tribution, as distinctly stated as in any recent text-book. It is in these words: "Lege Rhodia cavetur, ut si levandæ navis gratia jactus mercium factus est, omnium contributione sarciatur quod pro omnibus datum est." And the whole title of the Digest about this rule is wise and instructive.

There are, however, many other rubrics of the civil law which relate to shipping, and are not traceable to any earlier origin. The rubric immediately preceding that just quoted, is, " De Exercitoria actione," of which the general purpose is to make the ship-owner responsible for the acts of the master of the ship.

The rubric, "Nautæ, caupones, stabularii, ut recepta restituant," (Dig. 4, 9,) provides that mariners, (limited, however, in the title to the master of the ship,) and the keepers of inns and stables, should be responsible for property committed to their charge. And this is confirmed in the rubric, "Furti adversus nautas, caupones, stabularios." Dig. 47, 5.

The rubric, "De nautico fænore," (Dig. 22, 2, Code, 4, 33,) gives us the present rules which regulate loans on bottomry and respondentia.

In the rubric "de Incendio, ruina, naufragio, rate, nave expugnata,” (Dig. 47, 9,) it is provided that fourfold damages should be paid by the plunderer of a vessel in distress.

In these rubrics there are provisions applicable especially to ships, and to those who own or navigate ships. And it should be added also, that, upon some other topics of deep interest in the law merchant, as payment, and imputation (or, as we term it, appropriation) of payment, carriage of goods, novation, loans, and hiring of money, pledge, partnership, and finally the great topic of sales, the civil law is full of most profitable instruction.

It is perhaps to be regretted that the study of this system of law, which certainly deserves, if ever any system of law did, the proud title of "ratio scripta," is not more extensively pursued in this country. In England there was, formerly at least, a positive hostility to it; and it lingers there still, and may have come over to this country, and still exert some influence. If this were the proper place, it might not be difficult to show that it is at least questionable whether the common law doctrine of sales,which, upon the central question, when and how the property or ownership in the thing sold passes from the seller to the buyer, is in direct antagonism with the civil law, -is quite so well

adapted to mercantile purposes; and whether, even now, a more extensive use of the civil law distinction between the jus ad rem and the jus in re would not assist in determining questions which must still be regarded as unsettled. If we do not mistake, there are some indications that the courts and the profession are beginning to find that the common law, which is ours by inheritance, may be usefully illustrated at least, and, possibly, qualified, by principles drawn from the Roman civil law.

Students are often deterred from any examination of the civil law, by a belief that useful knowledge of it cannot be acquired, without the expenditure of a vast amount of time and labor. But this is a mistake. A thorough knowledge of all its principles cannot be acquired by less than a life of labor. This, however, is not necessary; and the orderly arrangement of this law, the exactness and clearness of its phraseology, the complete and well adapted apparatus for its study, which now exist, and the excellent introductions to it, which have been published in our language, enable a student in his hours of collateral study alone, to learn much of its history and general character, and of the order in which its topics are presented, and of the manner in which the principal books of reference to this law are constructed. Having learnt this, he will find no difficulty in afterwards examining fully any question which may arise in his study or practice; and we are persuaded that no lawyer who shall pursue this course will afterwards find reason to believe that the hours thus employed were wasted. "It is most certain," says Dr. Strahan, in his preface to his translation of Domat, "that it is in the body of the civil law that we have the most complete, if not the only collection, of the rules of natural reason and equity, which are to govern the actions of mankind." This is high praise; but even if it be deserved, the advice of Chancellor D'Aguesseau to his son may not be the less necessary. He wishes him "to distinguish for himself that which belongs to natural and immutable justice from that which is only the work of a positive and arbitrary will; to avoid being dazzled by the subtilties which are frequently diffused in the Roman jurisconsults; and to draw with safety from their treasury of reason and common sense."

The Consolato del Mare is a code of maritime law of great antiquity and equal celebrity. But it is not open to the English

student, as no translation into our language, excepting of a few chapters, has ever been published. The origin of this code is not certainly known; neither the names of its authors, nor the time nor the place of its earliest promulgation, can now be ascertained. It was first printed, however, somewhere in the fourteenth century, but is supposed to have been in force and in general use for a considerable time before. And, indeed, we consider the most reasonable theory of its origin to be that which regards it as a gradual collection, or digest of all the principal rules and usages established among commercial nations from the twelfth to the fourteenth century. Very many topics of maritime law are treated of in it, and various commercial regulations have been added in the editions which have appeared, from time to time, in Europe. It may be referred to profitably, in relation to the ownership of ships, and the rights and the obligations thereto; to the rights and responsibilities of master and seaman; to the law of freight, of equipment and supply, of jettison and average, of salvage, of ransom, and especially to the law of prize, in regard to which it has of late years exercised an important authority. The best edition by far, and by common consent, is that of Pardessus, in his Collection of Maritime Laws. We are in hopes that an English translation from this edition will soon be made and published in this country.

for this is disWe know that

Next to the Consolato in time, or, perhaps, puted, before it, come the Laws of Oleron. these were collected, or at all events promulgated and published, as the rules then in force for the regulation of shipping, in the small island of Oleron, off the coast of France. The French claim that Queen Eleanor, who was Duchess of the province of Guienne, near which Oleron lies, authorized and caused their publication; the English say that her son, Richard I., did this. The only thing certain is, that no one knows who their author was; but they were undoubtedly first established somewhere in the twelfth century. This code has been repeatedly published in English, and is most accessible to American students in the Appendix to the first volume of Peters' Admiralty Reports. Their value to the student of the law of shipping may be inferred from an enumeration of the principal topics. These are the navigation and sale of a ship, the duties and the rights of

master and mariners, wreck, freight, salvage, jettison, injuries to cargo, quarrels on board ships, collision, anchorage, supplies and repairs, the intentional stranding of a ship, pilots, partnership in vessels, and goods taken from wrecked ships.

The next code of which we shall speak is that known as "The Laws of Wisbuy." The exact date of these also is uncertain; and by some they are supposed to be older than the Laws of Oleron. The weight of authority is, however, that they were founded upon the Laws of Oleron, and were only modified so far as to make them better adapted to the usages or the wants of the commercial states or cities of northern Europe; and that the code was published about the twelfth or thirteenth century, immediately after the Laws of Oleron. Wisbuy was a convenient port on the north-western coast of Gott-land, an island in the Baltic, about equally distant from Sweden, Russia, and Germany. These laws, its former celebrity, and the works of art and luxury now found among its ruins, indicate that this city was the emporium of a great trade; although there is nothing in its position, and nothing preserved in its history, which explains either this or the rapid and total decay of its prosperity. Some historians, however, attribute its decline and destruction to dissensions and conflicts among its own citizens; and if they existed and endured, they would have been, indeed, a sufficient cause for swift and utter ruin.

This code covered a wide ground, embracing most of the topics of the law of shipping; but it is concise and sententious and very brief, occupying but a few pages in the Appendix to Peters' Admiralty Reports; and a cursory examination shows a coincidence with the Laws of Oleron quite too uniform to be casual.

The sixty-sixth section of the laws of Wisbuy has given rise to a curious question. It is in these words: "If the merchant obliges the master to insure the ship, the merchant shall be obliged to insure the master's life against the hazards of the sea." Here is a distinct recognition of the contract of insurance; and in terms which imply that it was familiarly known to mercantile persons. It follows, therefore, either that the Laws of Wisbuy are a much later work than is commonly supposed, — and against this theory the internal as well as the external evidence is very strong, or that this section is an interpolation of later

date, which is perhaps the prevailing opinion; - or that marine insurance and life insurance existed, and were common, centuries earlier than is commonly supposed. It is not the place here to go into a critical examination of this question; but we confess a strong disposition to adopt this last view, which seems to us supported by facts as well as arguments, and for which we have the high authority of Emerigon.

Sometime in the sixteenth century, there was published a French work, commonly known by the name of "Le Guidon," of which the whole title is "Le guidon utile et necessaire pour ceux qui font merchandise et qui mettent a la mer." This work was highly praised, as well as published and illustrated, by Cleirac, about a century after its first appearance, and is not unfrequently cited by writers on maritime law. But it relates mainly to bottomry and insurance, and, though there is some reference to other topics of the law of shipping, they are not presented with much fulness, and the work is of less value than those previously mentioned.

At length we reach the Ordonnance de la Marine of Louis XIV., published in 1681. Our own Kent calls this "a monument of the wisdom of his reign, far more durable and more glorious than all the military trophies won by the valor of his armies." It covers the whole ground of maritime law, including insurance; enacting with clearness and perspicuity all the provisions then in force, whether derived from the sources above enumerated, from a more general tradition, from previous enactments, or from usage. These it arranges in an excellent order; and displays a learning and ability in those who prepared it which forbids the supposition that they were mere compilers. But, strange to say, the authors of this ordinance are wholly unknown. This, also, is inserted in the Appendix to Peters' Admiralty Reports.

Almost a century after this ordinance appeared, Valin published his Commentary upon it. This admirable work acquired at once celebrity and authority, and is now oftener referred to in this country than any foreign work on maritime law. It was not, like Coke's Commentary on Littleton, a vast and illarranged mass of learning, that utterly submerged the treatise which it proposed to illustrate. But, while doing full justice to the ordinance, not only admitting its excellence in general, but