in such places within their county as the said justices shall think fit; and for that purpose to purchase and hold lands and tenements, or to appropriate to that purpose any lands and tenements belonging to the county which are not needed for the purpose to which they were applied or intended to be applied before such appropriation; or, instead of providing new lock-up houses, to order that the lock-up houses, strong rooms, or cages belonging to any parish be appropriated for the purpose of this act, and if necessary be enlarged or improved; and the expense of building, hiring, or otherwise providing, repairing, and furnishing such lock-up houses shall be defrayed out of the county rates: provided always, that notice of the day and hour at which any business relates to providing, enlarging, or improving any such lock-up house will begin at such session shall be given by the clerk of the peace, with the notice of holding the session on the requisition of any five justices acting for such county; and that no such lock-up house shall be built or otherwise provided, enlarged or improved, except upon such plan as shall be approved by one of her majesty's principal secretaries of state : provided also, that every such lock-up house shall be within the inspection of the inspectors of prisons.

Superintending Constables.]-5&6 Vict. c. 109, s. 23. Whenever the justices shall have provided a lock-up house under this act, they shall also appoint a superintending constable to have the charge thereof, who shall have all the powers and immunities of a parish constable under this act, and shall have the superintendence of all the parish constables appointed in such parishes as shall be ordered by the said justices, and under such regulations as they shall make; and every such superintending constable shall be entitled to hold his office until dismissed by the justices in general or quarter session assembled, and shall receive such salary out of the county rates as the justices assembled as aforesaid shall order.

Recovery and Application of Penalties]-Sect. 24. All penalties herein made payable on conviction of any offender before two justices of the peace may be levied, in case of nonpayment thereof, with the costs and charges attending such conviction, by distress and sale of the goods and chattels of the offender, by warrant under the hands and seals of any justice of the peace of the county, riding, or place wherein such conviction shall have taken place, with the reasonable costs of such distress and sale; and the overplus, if any, shall be returned to the party whose goods and chattels shall have been distrained; and by sect. 25, all penalties levied under this act shall be applied in aid of

the poor rates of the parish in which the offence shall have been committed, for which such penalties shall be levied.

Interpretation of Act.]-Sect. 26. In this act the word "county" shall be taken to extend to every riding or division of a county for which there is a separate court of general or quarter sessions of peace; and the word "parish" shall be taken to extend to every township or other district maintaining its own poor, and also to every extra-parochial place which shall not be annexed to an adjoining parish, for which places the justices in petty sessions assembled shall be empowered to appoint persons to act as overseers; and the word "overseers shall be taken to extend to all persons charged with collecting rates for the relief of the poor in any parish, and, in extra-parochial places not added to any adjoining parish, to the persons appointed by the justices as aforesaid.

SECTION VIII.

OF GENERAL SESSIONS: HOW, AND BY WHOM CONVENED.

General Sessions of the Peace.]-A general sessions of the peace is a court of record holden before two or more justices, whereof one is of the quorum, for execution of the general authority given to justices by the commission of the peace and certain acts of parliament (p).

The only description of the above general sessions which is usually holden in modern times is the court of "General quarter sessions (q); but in the county of Middlesex, besides the four quarter sessions, four general sessions are held in the intervals, and original intermediate (r) sessions also occasionally take place. As the statutes requiring general sessions to be held at particular times are merely directory, there is no ground for the doubt at one time expressed, whether by law justices have power to hold sessions more frequently than once a quarter for sessions so held are clearly legal: indeed 2 Hen. V. st. 1, c. 4, s. 2, after pointing out at what parts of the year the four sessions shall be held,

(p) Dalton, c. 185; Cro. Circ. C. 13; 5 Burn's J., tit. Sessions; Lambard, 379.

(9) In common parlance general sessions are the same as quarter sessions, Lambard, B. 4, c. 19, p. 593. "Sessions" in old statutes, means the general congregation of justices of the county, &c. (12 R. II. c. 10: 14 R. II. c. 11),

whether special (Lambard B. 4, ch. 20, p. 623), or general, as distinguished from petty sessions, which have only received powers, from modern acts, in order to prevent one justice from acting alone in cases of importance. See the argument in Reg. v. Watkinson, 2 P. & D. 622; 10 Ad. & E. 288.

(r) See R. v. Mullaney, 6 C. & P. 96.

adds, and more often if need be." But in counties where, from the occasional arrear of business, particularly of smaller offences before the spring and summer circuits, it is desirable that sessions shall take place more frequently than once a quarter, it is the modern practice to adjourn the last preceding quarter session to some intermediate day before the time for holding the next original quarter session, instead of holding an extra original general session (s). It has also been recently decided in a Middlesex case that the holding original intermediate general sessions without adjournment of the last preceding quarter session, is perfectly legal, upon issuing a new precept to the sheriff, and new summonses to the jurors (t).

How called together.]—A general session may be called by any two justices within the jurisdiction, one being of the quorum, or by the custos rotulorum and one justice; but not by one justice or by the custos rotulorum alone (u). The presence of two justices is necessary to its being held (x), or even adjourned so as to hold it legally (y) at another time.

The clause in the commission, "that the sheriff shall cause a jury to appear at such days and places as the said justices, or any two or more of them as aforesaid shall appoint," confers the authority on two justices to convene a general session. This is done by issuing a Precept under their hands and seals, addressed to the sheriff, requiring him to summon the proposed session of the peace for general purposes, at some day not less than fifteen days from the date of the precept (z), to return a grand and petty jury, and give notice throughout his bailiwick to jurors, coroners, gaolers, stewards, constables, and bailiffs of liberties, whose attendance is requisite (a). The precept to the sheriff is necessary in order that he may summon all the persons who are bound to attend as constituent parts of a court of criminal jurisdiction, called together by the same instrument. This difference in the object of a general sessions, as distinguished from a special sessions, accounts also for the difference of the mode in which the two courts are assem

This is a legal course. See R. v. Grince, T. 4 G. I.; 19 Vin. Ab. 358, and the opinion given by the law officers in 1815, on a case submitted to them from Staffordshire, printed in 5 Burn's J. 24th ed. 203; R. v. West Torrington, Burr. S. C. 293.

(t) R. v. Mullaney, 6 C. & P. 96, n. ; see Bushy v. Watson, post, 64, n. (u) Lambard, 375.

(x) 1 Bla. C. 354, n.; 5 Burn's Just. 582, 28th ed.

(y) R. v. Westrington, 1 Bott. 733. See 2 Stra. 1264, R. v. Polstead.

(z) Lamb. B. 4, c. 20; 2 Hawk. B. 2, c. 8, s. 50; 5 Burn, 28th ed. (Chitty) 587.

(a) Dalton, c. 185, gives the form of this precept or warrant. See 2 Hawk. B. 2, c. 8, s. 49; and as to high constables, 7 & 8 Vict. c. 33, s. 8.

bled. The issue of such a precept to the sheriff is absolutely requisite to compel any person whatever to attend a general session, or to expose him to the penalty of absence. But it is not absolutely necessary to the holding such a session, that a regular precept should be issued; for though it may be irregular, yet if two or more justices, the jury, and all persons necessary to hold a sessions appear, the proceedings of that sessions, if regularly transacted, will be valid (b).

A supersedeas out of Chancery is the only authority capable of superseding a precept duly issued by two justices for holding a general session (c); and though it was formerly said that two or more general sessions might lawfully be holden at one time within the same county on precepts issued to the sheriff by different sets of justices, the service at one of which would discharge the juror, &c., from service at the others (d), it is very doubtful since R. v. Sainsburg (e), whether either general session so held would be valid (f); and it is certain that if attempts to hold such several sessions were made without apparently good reason, or for sinister purposes of harassing parties, &c., &c., the justices issuing them would be liable to indictment or information, and would afford reason to the Lord Chancellor for striking their names out of the commission (g).

SECTION IX.

OF GENERAL QUARTER SESSIONS.

Described.]-General quarter sessions of the peace are that species of general sessions which is held under authority of the commission of the peace by two or more justices (one being of the quorum) at some place within the county fixed by their precept, once in every quarter of the year, as directed by various statutes (h).

and a court of record, and not a court of inferior jurisdiction," per Lord Tenterden, in R. v. Smith and others, 8 B. & C. 343. See 2 Haw. c. 8, s. 58, citing 2 Hale, 49, 50, in opposition to the passage of Lambard, B. 4, c. 19, 20, there cited; and see R. v. Hewes, 3 Ad. & E. 725, post; also 15 East, 633, and per Patteson, J. in R. v. Mullaney and others, 6 C. & P. 98. It has power to quash an indictment before plea. Reg. v. Wilson, 14 L. J. (M. C.) 3.

As the quarter sessions proceed according to the course of the common law in taking cognizance of offences made triable there by statute, the com

When holden.]—As long ago as the year 1362, it was enacted by 36 Ed. III. c. 12, that in commissions of the peace it should be expressed that the justices should hold their sessions four times a year, that is to say, one within the octave of Epiphany, another within the second week of Midlent, a third between the feasts of Pentecost and St. John the Baptist, and the fourth within eight days of St. Michael. By 12 R. II. c. 10, the justices were directed to "keep their sessions in every quarter of the year at the least, and by three days if need be," without fixing the periods within each quarter; st. 2 Hen. V. sess. 1, c. 4,. supplied this in some degree by directing the justices to make their sessions four times by the year, that is to say, in the first weeks after Michaelmas-day, the Epiphany, the clause of Easter, and the translation of St. Thomas the Martyr, " and more often if need be" (i).

By 54 G. III. c. 84, the Michaelmas sessions were directed to be holden in the first week after the 11th October. Of these directory acts, the last is the only one which remains untouched; for in consequence of the recent alteration of the terms, it was deemed fit also to make a corresponding change in the law in force, respecting the times of holding the quarter sessions. Accordingly by the act 11 G. IV. and 1 W. IV. c. 70, " for the more effectual administration of justice in England and Wales," it was enacted (k), “That in the year of our Lord 1831, and afterwards, the justices of the peace in every county, riding, or division, for which quarter sessions of the peace by law ought to be held, shall hold their general quarter sessions of the peace in the first week after the eleventh day of October; in the first week after the twenty-eighth day of December (1); in the first week after

mon law consequences attach, inter alia, that an indictment found there may ba removed by certiorari into the Queen's Bench, and tried at the assizes. R. v. Wadley, 4 M. & Sel. 508, adopting Lord Mansfield's doctrine in Hartleyv.Hooker, Cowp. 524, as acted on in R. v. Hube, 5 T. R. 542.

Again, if a statute directs an appeal to the quarter sessions, and that such appeal shall be final, and that no other court shall interpose, yet a certiorari lies. R. v. Reeve, 1 Bla. R. 231; 2 Burr. 1040; see other cases, cited 4 M. & Sel. 510.

"The court of justices of peace is no more base than this court, (King's Bench) for the justices of peace have power to enter pleas of the crown, scil. of felony, as well as those of B. R. have" per Rolf, Year-Book, 4 Hen. 6, 23, cited in 19

Vin. Ab. 343, from Brook's Abr. tit.
Failer de Record, Pl. 3.

As to when it is not for all purposes and intents a court of oyer aud terminer, see post, Ch. III. s. 1; 1 Hale's P. C. 23, 24; Smith's case, Cro. El. 87, cited 9 Co. 118 b.

(i)"

"On this act of Hen.V." says Eyre, C. J., "have arisen in all other counties except Middlesex, two kinds of sessions; first, general quarter sessions, at the statutable times, and second, general sessions at other intermediate periods. The quarter sessions has by several statutes the same jurisdiction as the general sessions, and more." Bushy v. Watson, Bla. R. 1050. (k) Sect. 25.

(1) This enactment occasionally causes the contradiction in terms of holding more than four sessions called quarter