The Express.
London, England, 1856-07-05 00:00:00

LONDON, SATURDAY, JULY S.

IT is abundantly clear, from what took place lut
Thu►sday night in the House of Commons, that the
BoLicyron•Outwes Testamentary Jurisdiction Bill
is virtually shelved for the present union. Doo•ori
Commons has another year's leans of life. 1867 will
still find us living on in impotent impatience under
a dispensation of Courts Peculiar and Arobidiacunal
--sullenly submissive to the vexation of Diocesan and
Metropolitan probate, or rousing ourselves, it may be,
for one more effort (who shall say it will be the
last P) to shake off from our much-eaduring necks
the inevitable incubus of Mr. Moons. After the
strictures we have recently felt it oar duty to make
on the provisions of the Government Bill, even in its
ame, ded form, it would be affectation to profess any
great degree of regret at its miscarriage. But what
we do regret, and what the country has right to com-

plain of, is the ball-earnestness and vacillation of those
who have been charged with the duty of preparing and
laying before Parliament an effectual scheme of Eccle-
siastical Court Reform. Sir R. BETHELL complains of
the peculiar hardship of his position in being deserted
on this question alike by friend and foe. He imputes
the blame of his anticipated failure to a
fault which a priori perhaps would hardly
have been laid to his door—a too great desire to
please all parties. We most be allowed to doubt
whether this amiable weakness has had much to do
with the result. It is not because Sir RICHARD
RETRIAL, In obedience, as he would have us
believe, to the prompting' of a nature kindly
even to feebleness, had endeavoured to conciliate
all opponents by adopting all opinions—that he
now meets with a universal want of sympathy
and support. It is because, on a subject on
which he was bound betore he meddled with it to
have formed the most deliberate opinions, he had no
opinions of his own at all, or none which he had
matured with are and was prepared to main-
tain with earnestness. His whole conduct in
relation to this matter is reconcilable to but one
of two theories. He has throughout been either half-
iaformed or halt in earnest. He has not taken the
pains to master the subject, or he has been trifling
with the public and his own reputation by =skis g a
parade of doing much when he had come to the
foregone conclusion that nothing was to be done.
The truth probably is that he is in some degree
amenable to both these imputations. A cry was up
against the Boolegastioal Cones. The public were
in earnest about the matter, but nobody else was.
Parliament was indifferent; the proctors were zealous,
as men always are when fighting for a monopoly.
People in power bad a tolerably numerous oouainhood,
who in one way or another were making a tolerably
song thing out of the emoluments of the menaced
jurisdiction. It was necessary to appear to be doing
something; it was by no means so necessary that
anything should actually be done. It fell upon Sir
RICHARD BETHILL to be the organ and representa-
tive of this parliamentary necessity. His method ot
proceeding, even under the circumstances, has cer-
tainly not been dexterous. He has not been sufficiently
regardful of appearances. He has never had the art
to seri thoroughly in earnest ;he has repeatedly
turned round oa himself. Three years ago his pro-
posal was to transfer the testamentary jurisdiction to
the existing Courts of Chancery. The public received
the suggestion with a perfect roar of disapprobation.
The next session his plan was changed. Instead of
the Court of Chancery, he recommended the erec-
tion of a new tribunal, which, though not the Court
of Chancery, was to be a Chancery Court, adjudicat-
ing upon will', with a separate judge and a distinct
staff, bat according to the established methods of
Chancery prooedare. This scheme, too, had to be
abandoned; and the plan of this session, after under-
going considerable modifloatioos. had at length settled
down into the form of a distinct Metropolitan Tri-
bunal, adjudicating on viva owe evidence, with
a Common Law Procedure, and assist, d, la
the cue of small testamentary properties, by
the County Courts. This scheme, too, is about
to share the fate of its predecessors; and there is now
some hope that next session Sir R. Barium, may be
driven upon trying the only alternative left him, and
resorting to that plan which common sense, conve-
nience, and economy alike point out for his adoption
—the transfer of this jurisdiction to the superior
Courts of Common Law and the County Omuta.
Should this be the result of the delay, there
will be tin reason to regret the imminent and inevi-
table postponement of " the Testamentary Bill, 1856."
We have no desire to press the case unfairly against
Sir R. Brrnu.L. It is quits certain that he has met
with vehement opposition on the part of those inter-
ested in sustaining the existing state of things; it is,
we fear, scarcely to be doubted that he has not
received at the hands of Government more than an
apparent and lukewarm support.
One practical conclusion we cannot help drawing
from the whole matter, and that is the cogent evi-
dence it affords of the expediency of appoiotiag a
Minister of Pablio Justice. Had such an officer been
charged from the first with the duty of projecting
and carrying through a systematic and thoroughly
Itroosidered scheme for the Transfer of Testamentary
' Jurisdiction, the reputation of Government for ad-
ministrative capacity would not have been shaken by
such a succession of mortifying failures ; the present
obnoxious and absurd procedure would long since
have ceased to vex and harass the country; we
should have had one probate for the whole empire;
we should have heard of such an unnecessary
device as " Her hlsmert's Court of Probate and Ad-
ministration; but Sir JOHN 'ZIT'S and his brethren
of the Common Pleas would have been adjudicating,
to the universal satisfaction of the whole community,
—not being registrars, advocates, or proctors, —upon

all matters testamentary beyond the limits of the
County Court jurisdiction.

There is about to be a smarmy in the nprossuts-
doe of Calne. Lord Shelburne, who has accepted
the Otitis= Iluadredir, is to be called to the House
of Lords. It is also understood that his lordship is
to be appointed Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs.;
Sir William Filmic& Williams, of Kan, is the
candidate for Cane.

Its not improbable that the prorogation of parlia-
ment will tithe plea ea Thursday, the 24th iustaat, the
Ilia Maria% whitebait Mauer, is ell likelihood, tali/Jig Vain
ea Saturday, the 1911.-014 e.

The Bishop of Oxford has undertaken to give a
valodisiory address oe Mode y mat to these lamas of the
Promotive and Reformatory Imditatite, is Gowu-street,
who are about to nalgrate.
Admiral Lard Lyons has posed through Paris, on
Ids way to the Crime.
A coupon of naturalists sod physicians will be
hell at Visas& ea ski 16.. b of tleptember.