The Express.
London, England, 1867-02-19 00:00:00

DRURY LANE.

211151 F.VYNINO, THE .117:ALIUS \VI73: Mr. Phelps, Messrs.
E. Phelps, II ,inelnlr, C. Meyton, and II:smolt ; Mesdames 11.
Verdi, and 11. Anndenholf.—And NUMBER NIP: OR, HARLE-
QUIN AND THE GNO3IK KING OF THE GIANT !lOU:CLAM

HAYMARCZT.

THIS EnckMO, A LEC:i43S. FOR LIFE Ileum Sothern,
Bogen, Clark, Compton, Acc.: 34ra Chippendale, Mls.es 11111,
Wnght, am—LORD DENDREARY MARRIED AND 1141N1,,'
It/It. Mr. Saberu.—And JENN V LIND AT LAST. Miss Fluke.

rantaaws.

TEM TW 14, Ills Liffli.:77.....Messis. Verner.% Fenton:
Mrs. U. White and Allan Wentworth.—Aud SHADOW TREE
811 A FL Messrs Vining, Shore. Verner, V. VUllers, Forrester,
Mellon, and Cathcart: Misses Montagu, Edmonds, and Rodgers.

LI MUM,

TNT! EvMiran, THE TV:4IIiLTS4s Mr. Widdicomb.—And
ROUGE ET !SOUL Mews. Yachter, Emery, Cowper. ltorelaod,
Fitzpatrick. Dalton, Reynolds, Lomas, Andrews, PtLe, hc. ;
Yrs. L. Murray, and Misses llamado, Grattan, and C. Lectereq.

STRAND.

Ting tYLMMIO, MARRIED DAEGIITERS AND YOUNG lIUS.
MNDA —1,4 Night., of GUY FAWKR.i.—Amd A SUIT OF
TIERED'S.

HOLBORN.

THIS Relent., MY TFiiiNRXT. Mr. Delmore: Mimeos
Toole and Lennox.—And FLYING SCUD. Mews. Neville, Bel-
lmore, BWce, Yolhire, &c. ; Mesdames Y. Josephs, C. Saunders,
Bemis Foote, Addeo, Lemmas, Raymond, &a.

BRITANNIA.

TUN PRINCIM OF THE PEARL TSLAND'•.
OR, TILE THREE KINGDONN OF PEARL, GOLD, AND
SILVER Miss Jacobok—First-rate Pautomlugata —Awl THE
RETURN OF TILE WANDERER.

HIM! WATER AT LONDON BRIDOL
MI DAT —Morning, 211. foul Afternoon, 21. 4Nn.
TO-MotitOß—Morning, 4m Afternoon, Mt 25E4

LONDON, TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 19.

THE elevation of a Scottish Judge to the peerage,
with the avowed purpose that ho may in the
House of Lords take part in the judicial business
of the court of ultimate appeal for the three king-
(loins, is an event at once novel and pregnant.
Scottish barristers have, indeed, before now ful-
filled such duties, but it was only after they had
been called to, and had long practice at, the Eng-
lish bar. The names of Lord LOUGHBOROUGH in
a past generation, and of Lord BROUGHAM in this,
will at once occur among those who have thus,
after a period of practice in both countries, been
placed in the position of Appellate Judges. And
when the Court of Appeal is common for both, the
most rational course certainly seems to be that its
members should thus be certified to be acquainted
with both the systems of law which they are called
upon to administer and determine. Nevertheless,
in regard to Scotland, such has not hitherto been
the general rule. The names we have cited are
but exceptions, and for above a century and a half
it has been almost wholly by English lawyers
that the decisions of the courts of Scotland have
been reviewed. Yet when fur the first time it is
proposed that this method should be reversed, and
that a Scottish lawyer, with no special study of
the law of England, should be placed in the posi-
tion of sharing in the decision of not only Scottish
but English cases in appeal, it is impossible to
avoid being at first startled by the novelty. But
the proposition that what is good for the one
should be good for the other, is so manifestly
reasonable that the practical working of the
anomaly in regard to Scotland deserves our con-
sideration.

It is, we believe, almost universally admitted
by the Scottish bar, and indeed it has been stated
by the highest authorities that have adorned its
bench, that the system of appeal to a court
composed in general solely of English lawyers hrs
been of great benefit to its jurisprudence. The
first and obvious advantage is, that in cases in
which the law of Scotland has been unsettled,
there has thus been afforded an opportunity for
assimilating it to that already established in Eng-
land. This has, to a very considerable extent,
operated in bringing about a general accordance in
the mercanti!o codes of the two countries. But a
second, and perhaps more important advantage
has accrtibtl to the development of the law in
purely Scottish departments. It is the tendency
of lawyers in all countries to carry their own
principles to extremes. They love the doctrines
they have so painfully learned, not wisely, but too
well. They grow fascinated with their logical
coherence, and will rather tell a lie—under the
name of a legal fiction—than impair their universal
authority. Legal lies are, however, in the end as
bad policy as any ocher kind of dishonesty ;
and the theoretical completeness of a system is
constantly leading its authors into absurdities.
Now, the great Luefit to the law of Scothrd in
its administration by the House of Lords has
arisen from its being subjected to the finelligence
of men of ability who have had no such blind
fondness for its theoretical consistency as to hide
from them its practical inconveniences. The
niost learned Scottish counsel have found it im-
possible to indoctrinate the Law Lords with such
reverence for Scottish theories as to make
them regardless of the claims of crnmon sense.
Consequently, every principle has been test. d by
the rules of common sense, and the result has
been that the law has been relieved in some
points (ruin logical deductions that led to absur-
dity, awl in others has been guided into a path
which has proved, contrary to the opinion in
Scotland at the time, to be not less sound
than safe.

But there in certainly no reason to he given why
English law might not derive benefit from the like
methods. It also is full, as the lieges know to
their cost, of obsolete and false principles, of
absurd fictions, of doctrines urged to an irrational
extreme. What could better help to check the
further growth of such evils than the presenting
them to the 1 of an able and experienced judge,
to whom other systems of positive law are familiar,
and who is ••erred in the circumstances of life in
whiz!' law has to be applied ? Even in our own
courts we have indeed precedents for such ideas.
The Chancellor, who presides in the Courts of
Equity, is an often as tint taken from the Common
Law bar, and knew nothing of Equity till called
.11 to aftinn or reverse the decrees of every other
Chancery Court. So in the House of Lords, a
pure Common Law barrister is often required
to sit on appeals from the Courts of
Equity. It can be no harder for a Scottish
judge to t edify himself to decide a case'
from either a common law or an equitable