"Now for the Laws of England (if I shall speak my opinion of them "without partiality either to my profession or country), for the matter and "nature of them, I hold them wise, just and moderate laws: they give to God, "they give to Cæsar, they give to the subject what appertaineth. It is true "they are as mixt as our language, compounded of British, Saxon, Danish, "Norman customs. And surely as our language is thereby so much the richer, 66 so our laws are likewise by that mixture the more complete."-LORD BACON.

7, FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C.

Stephen's Blackstone's Commentaries.-Seventh Edition.

4 vols. 8vo., 4l. 48. cloth.

MR. SERJEANT STEPHEN'S NEW COMMENTARIES ON THE LAWS OF ENGLAND, partly founded on Blackstone. The Seventh Edition, by JAMES STEPHEN, Esq., LL.D., Judge of County Courts, late Professor of English Law at King's College, London, and formerly Recorder of Poole.

EXTRACT FROM PREFACE TO THE PRESENT EDITION.

In publishing an Edition of this Work in the year 1868, although it was the first after the death of my father, I did not think it necessary to introduce it to the Public by any prefatory remarks, inasmuch as my own name had long been connected with the Commentaries during his lifetime, and also because, though the statutes and cases which had intervened since the previous Edition had rendered it necessary, throughout large portions of the Work, to alter almost every page, still there was no change in its general structure, nor any statute of such paramount importance as seemed to require any preliminary announcement.

On the present occasion the case is somewhat different. And, in the first place, with regard to the brackets. These I have been urged both by friends and strangers to discard altogetherit being suggested that the Public no longer care to distinguish the parts of the Work for which the two Authors are severally responsible. In this view, however, I find myself unable wholly to concur, as I believe that most Readers would prefer to know the authority for the passage they are studying; and in my opinion, moreover, no general acknowledgment at the outset is sufficient fairly to explain the kind of aid which must be afforded to any Writer on English Law by the materials he appropriates from Blackstone's Commentaries. At the same time I do myself think that there is no longer any reason minutely to point out every place in which a sentence or two is taken from Blackstone, or in which an inaccuracy or deficiency in his exposition of the Law has been corrected, or where passages from his work have been omitted altogether as being not applicable to the present times. I have considered it sufficient that the Reader should be apprised whether the statement of the law on any particular subject is given substantially on the authority of Blackstone or not, and it is on this principle that the brackets have now been arranged.

The position of the Work in reference to the Judicature Act, 1873, also seems to call for some remark, as the Profession will naturally wish to know whether the changes introduced by that important measure will be found embodied in the present Edition.

To this question I reply that the chief enactments of that Act will be found in these pages, and that I have explained their effect to the Student throughout the Work, to the best of my ability. Neither trouble nor expense have been spared to accomplish this object, -with what success I must leave the public to decide.

It may also deserve notice that it has been thought it would be an improvement to commence the last Volume with the subject of Crimes, so as to comprise the subject of the redress of Civil Injuries within the compass of a single volume. This has accordingly been done, and the space in the Fourth Volume thus gained has, I think, been usefully filled up by the addition of a Table of Statutes.

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Grant's Bankers and Banking Companies.-Third Edit. By R. A. Fisher.

8vo., 28s. cloth.

GRANT'S TREATISE ON THE LAW RELATING TO BANKERS AND BANKING COMPANIES. Third Edition. With

an Appendix of the Statutes. By R. A. FISHER, Esq., of the Middle Temple, Barrister at Law.

"Eight years sufficed to exhaust the second edition of this valuable and standard work, we need only now notice the improvements which have been made. We have once more looked through the work, and recognize in it the sterling merits which have acquired for it the high position which it holds in standard legal literature. Mr. Fisher has annotated all the recent cases."-Law Times.

"Prior to the publication of Mr. Grant's work on this subject, no treatise containing the required information existed; and, since its appearance, such important alterations respecting banks and bankers have been introduced, that the work needed in many parts entire reconstruction and arrangement. The last two editions have been entrusted to the care of the gentleman whose name is attached to the work. Mr. Fisher's name is in itself a guarantee that his duties of editor have been ably and conscientiously performed. In this respect we can assure those interested in the

subject of this book, that they will in no respect be disappointed; obsolete and immaterial matter has been eliminated, and the present edition presents the existing law of bankers and banking companies as it at present exists." -Justice of the Peace.

"It is eight years since Mr. Fisher published the second edition of this practical book, and it now appears again re-edited by the same hand. Its steady sale shows that the public for whom it is written have recognized the kindness that was meant them, and makes a more elaborate recommendation superfluous. We must add, however, that the additions to the work, and the alterations in it which Mr. Fisher has made, are, as far as we can judge, real improvements, and that he has not failed to follow out the recent cases. The book used with care will no doubt be of great practical service to bankers and their legal advisers."-Solicitors' Journal.