VOL. VIII.

Pump

PUMP COURT.

THE case of In re Stewart & Sons is of great importance to solicitors, turning as it does on the scope and effect of the Solicitor's Remuneration Act, 1881, and the order and rules thereunder. Applicants, a firm of solicitors practising in Wakefield, had been employed by the Corporation in the purchase by them-under certain compulsory powers of acquiring property-of land and easements. The employment commenced before the passing of the Solicitors' Remuneration Act, 1881, but continued after that act, and the rules thereunder came into operation. The first question was as to conveyancing business completed before the passing of the act. Justice Kay laid down that section 7 was clear, and provided in effect that any taxation, after the general order came into operation, was to be regulated thereby, and therefore included taxation, after that date, of costs incurred before. We confess, though it is difficult to get over the words of the act, that we are to some extent doubtful whether this view is well founded. It is a maxim of construction of statute law, founded on the most obvious natural justice, that if it be possible to construe a statute so as to give effect to the language used by the legislature and at the same time not to take away rights that have accrued prior to the passing of the statute, that that construction shall be applied. Now, Messrs. Stewart had, prior to the passing of the act, done certain work and earned remuneration according to a certain then existent scale. To apply a different scale, resulting in a diminution of remuneration, is to take away an accrued, a vested right, from the solicitors who had done the work and earned the pay. Cannot force and effect be given to the language of section 7 without holding that it applies the scale to work done and remuneration earned before the passing of the act? In the case of work done after the passing of the act, there is a power to exclude the scale, but if it applies to work done before the passing of the act, then those who had done work previously, and who come for taxation of costs after are worse off, because they could not elect for or against the scale, the work having been done. Why should not the language

No. 128.

of section 7, general as it is, be read as applying only to cases where the solicitor has power to elect, and has not elected against the scale.

THE next point was what the meaning of the words, a solicitor may "before undertaking any business,' elect, &c., and on this point his lordship held that if the solicitor did anything for which he was entitled to charge, he had undertaken the business whether the charge he was entitled to make for the business done fell within the scale or not. That is to say, if asolicitor, about to be employed on certain business, del sires to charge for any such business as would fale within the scale remuneration not according to thss scale, he must elect before he does any of the busineld at all, and not merely before he does any which wousibe covered by scale remuneration. With regard to bued ness pending on December 31st, 1882, and complet er afterwards, Justice Kay thought a solicitor had no powre to elect, on the ground that business commenced befout could not be said to be undertaken after that date, bce he held, following an unreported decision of Justi Stirling in re Love, that where nothing had been don in the pending business between 31st December, 1882' and the date of notice to elect, it was effectual.

e

Two other points were whether the scale charges applied to the purchase of easements, the rights involved in the present case being of laying and maintaining pipes through the land of other persons. These rights the Corporation obtained for small sums of money under the powers of their special act, and Justice Kay held the scale did not apply to costs in such cases. other point was whether the scale applies to work done by a solicitor for a purchaser in case of a purchase under the Lands Clauses Consolidation Act, and on this point Justice Kay held the scale did not apply.

The

In re Licensed Victuallers' Mutual Trading Association, Limited, a note of which we give in another column, points to the way of getting rid of what has been felt to be a difficulty in the way of floating a company. It was decided in re Almada and Tirito Co., 38 Ch. D. 415, overruling previous cases, viz., In re Plaskynaston Tube Co., 23 Ch. Div. 542, and In re Ince Hall Rolling Mills Co., 23 Ch. Div. 545 n., that there is no power to issue shares at a discount so as to render the shareholder liable for a smaller sum than that fixed for the value of the shares by the memorandum of association, and that such issue would be invalid though the contract with the shareholder under which the shares were issued had been registered under section 25 of the Companies Act, 1867. Now, the contract in the case of re Licensed Victuallers' Mutual Trading Association, Lim., was to underwrite certain shares at 15 per cent. discount; had this been interpreted by the Court of Appeal as contract on the one hand to make and on the other hand to accept an allotment of shares subject to a liability to pay not the full amount which would otherwise be payable, but that amount less 15 per cent., the contract would have been invalid and the appellant could not under it have been put on the list of contributories. But their Lordships thought the contract as a whole amounted to an agreement to take certain shares, coupled with a contract on

the part of the company to pay £15 per cent. on the amount payable for the shares as commission to the allottee for agreeing to accept an allotment of them, and so upheld the contract and placed the appellant on the list of contributories.

Brockwell v. Bullock et. al., is an important decision of the Court of Appeal which will, we hope, be shortly reported. Action was brought by a medical man for fees incurred with reference to a lunatic. In September, 1886, a petition was presented for inquiry into the sanity of the defendant Bullock. Clift, Bullock's solicitor, asked Brockwell to examine Bullock. Afterwards Bullock was, by the master's order, required to attend and give evidence on the inquisition. The Lord Justices authorised a cheque for £200 to be drawn in Clift's favour for the expenses to be incurred in defending Bullock on the inquiry. Bullock was found of unsound mind, and a committee appointed. The £200 was not sufficient to meet all expenses, and plaintiff thereupon brought this action against the lunatic and his committee in the Brompton County Court. The County Court Judge held the action not maintainable, without an order under section 11 of the Lunacy Regulation Act, 1862. On appeal to a Divisional Court, Lord Coleridge, L.C.J., upheld this judgment, but Grantham, J., dissented. The Court of Appeal (Lord Esher, M.R., Fry, and Lopes, L.J.J.), reversed the decision of the Court below, upholding the views of Grantham, J. Lord Esher, M.R., pointed out that it would require very clear words in the Lunacy Regulation Act, 1862, to take from the plaintiff a right of action he would otherwise have, but that provision was an enabling one, not an imperative one, and anyone in the position of the plaintiff could not be heard in support of his claim, while the order might be made in his absence. Having regard to this, the Court were of opinion that the provisions of section 11 did not in effect substitute a new remedy to the exclusion of the old, but provided an additional remedy to which recourse might be had.

WE find that Sir Richard Webster is a Lincoln's Inn man after all. The mistake, which is very general, arises from the fact of his having chambers in the Middle Temple, and from his practising at the Common Law Bar. The mistake was a very trivial one either way, and does not in the slightest degree invalidate the remarks we made as to the Benchers not being the proper jury. In the circumstances all that is necessary is to read Benchers of Lincoln's Inn instead of Benchers of Middle Temple.

Mr. Henry Howorth, M.P., writes to the editor of The Times:

"I know of no occasion in recent years in which I am so confident that I represent the views of every thoughful politician as in raising an emphatic protest against such scenes as we have been enacting this afternoon, and I make bold to say that I have never seen so many grave faces in this House as during the miserable debate which is still in progress.

That the House of Commons should intervene in the middle of a great trial and, while the issues are still sub judice, should enter into an embittered wrangle about the merits of the case, the conduct of judges, and the characters of the counsel employed, is as indecent as it is contrary to all our traditions.

It is not altogether unnatural, perhaps that such a polemic, when it has been raised, should involve in its meshes political gladiators, careless of the honour of this House aud of the reputation of this country, careless whether men continue to reverence and regard the tribunals of justice as beyond the reach of calumny, and anxious only for ephemeral applause or the gratification of private rancour. It is beyond measure deploraable, however, that it should have involved the very advocates engaged in the case, the picked men of their profession, a profession which lives upon its only capital-namely, the high honour and integrity of its members. No man with shame left in him can fail to blush when he sees the motives and chivalry of distinguished lawyers, when conducting grave and difficult inquiries, made playthings of before cynical audiences like the one which gathers here. It necessarily degrades us all; nor does the mischief end here,

It seems to be forgotten that there has been no pronuncement whatever of any kind as to the merits of the case before the Commission by the only tribunal competent to give an opinion upon it. Yet we have lawyers and laymen, with the most complete forgetfulness of this elementary postulate of good sense, boldly affirming and denying certain facts and conclusions, and declaring certain issues to be solved which can only be authoritatively settled by the decision of the judges, and thus displacing the Commission by the House of Commons as a Court of Justice.

Surely, Sir, it is time that speeches which, if made out of doors, would be treated as involving contempt of court should be excluded from this House as derogatory to its character and as fatal to the reputation of law-abiding people, and that we should postpone the discussion of these bitter fruits of our rivalry at least until those whom we have selected to decide the great issues have given their decision.

If this cannot be done by an appeal from the Chair pointing out the danger and the indecency of such proceedings it might be done by special enactment.

In this matter I feel very free from responsibility. I tried very hard to persuade my leaders to introduce a new rule into our procedure excluding from our debates all matters still in dispute before a court of law, and I put down an amendment on the paper to this effect; but I was pressed to withdraw it on the ground, forsooth, that it would imply a want of common decency among members of Parliament.

It is for those who intervened, and who doubtless feel that all legislative gold is of bad quality which has not been refined in Ministerial crucibles, to save us from such scandals in future. They owe it to us and to the English people that, by some means or other, these discreditable and disgraceful scenes should be made impossible.

In writing this letter I know that I echo the views of a large number of men who bridge over the two extremes of party in this House, and who, perhaps, monopolise its better judgment."

The Lord Chief Justice writes to The Times :

My attention has been called to an expression in one of your leading articles to-day to the effect that Mr. Bernard Coleridge gave a vote in the House of Commons on the question raised by Sir William Harcourt which I, his father, would not have given. I strongly deprecate the introduction of my name into a controversy from which it is my duty carefully to abstain. I feel the great difficulty in so delicate and personal a matter of saying anything which may not be misconstrued. But I feel bound to say so much as this, that if I had thought the conduct of the Attorney-General right I should have voted with the Government; if I had thought it wrong I should have voted with Sir William Harcourt. As a matter of individual opinion I will add, that I cannot understand why it should be a subject of reproach to any one that he gives a vote in accordance with what he deems to be his duty both to the House of Commons and to his profession."

AT the annual general meeting of the Bar, to be held in the Old Dining Hall, Lincoln's-inn, on Saturday, the 13th April, 1889, the following alterations in the Regulations of the Bar Committee will be proposed by a member :

That "regulation 1 be struck out, and that the words, and every former Attorney or Solicitor-General to be members of the committee whilst in actual practice at the bar,' be added to regulation 5." Regulations 1 and 5 are at present as follows: "1. The committee to consist of fifty members." "5. The Attorney-General and Solicitor-General to be ecx officio members of the committee."

10:

That the following regulation be substituted for regulation In election by voting papers, each elector to have one vote for each complete number of two to be elected, and the votes may be divided in any manner between two or more candidates, but so that not more than four votes be given for any one candidate." Regulation 10 is at present as follows: "In election by voting papers, each elector to have one vote for each complete number of two to be elected, and the votes may be given all to one candidate, or may be divided in any manner between two or more condidates."

That the following regulation be substituted for regulation 14: "The committee to have power to appoint as additional members such barristers, not exceeding twelve in number, as they may consider specially qualified by reason of their parliamentary or professional position, or of their representing any circuit or section of the Bar not adequately represented. The members so appointed to go out of office on the second Saturday in the Trinity Sitting following their appointment." Regulation 14 is at present as follows: "On the representation made to the committee before the 1st November in any year by the members of any circuit, or of any other section of the Bar, that their circuit or section is not adequately represented on the com

mittee, the committee at their discretion to have power to add to their number barristers to represent such circuit or section, and in so doing, to have regard to the wishes of such circuit or section, but the total number of barristers so to be added is not to exceed twelve, and they are to go out of office at the next annual general meeting."

TRINITY HALL being the great legal College, or to speak accurately, the College at Cambridge mostly chosen by

men who intend to read for the Bar, it is interesting to note that as many as five of the winning crew are from this College, which means that as usual the Inns of Court will find muscle as well as brain among this year's students. No. 2 is a son of Mr. Justice Hannen, we believe.

AT the anniversary performance of "Sweet Lavender" on Thursday evening last, at Terry's Theatre, this favourite play was performed for the 371st time, during which period it has been witnessed by 229,607 persons. These numbers do not include those who have seen the play in Australia, America, and the English provinces.

THE programme for Mr. E. J. Lonnen's benefit at the Gaiety Theatre is now out, and, amongst other attractions, we may mention the re-appearance of Mr. Edward Terry as "Rob Roy" in Burnand's Gaiety burlesque "Robbing Roy": the first act of the successful burlesque "Esmeralda," with the beneficiare as "Claude Frollo"; Messrs. Geo. and Fred. Walton in the duel scene from G. R. Sims' burlesque, the “OfCourse-Akin-Brothers"; the Moore and Burgess Minstrels, and the following ladies and gentlemen, who will appear by permission of their respective managers: -Mesdames Kate Vaughan, Florence St. John, Violet Cameron, Madeline Shirley, Grace Pedley, Grace Woodward, Messrs. Arthur Roberts, Herbert Standing, Laurence Kellie, James Fernandez, Mons. Marius, Chas. Collette, George Giddens, Charles Godfrey, Harry Parker, Alec Marsh, Chas. Coburn, J. Tapley, J. J. Dallas, Chas. Bertram, A. Chevalier, S. Caffrey, E. D. Ward, Dudley Causton, Alfred Moore, Walter Joyce, &c., &c. Musical conductors: Herr Meyer Lutz, Walter Pallant, and John Crook. Stage managers: Charles Harris, Frank Parker, and Robert Soutar. Treasurer: F. J. Potter. Acting Manager: H. T. Brickwell.

THE INCORPORATED LAW SOCIETY.

THE following circular has been issued to the members :In pursuance of the resolution passed at the adjourned annual general meeting held on July 15, 1881, to the effect that meetings of the society should be held in January and April, I am directed to inform you that a special general meeting of the members of the society will be held in the hall of the society on Friday, the 12th of April next, at two o'clock precisely, to consider the subjects hereinafter mentioned, and of which notice has been duly given :

Mr. F. R. Parker will move :

"That a committee of eighteen members of the society be and is hereby appointed to consider and report to the next general meeting of the society whether any and what revised or additional rules of debate are desirable, and, if in their opinion, any such revised or additional rules are desirable, to prepare and submit draft rules for consideration with their report.

That the committee consist of the president and vice-president of the society ex officio, of four other members of council, to be nominated by the president, and of twelve members of the society, not being members of the council, to be nominated by the meeting."

Mr. F. K. Munton will move :

"That, looking to the volume of substantial work now thrown into the scattered London county county courts, this meeting is of opinion that a central metropolitan issuing office is immediately called for; and that in the interests alike of the junior bar, solicitors, and suitors, all remitted town cases should be grouped and tried in some building adjacent to the Royal Courts of Justice."

Mr. A. H. Hastie will ask how many solicitors have been

struck off the roll or suspended in each of the ten years ending 31st December, 1888.

Mr. Hastie will move:

"1. That in the opinion of this meeting the recent frauds and thefts of solicitors have greatly shaken public confidence in the profession."

"2. That a joint committee of members of the council and of other members of the society, in equal numbers, be now appointed to consider whether by a system of mutual insurance or otherwise any means can be adopted of restoring public confidence."

"3. That it is desirable that a Bill in Parliament should forthwith be put forward by the council, providing that all solicitors hereafter to be admitted (other than clerks now in articles), shall give security in a sum of not less than £5,000."

Mr. H. J. Mead will ask (1) whether under the Land Transfer Bill, if passed in its present form, solicitors, as such, will have any rights not possessed by unqualified persons; (2) if not, what steps the council have taken to insure that solicitors shall have the same exclusive rights with repect to the preparation of documents to be filed or entered in the Land Registry as they now have with regard to the preparation of deeds.

Mr. Herbert M. Low will ask whether, having regard (1) to the effect of recent and impending legislation, and especially (2) to the following remark of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the council propose taking any, and, if so, what steps towards obtaining the abolition of the annual certificate duty.

"While admitting the tax was not one which he (Mr. Goschen) liked, or which he would himself have originated or supported, the English Law Society had not taken any action in the matter, which caused him to feel a difficulty in dealing with the profession in Ire'and only."

Mr. Low will move :

That a petition for the repeal of the certificate duty be at once prepared, and that every solicitor Le afforded an opport tunity of signing the same, with a view to its subsequen presentation to the Chancellor of the Exchequer by a deputation from this society."

Mr. Charles Ford will move :

"1. That, in the opinion of this mecting, the feeling throughout the profession is so strong in favour of the abolition of the annual certificate duty that this society ought not any longer to remain inactive in the matter, even though the abolition of such duty involves a serious annual pecuniary loss to the society."

"2. That the interests of the solicitor's profession call for the establishment of an independent legal journal to advocate the rights of solicitors, such journal to be free from the influence of the bar."

Mr. Oswald Milne will ask what steps the council are taking in the interests of the profession with regard to the Land Transfer Bill now before the House of Lords.

Mr. Oswald Milne will move :

"That this meeting considers that the notice recently posted up in the Land Registry Office, with the authority of the Lord Chancellor, is unjust to solicitors, and casts a slur upon an bonourable profession, and this meeting requests the council to take the necessary steps to obtain the withdrawal of such notice."-E. W. WILLIAMSON, Secretary.

[We are glad to be able to announce that the matter having been urged upon the attention of the Lord Chancellor by the Right Honourable W. H. Smith, acting on behalf, and a the instance of Messrs. Milne & Milne, and nearly 200 other firms of solicitors in the Strand Division, His Lordship has a length expressed strong disapproval of the notice, and the Registrar has, in accordance with this disapproval, directed the entire withdrawal of the offensive notice, and has destroyed such copies of it as still remained obtainable by the public. Great credit is due to Messrs. Milne & Milne, of Clement's Inn, for the action they took in the matter. The above motion, therefore, of which notice has been given, or, at any rate, the latter part of it will no longer be necessary.-ED. P. C.).

LEGAL HONOURS.

MR. EDWARD JENKS, barrister, has been appointed Professor of Law at the University of Melbourne. Called at the Middle Temple in November, 1887.

MR. JOSEPH TURNER HUTCHINSON, barrister, Queen's Advocate for the Gold Cost Colony, has been appointed Chief Justice of that colony. Called at the Middle Temple in November, 1879. MR. CHARLES WILLIAM LANE, solicitor, has been appointed Clerk to the Kettering Board of Guardians, Assessment Committee, School Attendance Committee, and Rural Sanitary Authority, and Superintendent Registrar of Births, Deaths, and Marriages for the Kettering District, in succession to his partner, the late Mr. Henry Styleman Borrodaile Preedy. Admitted in 1865.

Marine and

INSURANCE.

The

THE reports and accounts of this General Mutual office for the year ending December 31st, Life Assurance 1888, are not at all satisfactory. The Society. comparative expenditure in commissions and expenses in management is altogether too high, and although the new business secured shows an increase over that of the last few years, yet it has been obtained at a price that is beyond even the most liberal margin that can be allowed in reason. completed new business consisted of 937 policies for £222,156, and 172 deferred annuities for £1,785, the total new life premium income on which amounted to £8,242. The total premium income was £52,310. Commissions and expenses of management equalled £16,304, which is about 31 per cent. of the total premium income. After allowing 7 per cent. on renewal premiums, the cost of the new business was over 157 per cent. of the premium income it brought. Such expenditure as this is really alarming, and when we find that the total death claims, together with bonus additions thereon, only amounted to £17,724, we naturally cry a halt, to ask a question, Does this office receive policy-holders' money to pay death claims or expenses? The difference between the two is only £1,320. In point of fact, for every £1 paid in death claims and bonus additions thereto, 18s. 4d. were expended in expenses of management. It is generally conceded that the primary object of a life office is to furnish indemnity against death, but when we find, as in this instance, that for every pound paid to the beneficiaries of deceased policy-holders nearly another pound is used in running the office, there is an appearance of something being radically wrong.

It is the old contention again. A plethora of petty offices, both mutual and proprietary, dividing up into many parts a volume of business that should never be sub-divided among more than ten offices at the greatest. Out of 82 British offices doing business in Great Britain, over 60 have averaged less than £500,000 of new business per year for four years past; the great bulk of these being nearer £300,000 than the above figures. Each office has its round of officials and clerks, from the directors and chairman and secretary, or manager, down to the office boy. Each has its sempiternal expenses. Rents, taxes, salaries, printing, postages, and the many and varied that go to make up the sum total. All have to come out of the income, and were the volume of business is small, and the income correspondingly the same, the percentage of expenses will necessarily be high in comparison.

If the business of the 82 offices could only be amalgamated under ten heads, the salaries or fees of 72 boards of directors would be dispensed with; and concomitantly those of secretaries, managers, auditors, and clerks, together with rents, &c., &c., &c., would also be done away with. The result would be extremely beneficial, as is apparent without explanation.

As it is the competition is too great, and the amount of business obtainable too much sub-divided.

WHEN we find an office paying out more Law Union Fire in surrender values than it receives in and Life Insurance Company. new premium income, we are forced to but one conclusion, that the matter of its gradual decadence is only a question of time. In the directors' report and general accounts of the Law Union, which were presented at the annual meeting held on Thursday last, the net amount received for premiums on the new business secured was £7,232. The amount paid out in surrender values exceeded this sum by £527, being £7,759. Those that have the slightest acquaintance with life assurance matters, know that surrender values, as refunded by an office, are far from being the actual value of the surrender, and that in consequence the amount of assurance lapsed must have been of considerable magnitude, and cannot but have a deleterious effect upon the general wellbeing of the office. The lapse element seems to be on

the increase, for we find in 1887, £6,133 were paid in surrenders, and for the same purpose the sum disbursed in 1886 was £5,074.

Although this company sails under the name of the Law Union Fire and Life, the provisions of the deed of settlement keep the capital and funds of each department distinct, so in reality it resolves itself into two comparatively petty companies, which cannot by force of agreement receive assistance from each other. As far as our own opinion goes, we do not consider this an evil. The fact, however, that the balance sheet shows shareholders' capital paid-up (fire) to be £40,000, and the fire fund only £64,488, does not seem to furnish, independent of shareholders' liability, a very large sum to indemnify policy-holders in this department against loss of an extended character, as sometimes happens through conflagration.

The new business secured in the Life Department during the year was £201,920. This is an improvement on that of 1887, when it amount to but £158,894. It is, however, considerably below the annual average for the past eight years, which was £228,261, a fact that is significant of the public's appreciation of the company, and the direction it is taking.

As if to overcome this retrogression, efforts are to be made to secure more new business, and "to afford facilities to the agents and connections of the company in the city for effecting insurances without delay the directors have opened a branch office at the Royal Exchange Buildings." The delay that would occur in the journey between the Royal Exchange and Chancery Lane could not necessarily be much even if pedestrianism alone were resorted to; but in these days of penny 'busses and shilling hansoms the delay in overcoming this distance need not be dangerously great.

The Law Union will, we fear, have to resort to other expedients besides the opening of city branches before its attractive power becomes magnetic.

WE wish to direct attention to the sysFire Insurance tem of "sweating" policy-holders which Sweaters. is in vogue among most fire insurance offices, some more and some less flagrantly offending in this respect. The inspector from the office, after prodding and prowling about, being unable to suggest any suspicious circumstance, and no mala fides in the insurer's statement being discoverable by the utmost ingenuity, and it being as clear as clear can be that the company are liable, the next step isto pay up and look pleasant? Oh! dear no. The next step is to send an assessor, who is not paid by a salary but by results; that is, he receives a commission from the office on the amount which he has beaten off the company's just liability. It can readily be understood, therefore, that the arts of the assessor in browbeating or cajoling the unfortunate policy-holder are protean. A most shameful abuse is made of the law which renders fire companies liable only for the actual value of the goods destroyed, and takes no consideration of the value at which they were assured, and on which the company had been for years receiving premium. The unfortunate and, perhaps, already half-ruined policy-holder is intimidated by more or less open hints that the statements on which the policy was granted, although bonafide, were hardly full and complete enough to render him secure in a law suit. He is, perhaps for the first time, impressed with the fact that the company is not bound to replace, but only to pay the decreased value at the time of the fire, and it is wholly useless for him to urge the question as to why then the company had continued to receive from him the premium on the original value up to the present time. The dangers of litigation, the uncertainty of the law, the power and pecuniary resources of the company, should it come to a fight, are not unadroitly urged upon an already harassed man, who has been burnt out, and who has plenty of demands on his time in removing and continuing his business and connection, and in endeavouring to minimise the result of the accident. If a busi

ness premises and books are burnt, and difficulties of collecting accounts are apparent, the offer of a lump sum down, however small, set against the delays and dangers of litigation, is almost always successful in clinching the matter, to the profit of the company and defraudment of the insured. But take a smaller case, which it is simpler to state in general terms, but which our readers can amplify and paraphrase to suit other larger and more complicated cases. A man spends, say £1,000, in furnishing a house new throughout, and insures it for the same amount. Say, six months after, he is burnt out. Well, other things being all right, and no argus eye in the office being able to pick a hole in the completeness of his answers to the thousand and one questions which were-merely formally, you know, and for protection against rogues-put to him at the time, the insured naturally expects to get his thousand pounds. But he is doomed to disappointment. The assessor meets him with the undeniable proposition that £1,000 was the value six months ago, and that all that second-hand furniture is worth, however well-preserved and however short a time it has become secondhand, is half the original cost. "The best test of the value," says our wily assessor, is, "what would it fetch for instance if you had had to send it to be disposed of by an auctioneer? Why everyone knows that you would be lucky if you got half what you originally paid, and then you have to pay expenses of removal and auctioneers' commissions." In this way the unfortunate policyholder is brought to a condition of mind when he is glad to take £500 on a policy, the full value of which is £1,000. If he sets up housekeeping again he has to put another £500 to it to replace what he has lost. We have taken a case where the fire occurred six months after insurance; but suppose the fire does not occur till twenty years after. For twenty years he will have been paying the premium on a £1,000 to get, when his goods are destroyed, the value of the goods after twenty years' deterioration. We have said that some fire offices are more iniquitous than others, but we shall be ready to receive the complaints of any policy-holders who feel that they have been unjustly treated, and we shall treat their communications as confidential, and take such steps as may compel the sinning office to amend their injustice. It is high time that the influential readers of Pump Court, who exercise so important an influence on legislation, should direct their attention to this matter. It is quite right that every discouragement should be given to over insurance on fire risks, and in the old days it was expedient that the interest of people should be made to run in the direction of helping to put out a fire rather than otherwise. But with regularly constituted fire brigades, which not only render unnecessary, but pre vent, private unregulated assistance, the conditions are somewhat changed. At any rate, the fire assurance companies should have some check, and ought to be made responsible in one way or the other for the premiums they receive.

General Life and THE annual meetings of different comFire Assurance panies follow each other in quick succesCompany. sion, and seem to string along in Indian file throughout the months succeeding the New Year. As it would be inexpedient to have them clustering around the same dates, it would appear as almost a matter of tacit agreement that these occasions should not clash with each other. The third Wednesday in May is the generally appointed time for the meeting of the proprietors of the prosperous office doing business at 103, Cannon Street, and favourably and commonly known by the brief but comprehensive title of the General. The report that will then be presented is not yet issued to the public, and, in consequence, we are unable to say exactly what the outcome of the year's business will be; but we venture to predict that the successive progressive steps that have been achieved year by year in the past will be increased by one more, representing the year 1888

The General was established in 1837, and has been a

progressive and popular office. Its 10th quinquennial report, which was issued at the last annual meeting, was of a highly satisfactory nature, and showed that in the jubilee year of the company, in its Life Department, a greater amount of new business was obtained than in any previous twelvemonth.

In the Fire Department the gross premiums received were £114,680, and from all sources the income amounted to £313,147. At the close of the quinquennial period the assets amounted to £1,094,314, and showed an increase of nearly a quarter of million over those appearing in account stated at the close of the preceding similar period.

The history of this office in both of its departments is of a nature calculated to inspire confidence and attract business. Each successive year has shown successive increase in those items that constitute the stability and desirable qualities of a public corporation of this nature. In addition to these, the repute and personnel of the directorate and management renders business a pleasing task, instead of, as is often the case, inciting a feeling of irritability, even where terms are even.

At the annual meeting of the London Chamber of Commerce, held on the 20th inst., Sir John Lubbock, Bart., M.P., in the chair, the annual report which had been printed and distributed among the members (numbering nearly 3,000) was discussed. The report contained the following paragraph:

DELAYS IN COMMON LAW CASES.

Your Council has been addressed with regard to the growing delays which occur in the trial of common law cases. The prejudice suffered from these has been admittedly so considerable that, at last, even the Law Societies have taken up the matter, and rather to the surprise of laymen, perhaps, have advocated the cause of reform and accelerated procedure. Your Council, when the disadvantages of the delays were originally brought before them, decided first to consult the solicitors who were members of the Chamber as to the best course of action to adopt, and were guided by the advice given, viz., to write to the Lord High Chancellor on the subject. It was after this step was taken that it transpired that the Incorporated Law Society and the Bar Committee were both working in the same direction. It is satisfactory now to be able to report that the evil of the delays is recognised, and that re-arrangements of trials and rotations of judges are being made, which, it is believed will produce a satisfactory remedy.

The Chairman having proposed the adoption of the report, Mr. F. K. Munton moved to expunge the sentence which we have given in italics as above, on the ground that it was a needless reflection on the Law Society, and was based upon a misapprehension of the facts. He said that, although only a new member of the Chamber, he was an old member of the Law Society, and the active and successful measures taken by that body in relation to the sittings of the Law Courts were initiated long before the Chamber of Commerce in any way intervened. He suggested that it would be desirable in the future that the Chamber should put itself in communication with the Law Society before taking measures in a matter peculiarly within their province, he being sure that the Society and the Chamber were quite at one, and he thought that concerted action was not only desirable but proper. Sir John Lubbock conceded that Mr. Munton's objection ought to be accepted, and in the result the report was adopted expunging the words in question.