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wrongfully detained from its owner, his only remedy is generally against the wrongdoer by a personal action to recover damages; if a ship, however, is wrongfully detained, the ship itself, by process in the Admiralty Court, may be at once arrested and proceeded against, and a specific decree obtained, restoring it to the owner. (Williams and Bruce on Admiralty, 17, 18.) This jurisdiction is exercised for a fourfold purpose.

1. To place claimants in possession of the ship.

2. To place claimants in possession of the earnings of the ship. 3. To enable the ship to be employed.

4. To examine accounts between co-owners and to apportion the earnings after such examination. (Roscoe on Admiralty, 49.)

In any action of possession the Court may decide all questions as to title or ownership of any ship or vessel, or the proceeds thereof, remaining in the registry (3 & 4 Vict. c. 65, s. 4, and 24 Vict. c. 10, s. 8), settle all accounts outstanding and unsettled between co-owners, and direct the ship, or any share thereof, to be sold. (24 Vict. c. 10, s. 8.)

Where a dispute arises between the owners of a ship, and the owners of more than a moiety of the sixty-four parts wish to employ her in making a voyage, the Court will decree possession of the ship to such majority, in order that she may be employed in the voyage. The plaintiffs will, however, be required to give security for the safe return of the vessel to the amount of the interest of the minority. The minority are entitled to bring an action of restraint to enforce their right of security. And the ship may be arrested until a bond is given for the required security. The Court considers both legal and equitable rights in determining the majority, and all owners who do not support the application are presumed to be content that the possession of the ship should remain as it is. The minority are not required to furnish any part of the cost of the voyage, and do not share in the profits of it, and are not entitled to any allowance for the depreciation of the ship caused by the ordinary wear and tear of the voyage. If the ship be lost the Court will order the immediate payment of the amount secured. (See Williams and Bruce on Admiralty, 19-22; Roscoe on Admiralty, 50, and cases there referred to; Smith's Summary of Admiralty Law, 32, 33; Haynes's Guide to Admiralty, 34-36.)

56. Would the doctrine of the Law Maritime that seamen have a lien on ship and freight for wages due to them extend to all or any of the following cases :—

(a.) Wages due to a master employed by a person who has fraudulently obtained possession of the ship, the master being innocent of the fraud;

(b.) A sale of the ship to a bonâ fide purchaser without notice;

(c.) Wages earned respectively before and after the giving of a Bottomry Bond;

(d.) An established claim for salvage services;

(e.) An established claim for damages by collision?

(a.) Yes, provided the master is both ignorant and innocent of the fraud. (The Mary Ann, L. R. 1 Ad. 8; see also The Edwin, Br. & L. 201.)

(b.) Yes. The purchaser, however bona fide, takes subject to all liens attaching to the ship (not cargo), unless the sale is made under the authority of a competent Court. (Coote's Admiralty Practice, 2nd ed. 20.)

(c.) The lien for wages whether earned before or after the giving of a bottomry bond would prevail against the bottomry bond. (William F. Stafford, Lush. 69; The Union, Lush. 128 and 137.)

(d.) Yes, unless the wages were earned before the salvage services were rendered when they would, according to the general rule, rank against the res in the inverse order of their attachment.

(e.) Yes; but the claim for damages has priority over that for wages, subject to the last mentioned rule. (Eustace Smith's Adm. 30.)

57. State the rule for the order of attachment of claims against the res in Admiralty proceedings, and enumerate and arrange in the order of their priority the various kinds of claims.

If the master of a vessel be part owner, does it affect the position of his claim for wages and disbursements?

It is an invariable rule that claims against the res rank in the reverse order of their attachment; the last in time is the first to be satisfied. Subject to this general principle their respective places

are:-

(1.) Salvage of life.

(2.) Salvage of property.

(3.) Claims for damage.

(4.) Wages and disbursements of seamen and master. (5.) Bottomry.

(6.) Mortgage.

(7.) Necessaries, so far as regards British ships.

It does not matter whether the master is part owner or not to enable him to claim for wages or disbursements. (The Feronia, L. R. 2 A. & E. 65; Roscoe's Admiralty Practice, 62; Haynes's Guide to Admiralty, 43.)

58. By whom, and under what circumstances, may a cause of forfeiture be instituted in the Admiralty Division? What is the effect of a decision in favour of the party instituting the cause, and what the effect of a decision adverse to him, and what is the authority for the exercise of the Court's jurisdiction?

A cause of forfeiture against an offending ship may be instituted by any commissioned officer on full pay or any British officer of customs or any British consular officer by an ordinary action in the Admiralty Division, the ship having been first seized by the party instituting the action. A ship is forfeited to the Crown(1) if any unauthorised person on board thereof uses the British flag and assumes the British national character; (2) if the owner or master does any act or permits papers to be carried with intent to conceal the British character of the ship; (3) if any unqualified person obtains a legal or beneficial interest in a British ship; (4) if any person claiming an interest therein makes a false declaration touching his qualification to own British ships.

The effect of a decision in favour of the party instituting the cause will be that the forfeiture will be held to relate back to the time when the wrongful act was done so as to override the right of a subsequent bona fide purchaser without notice of the fraud. The effect of a decision adverse to the party instituting the action may be that he will have to pay damages and costs. (The Leda Browning, and Lushington's Admiralty Reports, 69; 17 & 18 Vict. c. 104, s. 103; The Annandale, L. R. 2 P. D. & A. 179, 218; Roscoe's Admiralty Practice, 60; Haynes's Guide to Admiralty, 41, 42.)

59. Would an action in rem lie to enforce a judgment of a foreign Court operating by the law of the foreign country—

(1.) Against the ship itself;

(2.) Against the captain or owners personally?

Explain the principle which governs each of the supposed cases.

(1.) Yes; because the judgment confers a maritime lien, and the judgment can only be impeached by the English Court on proof of fraud. (Castrique v. Imrie, 39 L. J. C. P. 350; L. R. 4 E. & I. App. 414; The Bold Buccleugh, 7 Moore, P. C. 264.)

(2.) No; because the judgment would be a judgment in personam, and would not give a maritime lien to the plaintiff's who obtained it. The judgment against the captain or owners personally being a judgment in personam cannot be enforced here by an action in rem. (The City of Mecca, 50 L. J. P. D. & A. (App.) 53; L. R. 6 P. D. 106.)

"It is part of the law of nations that Courts of Admiralty in different countries have the power to condemn vessels and order them to be sold for the satisfaction of a maritime lien. Maritime liens are always recognised by all civilised nations." (Per Lush, L.J., in The City of Mecca, suprà.) "This claim or privilege (i.e., the maritime lien) travels with the thing into whosesoever possession it may come. It is inchoate from the moment the claim or privilege attaches, and when carried into effect by legal process by a proceeding in rem relates back to the period when it first attached." (The Bold Buccleugh, suprà.)

ECCLESIASTICAL LAW.

60. What propositions have been established by judicial decision as to the construction of the rubric in the commencement of the Prayer Book, which provides that, "Such ornaments of the Church and of the ministers thereof at all times of the ministration shall be retained and kept in use as were in this Church of England by the authority of Parliament in the second year of the reign of King Edward the VI.?"

The above quotation is taken from the ornaments rubric of 1662, and was construed in Ridsdale v. Clifton (46 L. J. P. C. C. 27; L. R. 2 P. D. 276) to mean (1) that the proper ornament of the minister in the ministration of the Holy Communion and other rites in parish churches is a surplice only; and (2) that a crucifix placed on a screen separating the chancel from the body of the church is not a lawful church ornament.

61. What general doctrines have been laid down by the Privy Council in ecclesiastical cases (1) as to the theological soundness or unsoundness of opinions; (2) as to the construction of the Articles and Liturgy; (3) as to different interpretations of which the Articles admit; (4) as to jurisdiction to settle matters of fuith?

"We have not been unmindful of the latitude wisely allowed by the articles of religion to the clergy so as to embrace all who hold one common faith. The mysterious nature of many of the subjects associated with the cardinal points of this faith must of necessity occasion a great diversity of opinion, and it has not been attempted by the articles to close all discussions or to guard against varied interpretations of Scripture with reference even to cardinal articles of faith, so that these articles are themselves plainly admitted in some sense or other according to a reasonable construction or according even to a doubtful but not delusive construction. Neither have we omitted to notice the previous decisions of the Ecclesiastical Courts, and especially the judgments of this tribunal (i.e., Her Majesty's Privy Council) by which interpretations of the articles of religion, which by any reasonable allowance for the variety of human opinion can be reconciled with their language, have been held to be consistent with a due obedience to the laws ecclesiastical, even though the interpretation in question might not be that which the tribunal itself would have assigned to the Article. We have been mindful of the authorities which have held that pious expressions of devotion are not to be taken as binding declarations of doctrine. But the appellant will, we think, himself feel how impossible it is that any society whatever of worshippers can be held together without some fundamental points of agreement, or can together worship a Being in whom they have no common faith."

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