many interesting practical questions discussed, we find a consideration of the question as to the duty and power of the court in issuing mandamus to compel public officers to award the contract to the lowest bidder, in which the doctrine is drawn, from an almost uniform current of authority, that the duties of officers intrusted with the letting of contracts for works of public improvement to the lowest bidder are not duties of a strictly ministerial nature, but involve the exercise of such a degree of official discretion as to place them beyond control of the courts of mandamus. We notice that the decision of the Massachusetts Supreme Court in Conlin v. Aldrich, 98 Mass. 557, where mandamus was granted to compel the members of a school committee to allow the relator to act as member of the committee, although they had previously recognized a third person as a member and allowed him to act in that capacity, is opposed to the general current of authority, which holds that where an office is already filled by an actual incumbent, exercising the functions of the office de facto, and under color of right, mandamus will not lie to compel the admission of another claimant, nor to determine the disputed question of title, but that in such cases the party aggrieved must assert his rights by the aid of an information in the nature of a quo warranto. Forms of Practice, or American Precedents in Personal and Real Actions. Interspersed with Annotations. By BENJAMIN L. OLIVER. Fourth Edition. Revised and enlarged by a Member of the Cumberland Bar, with References to the Later Statutes and Decisions, together with a large Number of New Precedents, framed by Eminent Pleaders. Embracing, also, Rules, Forms at Law, and Precedents, according to the Practice Act of Massachusetts. Supervised by a Member of the Suffolk Bar. Portland, Me.: Dresser, McLellan, & Co. 1874. WE are somewhat inclined to question whether it would not be better for the profession if such books as this were not published. They preserve the meaningless forms and unnecessary verbiage by which the practice of the law is encumbered, and which never rested on any more solid foundation than the fancy of some" eminent pleader," whose reputation has led his successors to suppose that much is good law which was merely bad taste, so that, like a flock of sheep after the bell-wether, they have continued for centuries to leap over an imaginary obstacle. Many a lawyer daily repeats some cumbrous phrase which his knowledge of the law teaches him is absolutely without value, merely because he is afraid to take the risk of varying it. Hence our "Humbly complaining, show unto your Honor your orators," and " Forasmuch, therefore," and all the elaborate absurdities which we daily copy out of some foreign book, instead of adopting that concise simplicity of statement which is the essence of good pleading. If law students would spend the time that they devote to copying forms in studying principles, they would, by the use of a little common-sense, easily invent forms far superior, in most cases, to those which they now "ignorantly worship," and make good models instead of perpetuating bad ones. In brief, a book of precedents contains nothing which a lawyer who understands his profession ought to need, and its use merely engenders a habit of not thinking for himself, but of adopting, without understanding it, the thinking of others, and so injures the quality of his mind and his professional ability. We are aware, however, that a book of precedents is a great convenience, and even those who agree with us in theory will none the less buy it for use on those occasions when they want their thinking done for them, or must commit work to others whose thinking powers they cannot trust, which in the course of a large practice are sufficiently numerous to make such a vade mecum an almost necessary part of a lawyer's library. "Oliver's Precedents" is a work of such well-established reputation that any criticism of it would be superfluous. The present edition contains about two hundred pages of new matter, consisting mainly of new forms, which in some instances have received judicial approval, but whose authority in general is derived from the name of the pleader or their intrinsic merit. Some seventy pages are devoted to the Practice Act of Massachusetts, and consist in large measure of matter taken directly from the statute-book. Massachusetts practitioners will perhaps find this convenient; but, in a work intended for general circulation, we are inclined to doubt the propriety of giving so much space to the practice of a single state, more particularly as the pleader there is merely required to state the facts necessary to his case, with substantial certainty and without unnecessary verbiage," which any man who pretends to practise law should know how to do. On the whole, however, the present editor has succeeded in his object, which was to make such additions to this well established work as would suit it to the demands of to-day. The volume is well printed and bound, and will doubtless command a ready sale. Commentaries on the Law of Agency. By JOSEPH STORY, LL.D. Eighth The affairs of mankind are now conducted to a large extent through the intervention of agencies. This is not only true of the great industries of the world, — manufacturing, mining, building, carrying, and producing, — in which the many are necessarily employed in working out the grand enterprises of the few; but whether men buy or sell, borrow or lend, insure or are insured, as well as sue or are sued, the negotiations are conducted, and the work is done for them by a class of persons who are supposed to be peculiarly qualified to transact the particular business in hand. The extent to which commercial and business corporations of all sorts have been multiplied has also introduced many new and interesting questions, and has certainly elevated the law of agency into one of the most important branches in the science of jurisprudence. A treatise which shall present this more modern phase of the subject with any thing like thoroughness and system remains to be written. In saying this, we intend no disparagement to the valuable work of Mr. Justice Story, the eighth edition of which is now before us. The daily need of a good book on agency, as well as the estimation in which this particular work is held by the profession, cannot be better illustrated than by the fact that another edition of it is again called for. But an eighth edition leaves very little to be added to what has been said before, either in the way of praise or censure. We take pleasure, however, in heartily commending the work of the present editor. Wherever his hand is seen, it is to a good purpose. The notes which Mr. Green has added are generally brief, but none the less valuable on that account. They are full of matter; and his citations, so far as we have been able to verify them, are always to the point. The note which he has added to section 24 on attorneysat-law, and that to section 453 a, relating to the liability of a master to a servant for injuries received by the latter in the course of his employment, will not fail to attract attention as especially thorough and comprehensive. We wish, however, that his scissors, as an editor, had been employed to make some subtractions as well as additions. The book is loaded, to an unnecessary if not wasteful extent, with full-length citations of opinions which are very familiar or easily accessible. In repeated instances, from six to twelve pages are consumed in this way, when the gist of the opinion could be as well stated in as many lines, and the remainder of the space more profitably employed, - or omitted. Some of these quotations were inserted by the venerable author; but many more have been added by subsequent editors, whose work it would be no iconoclasm to disturb. We are also forced to notice some remarkable omissions. Under section 119, where the effect of a bill of lading signed by the master for goods never received on board is discussed, we are treated at full length to the opinion of Jervis, C. J., in Grant v. Norway, 2 Eng. Law & Eq. 337; but there is no reference whatever to the two leading cases on that subject in our own courts, of Sears et al. v. Wingate, 3 Allen, 103, and Schr. Freeman v. Buckingham, 18 How. (U. S.) 182. Nowhere is there any reference to the important case of Sanborn v. Fireman's Ins. Co., 16 Gray, 418, establishing the authority of an agent of an insurance company to make an oral contract of insurance; nor to that of Lowell Five Cent Saving Bank v. Winchester, 8 Allen, 109, in which the law of special and limited agencies is stated by Bigelow, C. J., in an opinion which deserves to rank as a choice monograph on that subject. And in Mr. Green's valuable note on attorneys, to which we have referred, the pertinent case of Bodartha v. Goodrich, 3 Gray, 508, as to the effect of an appearance by an unauthorized attorney, is apparently overlooked. But these omissions are certainly pardonable in an editor who, as we learn from his preface, has |