and promissory notes, every one of which proved, when opened, to be undefended, and in all of which the holder had been kept out of his just rights, and the funds for distribution among other creditors been diminished by the costs of litigation. A petition in favour of the Bill was soon after presented by Lord John Russell to the Commons, from 309 of the leading houses of bankers, merchants, and traders in the city, and meetings held in all the great trading towns have passed resolutions calling for this valuable improvement of the Law. In fact, there are no persons adverse to it, except certain attornies who dread a loss of business, and certain inferior tradesmen and railway speculators, who dislike the unpleasant operation of being compelled to pay their debts at the time when these are due.

If this Bill, and that on Common Law Procedure, shall pass, it is impossible to deny that the Session will have been most fruitful in important amendments of the Law, independent of the other lesser measures to which we have referred, and to which, we may add one hardly to be classed among those of inferior magnitude. Lord Harrowby's Bill, already passed for the Registry of Bills of Sale, supplies a defect long complained of; and the extension of its provisions, by the Commons, to Insolvency, the Lords having confined it to Bankruptcy, is an undoubted improvement.

It is much to be lamented that on Criminal Jurisprudence, Mr. Aglionby's Bill to enable prisoners arrested for larceny to plead guilty before Petty Sessions, and thus save the delay and expense of sending them to Quarter Sessions or Assizes, was postponed; and that Mr. Phillimore's Bill for a Public Prosecutor did not reach such a stage as to make the pledge given by the Government more specific and effectual, that they would undertake the subject. No one could blame Mr. Aglionby for yielding to the pressure, near the close of the Session, with the intention of adopting next year the suggestions of the Lord Chief Justice for extending the scope of the Bill; and Mr. Phillimore deserves great commendation for the fairness and candour of the spirit in which he acceded to the suggestion of the Government, that the great difficulties in the way of a general measure for a

Public Prosecutor, or his delegates, all over the country, might possibly be overcome, were the plan tried partially in the first instance. He did good service by bringing forward the plan; and it is impossible to deny that his consenting to its postponement only evinced his sincere desire for its

success.

We here close our review of the events in the latter portion of the Session. Our hope is (not unmingled with apprehension when we regard the endless contentions prevailing in Parliament on party and personal questions, and the manner in which public business has been too often conducted) that no more defeats may await the friends of Law Amendment, and that the end of the Parliamentary year will be marked by the adoption, and not by the rejection, of the important measures which are now so near being carried.

NOTE.

We have expressed no more than a confidence in Lord Cranworth as a Law Reformer, in the course of this article ; of his eminent merits as a judge, both for acuteness, learning, unwearied industry, and unceasing patience, it is wholly superfluous to speak.

We have adverted also with equal justice to another eminent individual, Lord Lyndhurst, whose services to the great cause of Law Amendment have been unvaried and invaluable, and happily are still continued.

We have said nothing of the Bribery Bill in our Summary, because it is daily undergoing alterations. But we must bear our testimony to the great merits of Mr. Walpole, as Chairman of the Select Committee, and as having had a principal share in the Bill as reported from that Committee. But indeed his whole conduct, both while in office and since, has been that of a firm but judicious friend to the Amendment of the Law. Sir F. Kelly deserves this praise also, and his Bribery Bill gave the important provision of the Elective officer, which the Committee adopted.