Preface. IN the following TREATISE I have attempted to dispose, in an appropriate arrangement, the principles of the common law, the statutes, and the decided cases relating to every offence which may be made the subject of prosecution by indictment; except only that of High Treason. The substance of the law of crimes and misdemeanors, contained in the Works of Hale, Hawkins, Foster, Blackstone, East, and Leach, has been carefully collected; and to this important matter cases from the various printed reports have been added, together with such MS. cases as I was able to obtain, and of the authenticity of which I had reason to be satisfied. I have anxiously endeavoured so to make the selections and citations as not to load the work with any superfluous matter, and yet to supply the necessary information as well to those who, in a judicial character, may be called upon to carry the criminal law into execution, as to those who may be engaged either in the prosecution or defence of a party indicted. The crime of High Treason was not originally included in the plan of this Work, on account of the great additional space which the proper discussion of that important subject would have occupied; and because prosecutions for that crime, happily not frequent, are always so conducted as to give sufficient time to consult the highest authorities. But it was a part of the original plan to have subjoined a copious chapter or book upon the law of Evidence in criminal prosecutions; and it was not till I had made considerable progress, and ascertained the length to which the work would necessarily extend without such addition, and also the impossibility of finishing it even in its present shape without considerable professional sacrifices, that such part of the original plan was, for the present, abandoned. But though the law of Evidence on criminal prosecutions is not fully treated of, I should observe that the points relating to Evidence and the competency of witnesses which apply more immediately to particular offences are for the most part introduced in the conclusions of the several Chapters. The subject of Process, and other matters of Practice in criminal prosecutions, having been so lately treated of by a learned author,* are not introduced into this Treatise; and it seemed also, that in a work which is intended to offer only that which may be useful to the public, it would be deemed superfluous to insert precedents of Indictments which have been so abundantly supplied in several modern publications.† And neither the object of the work, nor its reasonable limits, would admit the introduction of the law relating to minor offences cognizable only by summary proceedings before Justices of Peace, which are, therefore, only occasionally mentioned where they appear to explain, or to be closely connected with offences of a higher degree. It would not become me on the present occasion, to omit the expression of my best thanks and acknowledgments to Sir EDWARD HYDE EAST, for the assistance which I have derived from his laborious and most learned Treatise and I gladly also take this opportunity of thanking Mr. CHETWYND, the learned Chairman of the Quarter-Sessions for the County * See the First Volume of Mr. Chitty's Criminal Law, published in 1816. The Crown Circuit Companion (8th Ed.); Mr. Starkie's Treatise on Criminal Pleading; and Mr. Chitty's second and third volumes of his Treatise on Criminal Law. of Stafford, for many friendly communications, rendered peculiarly valuable by his long and close application to the study of the criminal laws of the country. may How far the pains which I have taken with this Treatise be rewarded with the approbation of those for whose use it is intended, is a subject, on which the hopes I may venture to entertain cannot but be clouded with apprehensions which my late attentive and minute examination of the works of others has not been calculated to allay. The most cheering reflection under such circumstances is, that those who are best qualified to judge of the merits, will be most likely to take into consideration the great difficulties of the undertaking, and most disposed to criticise in the same kind spirit with which Dr. Burn, after pointing out one of the errors in the work of a celebrated writer on the crown law, says: "This is only remarked as an instance, that in a variety of matter it is impossible for the mind of man to be always equally attentive." 5, Old Square, Lincoln's Inn, 7th July, 1819. WM. OLDNALL RUSSELL. |