LAW OF EVIDENCE. AS ADMINISTERED IN ENGLAND AND IRELAND; WITH ILLUSTRATIONS FROM THE AMERICAN AND OTHER FOREIGN LAWS. SEVENTH EDITION. BY JOHN PITT TAYLOR, Esq., JUDGE OF THE COUNTY COURTS FOR LAMBETH, GREENWICH, AND WOOLWICH. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. Longum iter est per præcepta, Breve et efficax per exempla.-SENECA. LONDON: WILLIAM MAXWELL & SON, 29, FLEET STREET, E.C. MEREDITH, RAY, & LITTLER, MANCHESTER; HODGES, FOSTER, & CO., AND E. PONSONBY, DUBLIN ; THACKER, SPINK, & CO., CALCUTTA; C. F. MAXWELL, MELBOURNE. 1878. PREFACE TO THE SEVENTH EDITION. A DEDICATION in the nineteenth century is an anachronism, or I should be tempted to dedicate this, the Seventh Edition of my Treatise on Evidence, to a very dear friend, at whose pressing instance, and by whose wise advice, I was induced to undertake the arduous task of preparing it, as affording the best means of assuaging very bitter grief. The labour I have bestowed on the work has been necessarily great, partly, because the last Edition of my book has been out of print for an unusual length of time, but, principally, because the Judicature Acts of 1873 and 1875 have altered the law on so many subjects, and unsettled it to such an extent, that it has become extremely difficult, either to dovetail the old procedure or the old principles with the new, or to determine, in a cloud of cases, by what rules the practitioners and the suitors must henceforth be guided. We all know what is the best recipe for spoiling broth; and, possessing that culinary knowledge, we, perhaps, ought not to marvel, if a colossal scheme of law reform,—subjected in the first instance to the criticisms of a multitude |