been reduced to 8d.; and the fee of 1s. 2d.

for copy of Depositions received by the Examiners, has been reduced to 8d. The reason assigned for both reductions is the succession of Mr. R. C. SCARLETT to the Peerage, by which event, that gentleman's indefensible Compensation under the Exchequer Court Equity Transfer Act expires.

Gray's Inn, 1st May, 1844.

CHANCERY OFFICES ABOLITION ACT,

5TH AND 6TH VICTORIA, CHAP. 103,

1842,

ITS COMPENSATIONS AND NEW OFFICES.

THE evils and abuses of the "SIX CLERKS' OFFICE" in Chancery, were long notorious in the legal profession. A reform of this department of the Equity procedure had been the constant subject of public and legislative discussion for a century past. Law Reformers, however, had failed in every attempt to abate the nuisance, the "danger of innovation" protecting the Six Clerks in common with all other sinecurists in State and Church.

In 1842, a successful assault was made on this ancient establishment in Chancery. But there is an old English proverb, "that you may pay too dear for your whistle." The object of the following pages is to inform the public, and the legislature, of the circumstances and excessive cost of this "reform" of the law; and to guard the House of Commons against future impositions on its ignorance, indifference, and idleness. There are several bills now in Parliament crammed with "compensations," under the mask of "law reform." None of these bills ought to become law till a Select Committee of the Commons is informed of the exact number of indi

viduals proposed to be compensated, and the amounts of their respective compensations. We may buy too dear. The titles of Acts and their Preambles are often gross impositions on the legislature, and they often, in "law reform," cover some concealed jobs.

The Act in question, of the date of the 10th August 1842, is entitled, "An Act for Abolishing certain Offices of the High Court of Chancery in England." The Royal Speech, on the 3rd of February preceding, made no allusion to the subject; that annual programme of ministerial policy simply stating, that "measures will be submitted to your consideration (My Lords and Gentlemen) for the amendment of the Law of Bankruptcy, and for the improvement of the jurisdiction exercised by the Ecclesiastical Courts in England and Wales.”

The declared object of the Act was the beneficial abolition of the Six Clerks Office, and of the Offices of Clerks of Enrolment.

Section 1. Abolished three Clerks of Enrolment, and five Six Clerks, whose offices were sinecures. One Deputy Clerk of Enrolment; thirteen Sworn Clerks, or Sixty Clerks; seven waiting Clerks or Agents. Total, 29 persons; besides messengers and porters.

Sections 3 and 4. Substituted one Clerk of Enrolments; four Record Clerks; six Taxing Mas

ters.

Section 9. Empowered the Clerk of Enrolments to appoint three Clerks Assistant; each of the

Clerk of Records three clerks each, and each Taxing Master one clerk each.

Section 28. Empowered the Master of the Rolls to appoint such number of messengers and servants as may be necessary.

Total substituted number of persons, exclusive of messengers, &c. THIRTY-TWo.

By section 5, the number of Record Clerks may be increased to six, and the number of Taxing Masters to nine-each of whom may appoint clerks as provided by section 9, and the number of new appointments may, by such means, be increased to forty-six!

In order to demonstrate the injustice of the Act of Parliament to the public and profession, it is necessary to state, shortly, the early history of the Six Clerks Office, and the state of the Court of Chancery at the time the Act passed; and also the then existing duties of Officers who have been causelessly or exorbitantly compensated.

The Six Clerks were, originally, together with the Master of the Rolls, the sole Officers of the Equity side of the Court of Chancery. The Master of the Rolls had the sole custody of the Records of the Court, and investigated various matters referred to him by the Chancellor, and the Six Clerks were the only authorized persons who could prosecute and defend suits in the Court. They were appointed by the Master of the Rolls, and their number was limited to six. A similar principle of restriction as to the number of Proctors still exists

in the Ecclesiastical Courts. As their name implies they were all persons in "Priest's Orders," and originally subject to all the restraints which the Church of Rome imposed; and they participated in the rights and privileges of Ecclesiastics.

Their official duties, as Chancery Six Clerks, were originally similar to those of Attornies in the Courts of Common Law; the nature of the Court, and the difference in the mode of procedure, distinguishing the character of these Officers of Law and Equity.

In the 15th year of the reign of Henry the 8th, the following Act of Parliament was passed to enable the Six Clerks to marry :-*

Sect. 1.-In most humble wise beseechen your Highness your true and faithful subjects, and daily servants, the Six Clerks of your High Court of Chancery, That whereas of old time accustomed hath been used in the said Court, all manner of clerks and ministers of the same Court, writing to the Great Seal, should be unmarried (except only the clerks of the Crown) so that as well the Cursitors, and other Clerks, as the Six Clerks of the said Chancery, were by the same customs restrained from marriage, whereby all those that contrary to the same did marry, were no longer suffered to write in the said Chancery, not only to their great hindrance, losing thereby the benefit of their long study and tedious labours and pains in youth taken, in the said Court, but also to the

great decay of the true course of the said Court, and forasmuch as now the said custom taketh no place nor usage, but only in the office of the said Six Clerks, but that it is permitted and suffered for maintenance of the said course, that as well the said Cursitors, as the other Clerks aforesaid, may anddo take wives, and marry at their liberty, after the laws of Holy * 14 & 15 Henry VIII. cap. 8.