from a MS. in the Royal Library of the Escurial, which contains a Castilian version of the Laws of Oleron under the title "El fuero de Layron." That the same Sea Laws were also received in the ports of Western Italy, may be gathered from an ancient version of them in old Gascon patois, and headed "Asso es la copia deus rolles de Leron de jugemens de Mar," which is preserved in the Archives of the City of Leghorn. In fact the Laws of Oleron embodied the Customs of the Sea, observed by all merchants and mariners engaged in the trade of wine, and of oil, and of salt, between the ports of the Atlantic Seaboard of France and the ports of England and of Flanders and of the Baltic sea on the one hand, and the ports of Spain and of the Western Seaboard of the Mediterranean on the other hand. It is not too much to say that the Courts, which administered these Laws of the Sea to passing mariners of all nationalities, were in the proper sense of the word International Courts, and that the High Court of Admiralty of England, which has been recently transformed into a Division of the High Court of Justice, has transmitted to the new Court its International character with all its International responsibilities.

The connecting links of a continuous chain of medieval Maritime Law, which may be said to have girt the civilised world in the fourteenth century, are discoverable Southwards in the Sea Laws of Barcelona, which were subsequently embodied in the Book of the Consulate of the Sea, and Northwards in the Gotland Sea Laws, which ultimately acquired the name of the Maritime Law of Wisby, to which reference has been already made. This latter body of medieval Sea Laws is hardly less famous than the judgments of Oleron, although they were not much known beyond the limits of the Baltic Sea, as long as they existed in MS. These Laws are in fact a compilation of Sea Laws derived from three distinct sources, a Baltic source, a Flemish or Gascon source, and a Dutch source. No ancient MS. text of this

collection of Sea Laws is known to exist in England, although the merchants of the Island of Gotland, of which Wisby is the capital, obtained special trading privileges in England, under a charter from Henry III. (A.D. 1237), the original of which with the seal attached to it is still preserved in the Archives of the City of Lubeck. We have little evidence of the use of these Sea Laws by name in the English Admiralty Courts before the seventeenth century, but they were known in the Admiralty Courts of Scotland as the Wisby Sea Laws* before the middle of the sixteenth century, probably by reason of the intercourse of the Baltic mariners with Scotland being more intimate than with England.

It appears that, under the Tudor Sovereigns of England, the Instance Court of Admiralty held cognizance of charter-parties, affreightments, and maritime contracts made in foreign countries beyond the sea, and although the Common Law Courts had attempted to oust the Admiralty of its jurisdiction in such matters in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, they were not successful until the Stuart Dynasty succeeded to the throne, when Sir Edward Coke, as Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, gave his opinion that, under the Statute 13 Richard II., the Admirals' jurisdiction was confined to things done upon the Sea. Thenceforth a new struggle between the Admirals' Court and the Common Law Courts arose, in which the latter were victorious. Much may be said for the object which Sir Edward Coke had in view, but little can be said for the means, to which resort was had to enable the Common Law Courts to enlarge their jurisdiction beyond its ancient limits, as it was necessary for those Courts to devise legal fictions of an unreasonable character in order to found a "venire" from which a Jury might be summoned; such, indeed, as would revolt

They are frequently cited under the name of "Wisbie Sea Laws" in the "Practiks," compiled by Sir John Balfour, of Pittendreich, Lord President of the Court of Session in 1563.

the common sense of Englishmen in the present day. The Common Law Courts, however, always refrained from encroaching on the proper jurisdiction of the Silver Oar, and never attempted to extend the operation of the Common Law to the High Sea.

An apt illustration of the deference shown by the Judges of the Courts of Common Law to the jurisdiction of "the Silver Oar," on the High Seas, is furnished in the recent case (1835) of the Attorney-General v. Tomsett, reported in 2 Crompton, Meeson, and Roscoe's Reports, p. 175, which was heard before Baron Parke, Baron Bolland, Baron Alderson, and Baron Gurney. It was a revenue case, in the nature of an information for unlawfully unshipping goods in the Downs about two miles from the shore, but within the statutory limits of the Port of Dover. Platt, Counsel for the Defendant, said: "Even admitting that the enactment in the Statute 13 and 14 Car. II., ch. 11, has the meaning contended for, it cannot affect the limits of the Kingdom of England. The Commissioners might have had powers to vary the limits of the ports, but they had no power to alter the ancient boundaries of the kingdom. [Alderson, B.: The Downs are within the ancient limits of England.] Platt: It is submitted that the narrow seas were not part of the Kingdom of England. [Alderson, B.: The authority of Lord Hale* is to the contrary; he says they are within the kingdom.] Platt: No doubt they are part of the dominions of the Kings of England, and so are the Colonies, but it is submitted that they are not part of the Kingdom of England. If they were they would be within some county, but that is not pretended. The jurisdictions of the Admiralty and the Common Law Judges divide between high and low water mark. The warrants of the Chief Justice of the King's

A reference is made in a note appended by the reporter to Lord Hale's Treatise de Jure Maris, ch. 4, but we have searched through the chapter indi. cated in vain for a confirmation of Baron Alderson's remark.

Bench, which are tested England, to wit, are of no authority in the Downs. [Gurney, B.: It is necessary to get the Silver Oar from the Admiralty, in order to authorise an arrest there.]"

The Silver Oar, as an emblem of maritime jurisdiction, is probably peculiar to British Courts, and the Silver Oar of the Admiralty Courts is of great historical value, as a standing memorial of their long-established practice to arrest both persons and vessels on the High Seas. Nothing is known for certain as to the origin of the ancient Silver Oar of the High Court of Admiralty, which is kept in the custody of the Marshal of the High Court; that it was in use in the reign of Queen Elizabeth is a legitimate inference, from an inscription on the base of the stem, the centre of which is sunk, and in the depressed part are engraved the anchor and twisted cable, the peculiar badge of the Admiralty of England, whilst round the raised edge, which encircles the anchor and cable, is the legend "Jasper Swift, Marshiall of the Admiralte." This name at once carries us back to the twenty-eighth year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, in which year there are several warrants recorded in the Admiralty Rolls, which are addressed to Jasper Swift, then Marshal of the High Court, in the name of Charles, Lord Howard, Baron of Effingham, at that time High Admiral of England. There are, however, other symbols on the oar, which carry its history further back. There is, for instance, embossed on the blade of the oar, which has the shape of a paddle or ancient steering oar, an heraldic shield bearing the arms and supporters of King Henry VII., and as the shield has the appearance of having been superposed on the blade, its presence is not inconsistent with the oar being of still higher antiquity, and it has been conjectured from the annuli or knobs, which encircle the stem and divide it into three parts, and in respect of which it resembles the Silver Oar of the Admiralty of the Cinque Ports, that a portion of the stem may be Edwardian; we say a portion of the stem, as the upper part of it has been renewed as

recently as in the reign of George III., probably by reason of its having been worn away by friction against the shoulder of the Marshal, who carries it as Serjeant-atMace, on all occasions when he attends the Judge. On the other hand, the Silver Oar of the Admiralty of the Cinque Ports is in form and size very similar to that of the High Court of Admiralty of England. It is probably the more ancient of the two oars. It has no shield of arms engraved upon the blade, but simply an anchor with two cables, in like manner as the oar of the High Court has an anchor with a twisted cable, the badge of the High Court, engraved on the upper part of the blade. There was a tradition in the Registry of the High Court of Admiralty, when it had its home in Doctors' Commons, that there was formerly a little silver oar, which the Marshal or his deputy carried with him as the symbol of his authority, when he had to execute a warrant of arrest against persons or vessels on the High Seas. The practice in the present day is for the officer of the High Court, when he proceeds to arrest a person or a vessel on the High Seas, to carry with him a small circular staff surmounted with a silver crown, below which are engraved on a silver plate the anchor and twisted cable of the Admiralty. If it is permissible to reason from the practice of inferior Courts on such a subject, si parva licet componere magnis, the ancient practice of the water-bailiff of the town of Dover may be cited as instructive. There is, for instance, preserved in the Archives of the Corporation of Dover a little silver oar, the stem of which is fitted into a brass circular tube in such a manner, that a brass case or cover may be screwed on to the tube, so as to conceal the oar from sight. The silver oar itself, in this instance, has engraved on it an anchor and cable, whilst the outside case. is surmounted with a crown, below which a similar anchor and cable are in like manner engraved. When the cover is screwed on, the entire instrument has the appearance of a