forth as you are directed and employed by the said commissioners or any of them to take, write down, or engross the said depositions or any of them, so help you God."

4. When the commissioners are sworn, they will examine the witnesses separately upon interrogatories annexed to the commissions, and will first administer to them the following oath:

"You are true answer to make to all such questions as shall be asked you upon these interrogations without favour or affection to either party, and therein you shall speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God."

5. This oath being administered, the general state or title of the depositions, preparatory to the examination of the witness, must be drawn up in the following manner.

"Depositions of witnesses produced, sworn and exam

as fol

Defendant on the part and behalf of the lows:"

6. Immediately under this title must follow the name, place of abode, addition and age of the witness, thus:

aged

"A. B. of years and upwards, being produced, sworn, and examined in behalf of the in the title of these depositions named, doth depose as follows, viz. First-To the first interrogatory he saith, &c." (go on with the witness's answer.) "Secondly.-To the second interrogatory he saith, &c." and so on throughout. If he cannot answer, let him say "That he knoweth not."

7. If there be any cross interrogatories, the witness will go on thus:

"First-To the first cross-interrogatory, he saith, &c." and so on throughout.

9. When the witness has finished his deposition let him subscribe it, and the commissioners will certify as follows: "Sworn before

If the deposition consists of more than one sheet, the commissioners should set their names in the margin, or at the foot of each half sheet and so on with the next witness.

The papers marked

and which are annexed to the commission, must be endorsed by those of the commissioners who execute it, in this manner.

plaintiff and

defendant

"At the execution of a commission for the examination of witnesses between this paper writing was produced and shown to by him deposed unto at the time of his examination before

A. B.
C.D.

E. F.

and

Coms."

When the witnesses are examined, their depositions are

to be fairly copied on paper, after which the commission must be thus indorsed:

"The execution of this commission appears in certain schedules hereto annexed.

A. B.

C. D. Commissioners."
E. F.

The depositions must be annexed to the commission, and then the commission, interrogatories, and depositions must be folded into a packet and bound with tape. The commissioners set their seals in the several meetings or crossings of the tape, endorse their names on the outside, and direct it to the clerk of the court from which the commission issued.

*When the commission is thus executed, made up, and directed, it must be delivered by one of the commissioners, per

• This is necessary only, it is believed, in the state of New-York.

sonally, to some person who is coming to the place where it is to be delivered, and who must be able, on his arrival, to make the following oath before one of the judges:

"That he received the same from the hands of A. B. one of the commissioners, and that it hath not been altered or opened since he so received it."

(Or it may be delivered to the court by one of the commissioners.")

THE LAW MARITIME.

An Argument, in Behalf of a Bill to Ascertain the Jurisdiction of the Admiralty in the House of Lords.

MY LORDS,

BY SIR LEOLINE JENKINS.

It is with the greatest disadvantages imaginable, that I do appear before your lordships, since it is expected that I should support a bill, which my lord chief justice Vaughan has represented to be against the common law, and a flat contradiction to several statutes; for I have not only the infinite want of his learning, reason, and experience, but I am to go out of my own profession; I am to expect no aids from the civil law, but am to make out what I shall offer to your lordships, by the peculiar law and practice of this kingdom.

However, since his royal highness expects, and your lordships are pleased to command, that I should lay before you what I have to say, I shall do it with all submission possible to your lordships, and with that deference which I owe to the person and judgment of my lord chief justice.

My lord chief justice was pleased to begin his argument with three statutes; I shall not need to recite or repeat them, your lordships, I doubt not, remembering the words and purport of them very exactly. But I must crave leave to speak to that which was observed upon them.

The learned chief justice was pleased to say, that they were the foundation of the admiral's jurisdiction; but with submission to his lordship, I do conceive the jurisdiction of the admiral was founded long before. For those statutes imply not only, that there was such an officer, but that he had such a jurisdiction, in Edward III.'s time, long before this statute, intending no more but to reduce him to that standard.

That there was such an officer in Ed. III.'s time having a jurisdiction in maritime causes, I will produce to your lordships a copy of a roll in the Tower; 'tis the patent of Robert de Herle, wherein, 1. He has his jurisdiction set out to him as to certain causes that is maritime. 2. Over certain persons, viz. seafaring men. 3. His law, whereby he is to govern himself, prout de jure et juxta legem maritimam; which we say, are the laws of Oleron, the constitutions of the admiralty, and the imperial civil law.

In the 12 Ed. III. there is another roll, de articulis super quibus, &c. 1. For the carrying on of the proceedings, and re-establishing that judicature that his grandfather Ed. I. and his council had ordained, for the preservation of his sovereignty and admiralty in the seas. 2. The interpreting, declaring, and asserting those laws, which his predecessors had made for seafaring men; which laws (says the record) were corrected and published by Richard I. coming from the Holy Land.

There is a third Record mentioned in my lord Coke and Mr. Shelden, de Superioritate Maris, which imports, at least, these two things.

1. That there were then (22 Ed. I.) Maritime Laws, Statutes, and Ordinances, and Defences in being.

2. That the admiral had then all manner of cognisance, haut et basse justice, upon all facts that might appertain to the sovereignty of the seas.

This record has the countenance of 22 Ed. I. 22 Ed. II. which was 1294; and the 13 Ric. II. which was Anno 1389.

That which I conceive is a 'natural inference from these three records put together is 1. That the admiral was then in possession of a jurisdiction over maritime persons, and in maritime causes, and that he had all power and coertion, nay, of life and limb, within his jurisdiction; for so the words haut justice does imply, and it continued in him till the 28th of Hen. VIII.

2. That the causes we humbly contend for, are so many species of maritime causes, though they may have some circumstances in them done upon the land, and are so reputed by all nations; and are every where adjudged, not by the munici pal or ordinary law of the land, but by a law peculiarly adapted to the nature of those causes. Causes, my lords, I say, which have no rules for them in the common laws, but have been always adjudged in the admiralty courts as properly belonging to that jurisdiction.

3. That these statutes are capable of interpretation, that may preserve to the common law all its just pretensions, and yet leave the admiral in possession of all these causes which are properly his, and which he desires may be declared to be his right.

I hope, my lords, I may take leave to measure maritime causes, by the same rules and reasons that we do other distinct classes and species of causes; the mere locality does not make a cause maritime, but the analogy that this species has with others: For it was observed yesterday, that the sealing of a bond or lease super altum mare, would not make it cognisable in the admiralty; I submit it to your lordships then, whether the sealing of a charter-party to go from London to Lisbon, can make the cause a land cause; since the main scope of the charter-party is to be performed on the sea, and nothing of the undertaker's business is to be performed upon the land; and therefore by a parity of reason, that case ought to be cognisable in the admiralty, and not at common law.

So that it is the law only that makes the provision, and is decisive in the case, and is to determine whether the cause