is prepared for it by "Cosmopolis," which "Kosmodike" evidently imitates. The English is sometimes a little uncertain, and looks as if it were not always of home growth. The recent case of De Nicols (1898, 2 Ch. 60) is treated at some length, and there is a brief but correct sketch of the growth of the legal capacity of the married woman in England. One paragraph gives a very gloomy view of the social and professional position of the Russian Bar. It numbers only six thousand for the whole Empire, it is ill-paid, has no social position, and does not attract the best men. It is a pity that some of our juniors who overcrowd the Temple cannot see their way to settling in a country where there is only one advocate to every twenty thousand of the population. But perhaps they wonld not like to be known as prisiagni (i.e. sworn), the name is too suggestive of that durance vile which foreigners have a way of associating with Russian life.

Comité Maritime International. Conférence d'Anvers. (September, 1898.) Antwerp, 1898.

Bulletin de l'Association Belge pour l' Unification du Droit Maritime. Antwerp, 1898.

The report of the Committee adopts the results of the discussion on a proposed draft code defining the responsibility for maritime damage, settling a period of prescription for actions, etc., all matters now differing in different systems of municipal law. Another brochure deals with the responsibility of shipowners, and the report of the Committee on this also appears, as far as regards the Norwegian system. The discussions and reports are very interesting as possible steps to a draft international code on the subject, something on the lines of the Sailing Rules. We are probably not very near such a solution of important questions; but some day a general system of dealing with collisions at sea may be adopted. Its utility is obvious.

Journal du Droit International Privé. Paris, 1898. Nos. 5 to 8.

Those numbers are a little inconsistent with the title of the review. They are concerned mainly, as the editor admits, with questions of public law, no doubt of great importance, arising out of the SpanishAmerican war. On these matters English and American contributors are more in evidence than usual. The interesting articles on submarine cables in time of war (Professor Holland and Mr. Morse),

on coal as contraband of war (Dr. Gover), on the mining laws at Klondyke (Mr. Beulloc, of the Montreal Bar), make a very good show for English-speaking countries. Several recent English and American cases are noticed, the most important being the action brought by the French Republic against the Chicago Exhibition Company and tried in the Illinois Circuit Court last year. It was held that the organizers of an exhibition are bound to observe the utmost diligence to preserve the exhibits, and failure to do so renders them liable to an action. In this case the exhibits were destroyed by fire, the Court finding that the destruction was due to an insufficient water pressure. The question appears to have been raised, but not decided, whether France could have sued the United States on an implied guarantee of safety of the goods shown. Probably such an action could only have been competent by the United States voluntarily submitting to the jurisdiction of their own tribunals.

La Giustizia Penale. Rome, 1898.

This periodical continues to show that the study of criminal law is one especially suited to the countrymen of Beccaria. It is quite astonishing to read the bibliography of the numerous books and articles published in Italy on the subject. Some of the decisions are very interesting. The English lawyer will perhaps hardly care for cases on breach of the Government monopoly of tobacco, or what is to be done when the foreman of a jury cannot speak intelligibly. On the other hand, cases such as that on p. 858 remind the English lawyer of some of his own text-books. Giuseppe gave his servant Giovanni a loaded gun to clean, neither of them knowing that it was loaded. In the course of being cleaned it went off and injured Vito. It was held that both Giuseppe and Giovanni were criminally liable, the latter on the somewhat curious ground that, as he had been a soldier and accustomed to weapons, he ought to have satisfied himself that the weapon was not loaded.

La Revue Générale. Brussels. July-October, 1898.

With the July number our old friend and contemporary assumes a cover of a new design and hue, to our mind an improvement on the old. The English reader will find one or two articles, which, if not strictly legal, are at least interesting to lawyers. One on New York and Tammany is a commentary on Dr. Bryce's statement that "the government of cities is the one conspicuous failure of the United

States." Another article contains an analysis of the occupations of the 152 members of the Belgian Chambre des Représentants. Lawyers are well to the fore, and most of them belong to the winning side. The new House contains 46 advocates, four notaries, and three jurists. In the bibliography of legal works the preponderance of books on election law is conspicuous, as might be expected in a country just recovering from a general election on a new electoral basis. The Revue Générale and the Revue Bibliographique Belge, issued by the same publishers, both contain a long review of M. Hector Lambrechts' Dictionnaire pratique de Droit Comparé, which appears to be a very valuable and complete work. Whether the learned author's sense of proportion is quite developed appears to be a question. Only one volume is devoted to England, while Roumania takes four!

Rivista Politica e Litteraria. Rome. Rome. July-October, 1898. There is little of legal interest in these numbers, except an account of an Italian criminal trial in Il Racconto dell'Imputato, one The usual ignorance of English titles is shown of the characters, "Sir Percilson," in another "Lady Makenzie" in the same contribution appear quite possible. The reviews of books are very well done, but none of them deals with legal subjects.

of the short stories. in the name of one novelette, nor does

Received too late for notice in this issue :-The Maritime Codes of Holland and Belgium, by His Honour JUDGE RAIKES, Q.C., LL.D.; Redress by Arbitration, by H. FOULKES LYNCH; Accidents to Workmen, by R. M. MINTON-SENHOUSE and G. F. EMERY, LL.M. (London: Effingham Wilson). Roman Canon Law, by Professor MAITLAND, M.A., LL.D. (Methuen & Co.). The Land Transfer Acts, by W. AMBROSE, Q.C., M.P., and W. B. FERGUSON, M.A.; The Criminal Evidence Act, 1898, by W. B. ALLEN and Sir H. B. POLAND, Q.C. (Butterworth & Co.).

The Law Magazine and Review receives or exchanges with the following amongst other publications:-Review of Reviews, Juridical Review, Public Opinion, Law Times, Law Journal, Justice of the Peace, Law Quarterly Review, Irish Law Times, Scots Law Times, Australian Law Times, Speaker, Accountants' Journal, North American Review, Canada Law Journal, Chicago Legal News, American Law Review, University Law Review, American Law Register and Review, Harvard Law Review, Case and Comment, Green Bag, Virginia Law Register, The Docket, American Lawyer, Albany Law Journal, Madras Law Journal, Law Digest and Recorder.

THE

LAW MAGAZINE AND REVIEW.

No. CCCXI.-FEBRUARY, 1899.

I.-LEGAL EDUCATION.

EVERAL months ago the Lord Chief Justice suggested

SEV

in the pages of the Law Magazine that "all friends of legal education should promptly take counsel together." It is earnestly to be hoped that the suggestion will be adopted. Without such consultation no satisfactory solution of the difficulties which beset the question is at all probable. It is generally admitted that the present state of legal education in England is unsatisfactory, and yet there never was a nation or a time in which sound legal training on a basis both scientific and practical was so important. Business transactions are more varied, and on a larger scale than they have ever been. Relations with countries where different systems of law prevail are more intimate. Students from all parts of the world are anxious to study English law, or at all events to gain the advantages which may accrue to them from being called to the English Bar. From India, Burmah, West Africa, the Cape, Guiana, the West Indies, and many other countries, young men are coming to England with that object. Anywhere the English barrister may come forward to give evidence as an expert in English law; he may be appointed to exercise judicial functions in the parts of any continent where commerce is most active. Is adequate training provided for those who may have such work to do? Is any adequate test required to insure that they shall be fit for it?

Is it not possible for a man to become a barrister with less trouble, less knowledge, less training than would be required to enable him to enter any other profession?

Eminent and influential lawyers have been discussing the reform of legal education for fifty years; some improvements have been made, but they are small compared with what has been done to improve the training of medical men, or of solicitors, or even of candidates for holy orders, or for the services. The principal reasons for the failure of the reformers to establish a satisfactory system of legal education are that they have formed no definite ideal of what ought to be accomplished, no clear basis of agreement as to the exact objects they desire to achieve, and that although many of them have been men of the greatest talents, occupying the highest positions, and whose opinions command attention, they have been really amateurs on this subject. To have examined or taught, to know anything by experience of the needs or capacity of students, has been generally regarded as a disqualification for expressing any opinion on legal education. The difficulties, however, which attend the establishment of a satisfactory system in England will not be solved by those only who have never faced the difficulty of framing a course of lectures which will possess something like scientific arrangement, and be at the same time practical and tolerably interesting, or who have never set an examination paper and seen the nature of the answers given. How the amateur examiner loves a question which he remembers to have been set to him as a candidate thirty years ago, or one that can be fully dealt with by quoting half a page direct from a crammer's notes, or answered by simple "yes" or "no," giving the candidate who tosses up an even chance for full marks or none! On the other hand, the professor whose knowledge of law is entirely derived from books, who has never perused a title or settled a conveyance, drawn a pleading, examined a witness, or framed minutes of an order,