incurred in the courts to which he does not, as well as in those to which he does, belong.

The Barristers and Serjeants-at-Law are also looked upon as members of the courts, the latter peculiarly so in the Common Pleas. Until the 25th of April, 1834, the serjeants had an exclusive right of audience in that court, and anciently they were almost the only advocates in civil cases. So lucrative a profession tempted the cupidity of the ecclesiastics although forbidden to interfere in secular pursuits; and the coif is said to have been invented to hide the tonsure of the priests who assumed it. As to the barristers, they were anciently called " Apprentices to Law," and occupied a rank very inferior to that of the serjeants : one of the first of them who attained great legal eminence was the celebrated Edmund Plowden, and Sir Francis Bacon was the first King's Counsel under the degree of serjeant. The right of the serjeants to practice exclusively in the Court of Common Pleas was, on the 25th of April, 1834, abolished by a royal warrant, which has, however, since been considered invalid, and the serjeants have resumed the exercise of their ancient privilege.

The Attornies are also officers of the superior courts. By stats. 1 Vict. c. 56, s. 4, and 1 & 2 Vict. c. 45, admission in one court entitles the attorney so admitted to practice in the other two, on signing their respective rolls; and the courts, considering them as their officers, exercise a superintendence over their professional transactions. Every attorney is obliged by statute to take out an annual certificate at the Stamp Office;

established for all the courts, and by the authority of all of them and several sets of Rules, containing very important regulations, have been in this manner promulgated. They have also power under the provisions of acts which will be hereafter noticed, to prescribe the form of certain writs, and to make alterations in the practice of pleadings and entering proceedings of record.

The persons who next engage our attention are the Officers of the respective courts. The most important of these are the "Masters," whose duties and emoluments are regulated by stat. 1 Vict. c. 30. This act creates five principal officers, called "Masters," to transact the civil business of each court. These gentlemen hold their appointments, like the judges, during good behaviour; their salaries are charged upon the fees of court, and if those prove insufficient, upon the consolidated fund. They are to receive no gratuities, and they are prohibited from acting either as barristers or as attornies.

The duties imposed on the Masters are numerous and important; they are, with the assistance of their clerks and messengers, to transact all the civil business of the three courts, excepting that of a judicial character; they are to keep, and render quarterly to the Treasury, an account of their fees and disbursements, and the taxation of costs, which forms an important part of their duty, which had previously been carried on in separate offices in each court, is directed by the above act to be performed in one office for all the courts, and each of the Masters is to tax indiscriminately the costs

who tries them; the period during which the court itself is active is regularly during Term, and during Term only. In consequence, however, of the press of business during term, stat. 1 & 2 Vict. c. 32, has now conferred upon the courts the power of appointing sittings in Banc, to be held during the vacation for the transaction of business pending before them respectively. The institution of these terms is very ancient ; they appear to have originated in the respect which the judges used in early times to pay to certain holy seasons of the year; thus, they always adjourned at Christmas, Easter, and Whitsuntide, deeming it improper to perform secular business during those festivals thus originated the spaces which intervene between Michaelmas and Hilary, Hilary and Easter, and Easter and Trinity Terms. As to the vacation between Trinity and Michaelmas, a space during that period was, from the earliest times, allowed for the haytime and harvest. In course of time it was found convenient to regulate the length of the periods devoted to business. This was done by several acts of Parliament, and they are now fixed by 1 Wm. 4, c. 70, and 1 Wm. 4, sess. 2, c. 3, s. 2. (1) In the same way

(1) Hilary Term begins January 11, ends January 31.

If the term would end on Sunday, Monday is to be substituted. If any of the days between the Thursday before and Wednesday after Easter would fall in term, there are to be no sittings, but Easter Term is to be prolonged and Trinity Term postponed by an equal number of days.

originated the University Terms, and even, perhaps, the holy days given at some of the public schools at Christmas, Easter, Whitsuntide, and Bartholomewtide.

Until a very recent period, all the proceedings in an action, except the trial, were supposed to take place during term; writs were all tested and returnable in term; pleadings were entitled of a term; there could be no judgment except of a term, and, when signed, it related to the first day of that term. All this originated in the circumstance that anciently the proceedings used, in reality, all to take place while the court was actually sitting, which was in term time only. Now, however, in consequence of several recent statutes, most of the steps in an action, except those which require the immediate intervention of the court, may be taken during vacation; still it is important to recollect the ancient system, for, wherever no statute has expressly intervened, it still remains. Thus, if a plaintiff obtain a verdict at the assizes or sittings, he formerly must have waited for its fruits till the next term; and so he must now, unless the judge will grant him speedy execution under stat. 1 Wm. 4, c. 7, for that act has not abolished the old rule, but only enabled the judge to dispense with it. So, too, the principal statute altering the system, viz. stat. 2 Wm. 4, c. 39, does not apply to actions of Replevin.

The chief enactments by which the old system has been altered, are, 11 Geo. 4, and 1 Wm. 4, c. 70, enabling bail to justify during vacation; 1 Wm. 4, c. 7,

commonly called the Speedy Judgment and Execution Act; 2 Wm. 4, c. 39, commonly called the Uniformity of Process Act, the eleventh section of which is the principal enactment on this subject; 3 & 4 Wm. 4, c. 67, s. 2, which allows jury process to be tested in vacation, and writs of execution to be tested in vacation and returnable forthwith; and the Pleading Rules of Hilary, 1834, sects. 1 & 3, which abolish the relation of pleadings and judgments to the term.

The period devoted to business was formerly entrenched on by a number of holidays observed at the offices of the courts, and productive of great inconvenience. They are now, however, much reduced in number, and the subject of holidays entirely regulated by statute 3 & 4 Wm. 4, c. 42, s. 43, and Reg. Gen., Hil. 6 Wm. 4. Part of the long vacation is freer from business than the rest, in consequence of the eleventh section of the Uniformity of Process Act, which prevents any pleading from being filed or delivered, except by consent, between the 10th of August and the 24th of October.

The history and constitution of the courts in which an action is commenced, having been thus stated, it is time to proceed to the consideration of the steps taken in the action itself. Before doing so, however, it is right to state in what manner these formal steps are liable to be affected or controlled by the summary, or, as it is sometimes called, equitable jurisdiction, of the courts, for the jurisdiction of the superior courts is of two descriptions, summary and formal. The latter consists in the sanction given by the authority of the