the common law still reigns in primeval simplicity (Foster v. Reeves, '92, 2 Q. B. (C. A.) 255), so the luckless landlord could not get his rent, and the tenant went on his way rejoicing. The point, as Lord Esher remarked, is a puzzling one, but that at this time of day we should have one law administered in one Court, and another in another Court, is something worse than a puzzle; it is very like a scandal.

Executor de son tort' we know pretty well, chiefly as a phrase useful for frightening people who intermeddle with an estate. 'Trustee de son tort' is a phrase of more vague and uncertain import. If it be a sin to be fat and merry,' as Falstaff says, 'God help the wicked;' and if it be a breach of trust to help a widow executrix in a friendly way to carry on her late husband's business (albeit not authorised), to look after the accounts and initial cheques. drawn by her, there will not be much disinterested kindness of this sort going about in future. In law the distinction is plain: there is no such control over the trust fund as could constitute the alleged trustee de son tort a trustee at all. In morals it is still plainer. Mankind according to Burns is an 'unco squad,' but this is too mild a description for the unconscionable people who bring such an action as Barney v. Barney ('92, 2 Ch. 265).

Griffiths v. Hughes (76 L. T. R. 760) was an even grosser attempt, fortunately foiled, to make a trustee account for property of the wife which he had advanced to her and her husband, at their request, to pay debts. It was precisely one of those discreditable cases which § 6 of the Trustee Act, 1888, was designed to meet, but the words of the section are at the instigation or request or with the consent in writing of the beneficiary.' They include, it is satisfactory to know from Kekewich J., a verbal request. Boni judicis est ampliare justitiam.'

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Judges are often blamed for not laying down general propositions of law, but the doing so is fraught with danger. For instance in Cohen v. Mitchell (25 Q. B. Div. 262) we have the Master of the Rolls laying it down that until the trustee intervenes all transactions by a bankrupt after his bankruptcy with any person dealing with him bonâ fide and for value in respect of his after acquired property whether with or without knowledge of the bankruptcy are valid against the trustee.' 'Malignant fate sat by and smiled.' For hardly had the words been uttered before there comes Re New Land Development Association and Gray ('92, 2 Ch. (C. A.) 138) a case of real estate, and Court of Appeal, No. 2, is obliged to qualify the proposition by admitting that the doctrine has not

the slightest application to real estate. Probably it will be further qualified before long: for the rationale of the doctrine in Cohen v. Mitchell seems to be that suggested by Cave J. in Ex parte Woodthorpe (8 Morr. 236), viz. that it relates to cases in which the bankrupt has been carrying on business without interference by the trustee, in other words with his implied sanction. There must be some estoppel of this kind to displace the trustee's title.

Is an infant a person? Precocious infants are often found not only applying for shares but subscribing a company's memorandum. The infant does not mind, for he is safe and can sing in the presence of the liquidator, but if one of the mystic seven should not be a person' the consequences to the company are disastrous. It tumbles down like a house of cards according to the Court of Appeal's decision in Re National Debenture Corporation ('91, 2 Ch. (C.A.) 505). It is therefore satisfactory to have Vaughan-Williams J. deciding that an infant is a 'person' (Re Luxon & Co. No. 2, 40 W. R. 621) affirming Hall V.C.'s view in Re Nassau Phosphate Co. (2 Ch. D. 610). The infant's contract as a subscriber is another thing. It is voidable of course, which means valid till rescinded, but however he elects he is still a 'person' and no subsequent repudiation can disincorporate the company. Infant subscribers are not however to be encouraged, for the result might be (though wildly improbable no doubt) that with seven infants subscribing all the share capital, the company's capital would be wholly illusory.

Tennant v. Smith, '92, A. C. 150, decides a matter which we should have thought was almost too obvious to require decision, at any rate by the House of Lords, namely that the privilege of occupying a house which the occupier has no right to sublet or use for his profit, is not income, and is not chargeable with income-tax. The case however is remarkable for Lord Halsbury's statement of the principle governing the construction of taxing Acts. It has, he says, been referred to in various forms, but I believe they may be all reduced to this-that inasmuch as you have no right to assume that there is any governing object which a taxing Act is intended to attain other than that which it has expressed by making such and such objects the intended subject for taxation, you must see whether a tax is expressly imposed.' This principle, which is often overlooked, is important. There is no such thing as the 'spirit' of a taxing Act. Any judge who construes such an Act must look to its words only. He must not include anything which does not come within them, and, we may add, he must not exclude anything which does come within them. A taxing Act is meant to tax.

1840-1892. A contrast. In 1840 one St. George presents a loaded pistol at one Durant, and is on the point of firing it. St. George's finger is on the trigger, when a bystander seizes his hand and prevents his firing. The prisoner is indicted under 1 Vict. c. 85, s. 3, which makes it a crime to attempt' to discharge firearms at another person with intent to do him grievous bodily harm, by drawing a trigger or in any other manner.' The prisoner is, under the direction of Baron Parke, acquitted. The ground of the acquittal is that he was prevented from pulling the trigger, and therefore did not attempt to discharge a loaded arm by drawing a trigger or in any other manner' analogous to drawing a trigger. The puzzled jury add to their verdict, we think that he presented the pistol with intent to discharge it, the pistol being loaded,' and clearly fail to appreciate the merit of Parke's subtlety. (See Reg. v. St. George, 9 C. & P. 483, 493.) In 1892 one Duckworth follows in the footsteps of St. George. He presents a loaded pistol at his mother, whom he had already threatened to kill. He is on the point of firing, when a bystander seizes his wrists and snatches the pistol from him. Duckworth is indicted for exactly the same offence as was St. George, under an enactment, 24 & 25 Vict. c. 100, s. 18, which, as far as the present point is concerned, repeats the terms of Vict. c. 85, s. 3. Duckworth is convicted and duly sentenced. The attention of the judge is called to Reg. v. St George. A case is stated for the Court. Coleridge C.J. and four other judges unhesitatingly uphold the conviction and overrule Reg. v. St. George on this point: Reg. v. Duckworth, '92, 2 Q. B. 83. The maxim that penal statutes are to be strictly construed is no longer applied with Parke's logical rigour.

The publication of a mere copy of the contents of a register of County Court judgments which is kept under an Act of Parliament, and which by law the public are entitled to inspect, is privileged.

This is the effect of Searles v. Scarlett, '92, 2 Q. B. (C. A.) 56, which satisfactorily carries out the principle established by Fleming v. Newton (1848), 1 H. L. C. 363. The unsatisfactory point in the judgment of the Court of Appeal is that it does not lay down the broad rule that facts which under the sanction of the Legislature are recorded for the benefit of the public may always be made public without exposing the man who publishes them to an action for libel. The Court, so far from laying down this principle, seems unwilling to overrule Williams v. Smith (1888), 22 Q. B. D. 134; and further intimates an opinion that the publication of facts contained in a public register would not be privileged if the motive for publishing them were in any sense malicious. We do not for a

moment dispute that this may be good law; but we do contend that as a matter of expediency any man ought to be at liberty to publish (assuming he does so accurately) any facts which the Legislature orders to be recorded for the very purpose of their being known to the public. The report of the contents of a public register should stand in the same position as the accurate report of a trial.

Attorney-General v. Smith, '92, 2 Q. B. 289, gives some relief to honest executors. 7 dies, leaving pictures of great value. His executors, who probably knew little of art, make a bona fide return of the value of the pictures, placing them far below their real worth. Probate duty is duly paid on the value returned by the executors, and the error is not discovered until T's estate has been fully and finally wound up. The Inland Revenue naturally attempt to recover the duty due on the real value of the pictures. The Queen's Bench Division decide that the claim is made too late, for that the executors have ceased to be 'persons acting in the administration of the estate' within the Customs and Inland Revenue Act, 1881, s. 32. The decision certainly is in accordance with justice, and apparently gives fair effect to the words of 44 & 45 Vict. c. 12, s. 32. There is difficulty enough as it is in the position of an executor. It certainly is not the interest of the public that the discharge of an executorship should become so full of peril that it will not be accepted by any honest man. It is satisfactory to find that strict adherence to the literal sense of the words of a statute has for once conduced to the promotion both of justice and of sound policy.

We take the following note from the new (third) edition of Sir F. Pollock's book on the Law of Torts, where it appears as an addendum:-The normal rights of co-owners as to possession and use may be modified by contract. One of them may thus have the exclusive right to possess the chattel, and the other may have temporary possession or custody, as his bailee or servant, without the power of conferring any possessory right on a third person even as to his own share. In Nyberg v. Handelaar, '92, 2 Q. B. 202, A had sold a half share of a valuable chattel to B on the terms that A should retain possession until the chattel (a gold enamel box) could be sold for their common benefit. Afterwards A let B have the box to take it to an auction room. Then B, thus having manual possession of the box, delivered it to Z by way of pledge for a debt of his The Court of Appeal held that Z had no defence to an action by A to recover the value of his half share. The judgments proceed on the assumption that B, while remaining owner in common as to

own.

half the property, held the possession only as bailee for a special purpose, and his wrongful dealing with it determined the bailment, and revested A's right to immediate possession: see Fenn v. Bittleston, 7 Ex. 152, and similar cases cited in text. Qu. whether, on the facts, B were even a bailee, or were not rather in the position of a servant having bare custody.-The case adds nothing to the settled principles of the Common Law as to possessory rights and remedies, but it affords an interesting and rather novel illustration.

The language of the Employers' Liability Act (which remains unamended notwithstanding many promises) continues to accumulate minute judicial interpretation: Willetts v. Watt & Co., '92, 2 Q. B. 92, C. A. Whether the law be substantially just or not, the clumsiness and intricacy of its existing form have made it all but impossible that it should seem just to the persons most concerned with it.

Market gardening is one of the refuges of the British farmer in these days, and it is certainly hard to stop him from growing tomatoes, grapes, and mushrooms, which do pay, instead of wheat and turnips, which do not pay, merely because he has covenanted to cultivate according to the best rules of husbandry practised in the neighbourhood' (Meux v. Cobley, '92, 2 Ch. 253). Such a covenant is no more than what the law implies from the relation of landlord and tenant, and what the rules to which it refers the custom of the country-are designed to secure is simply the most beneficial enjoyment of the land compatible with the avoidance of waste. Keeping this in view, the best rules' must be construed with reference to the changing circumstances of time and place; in other words, the farmer may grow what he finds the best market for. This is the sense of the thing. No doubt there is such a thing as ameliorative waste by increasing the burden on the land or impairing evidence of title, but market gardening does neither. In Grand Canal Co. v. M'Namee (L. R. Ir. 1 Ch. 132) the tenant of a disused hotel had turned it into officers' quarters, putting up wooden partitions in the coffee and billiard rooms and stoves for fireplaces. In dismissing a motion for an injunction Lord Ashbourne pointed true the principle Was it a reckless desire to destroy or render the premises useless? No! it was to make the premises of use, in the most beneficial way to the owner.'

It would be better taste for directors of a company not to join in the sauve qui peut struggle when the ship is sinking, but they do, and hitherto they have done so with marked success, thanks to the unsatisfactory state of the law with regard to their share qualifica