quainted with all the feelings of the human heart, and versed by experience in all the ways of mankind. He may be considered as having a genius for magistracy, as much as our Milton had for poetry, or our Wilkie for painting. Perhaps the excellence which he attained may be traced to the passion for justice by which he was constantly actuated. This induced him to sacrifice ease, and amusement, and literary relaxation, and the allurements of party, to submit to tasks the most dull, disagreeable, and revolting, and to devote all his energies to one object, ever ready to exclaim "Welcome business, welcome strife, For thee, fair JUSTICE, welcome all!!!" 1 Holt derived much advantage in his own time from the contrast between him and the Judges who had recently preceded him. Accordingly, his contemporaries speak of him with enthusiasm. Burnet, after giving an account of the manner in which the Revolution Judges were selected, says, "The first of these was Sir John Holt, made Lord Chief Justice of England, then a young man for so high a post, who maintained it all his time with a great reputation for capacity, integrity, courage, and dispatch." Said the TATLER," He was a man of profound knowledge of the laws of his country, and as just an observer of them in his own person. considered justice as a cardinal virtue, not as a trade for maintenance. The criminal before him knew that, though his spirit was broken with guilt, and incapable of language to defend itself, his judge would wrest no law to destroy him, nor conceal any that would save him. never spared vice; at the same time he could see through the hypocrisy and disguise of those who have no pretense to virtue themselves but by their severity to the vicious." He He The lustre of his fame in latter times has been somewhat dimmed by our being accustomed to behold judges 1 Own Times, iii. 6. Tatler, No. xiv. little inferior to him; but we ought to remember that it is his light which has given splendor to these luminaries. of the law. During a century and a half, this country has been renowned above all others for the pure and enlightened administration of justice; and Holt is the model on which, in England, the judicial character has been formed. He complained bitterly of his reporters, saying that the skimblescamble stuff which they published would "make posterity think ill of his understanding, and that of his brethren on the bench." He chiefly referred to a collection of Reports called "MODERN," embracing nearly the whole of the time when he sat on the bench, -which are composed in a very loose and perfunctory manner. More justice is done to him by Salkeld, Carthew, Levinz, Shower, and Skinner,-but these do little more than state drily the points which he decided, and we should have been left withont any adequate memorial of his judicial powers had it not been for admirable Reports of his decisions published after his death. These, beginning with Easter Term, 6 W. & M., were compiled by Lord Raymond, who was his pupil, and who became his successor. Many of them are distinguished by animation as well as precision, and they form. a delightful treat to the happy few who have a genuine taste for juridical science. In deciding private rights, Chief Justice Holt's great achievement was, that he moulded the old system which he found established, to the new wants of an altered state of society. The rules of the common law had been framed in feudal times, when commerce was nearly unknown and personal property was of little value. Manufactures were now beginning to flourish; there was an increased exchange of commodities with foreign countries; and the English Colonies in America were rising in importance. Yet, it having been adjudged in the YEAR-BOOKS that "a chose in action (or debt) cannot be transferred, because livery of seisin cannot be given of it as of land," the negotiability of bills of exchange and of promissory notes (or goldsmiths' notes, as they were called) was in a state of utter confusion, and nobody could tell what were the liabilities or remedies upon them."' By a long series of decisions, and by an act of parliament which he suggested, he framed the code by which negotiable securities are regulated, nearly as it exists at the present day. He likewise settled several important questions in the law of insurance, although it was reserved for Lord Mansfield to expand and to perfect this important branch of our jurisprudence. From Holt's acquaintance with the writings of the civilians, he most usefully liberalized, defined, and illustrated the general law of contracts in this country. The most celcorated case which he decided in this department, was that of Coggs v. Bernard, in which the question arose," whether, if a person promises without reward to take care of goods, he is answerable if they are lost or damaged by his negligence?" In a short compass he expounded with admirable clearness and accuracy the whole law of bailment, or the liability of the person to whom goods are delivered for different purposes on behalf of the owner; availing himself of his knowledge of the Roman civil law, of which most English lawyers were as ignorant as of the Institutes of Menu. Thus he began: "There are six sorts of bailments:-First, a mere delivering goods by one man to keep for the use of the owner; and this I call a depositum. The second sort is where goods are lent to a friend gratis, to be used by him; and this is called commodatum, because the thing is to be restored in specie. The third sort is where goods are left with the bailee, to be used by him for hire: this is called locatio et conductio: the lender is called locator, and the borrower conductor. The fourth sort is where goods are delivered to another as a pawn, to be a security to him for money borrowed of him by the bailor; and this is called in Latin vadium. The fifth sort is where goods are delivered to be carried, or something to be done about them, for a reward to be paid by It was then doubted whether any one could draw, accept, or indorse a bill of exchange except a merchant ?-whether notice of the dishonor of a bill was necessary to charge the drawer or indorser?-whether an indorser was liable except on default of the drawer?-whether there was any distinction between foreign and inland bills?-whether interest was recover. able on dishonored bills? and whether a promissory note, payable to order was transferable by indorsement ? the person who delivers them to the bailee. The sixth sort is where there is a delivery of goods to somebody, who is to carry them or do something about them gratis, without any reward for such his carriage or work; which is the present case." He then elaborately goes over the six sorts of bailment, showing the exact degree of care required on the part of the bailee in each, with the corresponding degree of negligence which will give a right of action to the bailor. In the last he shows that, in consideration of the trust, there is an implied promise to take ordinary care; so that, although there be no reward, for a loss arising from gross negligence, the bailee is liable to the bailor for the value of the goods. Sir William Jones is contented that his own masterly Essay on the Law of Bailment" shall be considered merely as a commentary upon this judgment; and Professor Story, in his "Commentaries on the Law of Bailments," represents it as "a prodigious effort to arrange the principles by which the subject is regulated, in a scientific order." Holt was the first to lay down the doctrine, which was afterwards fully established in the case of Somerset the negro,' that the status of slavery cannot exist in England, and that as soon as a slave breathes the air of England he is free. The question originally arose before him in a very technical shape. In point of fact, a slave had been sold in Virginia, where slavery was allowed by law; and, an action being brought in the Court of King's Bench for the price, the declaration stated that "the defendant was indebted to the plaintiff, in the parish of St. Mary-le-Bow, in the ward of Cheap, in the City of London, for a negro slave there sold and delivered," allegations of time and place in such proceedings being generally immaterial. But on this occasion, after a verdict for the plaintiff, there was a motion in arrest of judgment because the contract in respect of which the supposed debt arose, was illegal. Holt, C. F.: "As soon as a negro comes into England he is free; one may be a villein in England, but not a slave. The action would have been maintainable if the sale had been 1 20 St. Tr. 23. alleged to be in Virginia, and that, by the law of the country, slaves are saleable there." Judgment arrested. Subsequently, an action of trover was brought in the Court of Queen's Bench to recover the value of a negro alleged to be the property of the plaintiff, and to have been unlawfully detained by the defendant. The plaintiff's counsel relied upon a decision of the Court of Common Pleas, "that trover will lie for a negro, because negroes are heathens, and therefore a man may have property in them, and, without averment, notice may be taken judicially that negroes are heathens." But, per Holt, C. J.: "Trover does not lie for a black man more than for a white. By the common law no man could have a property in another man, except in special cases, as in a villein, or a captive taken in war; but in England there is no such thing as a slave, and a human being never was considered a chattel to be sold for a price, and, when wrongfully seized, to have a value put upon him in damages by a jury like an ox or an ass.' He likewise scouted the doctrine about "forestalling and regrating," by which commerce continued to be cramped down to the end of the reign of George III.; showing that, if acted upon, every man who wished to have a dish of fish must go and buy it at Billingsgate, as it would be unlawful for fishmongers to buy turbot or lobsters there for the purpose of selling them again.' He showed considerable boldness in deciding that under the statute of Elizabeth, subjecting to a penalty all who do not frequent their parish church on Sunday, a man is excused who frequents any other church. Holt, C. F.: "Parishes were instituted for the ease and benefit of the people, and not of the parson, that they might have a place certain to repair to when they thought convenient, and a parson from whom they had right to receive instructions; and if every parishioner is obliged to go to his parish church, then the gentlemen of Gray's Inn and Lincoln's Inn must no longer repair to their respective chapels, but to their parish churches; Smith.v. Brown, Cases temp. Holt, 405. 3 Keble, 685; 1 Lord Raym. 146; 2 Lord Raym. 1275; Salk. 666. I Shower, 292. |