OFESSOR IN UNION COLLEGE OF LAW, CHICAGO; AUTHOR OF BOSTON: CHARLES C. SOULE, Law Publisher. mi- ing PREFACE. BLACKSTONE'S COMMENTARIES deservedly constitute in this country the first book of the course of legal study usually prescribed for students of the law. Probably, however, every student who reads Blackstone is embarrassed by his own inability to distinguish obsolete or unimportant matter from the vital and fundamental principles of the law, and therefore does not know what parts demand the at attention, in order to fix them in his memory, and may be dismissed with a more superficial examination. ject of this Abridgment is to relieve that embarnt, and thereby to lighten his labor and economize ime by directing his energies to what seems most thy of attention. This has been attempted by elimi obsolete and unimportant matter, by displaying principles in heavy-faced type, and by printing theimportant parts of the text in brevier, while matte or importance as a rule has been printed in non Doubtless there will be some difference of opinio what is of more and what of less importance, and |