performs alone the actual duties of the office, for it will be remembered that the Regents are under the Council, and, though they represent it, do not in any sense usurp its functions. Their number, their name, and their term of office might be altered; even if elected for life the rule of the State would not be infringed. The very short duration of their power, however, prevents them from clinging too much to it, and at the same time ensures a share in it for each member of the Council. A government cannot be called aristocratic when the patricians are in a minority of one to two; when, moreover, this third part is composed not only of those of noble birth, but also partly of the more illustrious citizens, whom the Council ennobles by election to the places of noblemen.

It has been observed that the most democratic government, even when entirely deprived of the electoral function, is that in which all the citizens, instead of the right of appointing, have the prospect of being appointed. This, thanks to the small number of the citizens, seems to be the case in San Marino, especially when we remember how many other offices there are besides that of Councillor which the citizens may be called on to fill.

The people have a share in the government because the government lives in the very midst of them. The Sammarinesi must of necessity take interest in the politics of their State: every hearth furnishes its contribution. Strongly rooted traditions have handed down the customs for thirteen centuries, and it would be difficult to find a people that take more part in public matters. These nine thousand Sammarinesi almost embody Prevost-Paradol's ideal of a people of politicians.

The legislation of the Republic is in close connection with the constitution. The constitutional Charter forms the First Book of the Statutes. Of the remaining five books some rubricæ are still in force; others have been torn out and

forgotten, and some have been repealed. The latter is the case with the penal legislation of the statutes, which was severe, even cruel. An insult to the Captains was punished with death and the confiscation of property; forgery with the loss of a hand and degradation; arson with decapitation; the parricide was hanged and his body delivered to the mob.

In 1848 capital punishment was abolished, and in 1865 a Code was promulgated, drafted by L. Zuppetta, a wellknown Neapolitan lawyer. This Code is, in accordance with the principles of the classical penal school, divided into two parts. The first contains the law about penalties in general; the second the punishment for each particular offence. It imposes penalties, from a minimum of three years' hard labour or of one day's imprisonment, to hard labour or imprisonment for life, and fines of from five to five hundred lire.

Offences are divided into the following categories: (a) misdeeds against the State, public order, public faith, the order of the family, personal integrity, honour, property; (b) torts or involuntary offences; (c) transgression of first and second degree. The distinction does not depend on the quality of the punishment, but on the nature-fraudulent, culpable, political-of the offence. Very nearly all the forms of crime of modern times are here provided against. Strikes and duels are not contemplated; but of strikes and duels even the memory is fortunately nonexistent.

The Code of penal procedure, 1878, enacts that the Tribunal be composed of a single judge. The proceedings are summary for all crimes of minor importance; for the others a preliminary investigation takes place, which on request of the defendant is repeated in public. Accusation and defence are both made in writing.

A few regulations and bye-laws complete the penal legislation which after some twenty years of trial has been definitively sanctioned.

The civil legislation is contained in the ancient statutes. We should, perhaps, rather say that these statutes are still applicable, although the rules contained in them are fragmentary and partly fallen into disuse. Let us glance shortly at these rules, added on to the text without any order whenever the necessity arose.

That the citizenship is not to be acquired by lapse of time; that no foreigner may buy landed property without obtaining a licence and paying 5 per cent. on the price to the Exchequer ; that for those under twenty-five years of age a trustee be appointed; for the insane a guardian, with limited power; that filiation be proved by two witnesses; that a widow have all the right to the aliments from the patrimony of her deceased husband; that the despoiled be immediately restored to his possession; that the purchaser at the public market be not bound to give back the article to another than the seller except on receiving back the price; that the legacies made by a wife to her husband be reckoned in with the portion of her dowry due to him, which is a third if there be no children; that a girl in competition with boys should be excluded from the succession, but proportionally well provided for; that youths of the age of twenty (male or female) be able to conclude a contract and may enforce it; that he who demands a payment twice be condemned in duplum; that he who fails to meet his engagement after giving earnest money, must pay double and yet be held responsible for the fulfilment of the contract; that it be allowable for a wife in case of necessity to alienate things belonging to her dowry with the consent of the tribunal; that between married people objects of small value (jocalia) are supposed to be given irrevocably inter vivos: everything else, in case marriage be dissolved, to go to the husband; that in the sale of property the neighbours have the preference; that the sales with an agreement for redemption should be preceded by an appraisement on oath, or allowed by the judge; that whoever

has promised or hired his or other people's work keep his engagement or pay damages; that neither servants nor masters be allowed to arbitrarily break an engagement; that the security be always primarily liable and the principal be obliged to indemnify him for all he may have paid; that if three years have elapsed without any claim for wages, or eighteen months for credits against the Exchequer, there be a presumption of payment; that a creditor may demand the arrest of a debtor.

A curious document is the Agrarian Statute. It is divided into two parts; the first, written in prose and in verses taken from the Georgics of Virgil and of Alamanni, discusses the art of cultivating the land (a real manual of agriculture); the second treats of the duties of the farmer, and in general of the precepts of the contract for cultivation of farms. A few special laws complete the civil legislation. Such are: a Bill on mortgages drawn up on the lines of the French Code (1854); a short Code concerning bills of exchange, a very modern and good one (1882); a Law on immigration, which forbids the lodging or housing of individuals or whole families not provided with an income of at least a hundred lire per head. In any case the foreigner who stays longer than four months in the Republic must get a licence from the Council (Principe e Sovrano) (1872). Lastly, there are many fiscal laws on stamp and registration duties substantially the same as those obtaining in every corner of the globe. For cases not foreseen by the Statute or the special laws, the Roman or common law suffices. Recourse must be had to the Digest, not only in regard to contracts, but also to personal rights. The status of persons is as it was in ancient Rome; the woman is under the husband's manus, the son during his father's lifetime is under the father's authority, except in case of emancipation. The verbal will and the feoffment in trust are still in force. Only the confarreatio and the coemptio and the other Roman forms of matrimony

have vanished, thanks to the canonical law, which has here imposed itself.

Thus, now that all the countries of the earth from the American Republic to the renascent Japan, from the countries of the Levant to the states of Northern Europe, are provided with Codes, or at least with laws consolidated in a Digest, now especially that, after a hard struggle, the anti-historical school, in the name of the principle of nationality, has obtained the publication of one Code for the German empire, thus sweeping away the Roman and the common law, there still nestles on the Titanus, as in a last refuge, the law of the Pandects a phenomenon of juridical longevity not so conspicuous as the political one, but not less admirable. It is greatly to be doubted whether even the best of codes (in a country where the unity of legislation has been obtained) would be preferable to the flexible and tried application of the common law for this, like the feeling of liberty, has entered into the marrow of the people.

Procedure in civil cases is entirely regulated by Statute. The procedure of cognition is in no way dissimilar from that of the other mediæval Italian statutes. The fundamental principle is that the proceedings be speedy and that, as far as possible, the decisions be made sine strepitu and figura judicii. Cavillous objections and calumnious deductions are rejected; appeal of interlocutory sentences is not admissible; the terms are brief-the judgment has to be pronounced within ninety days from the opening of the case. Deeds and simple contracts, though recognized, are executive titles. To the creditor are immediately delivered executive writs of enforcement, assigning to the debtor a short term in which he may put forward and prove his objections. This proceeding of execution is modelled on the Roman form, and is the same to-day as it was under the Emperors (pignus ex causa judicati captum). The creditor is provisionally put into possession of the goods, property, or credits of the debtor. If the latter