PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION

These Notes are intended for use by students who are taking the Course in Vol. II of Blackstone's Commentaries and are taking the Course in Real Property with a text-book. No attempt is made to consider the law of other states, and it is assumed that the majority of those using this compilation will practice law in Allegheny County. Peculiarities of Western Pennsylvania law are considered, but no attempt is made to refer exhaustively to the statutes local or special to the various counties. The Compiler has not cited any more decisions than seemed necessary, and the Notes are not to be substituted for a digest. The student who desires to become a "lawyer" (as distinguished from a "member of the bar"-there are thousands of the latter and few of the former) will read the cases cited and examine the provisions of the statutes. It is assumed that access may be had to Stewart's 13th Edition of Purdon's Digest, and to the Pennsylvania decisions. The 1913 Session of the Legislature will make a few changes in the law, and individual annotations should be made of these and of current decisions. Any errors of citation and of statement in the following pages the Compiler hopes to rectify.

March, 1913.

RICHARD H. HAWKINS,

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION

Following the exhaustion of the First Edition a few corrections were noted and a few additions made for this edition.

RICHARD H. HAWKINS.

Sept., 1915.

PREFACE TO THIRD (1922) EDITION

Herewith submitted.

RICHARD H. HAWKINS.

Sept., 1922.

FOREWORD

"Of the 114,000 lawyers in the United States according to the census of 1910, a very considerable part are not needed. for the due administration of justice. If that business were conducted like the business of any great industrial or transportation company which is striving for the highest efficiency at the least cost in order to compete successfully with its rivals, a very considerable percentage of the 114,000 would be discharged. We at the Bar are not producers. We perform indeed a necessary service for the community; and to the extent of that necessary service we contribute towards the production of all wealth and the effectiveness of all energy in the community, and we take toll, rightly, from all the property and business in the community for the service. Superfluous lawyers, however, beyond the number necessaray to do the law business of the country, are mere pensioners and drags upon the community and upon all sound economic principles ought to be set to some other useful work. There is plenty of work for them to do on the farms of the country.' -Elihu Root, President American Bar Assn., 1916, in Annual Address, Vol. 2 of Journal of Assn., 739.