imprisonment for twenty-four hours, and suspended from practising as an attorney or counsellor at law, in the said district court, for the period of eighteen months.

The question arising under the articles of impeachment, therefore, is, whether the judge acted arbitrarily, oppressively, and unjustly, in ordering this punishment.

Condensed Reports of Cases in the Supreme Court of the United States; containing the whole series of the Decisions of the Court, from its organization to the commencement of Peters's Reports at January Term, 1827. With copious Notes of parallel Cases in the Supreme and Circuit Courts of the United States. Edited by Richard Peters, Esq. Counsellor at Law and Reporter of the Decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States. and II. pp. 655 and 736. Philadelphia. 1830.

Vols. I.

The learned editor of this valuable work, who has now been the Reporter of the Supreme Court of the United States between two and three years, gives the following reasons for the present publication, together with an exposition of his plan, in the preface to his first volume:

'The Supreme Court of the United States has been organised for thirty-eight years, and its decisions form, in themselves, almost an entire code of laws. Many of the difficult and important questions of constitutional construction, and of the nature and extent of the powers reserved, granted, and claimed under the constitution, have passed under the careful observance and judgment of the court. International questions of the highest moment; numerous points of general commercial law; principles, upon which, as its deep and broad foundations, the law of evidence rests; the construction of statutes of the United States; the rules and statutes, by which the titles derived under the United States, to the lands held by the enterprising and prosperous inhabitants of the vast and fertile regions of the south and west, are permanently governed :-all have there been subjects of investigation and final adjudication.

The chancery jurisdiction of the federal courts has brought before the Supreme Court, in submission to its scrutiny and judgment, most of the rules of equity practice and much of the general chancery law; and the right of appeal and writ of error, by which cases arising in the courts of the District of Columbia may be removed for final determination, has obliged the court to decide many points, which, but for this domestic jurisdiction, might not have been under its consideration. Many questions which have been brought up in those cases, are of usual occurrence in the common transactions and business of life; and are of very general application and influence.

'Considerations growing out of these circumstances impose the

necessity, that the law thus general, thus established, thus supreme, should be universally known. That there should be found but few copies of the reports of the cases decided in the Supreme Court of the United States, in many large districts of our country in which there are federal and state tribunals, is known to be a frequent fact. In some of those districts not a single complete copy of the reports is in the possession of any one; [!] and thus the great and overruling law of the land, is almost unknown in many populous parts of the Union.'

Mr. Peters then adds, what every professional man has felt, that this state of things is the consequence of 'the heavy expense' of purchasing the twenty-four volumes of Dallas, Cranch, and Wheaton; and it is the object of his present publication to obviate this inconvenience, by condensing those twenty-four volumes into six, which will include all the cases adjudged in the Supreme Court of the United States from 1790 to 1827, inclusive.' In order that the work may still preserve a form which will make it authority in all judicial tribunals, the whole opinion delivered by the court in every case will be given in the language of the court; and such a statement or abstract of the facts of the cause will be made as will fully and accurately exemplify the decisions. The matter will not be abbreviated, so as to omit any thing which is important, or which in any manner forms an essential feature of the case. An abridgment is not contemplated; the work is intended to be of a higher order;

and, to maintain and illustrate the connexion between this publication and the reports of Mr. Dallas, Mr. Cranch, and Mr. Wheaton, and to enable those who shall possess it, to resort to the cases in their volumes, a reference is always given, as well in the body of the work as in the index, to the pages of those reports.'

Such is the plan of this work; and we believe the profession will generally agree, that it promises to be of great utility. We have been obliged thus far to deny ourselves the gratification of possessing all the United States' Reports, for the reasons alluded to by the editor; and we have accordingly resorted to the present publication. So far as we have had occasion to use it, we have found it very satisfactory in the statements of the original cases; and the numerous references to what Mr. Peters calls 'the parallel cases decided by the court,' as well as his other references, give great additional value to this work. He has also supplied a deficiency, which has been always felt, in the decisions taken from Dallas's part of the series of United States' Reports-we mean, the want of an abstract, either at the head or in the margin of each case. Every little facility of this kind, made with judgment, is, to a practising lawyer, of more importance than its humble rank would seem to indicate.

As the value of a publication like the present, for the use of

practising lawyers, depends much upon its accuracy, even in its minutiæ, we regret to observe some indications of less care on the part of Mr. Peters's printer, than should be found in a book which is to be relied on as 'authority in all judicial tribunals.' We feel a reluctance at particularizing oversights of this kind; but justice to the party concerned requires it, lest our general remark should be interpreted too rigorously against him; and in justice to him, we ought to add, that we have particularly examined only the first twelve pages of the first volume.

In vol. 1, p. 2, we find the well known name, of our old Dutch acquaintance, Van Staphorst, changed into Van Stephorst; but this is not wider from the mark than Dallas's printer was in the original report, Van Stophorst; both, perhaps, excusable oversights in printing a foreign name.

P. 3, line 15, for right claim, read right and claim.

P. 8, line 3, from bottom, for creditors, read debtors.

P. 11, line 2, for entertain the complainANT ON libel, read entertain the complaint or libel.

P. 11, line 20, for 2 Bulsh. 27, 8, 9, (copied from Dallas,) read 3 Bulst. &c.

P. 11, line 25, for subsequent acts. . . . give jurisdiction, read NOR can subsequent acts. . . . give jurisdiction.

We notice occasional omissions, and not unfrequent errors, in the references to authorities; which Sir William Jones has justly called 'the bane of the student and of the practiser.' Some of these faults belong to Mr. Peters's and some to Mr. Dallas's printer:

P. 11, line 31, for 9 Wood.' (copied from Dallas,) read '2 Wood.'

P. 11, line 33, 34, for 4 Inst. 131,' read '4 Inst. 134; the former citation referring to the king's household, and not to his admiralty court, which is the subject of discussion in this case. Page 11, line 42, for 'Puff. 344,' Dallas has Puff. 544.' &c. We shall only add one more remark on what we have considered as errors of the press. We are, on the whole, rather surprised that there should be so frequent instances, when, as we presume, the compositor must have had a printed copy before him. But we recollect an anecdote of the celebrated German scholar, Wolf, which may, perhaps, explain it. He used to say, that whenever he wished to have his works printed correctly, he always prepared his copy in as ill a hand as he could write; for then it could only be set up and read by the most experienced and dexterous compositors and the most careful correctors of the press, instead of being put into the hands of printers' apprentices, as we fear may have been the case with some parts of the present volumes.

It gives us much satisfaction to observe that Mr. Peters, con

sistently with his plan of an economical and 'condensed' edition, contents himself with referring to the Digests now in use, (as in page 1, to Coxe's Digest,) instead of repeating the 'bead roll' of cases under every head. In conformity with his plan of retrenching unnecessary matter, we observe he generally omits the opinions of dissentient judges; but sometimes he inserts them. Which is the better course, might perhaps be a subject of dissenting opinions among professional men.

The

We need not add, that we are much gratified at the prospect of having in such a very moderate compass so great a body of American law from the highest tribunal of our country. plan, we presume, will comprehend the Reports of Mr. Peters himself, after the decisions shall be so numerous as to make it proper for him to give the public a 'condensed' edition of the whole series. The body of judicial opinions, which will thus be communicated to all those countries with which we have any international connexion, will be one of the proudest monuments of American juridical talent and learning.

INTELLIGENCE AND MISCELLANY.

Bradley, the Conveyancer. An edition of Bradley's Points in Conveyancing, has recently been published in England by Mr. Atkinson, who gives the following biographical sketch of the author, which we take from the London Law Magazine:

"Mr. Ralph Bradley was born on the 2d September, 1717, at Greatham, a village twelve miles from Stockton, in the county of Durham, of humble parentage, and the early part of his life was spent in the laborious and humble occupation that belong to such a station. His attention was, at an early period of life, turned to the profession of the law, and he practised in the first instance as an attorney,- —a class of men, who may boast that they have sent to the bar the most distinguished lawyers, who have shone either as judges or advocates. Bradley soon discovered, that his talents fitted him for a sphere of exertion more elevated, than belongs to this useful and honorable branch of the profession; he procured himself to be admitted of Gray's Inn, and was, in due time, called to the bar by that honorable society. He established himself, as a conveyancer, at Stockton-upon-Tees; where he practised, for upwards of half a century, with the highest reputation, and the most eminent success. During this period he managed the concerns of almost the whole county of Durham; and, though a country practitioner, so high was his reputation, that the leading conveyancers in London yielded the utmost deference to his opinion, and he was consulted on almost every question of magnitude which was agitated in his day. How splendid must have been his talents, and how rare his learning, may be inferred from the fact, that among those cotemporaries were Fearne, then in the full maturity of his career, and Mr. Butler springing into public notice, and already seizing on those laurels of supremacy, which he subsequently held for so long a period without a rival or a competitor.

'Bradley's hospitable board, his facetious humor, and convivial qualities, of which several anecdotes are still preserved among his friends, secured for him an extensive and honorable circle of acquaintance. And though he lived in a style, approaching almost to magnificence, he accumulated a fortune of upwards of £50,000. Among his pupils were many of the most eminent conveyancers of the last age, and some of the most distinguished