any time during the coverture, and dower assigned called widow's of which any issue she might have quarantine. had might by possibility have inherited.

Dower may be barred by the wife's adultery, by a divorce, by reason of her husband's treason, and by detaining title-deeds. Widow's right enforced by action. Dower may also be prevented by taking a conveyance, subject to dower uses.

As to dower since 1834, see 3 & 4 Will. 4, c. 105.

Again, suppose he has been reading the chapter on the law of descents in the same volume, the following might easily be deduced:

It is a maxim that nemo est hæres viventis; therefore, the ancestor must be dead before he can have an heir. Before that time, the person is called either the heir apparent (being the person who, should he outlive the ancestor, will be the heir at all events, as the eldest son); or, the heir presumptive (he being one who, should the ancestor die immediately, would be his heir, but whose hopes may be cut off by the birth of an heir apparent, as a daughter by the birth of a son). The ancestor must also die intestate, to transmit by heirship.

The law of descents is founded on custom, not statute. It dates as far back as the reign of Hen. 2; but had not attained complete maturity till the reign of Hen. 3, or Edw. 1, and underwent no change from that time till partially reconstructed by the stat. 3 & 4 Will. 4, c. 106; and as modified thereby it may be reduced to the following rules or

canons:

I. In every case the descent shall be traced from the purchaser.

The purchaser is he who took the lands in any other manner than by descent. And by the statute, the last person who had a right to the land, and is not proved to have taken it by descent, &c., is to be deemed a purchaser. This is contrary to the old law.

II. Inheritances shall in the first place lineally descend to the issue of the purchaser in infinitum.

III. Males are preferred to females, and an elder male to a younger; but females, when there are several, take together.

IV. The issue of the children of the purchaser represent or take the place of their parent in infinitum, the children of the same parent being always subject (among each other) to the same law of inheritance as is contained in the third rule.

Thus the child, or grandchild, of the eldest son will take preference over a younger son, i.e., the child's or grandchild's uncle, &c.

V. On failure of the issue of the purchaser, the inheritance shall descend to the nearest lineal ancestor then living, in the preferable line, if no issue of a nearer ancestor in that line exist.

Under this rule the estate, on failure of issue, will descend to the father, if living; and if he be dead, to his issue. Therefore, if B. had two sons, C. and D., and C. acquires property, and dies intestate and without issue, his estate will go to his father B.; but if B. is dead, it goes to his issue D., who is also C.'s brother.

This rule is different from the old law, which said that the land should

rather escheat than ascend to an ancestor. The descent of an inheritance was compared to that of a falling body, which, of course, never goes upwards.

As to which is the preferable line, appears by the next rule.

VI. Among the lineal ancestors of the purchaser, the paternal line is preferred to the maternal. That is, the father and all the male paternal ancestors of the purchaser and their descendants are admitted before any of the female paternal ancestors or their descendants; and all the female paternal ancestors and their descendants before the mother or any of the maternal ancestors or their descendants; and the mother and all the male maternal ancestors and their descendants before any of the female maternal ancestors or their heirs.

It will be observed that the male stock is throughout preferred to the female.

The 8th section of the statute has settled a question which was the subject of much controversy, by enacting that when the male paternal ancestors and their descendants fail, and the female paternal are admitted, the mother of a more remote male paternal ancestor and her descendants shall be preferred to the mother of a less remote male paternal ancestor or her descendants; and when the male maternal ancestors and their descendants fail, and the female maternal ancestors are admitted, the mother of a more remote male maternal ancestor and her descendants are to be preferred to the mother of a less remote male maternal ancestor and her descendants.

VII. Kinsmen of the whole blood to the purchaser are preferred to those related by the half-blood; but a kinsman of the half-blood is now capable of being heir, and such kinsman inherits next after a kinsman in the same degree of the whole blood, and after the issue of such kinsman, when the common ancestor is a male; and next after the common ancestor when such ancestor is a female.

This rule, like the fifth, is an alteration in the law of inheritance; for as the law stood formerly, the half-blood, like the lineal ancestor, was excluded, and the lands escheated rather than he should take.

VIII. Where there is a total failure of heirs of the purchaser, &c., the descent shall be traced from the person last entitled to the land as if he had been the purchaser.

Miscellaneous points connected with descent.

1. To complete his title the heir must enter upon the lands.

2. The lands descended are liable to the debts of the ancestor, as well those by simple contract as by specialty.

3. When a testator (since 1833) devises land to his heir, such person takes as devisee, and not as heir.

4. A man takes by purchase lands limited to the "heirs" or "heirs of the body" of his ancestors, by the conveyance of a stranger, if not falling within the rule in Shelley's case; but the descent to such land is to be traced as if the ancestor had been the purchaser. Purchaser is to be here taken in its legal sense.

The preceding example embodies the salient points of the chapter (about fifty pages) upon which it is based. Analysing thus tends to reflection, method, and classification, which must, of course, greatly assist the student in the acquirement of knowledge.

Where the clerk contents himself with very brief notes, and the work he is studying is his own, the notes may be made with advantage in the margin of the book.

LAW LECTURES.-Lectures are generally deemed aids to the study of the law; but as they are at present conducted, they are almost, if not entirely, useless. We have asked the opinion of many who have attended lectures, as to the benefit derived from them, and without an exception all have stated that they received little or no advantage from them.

The student sits and hears the lecturer read a paper on a given subject: when the paper is read the student and lecturer part-nothing further is done. The lecturer may, perhaps, state that he will be very glad to answer any questions respecting the subject of the lecture, but if no student is bold enough to put a question, the lecturer departs, and his hearers go away no wiser than they came. The student is pretty attentive at first, but he soon gets tired, as he has nothing to keep up his interest; his attendance becomes less frequent, till at last it ceases altogether, and he votes the whole thing a bore.

Before the student can derive any benefit from law lectures, he must have a fair knowledge of the subject about to be lectured upon; and unless he has, it will be impossible for him to follow the lecturer, let him give what attention he may. Thus, suppose the student has by diligent attention managed to follow the lecturer to a certain point, and he then finds that the lecturer is reading something he no longer understands, he begins to think about the subject, and when he next gives his mind to the lecture, the point upon which he has been pondering no longer engages the lecturer's attention; the thread of the subject is completely lost, and inattention to the rest of the lecture is the result. To remedy this, the reader should give notice to the students upon what subject his lecture is to be, and the books and cases he intends to read and refer to. He should also from time to time examine his hearers, and see that he is properly understood, and explain away their doubts. The student should also read up the subjects of the lecture after as well as before he hears it.

Dr. Johnson thus speaks of lectures: "People have now-a-days got a strange opinion that everything should be taught by lectures. Now, I cannot see that lectures can do so much good as reading the books from which the lectures are taken. I know nothing that can be best taught by lectures, except where experiments are to be shown. You may teach chemistry by lectures; you might teach making of shoes by lectures."(a) Dr. Parr shows the advantages of a tutor over a lecturer. "The tutor, he observes, "can interrogate, where perhaps the lecturer could only dictate; and, therefore, in his intercourse with learners, he has more opportunities for ascertaining their proficiency, correcting their misapprehensions, and relieving their embarrassments."(b) This fully bears out what we have already said-viz., that the lecturer should examine his hearers to see that he is properly understood, and clear up their doubts, if any exist. Again, as Mr. Warren justly observes, "all pupils have not the same abilities and the same acquirements. How, then, can lectures be framed so as to be suitable to all? But in private teaching the tutor can adapt his instruction to the peculiar wants of his pupils; and their attention is kept awake by the consciousness that each is personally addressed.”

(a) Boswell's Life of Johnson, vol. ii. p. 6.

(b) Works, vol. ii. p. 568.

Mr. Joy, in one of his letters on legal education, speaking of the difficulties which now necessarily beset the path of the solitary student, says: "These evils would be in a great degree met by his being obliged to attend lectures delivered, and examinations presided over by those who, by practice in their profession, could experimentally apply and develop the principles of legal science. But to make lectures effectual, not only must a systematic course of reading, to be pointed out by the lecturer, be combined with them, but oral and written examination on the subject of each lecture is essential to make such course of instruction effectual to any considerable degree. The habit of attending a lecture, merely to write down its contents, is worse than useless. It tends to superficial knowledge. To be profound, to be practical, to combine practice with theory, the art with the science of law, a regular course of study, bearing upon the lectures that are delivered, and an earnest and hearty oral examination of the student from day to day, and the sympathy of the lecturer, and a kind and anxious spirit on his part, to encourage and assist the student, and create in him a moral as well as intellectual interest in that which is to engross him in after years, are all essential."

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We will take leave of this subject by stating what the Select Committee on Legal Education report upon it. They say, It is not sufficient that the professor deliver a lecture; lectures without examination, frequent and accurate, without class teaching, without private instruction, fall dead on the majority of hearers; and, however popular in the outset, sooner or later, on the concurrent testimony of some of the most experienced lecturers and lawyers themselves, gradually deteriorate, and finally lose their efficacy and audience. But lectures, class teaching, and private instruction, may each and all be excellent, and yet be productive of no real benefit, unless it be also practicable to insure hearers. Some maintain that this result is sure to follow from the superior and intrinsic merit of the instruction and instructor; that to secure acceptance it is only necessary to render acceptable; while others again reply, that without incentive or obligation of some kind, remote or immediate,(a) the highest excellence will not be appreciated, and the most valuable opportunities will be passed by."

The student is, we think, now able to judge for himself as to the expediency of giving the time and the money to attend mere law lectures, and we will, therefore, pass on to consider

DEBATING SOCIETIES.-These societies, if properly conducted, are great aids to the student in the acquirement of knowledge, for the love of victory will spur him on to great exertion; he has a keen interest in the subject before him, and frequently spares no pains or labour to get it well up. They have, however, one drawback; they often cause the student to give too much time and attention to particular points. But if conducted under a president, who is able to sum up the merits of the case pro and con., and pronounce a calm judgment, which will have weight with his hearers, this would add greatly to its advantages.

Mr. Warren speaks in favour of debating societies, and has collected the opinions of several old writers on the point, the first of whom is the celebrated Lord Coke; he says: "The next thing to be observed by our student is conference about those things which he reads and writes. Reading without hearing is dark and irksome; hearing without reading

(a) Articled clerks have this incentive-the examination, honours.

is slippery and uncertain; neither of them yield seasonable fruit without conference." Fulbeck says: "Students will not do amiss, if at certain times they meet among themselves, and to propose such things as they have heard or read, by that means to be assured of the opinion of others in those matters. By this means they may be brought better to understand those things, one, perhaps, seeing and giving a reason which the other is not aware of; and if he misapprehend a point of law, the other may instruct him therein. Hereby are they likewise brought more firmly to retain in memory the things that they have heard or read."

For the like reasons moot courts are aids to the student in his course of study.

MUTUAL CORRESPONDENCE.-Some advantage may also be gained by articled clerks joining these societies, as they, like debating societies, tend to produce greater exertion; but they have the same drawback, viz., confining the student's attention too much to individual points, and they are without any other of the advantages attending debating societies. We are afraid they will hardly repay the student if he gives too much attention to them; and, indeed, we have known clerks merely copy their answers out of text-books, without giving the subject more trouble. Such a course of proceeding must necessarily be a mere waste of time.

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COPYING PRECEDENTS, &c.-By copying precedents, we mean transcribing various forms of conveyances, and pleadings, from text-books, and from forms which come before the clerk in practice. This system has its advocates and opposers. Mr. Lee thinks that every hour employed in copying precedents, elsewhere existing in print, is an hour lost, but which might have been usefully employed in acquiring the principles on which those precedents were originally framed."(a) Mr. Warren, although condemning the practice if carried too far, says: Nothing can be more desirable than for the student to copy out a few good precedents, judiciously selected, with due reflection upon what he is doing, and constant reference to the rules and principles upon which they are framed. Three or four precedents a week thus copied will be of great service to the student; not only as tending to fix in his mind the rules of law, but to assist him hereafter in the construction of [conveyances] and pleadings in the course of business. He cannot go to greater extent in copying precedents than this, without uselessly encroaching on his valuable time, and degrading himself into a kind of copying clerk."(b)

We agree with Mr. Warren. In copying precedents, the articled clerk should make every endeavour to understand their application, and the rules of law by which they are governed; otherwise he will derive no further benefit than does any mere engrossing clerk in the office; and it is well known that a copying clerk, who never reads or studies, remains a copying clerk, a mere machine, to the end of his days. It is often said that the clerk wants the precedents for his own use when he practises for himself. This, however, is a poor excuse, as valuable precedents may now be purchased for a very small sum.

In drawing your drafts it is a good plan to sketch an outline of the work to be done. Thus, suppose you are about to draw a will for (say) Mr. James Smith, the following would greatly assist :

Lee's Dict. Pract.

Warren's Law Studies, p. 860, 2nd edit.