Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 68, No 422, December 1850

31

Observations, p. 39.

32

Previous to Hardenberg's administration, the peasants enjoyed the dominium utile of their lands, (bauern hofe, as they were called,) but subject to the payment of a certain quit-rent or feu-duty to the superior lord; and the scope of the change was to make these quit-rents redeemable, by the cession of a certain fixed proportion of the land and to vest the absolute property of the remainder in the vassal. It is obvious, therefore, that there is not the slightest analogy between the case of the Prussian feuar (as we should call him in Scotland) and that of an ordinary tenant-at-will or lessee of land, and that the commutation we have described has no similarity whatever to the schemes of "tenant-right," of which we now hear so much.

33

We are glad to observe, in the recently published Report of the Royal Commission presided over by Lord Langdale, some indication of progress towards supplying the want of a system of Registry in England, – a want which, as the Commissioners truly affirm, operates as a heavy burden on land property, and a material diminution of its value.

34

Evidence of Lords' Committee on the Burdens affecting Land, p. 423.

35

Observations, p. 154.

36

Notes, p. 287.

37

Observations, p. 153.

38

Modern State Trials: Revised and Illustrated, with Essays and Notes. By William C. Townsend, Esq., M.A., Q.C., Recorder of Macclesfield. In 2 vols. 8vo. Longman & Co. 1850.

39

In one of Dr Johnson's various conversations with Boswell and others, on the subject of duelling, he said, "A man is sufficiently punished [for an injury] by being called out, and subjected to the risk that is in a duel. But," continues Boswell, "on my suggesting that the injured person is equally subjected to risk, he fairly owned he could not explain the rationality of duelling." It will be remembered that, in previous conversations, the Doctor had endeavoured to do so, by various unsatisfactory and sophistical reasons; and one of his arguments, recorded by Boswell, was quoted by the counsel of Mr Stuart, when tried for having shot in a duel Sir Alexander Boswell, the eldest son of Boswell!

40

Townsend, vol. i. p. 170-171.

41

Ibid., p. 154-5.

42

Townsend, vol. i. p. 152.

43

Ibid., p. 162.

44

Ibid., p. 163.

45

Regina v. Young. 8 Carr and Payne, 644.

46

In opening the case against Lord Cardigan, at the bar of the House of Lords, the Attorney-General, (now Lord Campbell,) of course speaking from erroneous instructions, imputed to Lord Cardigan the utterance of a most unbecoming and offensive expression, – "Do you think I would condescend to fight with one of my own officers?" We are satisfied that no such language could have fallen from a British officer; and the evidence shows that it did not in point of fact.

47

Vol. i. p. 210.

48

It was called "the Waltham Black Act," as occasioned by the devastations committed near Waltham, in Hampshire, by persons disguised, and with blackened faces – "who seem" says Blackstone, "to have resembled the followers of Robert Hood, who in the reign of Richard I. committed such great outrages on the borders of England and Scotland." – 4 Black. Com. 245.

49

Mr Chitty. Townsend, i. p. 209.

50

4 Black. Com. p. 199.

51

1 Townsend, p. 215, 216.

52

Ibid. p. 210.

53

For misdemeanour, a peer has no such privilege, but must be tried by a jury.

54

20th February 1841.

55

The mode of appointing this high officer, and of constituting the court, will be found explained at length in Blackstone's Commentaries. – Vol. iv. p. 259, et seq.