The volume before us is an excellent example of a good text-book, well meriting a fourth edition. The author brings to his work the experience of a patent practice extending over more than a quarter of a century. The arrangement of the book is logical, beginning with a discussion of such fundamental matters as the Subjects of Patents, Invention, Novelty, and Utility; then treating of the kindred subjects of Applications, Letter Patent, Reissues, Extensions, Title, Licenses, and Infringement; and winding up with a consideration of Courts, Parties and Causes, Action at Law, Damages, Actions in Equity, Injunctions, and Profits.

It is a pleasure to note that Mr. Walker's book is more than a mere stringing together of cases in logical order-a mere digest. It is, in truth, a valuable treatise on the subject of Patent Law, and includes intelligent discussion of principles, as well as statements of cases. Occasionally the author dissents from the conclusion reached by the court, as, for example, on the question whether the term "manufacture" "should be held to justify a patent for the invention of a new and useful human habitation, or of a new and useful improvement of such a structure," and in such cases he has the courage to state his own views-an excellent quality in a text-book writer.

The Appendix contains the Patent Statutes from the Patent Act of 1790 to date.

STREET RAILWAY REPORTS. Annotated. Reporting the Electric Railway and Street Railway Decisions of the Federal and State Courts in the United States. Edited by Frank B. Gilbert. Vol. I. Albany, New York: Matthew Bender. 1904. (xvi+

943 pp.)

This first volume of a new series of Reports covering current cases of a special nature, contains about one hundred and fifty Street Railway cases decided in twentyseven State Courts and the United States Circuit Court of Appeals between April 1, 1903, and the fall of the same year, the intention of the editor being to report "all the cases decided in the Federal Courts, in the courts of last resort of all the States, and the important cases decided in lower courts of original or appellate jurisdiction, relating in any way to the management, operation, or control of street railways, and the rights, duties and liabilities of street railway companies." Editorial notes are added to many of the cases. Naturally a majority of the cases. are negligence and personal injury cases; but many other important classes of cases are included, as, for example, those involving franchises, and those dealing with damages to abutting owners by elevated railroads, e. g., Aldis v. Union Elevated Railroad Company, an Illinois case, and the Massachusetts case of Baker v. Boston Elevated Railway Company.

STREET RAILWAY ACCIDENT LAW. By Andrew J. Nellis. Albany, N. Y.: Matthew Bender. 1904. (cxii+711 pp.)

This volume is, in effect, a well-arranged digest of American, including Canadian, cases, dealing with-to quote the sub-title"the liability of street railroads for injuries to the person and property by accidents to passengers, employés, and travelers on the public streets and highways, and [with] the pleading and practice in the various jurisdictions in street railroad litigation." Within these somewhat narrow lines the author's work seems to be carefully and thoroughly done, making the book one of

practical value. We feel bound, however, to protest in a friendly spirit against calling such a volume as this-excellent and valuable as it is in its own way-"a complete treatise on the principles and rules of law applied" to the subject in hand, for such a description imports a dignity and importance to which this book, and the many books of like character which are coming constantly from the press, have no claim.

HAMILTON'S CYclopedia of Negligence Cases. A Century of Negligence Law, Classified According to Facts. Containing all reported negligence cases decided in all the New York State Courts from the earliest period (1802) to October 10, 1903. Prepared and edited by T. F. Hamilton. New York: Baker, Voorhis, and Company. 1904. (lxxxi+1083 pp.)

To the New York practitioner who has any dealing with negligence cases this volume will be a time-saver and a book of practical value; nor is its value limited to New York cases, although it deals only with decisions in that jurisdiction. The facts in each case are stated in from one to six or eight lines: the condensing is well done, and the statements of the facts involved in each case are clear and sufficiently full. There is also an excellent one-line index.

THE LAW OF CRIMES AND CRIMINAL PROCEDURE. Including Forms and Precedents. By Lewis Hochheimer. Second edition. Baltimore: The Baltimore Book Company. 1904. (566 pp.)

The author treats his subject under four main heads, namely, General Doctrines, Procedure, Special Proceedings (c. g. Search Warrants, Inquisition of Homicide, Extradition, Certiorari, Habeas Corpus), and Specific Offenses. It is obvious that a full and comprehensive treatment of the wide field of criminal law and procedure is impossible in the small compass of four hundred and fifty pages. This impossible task the author has not attempted; on the other hand, he has written an excellent concise outline of

his subject, of value alike to the student who wishes to get a general knowledge of criminal law, and to the practitioner who has need of a text-book on this subject for quick reference.

THE BANKRUPTCY ACT OF 1898. Annotated and explained by John M. Gould and Arthur II. Blakemore. Boston: Little. Brown and Company. 1904. Buckram. (xvii+266 pp.)

Within this small volume the authors have given a concise and useful commentary on the present Bankruptcy Act, with its amendments, referring in the notes to the various sections of the act to the important and latest Federal and State decisions which bear thereon. Following the Bankruptcy Act itself are Forms of Bankruptcy and the General Orders and Forms established by the Supreme Court, November 28, 1898.

THE AMERICAN STATE REPORTS. Containing the Cases of General Value and Authority decided in Courts of Last Resort of the Several States. Selected, reported and annotated by A. C. Freeman. Volume 97. San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company. 1904. (1139 pp.)

The notes in this volume cover subjects of more than usual interest; c. g. Actions by Stockholders on Behalf of Corporations; When the Liability of a Carrier is Reduced to that of a Warehouseman; Effect, as against Stockholder, of a Judgment against a Corporation; Liability of Carriers for Injuries done by Strikers or Mobs; What is sufficient Joinder of Husband in Conveyance of Wife's Real Estate: Adjournment. of Execution and Judicial Sales; Power of Cities to Create Monopolies for the Removal of Garbage and Noxious Substances; Circumstantial Evidence; Right of Recovery of Employés accepting Extra-Hazardous Duties; and the Rights, Duties and Powers of Guardians ad Litem and Next Friends of Infants. The cases here reported were, for the most part, decided in 1902 and the first half of 1903.

CURRENT LEGAL ARTICLES.

"THE Succession of the Vice-President under the Constitution" is the subject of an interesting inquiry by Lewis R. Works, of the Los Angeles, California, bar, in the American Law Review for July-August. Mr. Works says in conclusion:

The questions that have been asked and suggested above may be concretely epitomized as follows:

1. Would not the Constitution be more consistent and harmonious if the strict grammatical construction of the sixth paragraph of Section one of Article two were deserted, and that one adopted which would confer upon a surviving Vice-President only the right to exercise the powers and duties of the Presidency and not the office itself?

2. Do not the other parts of the Constitution render doubtful the propriety of a strict grammatical construction of the clause in Section one of Article two and force us to desert it?

3. Would the other construction be in any sense harmful to our system of government?

4. Would not the ungrammatical construction, if it may be so termed, be more consistent with the true principles of our government than the other, on the theory that the people, the source of all governmental power under our system, have reserved to themselves the right to elect their Presidents, in the strict and direct sense?

5. When a President dies, is the office vacant for the remainder of the term, or does the Vice-President become President and leave the Vice-Presidency vacant for the remainder of the term, or, anomalous as it may seem, does the Vice-President hold both offices?

6. When a President becomes temporarily unable to perform the duties of his office, and the Vice-President is called upon to act, does he become President?

7. If he does become President, what does the late President become, and how

does he come back to his own after the removal of disability?

8. If the Vice-President does become President in such a case, does he cease to be Vice-President temporarily, and, if he does, how does he get back to the VicePresidency when the President's disability is removed, or does he get back at all?

9. If he does not become President in such a case, how does he become President when the latter dies, as he comes into power under the same provision in each instance? IO. Has the United States had twentyfive Presidents or only twenty?

II. Is Theodore Roosevelt President or only Vice-President performing executive duty?

As its title indicates, this paper is merely an interrogation, but, as a reading of it shows, an interrogation with many dependent branches. The writer has not found that it has ever been answered. Madison's journal of the Constitutional Convention is searched in vain for light upon it, as are also the Federalist and Story's Commentaries on the Constitution. So far as can be ascertained, the only time that the question has been even approached was when John Tyler, the first Vice-President called to executive duty, came to take the oath of office. It was taken before Chief Judge Cranch, of the Circuit Court of the District of Columbia, and the following statement is part of the Judge's certificate: "The above named John Tyler personally appeared before me this day, and, although he deems himself qualified to perform the duties and exercise the powers and office of President on the death of William Henry Harrison, late President of the United States, without any other oath than that which he has taken as Vice-President, yet as doubts may arise, and for greater caution, took and subscribed the foregoing oath before me." No doubts have ever arisen, and the other Vice-Presidents who have succeeded to the Presidential office have taken the oath as a matter of course. To end with yet one more question, was it necessary or was it even proper for them to have taken it?

The August number of The Law Magazine and Review (London) discusses three interesting questions of international law which have arisen in the present conflict in the Far East:

Firstly, the international position created by two Powers being engaged in hostilities in the territory of two other States, Corea and China, especially the latter, which remains neutral though having an army stationed near the boundary between Manchuria and the rest of China; and the consequent hindrance of the rights of other neutrals by treaty with China to trade at ports like Niuchwang which lie within the sphere of military operations. For practical purposes as regards neutrals Manchuria may be treated as Russian territory by occupation, whether with or without the consent of China: and at Niuchwang Russian military jurisdiction has been asserted, and neutral warships have absented themselves from the port. To the extent that such places are treated by the belligerents as falling within the sphere of warfare, the rights of neutrals must for the time yield to the necessities of war.

Secondly, the reported proclamation of the Russian Viceroy that any person transmitting news by wireless telegraphy from the Russian lines (including newspaper correspondents) are liable to be treated as spies, presumably because thereby news might thus be communicated directly or indirectly to the hostile forces. It is no doubt competent to the general of an army to give notice that the will punish any disclosure or information given by any one neutral or belligerent within the lines of the army or the limits of its operation to any other person, but no Power signatory of the Hague Convention can justify expanding the word "spy" (with its capital penalty) to include a person so offending. The Convention provides that only persons can be considered as spies who, acting secretly or under false pretexts, gather, or try to gather, information in the zone of operations with the intention of communicating

it to the other belligerent: and the term is not applicable to persons sent in balloons to transmit despatches or generally to maintain communication between different parts of an army or a territory (Art. 29). By the same Convention (Arts. 30 and 31) a spy taken in the act cannot be punished without previous examination, and if he regains his army and is then captured, he is to be treated as a prisoner of war, and incurs no risk for his former espionage. By the Russian regulations issued for this war the attention of the Russian military authorities is directed to this among other International Conventions. In the FrancoGerman war the German military authorities took similar action to that of Admiral Alexeieff, against persons passing over the German lines in balloons, not indeed punishing them capitally but imprisoning them; but this claim is now negatived as above. Whatever the origin of capital punishment for espionage, its present justification is no doubt based on the feeling that the strongest possible deterrent is required for insidious methods of warfare; but this is an additional argument against arbitrary construction of the term. Modern opinion is more mercifully inclined, and regards imprisonment as sufficient in most cases.

Thirdly, the use of floating mines by belligerents which, whether laid or not in the territorial waters, are found on the high seas and endanger neutral shipping. The view has been expressed by high legal authority, and even officially, that such mines may be legitimately laid in territorial waters, but not in the open sea, and it has been suggested that if mines have been legitimately so laid and are afterwards carried out to sea by weather, the belligerent is not responsible for injury which they may do to neutrals, like a stray shot fired at sea which accidentally hits a neutral ship. Under modern conditions of naval warfare it seems unreasonable for neutrals to insist on the ordinary three-mile fringe of territorial waters being the limit of offensive military operations, especially when the coast is in

belligerent occupation, and to claim the free right of passage over the waters outside that boundary. Neutrals may have the right to claim that the high seas not within the immediate sphere of belligerent activity shall not be rendered unnecessarily dangerous to their ships lawfully passing, but they cannot complain of mala fides or recklessness of belligerents if they do not take account of new conditions of warfare. But

an initial difficulty in the way of any protest by neutrals in this matter is that there is no binding limit of territorial waters in International law. It is true that more nations have accepted the three-mile limit than any other, that it was declared by the Behring Fisheries Arbitration Commission to be the "ordinary limit," and that it was adopted in the North Sea Fisheries Convention of 1883, in the Suez Canal Treaty of 1888, and by the fishery treaty of 1839 between Great Britain and France, as well as by their legislations. Official recognition of it, however, does not go further back than 1792, when the United States adopted it as being the extreme range of cannon, and it is not admitted by Norway, which claims four miles, or Spain, which claims six miles, and Russia, Germany, Austria, Italy and Denmark have refused to be bound by it and regard four miles as the minimum. An important Projêt, framed by Sir Thomas Barclay and accepted substantially by the Institute and the International Law Association in 1894 and 1895 respectively, proposed as the limit of territorial waters a distance of six miles from low water-mark, but allowed it to be extended to a distance corresponding to modern cannon range for purposes of neutrality by a notification from the neutral "riverian" Power to that effect; and in 1896 the Netherlands Government suggested to the other Powers the desirability of fixing such limits by International convention. Though other powers were not disinclined to the proposal, the British Government declared itself unfavorable, and it came to no result.

Of the position of belligerent ships of war which have taken refuge in neutral ports, the Law Journal (London) says:

If a belligerent ship which has taken refuge from the enemy in a neutral port were allowed to remain there an indefinite time, waiting to emerge when a favorable opportunity arose, the neutral Power would obviously be favoring the belligerent, and in some cases allowing him to use the port as a base of operations. As regards the repairing of a damaged ship, it may be conceded that such repairs should be allowed to be done in a neutral port as are absolutely necessary to make her seaworthy; but to allow repairs to be done for the purpose of making her efficient as a fighting machine is very much the same as allowing a new warship to be built for the belligerent. Obviously, the tendency of International law is to interpret the obligations of neutral Powers in the matter of not sheltering or repairing ships of war more strictly than in former times. The capture of the Rechitelni in Chifu Harbor is prima facie undoubtedly a violation of Chinese neutrality. Even though, as the Japanese assert, the Russians have systematically violated Chinese neutrality, this act of theirs would not be justified unless the Russian ship was herself violating Chinese neutrality, and China was unable or unwilling to carry out her duties as a neutral. If the Japanese Government cannot show conclusively that this was the case, the proper course will be to return the ship to the custody of the Chinese authorities.

A MEMBER of a recent grand jury in St. Louis thus describes "Mr. Folk in the Grand Jury Room," in The Law Register:

The question arises, How does Mr. Folk do it? That is what we jurymen studied over often. In the first place, he is not overburdened with details, having a strong staff. He has time for quiet thinking-the average American professional business man's characteristic lack. In his examination of a witness, Mr. Folk is direct and informal. You might think it a justice of the peace case, in