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of the question, whether the evils attending the present system of conveyancing are so great, that landowners, not intending to sell or mortgage, would be induced to avail themselves of the new process, which to them must be an expensive one, may be a dangerous one, and would not after all lead to any present advantage. All who may desire to sell or mortgage without delay, would necessarily be excluded from making application under the act. Now these evils, says the Solicitor-general, are

two:-
:-

"The first is the length of time which at present must elapse between the making of a bargain and the completion of the purchase. We know how the purchase of all other kinds of property is completed. If you buy stock you do not require to be told how many hours are necessary in which to make the trausfer. If you buy railway shares, in like mauner you have your purchase completed and your money paid in a few hours afterwards. Perhaps the most extraordinary facility of transfer obtains in the case of ships. In five minutes, and at an expense of less than five shillings, you may make a contract for, and actually transfer, such a ship as the Himalaya or the Great Eastern."-(Speech, p. 5.)

Mr. Hawkins in his very able pamphlet, says:

"The office of a register is not to promote simplicity and cheapness of transfer, but notoriety. There appears to me a fallacy in supposing that there is any thing natural in a system of registration as applied to the transfer of property. Where there is a thing to be sold, the absolute property of the seller, it will most easily, as well as naturally, be transferred by a direct process from him to the buyer, without the necessity of both resorting to an office in London to complete the transaction. Registration, qua registration, is only an impediment. The analogy of stock is cited.

The easiness with which stock is transferred is not caused by its being registered; it would be bought and sold still more readily, if, like a watch or any other chattel, it passed simply from hand to hand; but being not a corporeal thing, but a debt due to the owner from government, its transfer is effected by entry in the debtor's books, not for advantage, but of necessity."

Mr. Hawkins is not quite correct here. It is not a matter of necessity that the transfer should be effected by an entry in the debtor's books, for the debtor may give a bond transferable to bearer, as is done sometimes by our own government, and very generally by foreign states with regard to their debts, and the transfer by entry is an advantage to the creditor, inasmuch as it affords him more security than he would obtain by means of a

bond, which may be destroyed, lost, &c. But we agree with Mr. Hawkins so far as this, namely, that the system of registration does not of itself necessarily tend to simplify transfers. "The case of ships," observes Mr. Hawkins, "is peculiar; a ship is required to be registered to ascertain its nationality; without a register it would pass by simple payment and delivery. Registration is in all cases an additional element introduced into the affair, and to be desirable, it must be shown to save more than it adds to the trouble and expense of selling the commodity."

The Solicitor general, after having shown how easily stock and ships may be transferred-which Mr. Hawkins has shown might be more easily transferred if there were no register at all -turns to real property. He tells us that when an estate is bought, the purchaser cannot get possession of it until after a long lapse-sometimes no inconsiderable portion of a man's lifetime spent in the preparation of abstracts, in the comparison of deeds, in searches for encumbrances, &c. "Not only months, but years, frequently pass in a history of that kind," says Sir Hugh, “and I should say that it is an uncommon thing for a purchase of any magnitude to be completed-completed by possession and payment of the price-in a period under, at all events, twelve months." Had Sir Hugh had any experience as a conveyancer he would not have made this extraordinary statement, which is entirely without foundation. A. B., whose practice as a conveyancer, it may be said, is more extensive than that of any other man in the kingdom, says :-"It is known to all lawyers conversant with such matters, that the average time between a contract and the completion of a purchase in England, under the present system, does not exceed three months; and that of the exceptional cases which exceed that average, in a considerable proportion the delay proceeds from the fact of the purchaser being unprepared with the purchase-money."—(Letter, p. 5.) And we can fully corroborate this statement, from the experience of others as well as of ourselves. So much, then, for the first of the evils.

The second of the evils, says Sir Hugh, is this:-A buys an estate, investigates the title, is satisfied, pays his money, and obtains a conveyance. A year or two afterwards, A desires to sell or mortgage, as the case may be; B is willing to become the purchaser or to lend his money, but before he can do so there must be a repetition of the whole process which took place upon A's purchase of the estate. B must have his own solicitor and his own counsel to investigate the title, because he cannot trust those of A.

This is no doubt an evil-a very great evil; but the question is-Is it essential, in order to do away with that evil, to introduce all the cumbrous and expensive machinery which forms the basis of Sir Hugh's plan? The answer is patent—It is not. "The parliamentary title," writes A. B., "and the new and somewhat formidable statute of limitations, are incidents which you found to be inseparable from your scheme; but they were not the objects you had in view, apart from the diminution of the cost and delay with which the transfer of land is attended❞— (P. 3). Indeed Sir Hugh admits this, for he says:-" We all know that in practice, meagre as are the means at the disposal of conveyancers, such a thing is hardly ever heard of as a title passed by a conveyancer afterwards turning out to be a bad title"-(Speech, p. 13); and further, he believes that, "in point of fact, there are very few titles in this country which are not good"-(Speech, p. 21). But we can quote a somewhat higher authority on this subject even than Sir Hugh M'Calmont Cairns. Mr. Joshua Williams, in his evidence before the Registration Commissioners, said "The case of a bonâ fide purchaser being evicted for want of title is exceedingly rare "-(Rep., p. 307). It is clear, therefore, that a system by which indefeasible titles can be obtained is not in itself required in this country. All that is wanted is some plan by which the continued re-investigation of back titles may be obviated. We do not believe that the actual transfer in the register would be less expensive than an ordinary conveyance is now. A conveyance at the present day is a very simple instrument, and, except as regards the stamps,

is inexpensive; and if solicitors' fees, under the new system, are to be calculated upon an ad valorem principle, the saving on this head would be inappreciable.

Mr. Hawkins objects altogether to any system of registration, but suggests certain reforms in the law of real property, which would doubtless tend to simplify titles. He proposes, for instance, that mortgages should be mere charges, not to be heard of after they have been paid off; that a testator should be empowered to appoint a real representative, in whom all his real estate should vest absolutely virtute officii, and a conveyance from whom should confer as good a title as a conveyance of personal estate from the executor does now; that a general power in trustees to give receipts should be implied; that the law which makes judgment debts binding on land in the hands of a purchaser should be modified, &c. We should be glad to see most of these reforms carried out; but we cannot agree with Mr. Hawkins as to the utter uselessness of a good system of registration. We think that the plan proposed by the Registration Commissioners was good in the main; namely, that "a registration founded on ostensible or possessory ownership, should be permitted in the first instance, and that on such a registration the antecedent title might be left to be the subject of investigation, until, by lapse of time or otherwise, that investigation should become unnecessary "-(Rep., p. 28). A welldrawn act, based on this principle, would undoubtedly in the end obviate the evil of our present system of conveyancing with respect to the re-investigation, upon every dealing with land, of the back title; and, moreover, if fraud and forgery could be sufficiently guarded against, would ultimately secure the landowner from the danger to which he is now liable of deeds being lost or mislaid. An argument used by some who are opposed to any system of registration is, that it would be a very terrible thing to collect in one place the documents of title relating to all the land in the kingdom. Suppose, say they, the registry office and all its books, papers, and deeds should be destroyed, what a misfortune that would be! Would landowners feel safe

with such a sword hanging over their heads? To this we answer, that we firmly believe landowners would be safer if their deeds were deposited in some secure government building than they now are. Does any holder of English securities think himself in a particularly unsafe position, because the books which contain the only evidence of his being entitled to the property in question are kept at the Bank of England? The title-deeds to eight hundred millions are kept there, and we cannot see why the title-deeds to the landed property of the country could not be equally well and securely kept in another building of a similar kind.

But to establish a registry such as Sir Hugh M'Calmont Cairns proposes would be worse than useless. The remarks of the Commissioners quoted above from that report, which made so "profound an impression" on Sir Hugh's mind, that upon the opportunity offering he prepared measures in direct opposition to its import, are in every respect applicable to Sir Hugh's plan. And when to the objections foreseen by the commissioners are added those to which the details of the second bill are open—such, for instance, as the necessity for an application to a Court of Chancery, under the name of a Landed Estates Court, upon the death of a proprietor or of a trustee, or upon the sale of a portion of a registered estate, or the entering up of a notice of a lease, or upon other like occasions; the necessity of obtaining a certificate that no succession duty is payable before any dealing with land by way of transfer or mortgage can be had, and the many other difficulties and obstructions put in the way of the registered proprietor and those claiming through him, or for whom he may be a trustee-when, we say, all these objections are added, it is to us a matter of profound regret, and must be so to every true law reformer, that Sir Hugh M'Calmont Cairns should have thought fit, upon his own responsibility, and without giving any sufficient reason, to bring forward measures embodying a principle against which a great part of the report of the commissioners is directed. Sir Hugh cannot lay claim. to greater experience or a wider knowledge of the subject treated

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