3 1 District Registry Offices created under the Act last referred to;1 of the Office for the Registration of Assurances of lands in Ireland; 2 of the General Register Office in England, or Ireland; of the Charity Commissioners for England and Wales;5 of the Railway Commissioners ;6 of the Commissioners of Her Majesty's Works and Public Buildings;7 of the respective Commissioners for the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge; of the Prison Commissioners for England, and of the General Prisons Board for Ireland;" of the special Commissioners for Irish Fisheries; 10 of the Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland, at least for the purposes of the Drainage Acts; 11 of the Commissioners of Patents for Inventions; 12 of the Office of the Registrar of Designs for articles of 1 38 & 39 V., c. 87, § 120. 8 * 13 & 14 V., c. 72, § 45, Ir., enacts, that "there shall be made and kept at the said registry office a seal, to be called 'The Seal of the Register Office;' and judicial notice shall be taken of the impressions thereof in all courts, without any evidence of the said seal having been impressed, or any other evidence in relation thereto." 3 6 & 7 W. 4, c. 86, § 38, enacts, that "all certified copies of entries purporting to be sealed or stamped with the seal of the said register office, shall be received as evidence." See 3 & 4 V., c. 92, § 9. 4 26 & 27 V., c. 11, § 5, Ir. * 16 & 17 V., c. 137, § 6, enacts, that "The Charity Commissioners for England and Wales" "may have and use a seal for authenticating documents," and "shall sit from time to time as a board." 18 & 19 V., c. 124, § 4, enacts, that "every act of the board may be sufficiently authenticated by the seal of the Commissioners, and the signature of the secretary, or, in his absence, of the chief clerk." § 5 enacts, that "all orders, certificates, schemes, and other documents, issued under the seal of the board shall be deemed and taken to be the originals, and copies thereof shall be entered in the books of the board, and all such entries may be sufficiently certified by the signature of the secretary, or, in his absence, of the chief clerk; every order, certificate, scheme, and other document, purporting to be sealed with the seal of the board, shall be received in evidence without further proof; and any writing purporting to be a copy extracted from the said books, and to be certified as aforesaid, shall be received in evidence in like manner." 6 36 & 37 V., c. 48, § 4. 7 15 & 16 V., c. 28, § 1; 37 & 38 V., c. 84, § 2. 8 40 & 41 V., c. 48, §§ 4, 9. 940 & 41 V., c. 21, § 6, and c. 49, § 4, Ir. 1o 26 & 27 V., c. 114, § 33, Ir. ; continued by 31 & 32 V., c. 111; and amended by 32 & 33 V., c. 92, Ir. 11 26 & 27 V., c. 88, §§ 3, 5, Ir.; 29 & 30 V., c. 49, § 21, Ir. 12 15 & 16 V., c. 83, § 2, enacts, that "it shall be lawful for the Commissioners to cause a seal to be made for the purposes of this Act, and from time to time to vary such seal, and to cause to be sealed therewith all the warrants for letters patent under this Act, and all instruments and copies proceeding manufacture; and of the Record office, whether in England or in Ireland. In all proceedings, too, under the winding-up clauses of the Companies Act, 1862, the seal of any office of the Court of Chancery, or Bankruptcy, in England or in Ireland, of the Court of Session in Scotland, or of the Court of the Vice-Warden of the Stanneries, when appended to any document made, issued, or signed under those clauses, or any official copy thereof, must be judicially noticed.* § 7. The principle of admitting in evidence official documents § 7 without formal proof, was extended to a numerous class of cases by the Documentary Evidence Act, of 1845.5 That statute, after from the office of the Commissioners; and all courts, judges, and other persons whomsoever, shall take notice of such seal, and receive impressions thereof in evidence, in like manner as impressions of the great seal are received in evidence; and shall also take notice of, and receive in evidence, without further proof or production of the originals, all copies or extracts certified under the seal of the said office of or from documents deposited in such office.” 16 & 17 V., c. 115, § 4, enacts, that "printed or manuscript copies or extracts, certified and sealed with the seal of the Commissioners, of letters patent, specifications, disclaimers, memoranda of alterations, and all other documents recorded and filed in the Commissioners' office, or in the office of the Chancery Division of the High Court, appointed for the filing of specifications, shall be received in evidence in all proceedings relating to letters patent for inventions, in all courts whatsoever within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Man, and her majesty's colonies and plantations abroad, without further proof or production of the originals." § 5 further enacts, that "certified printed copies, under the seal of the Commissioners, of all specifications and complete specifications, and fac-simile printed copies of the drawings accompanying the same, if any disclaimers, and memoranda of alterations filed, or hereafter to be filed, under the said patent law Amendment Act, shall be transmitted to the office of the Director of Chancery in Scotland, and to the Enrolment office of the Court of Chancery in Ireland, within twenty-one days after the filing thereof, respectively; and the same shall be filed in the office of Chancery in Scotland and Ireland, respectively, and certified copies, or extracts from such documents, shall be furnished to all persons requiring the same, on payment of such fees as the Commissioners shall direct; and such copies or extracts shall be received in evidence in all courts in Scotland and in Ireland respectively, in all proceedings relating to letters patent for inventions, without further proof or production of the originals." 1 5 & 6 V., c. 100, § 16; and 6 & 7 V., c. 65, §§ 6, 7. 330 & 31 V., c. 70, § 18, Ir. 2 1 & 2 V., c. 94, § 11. 5 8 & 9 V., c. 113. The author of the present work naturally feels some satisfaction in referring to this statute, as he originally suggested to the Law reciting that "it is provided by many statutes that various certificates, official and public documents, documents and proceedings of corporations and of joint-stock and other companies, and certified copies of documents, by-laws, entries in registers and other books, shall be receivable in evidence of certain particulars in courts of justice, provided they be respectively authenticated in the manner prescribed by such statutes,"-that "the beneficial effect of these provisions has been found by experience to be greatly diminished by the difficulty of proving that the said documents are genuine," and that "it is expedient to facilitate the admission in evidence of such and the like documents: enacts, that "whenever by any Act now in force or hereafter to be in force, any certificate, official or public document, or document or proceeding of any corporation or joint-stock or other company, or any certified copy of any document, by-law, entry in any register or other book, or of any other proceeding, shall be receivable in evidence of any particular in any court of justice, or before any legal tribunal, or either House of Parliament, or any committee of either House, or in any judicial proceeding, the same shall respectively be admitted in evidence, provided they respectively purport to be sealed or impressed with a stamp, or sealed and signed, or signed alone, as required, or impressed with a stamp and signed, as directed by the respective Acts made or to be hereafter made, without any proof of the seal or stamp, where a seal or stamp is necessary, or of the signature, or of the official character of the person appearing to have signed the same, and without any further proof thereof in every case in which the original record could have been received in evidence."1 Sect. 2 enacts, that "all courts, judges, justices, masters in chancery, masters of courts, commissioners judicially acting, and other judicial officers, shall henceforth take judicial notice of the Amend. Soc. the alterations embodied therein, and afterwards prepared the bill, which, under the protection of Ld. Brougham, obtained the sanction of the legislature. 1 The words after the last comma were introduced into the Act while passing through the House of Commons. They appear to have been copied from the Act of 1 & 2 V., c. 94, § 13 (cited post, § 1533, n.) by some Honourable Member, who did not know distinctly what he was about. signature of any" judge of the Supreme Court of Judicature,1 "provided such signature be attached or appended to any decree, order, certificate, or other judicial or official document." Sect. 3 enacts, that "all copies of private and local and personal Acts of Parliament not public Acts, if purporting to be printed by the Queen's printers, and all copies of the journals of either House of Parliament, and of royal proclamations, purporting to be printed by the printers to the Crown, or by the printers to either House of Parliament, or by any or either of them, shall be admitted as evidence thereof by all courts, judges, justices, and others, without any proof being given that such copies were so printed." 2 1 36 & 37 V., c. 66. 2 § 4 provides, that "if any person shall forge the seal, stamp, or signature of any certificate, official or public document, or document or proceeding of any corporation or joint-stock or other company, or of any certified copy of any document, by-law, entry in any register or other book, or other proceeding as aforesaid, or shall tender in evidence any such certificate, official or public document, or document or proceeding of any corporation or joint-stock or other company, or any certified copy of any document, by-law, entry in any register or other book, or of any other proceeding, with a false or counterfeit seal, stamp, or signature thereto, knowing the same to be false or counterfeit, whether such seal, stamp, or signature be those of or relating to any corporation or company already established, or to any corporation or company to be hereafter established,- —or if any person shall forge the signature of any such judge as aforesaid to any order, decree, certificate, or other judicial or official document, or shall tender in evidence, any order, decree, certificate, or other judicial or official document with a false or counterfeit signature of any such judge as aforesaid thereto, knowing the same to be false or counterfeit, or if any person shall print any copy of any private Act, or of the journals of either House of Parliament, which copy shall falsely purport to have been printed by the printers to the Crown, or by the printers to either House of Parliament, or by any or either of them, or if any person shall tender in evidence any such copy, knowing that the same was not printed by the person or persons by whom it so purports to have been printed,-every such person shall be guilty of felony, and shall upon conviction be liable to "penal servitude for a period not exceeding seven years or less than five years," see 20 & 21 V., c. 3, § 2, as amended by 27 & 28 V., c. 47, § 2, "or to imprisonment for any term not more than The words or of any royal proclamation," were introduced into the original draft of the bill, and would seem to have been accidentally omitted. The omission, however, is remedied by 31 & 32 V., c. 37, § 4, cited, post, 1527, in n. 8. A somewhat nice question respecting the meaning of § 8 the word "journals," as used in the third section of this Act, has been raised at Nisi Prius.1 An action for work and labour was brought by an engineer against the director of a railway company, and the defence was that the plans and sections deposited by the plaintiff had not been drawn in accordance with the Standing Orders of the House of Commons, and that, consequently, the work was valueless. In order to establish this case, it became necessary to prove the Standing Orders, and with that view, the defendant's counsel tendered in evidence a book, which purported to contain the Standing Orders of the House of Commons from 1685 to 1846 inclusive, and to be printed and published by Luke James Hansard, by permission of the Right Hon. Charles Shaw Lefevre, Speaker. The court was then called upon to take judicial notice that these orders were the resolutions of the House, and as such were entered on their journals; and it was argued, that the book produced being a copy of extracts from these journals, must be regarded in the same light as a copy of the entire journals; that the Act, if reasonably construed, must apply to a copy of a part of the journals, as well as to a copy of the whole, and that although it three nor less than one year, with hard labour: PROVIDED ALSO, that whenever any such document as before mentioned shall have been received in evidence by virtue of this Act, the court, judge, commissioner, or other person officiating judicially who shall have admitted the same, shall, on the request of any party against whom the same is so received, be authorised, at its or at his own discretion, to direct that the same shall be impounded, and be kept in the custody of some officer of the court or other proper person, until further order touching the same shall be given, either by such court, or the court to which such master or other officer belonged, or by the persons or person who constituted such court, or by some one of the equity or common law judges of the superior courts at Westminster, on application being made for that purpose." §5 enacts, that the Act shall not extend to Scotland. See 24 & 25 V., c. 98, §§ 27-29. Pritchard v. Black, 21 June, 1847, Ex., coram Platt, B., MS. See Chubb t. Solomons, 3 C. & Kir. 75, which is clearly not law. 2 It is to be regretted that Mr. Hansard, in publishing the Standing Orders and other documents of the House of Commons, does not state in the title-page his official character. The Standing Orders of the Lords purport to be "printed by Geo. E. Eyre and Wm. Spottiswoode, Printers to the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty." C |