carry him, and have used force to remove him from the train. Not doing this, nor even requesting him to leave, but suffering him to remain, and receiving from him the ordinary fare, they must be held justly responsible for negligence or want of care in his transportation.

The question before the court was, whether the defendants were liable at all as common carriers. The defense was based entirely upon a regulation of the company. There was no question raised as to the general obligations of carriers. Indeed, none is raised at the argument. The counsel for defendants rest their defense on the rules of the company. The plaintiff had paid the usual fare of a first-class passenger. The defendants had received it, and had undertaken the transportation of the plaintiff in their freight train, during the course of which he was injured by their neglect or want of care. Under such circumstances, the judge said that they could not "plead their regulation in release of their ordinary liabilities, but they were just as liable as if it had been a passenger train, and as if there had been no notice, provided plaintiff was not guilty of any fault or want of ordinary care himself."

"We

Undoubtedly a passenger taking a freight train takes it with the increased risks and diminution of comfort incident thereto, and, if it is managed with the care requisite for such trains, it is all those who embark in it have a right to demand. The Chicago B. & Q. R. R. Co. v. Hazzard, 26 Ill. 373. have said in the Chicago & Galena R. R. Co. v. Fay, 16 Ill. 568," observes Breese, J., "that a passenger takes all the risks incident to the mode of travel, and the character of the means of conveyance which he selects, the party furnishing the conveyance being only required to adapt the proper care, vigilance and skill to that particular means; for this, and this only, was the defendant responsible. The passengers can only expect such security as the mode of conveyance affords."

If there was any peculiar risk incident to transportation on a freight train, the counsel should have called the attention of the court to such special difference, whatever it may be. But "the responsibility of a railroad company for the safety of its passengers does not depend on the kind of cars in which they are carried, or on the fact of payment of fare by the passenger." Ohio & Miss. R. R. Co. v. Mahling, 30 Ill. 9. "The evidence," says Walker, J., in that case, "shows that the road had been carrying passengers on their construction trains, and they must be held to the same degree of diligence with that character of train, as with their regular passenger coaches, for the safety of the persons and lives of their passengers."

If the defendants claimed that they might exercise a diminished degree of caution arising from the character of the train, they should have requested a corresponding instruction.

The cases to which our attention has been called, so far as we have been enabled to examine them, are inapplicable. In Lygo v. Newbold, 9 Exch. 302, the plaintiff contracted with the defendant to carry certain goods for her in his cart. The defendant sent his servant with his cart, and the plaintiff, by the permission of the servant, but without the defendant's authority, rode in the cart with her. On the way the cart broke, and the plaintiff was thrown out and injured. Held, that, as the defendant had not contracted to carry plaintiff, and as she had ridden in the cart without his authority, he was not liable for the per

sonal injury she had sustained. But in that case it does not appear that the defendant was a common carrier-that he undertook to carry, or received, or was to receive, any compensation for the carriage of the plaintiff. In Lucas v. New Bedford & Taunton R. R. Co., 6 Gray, 65, it was held that a person who enters the cars of a railroad corporation, not as a passenger, but for the purpose of assisting an aged and infirm relative to take a seat as a passenger, must, in order to maintain an action against the corporation for an injury sustained while leaving the cars, show that he exercised due care, that the corporation was wanting in ordinary care, and that such negligence was the cause of the injury; and if he attempts to leave the cars after they have started, or, finding them in motion as he is going out, persists in making progress to get out, he cannot maintain such action, if his attempt causes or contributes to the injury, even if the corporation give him no special notice of the time of departure of the cars, and are guilty of negligence in starting the cars, and in a jerk occurring after the first start, which negligence also contributes to the injury. But in that case the plaintiff was not a passenger; he was not there for the purpose of being transported. The servants of the corporation could not know, and were not obliged to know, the purpose for which he came aboard. Besides, the plaintiff must show due care. The implication from the case is, that with due care on the part of the plaintiff, and negligence on that of the corporation, the action was maintainable, and is adverse to the defendants. Exceptions overruled. Kent, Dickerson, Barrows and Tapley, JJ., concurred.

A FRENCH VIEW OF ENGLISH JUSTICE. A correspondent of Le Temps gives his impressions of the administration of justice in England as follows:

I have been introduced to John H-, a young and very obliging barrister. He lives in the Temple, a sort of nest of lawyers and law students, in which a multitude of chambers remind one of a Quartier Latin and of a law corporation. The institution is composed of four inns of court, each of which possesses a hall wherein the members dine, the student's chief duty being to eat six dinners here every term for three years. A year's attendance in a barrister's chambers entitles the student to be called to the bar without attending lectures. The professors are six in number, and attendance at a final examination is optional. There is no resemblance between this and an important law school like ours, founded to teach the theory in the first instance. In like manner there is no polytechnic school here; he who wishes to become an engineer enters an engineer's office, where he learns by practice like a painter's assistant. This deficiency in high class and systematical instruction, this omission in the matter of preliminary lectures on the theory of a profession, is very noteworthy and is thoroughly English. Besides, it would be no easy matter to deliver a course of lectures on English law. The law is not codified, as in France, upon accepted philosophical principles, but consists of a mass of statutes and precedents, more or less incongruous and sometimes contradictory, which the future jurist must himself digest after long study. On the other hand, there is no school of history, as in Germany, characterized by delicate tact and comprehensive views, and capable of explaining, first, the gradual adaptation of law to custom, and, sec

occasion to examine these several State reports, we are satisfied that all the cases in any of them likely to prove of interest outside of, the State in which they were decided will be found in this volume of the American Reports. The reporting is exceedingly well done, and the notes are, many of them, quite elaborate, and cannot fail to add to the value of the volume. To the lawyer who has not the means or the inclination to take the several State reports, we most heartily commend this series. The cases reported are all of them valuable, and the decisions will pass current as authority all over the country.

Dear Sir-I desire to call your attention to a legal question which is causing some commotion among the lawers and justices of the peace. The decision is reported in 2 Keyes. I think the decision is very elaborate, and I am unable to refer to it at length. It is there held that the term jury means a jury of twelve men, and as a justice of the peace has no power to summon that number, the justice has no jurisdiction of the cause when either party calls for that number. I know of several instances where nonsuit has been granted where one of the parties has cited this decision as authority. I obtained a nonsuit a few days since on this ground, and now expect the same authority to be used against me in a suit soon to be tried. It is im

portant that this matter be put at rest as soon as possible, for if such a rule of law is allowed to prevail, justices of the peace will soon be without power. Respectfully yours,

Editor Law Journal, Albany: Dear Sir,-A correspondent of yours, a few weeks since, made the inquiry, "Whether street railroads should be assessed as personal or real estate. "

The court of appeals, in a case conducted by myself, viz.: The People ex rel. the Dunkirk and Fredonia Railroad Company v. John J. Cassity, and others, assessors of the town of Dunkirk, decided that street railroads should be assessed by the assessors as real estate, and on the same principle that railroads operated by steam are assessed. The only question in this case was the one whether they should be assessed as personal or real. Yours truly,

F. S. EDWARDS.

Contributions from the legal fraternity are solicited to aid in the formation of a law library in Chicago.

GENERAL TERMS.

1st Monday in November, first department, New York.

2d Tuesday in November, third department, Schenectady.

3d Tuesday in November, fourth department, Syra

cuse.

2d Monday in December, second department, Brooklyn.

THE GRAND JURY SYSTEM.-When the grand jury at the Middlesex sessions came into the court with the last batch of bills, the foreman handed in the following presentment:

"We, the grand jurors assembled this 26th day of September, 1871, in the sessions house, Clerkenwell Green, in the county of Middlesex, beg respectively to offer this presentment to the presiding judge, and request that his lordship will forward the document to her majesty's secretary of state for the home department.

"We beg to suggest that while the office of grand jury may, when the committing justices are unpaid magistrates-gentlemen not trained to a knowledge of the law-be rigidly maintained, in all cases in which the committing justices are stipendiary magistratesan efficient body of men-grand juries may be abolished, inasmuch as in such instances the said juries are worse than useless; for the compulsory attendance of jurors occasions them not merely personal inconvenience, but ofttimes pecuniary loss.

"We, the undersigned grand jurors, earnestly solicit the attention of the home secretary to the above

irritating grievance."

This was signed by the whole of the grand jury. The judge said he would take care that the request of the grand jury should be attended to.-London Law Journal.

Life we are told is a trial, but the worst of it is there is no court of appeals we can go to in the event of our not being satisfied with the result of it. For myself, I should like uncommonly to move for a new trial.

An attorney, who was much molested by a fellow importuning him to bestow something, threatened to have him taken up as a common beggar. "A beggar!" exclaimed the man, "I would have you know that I am of the same profession as yourself - are we not both solicitors?" "That may be, friend, yet, there is this difference-you are not a legal one, which I am."

Law must, from its very nature, deal more or less with technicalities. Sometimes its terms are not wholly intelligible to the one with whom it has to do. Hiram Higgins appears to be a man whose knowledge of legal phrases was somewhat circumscribed. Hiram had been settling a little difficulty with one of his neighbors, named David Hughes, and was asked by his honor whether he pleaded guilty or not guilty.

Hiram scratched his head, and remarked, deliberately: "Well, judge, how do ye mean. Why, judge, you have known me long enough, I reckon, to know that I never done any thing to be guilty of-never was guilty, and never will be guilty in my whole nat'ral born life. I don' know what you mean by sault and batry nuther; but ef you mean to ax ef I licked David Hughes, and licked him good, too, I say at wunst, and without another word, I did; and I'll do it again."

The Albany Law Journal.

ALBANY, NOVEMBER 11, 1871.

JUSTICES' COURTS.

We have, from time to time, expressed our belief concerning the methods of procedure in justices' courts, and have briefly indicated what alterations seemed to be proper to bring their practice into harmony with that of our higher tribunals. The more we see of the proceedings of these institutions, the more certain we are that a thorough, radical change is required to make them what they were designed to be, and enable them to furnish the people with cheap and speedy justice.

We presume there are, without including the inferior courts of cities, about thirty-seven or thirty-eight hundred of these petty tribunals in the State of New York, and that there are tried and determined by them fully one hundred thousand cases annually. This would give to each court twenty-seven cases a year, or about one a fortnight, which we think is not an overestimate of the average business. The litigations in the city courts will add twenty thousand more to the above number. This enormous aggregate, exceeding, we suppose, that of all the cases in the higher courts of the whole country, indicates how great a share of legal quarrels are settled in the forum of our lowest judicial officer. Of course, the amounts in dispute are comparatively small, but the litigations are usually as warmly and closely contested, involve as important questions of law, and are conducted with as much ability on the part of counsel, as are like proceedings before more exalted bodies.

That these courts, taking cognizance of the little daily transactions of life, and having at one time or another to deal with the interests of almost every citizen, should be so organized and carried on as to perform their duties with the least expense, oppression and annoyance, is admitted by all. Do they do this under our present system? And if they do not, where is the fault and what the remedy?

Our justices' court system savors both of the old and the new. In fact, it is something like the scriptural mixture of new wine and old bottles. The provisional code of procedure, which our legislative managers have thought so excellent that they never dared change it for the permanent one, introduced into these courts certain regulations concerning jurisdiction and pleading, designed to assimilate their procedure to that of the courts of record. But the greater part of the law relating to them was left unaltered. The changes made were, without question, in the right direction, but they only went far enough to confuse the public, without remedying greatly the evils formerly in existence.

business with the least expense. They do not at present do this. The greater portion of the accounts sued in them are less than twenty-five dollars each. There is very seldom a claim above fifty dollars taken into them, that is, if the plaintiff is sure of success and his attorney knows any thing. His attorney sues in the supreme court, first, because he recovers costs, and, next, because he does not have to expend so much to get a judgment. In the inferior court the justice must issue the summons, for which he charges, the constable must serve it, for which he charges; the trial is charged for, so is the judgment and execution. If the party wishes a transcript he has to pay for that, and then pay the county clerk for filing and an execution. By the time the sheriff is set in motion, a very large percentage upon the claim has been paid in legal and, sometimes, illegal fees. In the higher court the attorney issues the summons, serves it by his clerk, and only pays a trifling sum, when entering the judgment, for fees.

In both instances we assume that there is no defense made, but a defendant is ten times as likely to fight in a justice's court as in any other, and is almost certain to do so if he is not pecuniarily responsible. This adds largely to the expenses of the plaintiff, and he can get in return only a worthless judgment.

These courts are very frequently oppressive and are sometimes made instruments of extortion. A resident of some nearly inaccessible town thinks or pretends he has a claim against a person in another part of the county. He brings suit for it before some justice of his own neighborhood. He knows that upon a fair trial his chances of success would be very slim, in fact that he would be beaten. But he also knows that the defendant can better afford to pay his trumpedup claim twice over than to fight it, and depends upon this fact to enforce collection of what he demands, and we must say that in most instances these attempts succeed. The defendant knows that the writ is brought to extort money, but that he can compromise at less cost than he can defend, and he takes the cheaper course. Every lawyer has met with scores of cases of this character.

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