interest, when he thus pictured one of the causes of "the phenomenon which has aptly been called beneficial hidation":"Long ago the prevailing idea may have been that team-land, house-land, pound-land and fiscal hide, were or ought normally to be all one; and then the discovery that there are wide tracts in which the worth of an average team-land is much less or somewhat greater than a pound may have come in as a disturbing and differentiating force, and awakened debates in the council of the nation. We may, if we like such excursions, fancy the conservatives arguing for the good old rule 'One team-land one hide,' while a party of financial reformers has raised the cry, 'One pound, one hide.' Then 'pressure was brought to bear in influential quarters,' and in favour of their own districts the witan in their moots jobbed and jerry-mandered and rolled the friendly log, for all the world as if they had been mere modern politicians."2 In both these last two points-in his love for the concrete and his sense of the presence of an all-pervading similar human nature-he resembles Walter Bagshot. These characteristics enabled both men to render ordinarily dull topics interesting, to give convincing explanations of abstract doctrines and tendencies, and to picture the characters and motives of men with wonderful skill and freshness.

Closely allied to this last characteristic of Maitland's mind is his sense of humour and his constant gaiety. His sense of humour and his keen scent for the human lead him to illustrate the institutions of the past by parallels from the present that, to use an hackneyed expression, both amuse and instruct. The quotation which I have just made from his discussion of the hide in Domesday Book and Beyond is as good an illustration as any. Innumerable instances could be gathered from almost any of his books. And this humour is never anything but kindly. It goes hand in hand with a 2 Ibid, 470, 471.

1 Domesday Book and Beyond, 448.

gaiety of manner which seems to make light of difficulties, and often conceals the learning and research which underlie the brilliant argument that flows so easily. Finally, to this humour and gaiety there is added a talent for the epigram which clinches an argument, and sums up in some memorable phrase the conclusion of the whole matter.

The style was characteristic of the man; but the charm of the man was greater even than the charm of his style. His eye was always open to the good points of a piece of work. He was ever ready to assist and encourage. His passion for truth, says Mr. Fisher,' was so intense and disinterested, "that he would speak with genuine enthusiasm of such criticisms of his own work as he judged to be well founded and to constitute a positive addition to knowledge." Such a man was necessarily not only a great historian but a great teacher. Mr. Chaytor and Mr. Whittaker, in their preface to his lectures on Equity, say: "Those who have heard them delivered-amongst whom we are-with all Maitland's gaiety and with all his charm of manner and his power of making dry bones live will not easily forget either the lectures or the lecturer. Equity, in our minds a formless mystery, became intelligible and interesting; and as for the lecturer, well, there were few things that his hearers would not have done or attempted to please F. W. Maitland." And his pupils were not only those who were privileged to attend his lecture room. Many readers of his books have been induced by them to interest themselves in the topics in which he was interested, and so to become his pupils in a very real and practical sense. What other writer on the personality of the corporation could have inspired so much literature on a set of problems very remote from those which usually appeal to the mind of English lawyers? Probably it is not too much to say that the charm of his style will for many a year be a valuable asset to the cause of legal history. 1 Fisher, 177.

It will do much to convince lawyers that it is both necessary and interesting.

What will be the influence of this great lawyer, historian and teacher, upon the study of law and history? It is too soon to judge yet. But it seems to me that in three directions his influence will probably be both far reaching and permanent.

Firstly, he has taught us to apply the methods of historical criticism to the sources of English law. We know now something of the influences under which Bracton wrote. We know infinitely more than we did before of the real nature of the Year Books. From his various works we get many hints as to the point of view from which we should look at many other writers upon and sources of English law. It is good for a legal system to be taught occasionally to look at its authorities in a new light, because it tends to substitute for a blind adherence to their letter a real understanding of their spirit. What the school of the humanist lawyers of the sixteenth century did for the study of Roman law, Maitland began to do for the study of English law. May there be found many successors to continue this work!

Secondly, he has taught English lawyers to look at their system in its relation to other systems of law. History, as he said, involves comparison. We understand the strength and the weakness of our own system the better for such a comparison. We see better where it is at fault. We are able to appreciate or criticise intelligently suggested reforms. And at the present day, when physical science is diminishing the size of the world, and nations are losing their former isolation, such knowledge is essential. It enables us to learn from the success or failure of the legislative experiments of other nations. "The system of law under which we live, its merits and defects, its relations to other living systems, these are themes which—so I imagine-might and ought to have a place in a scheme of social and political education."

.

His article on the making of the German civil code,1 which begins with these words, shows how he would employ the comparative method, not only to elucidate legal history, but also to improve modern law. As Professor Saleilles has said: "Une ère nouvelle de rapprochement s'ouvra pour cette vaste communauté juridique que fut jadis l'Europe civilisée au moyen âge, et qu'elle redeviendra encore sous la pression des besoins économiques et civilisateurs de l'époque moderne. cette pénétration se réalise jamais, des hommes comme Maitland en auront été les premiers et nobles ouvriers."

Si

Thirdly, he has renewed that partnership between the history of English law and the general history of England, which once existed in the days of Lambard, Bacon, Selden, Spelman, Prynne, and Madox, but had, in more recent times, been almost dissolved. For the future we hope and expect they will begin again to carry on their business in common with a view to their mutual profit. Together they can accomplish much that neither can accomplish alone. It is obvious, on the one hand, that a knowledge of legal history is essential to the proper understanding of all branches. of English history-political, constitutional, economic, or social. Law at all periods of our history is intimately related to all sides of the national life; and the enactments of the Legislature, and the decisions of the Courts, represent the considered judgments of the nation upon an infinite number of various human activities. It is obvious, on the other hand, that the reason which gives life to statutes and decisions cannot be grasped unless we know the ideas at the back of the minds of those who made them; and these ideas it is impossible to understand without some knowledge of the general history of the period when they were made. But, till Maitland pointed the way to re-union, law and history had too long remained in a state of unprofitable isolation. The lawyer, 1 Collected Papers, III, 474-488.

2 L. Q. R., XXIII, 141.

immersed in technical rules, forgot the human beings for whom those rules were made and the human needs which gave them birth. The historian, because he was ignorant of the meaning of these technical rules, was apt to misapprehend the meaning of statutes and the reasoning of the Courts. Maitland showed how history can humanise law, and how law can correct history. He was a consummate lawyer; but he never forgot the human beings who made and worked the institutions, or the human needs which shaped the laws, which he was describing. Under his hands even the most technical rules became living things-the expression of human policy or logic, of human passions or ideals.

W. S. HOLDSWORTH.

II. FREEDOM OF CONTRACT.

(Continued from Vol. XXXVIII, page 413.)

IVISION (4), viz., contracts made void by statute with a view to public policy, may seem primâ facie to be far more extensive than the residuum of void agreements which is still left to be considered. It is generally called "contracts void (or illegal) by statute" or "contracts made in breach of a statute." Apparently this might include either (a) agreements made with a view to committing a statutory felony or misdemeanour, or (B) agreements which indirectly involve the commission of a statutory felony or misdemeanour, or (y) agreements the mere making of which is itself a statutory felony or misdemeanour, or lastly (8) agreements which the Parliament has merely relieved the Courts from the obligation of enforcing. It is obvious that (a), (B), and (y) really belong to Division (1), i.e., contracts absolutely illegal, viz., agreements for committing or furthering a crime