don, Chester, Bristol, Coventry, Canterbury, Exeter, Gloucester, Litchfield, Lincoln, Norwich, Worcester, and York; and five towns, Kingston-uponHull, Nottingham, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Pool, and Southampton. Out of special grace and favour, the kings of England have at different times granted the privilege to these cities and towns to be counties of themselves, and not to be comprised in the counties by which they are surrounded, but to be governed by their own sheriffs and other magistrates, so that no officers of the county at large have any power to intermeddle therein.*

COURTS OF LAW IN SCOTLAND.

COLLEGE OF JUSTICE.-Though the first institution of the College of Justice is generally attributed to king James V., yet, in all probability, his grand-uncle John, duke of Albany, who was regent of the kingdom during that monarch's minority, was its original projector and founder. Sir George Mackenzie informs us, that the duke of Albany formed the intended court on the model of the parliament of Paris; and accordingly applied to his kinsman, Pope Clement VII., for a bull, empowering him to tax the Scottish bishoprics for the support of his intended institution. This was warmly opposed by the clergy, which occasioned considerable delay; but in the end, the wishes of Albany and the young king, who had assumed the reins of administration, prevailed at Rome, and the Pope issued a bull on the 15th September, 1531, authorizing a contribution to be raised from the Scottish bishoprics and monastic institutions, of ten thousand golden ducats of the chamber (ducatorum auri de camera), for the maintenance of the senators. The bull also provided that one half of the senators should be ecclesiastical dignitaries, and the other laymen. After providing for the maintenance of the ecclesiastical and lay dignitaries of this court, an act of parliament was passed on the 17th May, 1532, in the following terms: "Item, anent the second article concerning the ordour of justice, because our soverane is maist desyrous to have ane permanent ordour of justice, for the universale wele of all his lieges, and therefoir tends to institute ane college of cunning and wise men, baith of spiritual and temporal estate, for the doing and administracioun of justice in all civil actions, and therfoir thinks to be chosin certane persones maist convenient and qualifiet therfor, to the nowmer of thirteen persones, half spiritual, half temporal, with ane president: The whilk persones sall be auctorizat in this present parliament to sytt and decyde upon all ac

* Blackstone's Commentaries on the laws of England, Professor Christian's edition, with his Notes, 1830-Statutes at large-Law Magazine Tomlin's and Jacob's Law Dictionaries -Jeremy Bentham's Rationale of Judicial Evidence-Cabinet Lawyer-Dalton's Office of Sheriffs-Dawson on the Origin of Laws-Burns' Ecclesiastical Law.

tiouns civile, and nane uthers to have voit with thaim, on to the tyme that the said college may be institute at mare laisare: and thir persouns to be sworn to minister justice equally to all persouns in sic causis as sall happen to com befor them, with sic uthir rewlis and statuts as sall pleise the king's grace to mak and geif to them for ordouring of the samin. The three estatis of this present parliament thinks this artikle well consavit. And therfor the king's grace, with avise and consent of the said three estatis, ordainis the samin to have effect in all points, and now ratifyes and confirmis the samin; and has chosen thir persouns underwritten to the effect forsaid, quhais processes, sentences, and decretis sall have the samin strength, force, and effect as the decretis of the lordis of sessioun had in all tyme bygane Providing alwayis that my lord chancellor being present in this town or uthir place, he sall have voit and be principale of the said counsell, and sic uthir lordis as sall pleise the king's grace to enjoin to thaim of his gret counsell, to have voit siclik to the nomer of three or four."

Agreeably to this act, the court commenced its sittings on the 27th day of May, 1532, in presence of the king, and all the nobility and great officers of his court. Except in cases of war and pestilence, the court has regularly continued to sit ever since. During the usurpation of Cromwell, the functions of the judges were entirely superseded, and in place of this court, a set of commissioners for the administration of justice to the people of Scotland, was appointed by that military chieftain, and which interruption lasted from the year 1650, to the year 1661, when the restoration of the legitimate sovereign authority was naturally followed by the restitution of ancient laws and salutary usages. The judges of the Col

lege of Justice consisted of the lord chancellor, the lord president, fourteen ordinary lords or senators, and an indefinite number of supernumerary judges, called extraordinary lords. We shall now make some general observations regarding some of the more important of these offices, the qualifications necessary for filling them, and the honours, distinctions, and remuneration with which their services have been rewarded.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR.-This great officer of state is supposed to have derived his appropriate title from the Latin verb cancellare, it being his supereminent prerogative to alter or cancel any writ presented to the great seal, containing clauses, objectionable or prejudicial to the commonwealth. In Scotland, this office is of very high antiquity, and so early as the reign of Malcolm II., the chancellor had obtained precedency of all other officers of state. The mere delivery of the great seal constitutes the chancellor in England; but in Scotland, the office was usually conferred by a commission under the great seal, containing a warrant also for appending the privy seal to the gift, the great seal being in the cus tody of the chancellor himself. Latterly, the office was conferred for life. The absolute rank of the lord chancellor does not appear to have been

fixed, until James VI. directed that Sir John Maitland of Thirlstane, who then held the great seal, should have the first place and rank in the nation, ratione officii. In 1626, Charles I. directed that the archbishop of St Andrews, as primate and metropolitan of the kingdom, should take precedence of the lord chancellor in council, and at all public meetings. It does not appear, however, that archbishop Spottiswood, then primate, was ever able to enforce this order during the lifetime of the earl of Kinnoul, who then, and for a few years afterwards, held the great seal. On the death of the earl of Kinnoul, archbishop Spottiswood was appointed lord chancellor of the kingdom, being the first and only instance since the Reformation, of a churchman holding that high office: he held the office till the beginning of the grand rebellion, when the episcopal order were excommunicated by the famous assembly which met at Glasgow in 1638; when, justly fearing personal violence, he fled to England, and died at London: he was interred in Westminster abbey by order of his affectionate master, and of course, while he held the seals, the point of precedency could not form any point of dispute. After the restoration, the order of precedence of 1626 was renewed in favour of archbishop Sharpe, who being less scrupulous or more successful than his predecessor, assumed the precedence, so much to the chagrin of lord Glencairn, the lord chancellor, that the degradation was supposed to have hastened his death. The twenty-fourth article of union provides, that there should in future be only one great seal for the united kingdom of Great Britain, but that a seal should be kept and used in Scotland, in all things relating to private rights and grants which had usually passed the great seal of Scotland. The last lord chancellor of Scotland was James Ogilvie, earl of Seafield, who, after the Union, was re-appointed lord chancellor of that part of Great Britain commonly called Scotland, an office which seemed incompatible with that of lord Somers, then lord chancellor of Great Britain. His lordship, however, took his seat, as head of the College of Justice, and asserted his right of presiding and signing the interlocutors of the court in virtue of his anomalous dignity, long after he had been appointed lord chief baron of the Scottish court of exchequer, and after the keeping of the seal directed to be used in place of the great seal, had been entrusted to another nobleman.

LORD PRESIDENT.-In the papal bull for the institution of the College of Justice, it is not specified whether the lord president shall be chosen from the spiritual or temporal side of the bench; but it seems clear from the bull of approbation granted by pope Paul III., that it was intended that that office should be held by a bishop: till the Reformation this rule held, and the four first presidents of the court were the abbot of Cambuskenneth, who happened to be a bishop, and the bishops of Orkney, Ross, and Brechin. By the act, 1579, however, this rule was abrogated, and

that part of the institution which bore that the president should be elected from the spiritual side and be a prelate, was dispensed with, it being at the same time declared, that the president should be possessed of the same qualifications as the ordinary lords.

The first president and the other lords were appointed directly by the king and three estates, but by whom his three immediate successors were nominated, does not appear, although I think it most likely to have been by royal authority. In 1567, when Sir James Balfour was elected, express mention is made of the votes of the lords in the abstract of the act of his admission. In 1579, however, an act was passed by which the choice of president was confided to the "hail senators;" and, accordingly, on the death of the lord president Provand, we find that the lords of the spiritual side, having chosen lord Urquhart, one of the temporal, and those of the temporal side, the parson of Menmure, one of the spiritual lords, the two candidates were removed, and the choice fell upon lord Urquhart. This form of election was kept up so late as 1633, when the lords, after receiving a letter from Charles I. recommending Sir Robert Spottiswood "a8 a persone for his sufficience and experience able to bear that charge," then vacant by the decease of Sir James Skene, appointed Sir Robert Spottiswood, second son of the archbishop of St Andrews, and Sir Alexander Seaton of Kilcreuch, to be proposed as candidates; as in the former case they retired, and the lords elected Sir Robert Spottiswood, who was afterwards basely murdered by the dominant party for his steady attachment to his sovereign.

By the advice of parliament, Charles I. nominated in November, 1641, fifteen judges; but as no notice was taken of the office of president, the lords declared, that for the future, their president should only be elected for one session, and to the commencement of the next, and that the first act of any session should be the changing of the former president and the election of his successor. This plan continued to be the rule till Oliver Cromwell suppressed the court in 1550. On the restoration of Charles II., Sir John Gilmour was appointed constant president of the session, during the chancellor's absence, directly by the king, and since that period the crown has uninterruptedly exercised the right of patronage.

In point of precedency, it was settled by act of parliament in 1661, that the lord president, as an officer of state, should take rank before the lord clerk-register, lord advocate, and treasurer-depute.

The lord president's salary, as one of the fifteen ordinary senators, was the same as that of his brethren; but in respect of the dignity of his office, a pension from the crown was added, which gradually increased in amount in proportion as the coin was depreciated, and the manner of living altered. In the time of Sir George Lockhart this addition amounted to £700 per annum. In 1708, the lord president's salary amounted to £1000, and

was again increased in 1758 to £1300. In 1786 it was augmented to £2000, in 1799 to £3000, and in 1810 it was raised to £4300, at which it has ever since continued.

For many years the lords presidents possessed a rent-free house, which privilege they acquired in the year 1676, when, in consideration of his eminent services to his fellow citizens, the incorporation of the city of Edinburgh became bound to pay the house rent of Sir James Dalrymple of Stair, then president, and that of all his successors in all time coming. Lord President Forbes of Culloden renounced this privilege, and it has not been resumed by any of his successors.

LORD JUSTICE CLERK.-Originally, this officer was one of the fourteen ordinary lords of session, and although he had presided as the clerk or deputy of the grand justiciary, who was generally one of the great nobility, from the first institution of the court, yet he had no pre-eminence. But in the year 1808, when the court of session was separated into two divisions by the act 48 George III., cap. 151, it was declared, that the lord justice clerk should preside in the second division of the court; and, in consequence, he now takes rank immediately next after the lord president. The salary attached to his office is £4000. All criminal cases are tried by him as the presiding judge, and he travels the circuits in the same manner as the other judges.

ORDINARY LORDS.-By the original constitution of the court, the College of Justice consisted of fourteen senators and a president, and this number, through the long lapse of nearly three hundred years, and amid all the changes which have taken place in the constitution and jurisdiction of the court, continued unaltered, until it was at length reduced to thirteen (including the president) by act of parliament, 11 George IV. and 1 William IV. cap. 69.

But

The distinction of spiritual and temporal judges, provided by the bull of institution, was long carefully preserved; a churchman being always appointed when a vacancy happened on the spiritual side of the bench, and a layman when the deficiency happened in the temporal estate. at length this distinction was ordered to "be suppressed and forgotten," by act of parliament, 1640, cap. 27, by which the judges were ordained to be wholly temporal.

The first appointment of the senators of the College of Justice was made by their founder, James V., with the advice of the three estates of parliament; but their successors, for upwards of one hundred years, were appointed directly by the crown: till in the year 1641, during the grand rebellion, Charles I. was forced to concede that valuable privilege, and to declare that he would nominate the judges with the advice and approbation of the estates, if the vacancy should occur during the sitting of parliament, and during its intervals, by the advice and approbation of the