vations on the Statutes," in 1766. After mentioning the appointment of a committee of the House of Commons for the purpose of revising and consolidating the statute law, which had taken place fifteen or sixteen years before, and had not resulted in any material progress, and remarking on the unfitness of a body so constituted for a work requiring so much time and deliberation, he suggests

"That two or more barristers should be appointed who, from year to year, might make a report to the Privy Council, as likewise to the Lord Chancellor, the Master of the Rolls, and the twelve Judges, of a certain number of statutes which should either be repealed, or reduced into one consistent act; and send a draft of such proposed consistent act before the last day of every Trinity If the alterations should be approved of, they might pass into laws in the subsequent session of Parliament. The good consequences (he continues) of such a reformation of the law need not be dwelt upon, as the statute-book would be reduced to half its present size, and the subject better know the law he is to be governed by."

term.

It is strange that a work so salutary, and so necessary as a reformation of the public statutes, with a view to the repeal of obsolete laws, and the consolidation in one consistent code of the acts and parts of acts relating to one and the same subject, actually in force, should at this day still remain to be accomplished, although, probably, the necessity for it has been continually felt during more than a century; a period characterised too, at all events during the last thirty years, by law reforms of the most comprehensive nature, and by extensive changes in the law.

The "Jurist" recently, in pointing out the number of acts which are scattered about on the same subject, enumerated no less than twenty-six statutes relating to the law of evidence, thirty-one relating to that of executors, forty-two on landlord and tenant, and thirteen on bills of exchange! These, amounting to 112 statutes, could surely be consolidated into four on those four subjects. As a consolidation of scattered laws, the Bankrupt Act of 1849 may be mentioned as a step in the right direction; and we have much to hope from Lord St. Leonard's proposed consolidation of the criminal law.

In his recent publication, under the title of "Confusion worse Confounded, or the Statutes in 1852," Mr. Willmore has vigorously assailed the grim and ponderous monster called "Statutes at Large"-a giant consisting of 20,000 members, covering a space of 40,000 pages weighing more than two hundred weight, and in many parts composed of dead and forgotten law. Mr. Willmore has not failed to point out their contradictions, absurdities, and obscurities, or that there are in existence single statutes relating to heterogeneous subjects (Ex. gr., the 22nd George II., c. 46, which, according to its title, relates, inter alia, to the distemper among horned cattle, as well as to the regulation of attorneys and the affirmation of Quakers), and heterogeneous statutes relating to a single subject, besides statutes containing provisions of a general importance, of the subject-matter of which no intimation is given by the title. Many examples might be adduced of prohibitory Acts of Parliament unrepealed, which are repugnant to the age, and really dangerous and detrimental, inasmuch as private malice might drag them from their desuetude to vex individuals, and bring disgrace upon the law.

In recent law-making we have but too many instances of want of consistency and of the evils of hasty legislation, leading, truly, to "confusion worse confounded," and to such ludicrous anomalies as those which Lord Lyndhurst pointed out on the recent debate.

Having adverted to Mr. Barrington's proposal, I may mention the plan of Mr. Willmore, which is, simply that a permanent board of three commissioners be constituted and empowered to report—1st. With regard to future legislation, on every bill relating to public matters, within a month from the first reading, having regard, in their report, to existing legislation on the subject of it, the bill to be reviewed by them after it shall have passed through committee; and 2dly, With regard to the past, to revise the statute-book, and prepare bills for the repeal and consolidation of all the existing statute-law, neither altering nor adding anything; and he proposes that 10,000l. a-year should be set apart for this purpose-a small sum, surely, for Great Britain to weigh against benefits of such stupendous importance as the improvement of her laws.

In the employment of a permanent board to report on the

consolidation and repeal of statutes, this plan resembles that of Mr. Barrington; but, as far as relates to existing statutes, I should think it better that the reports of the Commission be made to the high judicial functionaries indicated by the latter writer than to Parliament. As the "Jurist" has remarked, the constitution of such a board seems preferable to the employment of an overworked barrister or two, under an overworked Lord Chancellor who goes out with the Ministry.

Whatever may be the constitution of the tribunal to which the public statutes are to be called, I hope Her Majesty's energetic Chancellor will concur in the following observations of Mr. Barrington:

"It is not," he remarks, " proposed by the term reformation of the law that there should be a new arrangement and Institute of the whole body of the law, as in the time of Justinian, or a Code Frederique, which is not practicable in this country, where every alteration must have the sanction of Parliament. Nor, was it practicable, would the proposer presume to alter what is founded in the deepest wisdom." If I understand aright, this was the view taken in the recent debate by no less an authority than Lord St. Leonard's.

It may deserve consideration whether, in a work of such magnitude, it might not be expedient to select one class of subjects for consideration at first. Thus, for example, the statutes relating to public government and constitutional law greatly need revision, with a view to the consolidation of those portions that remain in actual force. So, likewise, of the statutes relating to the rights of property. As a deliberate and careful revision is so essential, we should perhaps be well content if the important work of revising and making consistent only one great class of public laws were accomplished in the time in which Trebonianus and his assistants compiled the Pandects, viz., three years—a collection which Justinian allowed them ten years to compile. It would be well if we could see the accomplishment of the whole work in even a decade of years, or a longer period.

I shall conclude this long letter with a remark which seems particularly applicable to the present time:

"The reformation of the law (says Mr. Daines Barrington)

hath generally been an object, and often the chief glory, of every good and great reign. It is not, therefore, to be doubted but that under the present auspicious one, which hath begun by an act recommended from the throne itself to perpetuate to this nation the most pure and upright administration of justice, this great object will be, sooner or later, attended to."

4. TITLE OF DEFENDER OF THE FAITH.

["Notes and Queries," vol. ii. p. 481.]

Ir is quite startling to be told that the title of "Defender of the Faith" was used by the royal predecessors of Henry VIII. Selden ("Titles of Honour," ed. 1631, p. 54.) says:-"The beginning and ground of that attribute of Defender of the Faith,' which hath been perpetually in the later ages added to the style of the Kings of England (not only in the first person, but frequently also in the second and in the third, as common use shows in the formality of instruments of conveyance, leases, and such like,) is most certainly known. It began in Henry VIII. For he, in those awaking times, upon the quarrel of the Romanists and Lutherans, wrote a volume against Luther," &c.

Selden then states the well-known occasion upon which this title was conferred, and sets out the Bull of Leo X. (then extant in the collection of Sir Robert Cotton, and now in the British Museum), whereby the Pope, "holding it just to distinguish those who have undertaken such pious labours for defending the faith of Christ, with every honour and commendation," decrees that to the title of King the subjects of the royal controversialist shall add the title "Fidei Defensori." The pontiff adds, that a more worthy title could not be found.

Colonel Anstruther ("Notes and Queries," vol. ii. p. 442) calls attention to the statement made by Mr. Christopher Wren, Secretary of the Order of the Garter (A.D. 1736), in his letter to Francis Peck, on the authority of the Register of the Order in his possession; (which letter is quoted by Burke, "Dorm. and Ext. Baronage," iv. 408), that " King Henry VII. had the title of

Defender of the Faith." It is not found in any acts or instruments of his reign that I am acquainted with, nor in the proclamation on his interment, nor in any of the epitaphs engraved on his magnificent tomb, for which, see Sandford's History. Nor is it probable that Pope Leo X., in those days of diplomatic intercourse with England, would have bestowed on Henry VIII., as a special and personal distinction and reward, a title that had been used by his royal predecessors. It is true that in Matthew Paris the title of Defender is given to the King, in 1245; and Knyghton, anno 1387, records a commission in which Richard II. assumed the title of Defender of the Catholic Faith. Except in these cases, I am not aware that the title is attributed to the sovereign in any of the English records anterior to 1521; but that many English kings gloried in professing their zeal to defend the Church and religion, appears from many examples. Thus, in 15 Edw. III. the Commons say their gift of a ninth to the King was for his defence of the kingdom and the Holy Church of England. (Rot. Parl. in anno). Henry IV., in the second year of his reign, promises to maintain and defend the Christian religion (Rot. Parl. iii. 466); and on his renewed promise, in the fourth year of his reign, to defend the Christian faith, the Commons piously grant a subsidy (Ibid. 493); and Henry VI., in the twentieth year of his reign, acts as "keeper of the Christian faith." (Rot. Parl., v. 61.)

In the admonition used in the investiture of a knight with the insignia of the Garter, he is told to take the crimson robe, and being therewith defended, to be bold to fight and shed his blood for Christ's faith, the liberties of the Church, and the defence of the oppressed. In this sense the sovereign and every knight became a sworn defender of the faith. When the clergy, in 1530, gave the King the title of Head of the Church, they intended no more than their forefathers did when they called the King the "Defender," "Patron," "Governor," "Tutor" of the Church.

The Bull of Leo X., which confers the title on Henry VIII. personally, does not make it inheritable by his successors, so that none but that King himself could claim the honour. The Bull granted two years afterwards by Clement VII. merely confirms the grant of Pope Leo to the King himself. It was given, as we