The Press. — London, England, 1858-01-23 00:00:00

On the subject of attorneys, the following is worth notice: — If a purchaser neglect to have the title investigated, or his counsel overlook any defect in it, he has nu remedy beyond what the seller's covenants may afford I may remark, by the way, that as counsel, that is, bar risters, have no remedy for recovery of their fees, which are considered purely gratuitous and honorary, they are not deemed liable to their clients fur any blunders which they commit, however gross. But it is otherwise as to attorneys; they may maintain an action for their fees ; and if a purchaser is damnified by the gross want of skill in an attorney, or by his neglect to search for encum brances, he may recover at law against the attorney for any loss which he may sustain. But where the attorney has acted under the advice of counsel, he is safe. This is rather hard. The client cannot re coier from the attorney because the attorney has had counsel's opinion, and cannot recover from the counsel because tke transaction with him is not a " commercial one "—in other words, he has no remedy at all. As the new Divorce Bill came into operation the other day, it is as well to have some in formation about it. It will be seen that, at the end of the second paragraph, Lord St. Leo• nards supports the view we have always taken of the subject :— There are some important remedies applicable to all cases. As to children, the court may make such interim or final orders as it may deem just, with respect to their custody, maintenance, and education, and may direct them to be made wards of the Court of Chancery. This is interfering with a strong hand with the parental rights of the faller. Where the wife is the guilty party, the court may order a settlement of her property, either in pos ses•ion or reversion, for the benefit of the innocent party, and of the children of the marriage, or any of them. This is as powerful an interference with the wife's right of property. When a decree for dissolving the marriage has become final, the respective parties may marry again as if the prior marriage has been dissolved by death. But no clergyman of the United Church of England and Ireland is compellable to marry any person whose former marriage has been dissolved on the ground of his or her adultery. Bat in case of his refusal, when but for such refusal the persons wou:d be entitled to have the service performed in his church or chapel, the minister is to permit the marriage to be solemnised is his church or chapel by any other minister in holy orders entitled to officiate within the diocese. The right to marry again could not in my opinion have been denied to the parties, although it was strongly opposed, and is still objected to by a body of the clergy. The desire not to impose upon the clergy a duty which might be contrary to their conscientious feelings induced the Legislature to excuse those who objected from performing the marriage ceremony, thus making a law which of course was not deemed inconsistent with the laws of God or man, and yet excusing the clergy who were to give effect to it from obeying it—a clingmus precedent, and the exemption has not given satisfaction to the class in whose favour it was introduced. The substitute pro vided, where a clergyman declines to officiate, is well calculated to lead to disunion between neighbouring clergy. men, and ought, as it appears to me, never to have found its place in our statute law. Since the commencement of the year we have already observed several applications by women to the police-courts for the protection of the new law. Much more help seems to be ex pected from it than it will really give, and some people, as it would appear from a case which came before Mr. Combe last week ex pect that a magistrate will be able to divorce them on the spot! The most extensive pub licity, therefore, is to be desired for the fol lowing statement:— A remedy has been provided for the heartless cases of desertion by a husband of his wife, and then returning only to rob her of her miserable earnings—and this has been made general, so as to include cases where the deserted wife has, by her literary talents for example, acquired considerable property during the desertion. This protection covers all her earnings and property acquired since the desertion, as if she were a single woman, and binds her husband and his creditors, and any person claiming under him. It is to be granted by a police magis trate, if she is resident in a metropolitan district, or, if she is resident in the country, by justices it, petty ses sions, or in either case by the Court of Divorce. It is required to be shown that the desertion was without reasonable cause, and that she is maintaining herself by her own industry. The order may be reviewed or may be appealed from, but if disobeyed, the wife may recover the specific property, and also double its value. Whilst the older for protection continues, the wile is to be con sidered as invested with the same rights, and as subject to the same lial.ilities, as if she had obtained a decree of judicial separation. Lord St. Leonards is indignant at the abolition in words, but retention in fact, of the action for crim. con.—though if the divorce is to be on the ground of adultery, and the adultery is to be proved, we do not see how some such proceeding is to be altogether avoided. The permission, however, for a husband to bring an action before a jury for damages only, with out being compelled to go on to a judicial THE PRESS, JANUARY 23, 1858. separation, may lead to most objectionable consequences, and is a real blot in the act : A man may now recover damages for his wife's infidelity without seeking for a divorce, but may continue to live with her upon the damages recovered from her paramour, which may be settled upon her or upon the children Even when a divorce is obtained, the damages may be settled upon the children of the marriage, and the father may live with his children, whilst they are maintained and educated with the price of their mother's dishonour ! It may well be doubted whether this is an improvement of the old law, and whether we have freed ourselves from the reproach of foreign nations—that we consider a money payment as the proper consolation to a husband whose wife has proved unfaithful to him. The work is full of useful cautions, but no thing comes " home to our business and bosoms" like a bit of personal experience. All great lawyers have a horror of the arte perire sad, and personally keep away from their craft as much as they can. But a flock of geese have before now brought an ex-Chan cellor into hot water, and caused him instead of themselves to undergo the process of " roasting "; and stoves and flues might very naturally have had a similar result :-- A word of advice about your Fire Insurance. Very few policies against fire arc so framed as to render the compan y legally liable. Generally the property is inaccurately de scribed with reference to the conditions under which you insure. They are framed by the company, who probably are not unwilling to have a legal defence against any claim, as they intend to pay what they deem a just claim, with out taking advantage of any technical objection, and to make use of their defence only against what they may believe to be a fraud, although they may not be able to prove it. But do not rely upon the moral feelings of the directors. Ascertain that your house falls strictly within the conditions. Even having the surveyor of the company to look over your house before the insurance, will not save yon, unless your policy is correct. To illustrate this, I will tell you what happened to myself. I have two houses in different parts of the country, both of which open from a drawing-room by a glass-door into a conservatory. The one 1 had insured, for a good many years, from the time I built it ; the other I had insured, for a few years, from the time I bought it, in the same office, when a partial fire broke out in the latter, and I was then told by the office— s highly respectable one—that my policy was void, as the opening to the conservatory rendered it hazardous, and if so, of course both policies had been void from their com mencement. I was prepared to try the question, and ulti mately the objection was withdrawn, and my loss was paid for. Upon renewing my policy, with some alterations, I actually had some difficulty with the clerk of the company to induce, or rather to forge him, to add to the description the fact, that the drawing-rooms opened through glass doors into conservatories. In treating, at a later period, for a policy with another company, I required them to send their surveyor to look at the house and the stoves ; and everything to which objection could be taken were snown to him. The company then prepared the policy, and made it subject to the report made to them by their surveyor, referring to it by date. This report I never saw, and the objectionable stoves, &c., were not noticed. Of course I had the reference to the report struck out, and the policy made correct, but not without some prrsonal trouble. I state these circumstances, to show you how careful you should be. I advise you to look at once at your existing policy. If you have ad led an Arnot's stove or made any other important change in your mode of heating your house since your policy, or you had at the time of your policy any peculiar stove, Arc., not noticed in the policy, you should call upon the company to admit the validity of your policy, by an endorsement on it. Lord St. Leonards has performed an ac ceptable service in re editing this book, and we have no doubt it will enjoy, as it doserves, an extensive ciroulation. 77:e Mutiny of the Bengal Army. An Historical Narrative. By One who has Served uuder Sir Charles Napier. Part 11. London : Bosworth and Harrison. THE second part of what is popularly known as the " Red Pamphlet" will, we have no doubt, be eagerly received by the public. After a lengthened interval from the publication of the previous portion of the narrative, " One who has Served under Sir " Charles Napier " has presented us with the second, but not concluding, portion of his able narrative. The first part, it will be remem bered, brought down the detail to the outbreak at Delhi; the present portion carries us to the capture of the great city of the Mogul. The main object of the writer is to point out in the course of his narrative some of the lead ing results of the system pursued by the Government at Calcutta—a Government whose measures, always tardy, were often ill advised —in dealing with the unparalleled disasters with which India has been overwhelmed. The Indian events of the last few months are so fresh in the minds of our readers that we have no need to follow the narrative step by 89 step, and exhibit the rise and progress of that terrible insurrection, which was certainly mis managed if it were not misunderstood. We will rather seek to extract the opinions of the author upon some points of particular interest. We all remember how Lord Canning and the Supreme Council congratulated themselve upon the facility and success with which Sir Henry Lawrence had suppressed the insur rection in Onde. Neither Lord Canning nor his Council believed in the necessity for any further precautionary measures. They re garded the revolt as at an end : Mr. Grant., indeed, who was considered to carry the brains of the Council, in a minute which he recorded on that date. expressed his marked approval of the dilatory policy which had been pursued with reference to the 31th Native Infantry, and hoped that the Government would not depart from it on this or on any future occasion. He, therefore, advised that the punishment of the 7th Oude Infantry should neither be prompt nor sudden, and that it should be prepared by all those tedious forms under shelter of which the guilty parties in the 34th Native nfantry escaped punishment. Both he and Mr. Doris were evidently desirous to make the European officers the scapegoats : the latter recorded his opinion that no regi ment which was properly commanded would mutiny, and both expressed a desire that before punishment should be meted out to those men who had mutinied with arms in their hands, a strict and searching investigation should be made into the conduct of the European officers, and a proportionate punishment awarded to them—to those very men who were at the time risking their lives and the lives of their wives and children by remaining at their solitary posts, and by endeavouring to preserve order and disci pline—many of whom, not long after, paid for their zeal and confidence in their men by a lingering and cruel death. The Governor-General himself was apparently quite satisfied with the aspect of affairs ; on the 12th of May, whilst our countrywomen at Delhi were being massacred, he recorded his belief that the measures taken with reference to the mutineers had not been " too mild," and he was evidently of opinion that the spark of mutiny, though it might glow for a time, was fast dying out. It was in consequence of these feelings that he and his Council at this period acted a part which very nearly, for a time, lost to England the possession of India—to which many of the horrors which were afterwards perpetrated may be traced. So great was Lord Canning's confidence in the complete suppression of all mutinous resolves that on the Bth May he resolved to send back the 84th Regiment from Calcutta to Rangoon, thus leaving Calcutta to be garrisoned by one British regiment ; and was only prevented from doing so by the arrival of the intelligence of the massacres at Merut and Delhi. Then, indeed, Lord Canning acted with some degree of promptitude. He telegraphed at once to Bom bay for the Persian expedition ; but even the credit claimed on this occasion by Lord Gran ville so exclusively for Lord Canning does not appear to be supported by fact : it may fairly be presumed that to Sir Henry Lawrence belongs the credit of this measure ; his critical eye had discerned the coming storm, and on the 16th he tele graphed to Lord Canning to send for troops from Chins, Ceylon, and elsewhere, wherever they might be available. . . . It has been the fashion to bestow all the credit of this measure upon Lord Canning, but the Blue-book abounds with proofs that it is a credit which must bs shared with many others ; not only Sir Henry Lawrence, but his brother Sir John, General Anson, Sir P. Grant, and Mr. Colvin made it the aufject of their earliest mes sages. It was, in fact, an idea which must have struck every one ; to have neglected it, would have shown the grossest incompetency. As the revolt spread, and darker reports from Allyghur, Mynpoorie, Etawah, Agra, and Lucknow reached Calcutta, anml our lament able weakness of European force was ex posed, Lord Canning became embarrassed, and actually telegraphed to General Anson to divide his forces as much as possible—" to " detach his European Infantry and Cavalry "to the southward, and to undertake " the seige of Delhi with his Artillery." The result of such a movement would have been that the rebels would have captured our siege -train, Delhi in all probability would have been held to this day, and Sir Colin Campbell would now have been defending Calcutta. But in the face of disasters which were daily occurring, Lord Canning and his Council appear to have preserved their original anti pathy to " take time by the firelock.' They made not the slightest preparation for the transport of the expected troops. They declined, on the proposition of Havelock and Beatson, to raise a regiment of volunteer cavalry. They refused the enrollment of a European militia, and paralysed all the future operations of the war; but they had certain proof of the complicity of the King of Oude, and of the mutinous disposition of the sepoys