1

progress to the westward? We are disposed to hope, that the latter may be the case. Proving, as we have done, that floating ice on a wide sea can never be permanently stationary, we conceive that less difficulty will be found, than among an archipelago of islands, where it firmly attaches itself to the narrow passages bel tween them, as at Melville and Cockburn islands. In further proof of this, we might mention the voyage of William Barentz round the northern extremity of Nova Zembla; of a Russian ship having passed the same point in 1822; of the Russian corvette round Icy Cape in the same year; and the extraordinary journey from the mouth of the Kolyma to the northward over the ice, by Baron Wrangel, who was stopped by an open sea, on which neither ice Hor land was visible in any direction, as far as the eye could reach, to the east, north, and west.* These and many other instances prove the absurdity of fixed and impenetrable ice on the surface of a spacious sea, piono

Another circumstance not noticed by Captain Parry induces us to augur favourably of a practicable passage across the Polar Sea to the coast of America. It is that of the rapid tide (independent of the permanent current) which sets through the Strait of the Fury and Hecla, and which, on the former voyage, was also found to set up Prince Regent's Inlet, and to rise to the height of twelve feet. Now these two tides must have their origin in the Polar Sea ; and it is a question, which we presume hot to decide, what amount of influence, if any, the moon may exert on the surface of a sea covered or nearly so with ice? but we are induced to think that a very considerable surface of water would be required to cause a regular tide to the extent mentioned.

Once upon the American coast, we consider the object in a great degree accomplished. So many points of that coast are now known, the low parallel of latitude in which it generally runs, the resources it affords in fish and game, the known communications with the Hudson's Bay Company's posts, from Cape Turnagain to Mackenzie's River, and the thickly inhabited country which lies between the rocky mountains and Behring's Strait, as recently explored by the Americo-Russian Trading Company, must give a confidence to those employed on the Enterprize, and set their minds at ease in the event of any accident befalling the ships. In this we apprehend we have Captain Parry's concurrence, who thus termi

This excellent officer had nearly perished on a second attempt in the month of March last. He had scarcely advanced fifty werst, when a gale of wind broke up the ice all around him, and he found himself on an open sea tossed about on a floe of ice about eighty fathoms long, and forty broad, floated about at the mercy of the wind and currents which fortunately drove him at length, half dead with cold and hunger, to the Asiatic shore, not far from Behring's Strait.

nates

*》《**

nates his narrative, For my own part, I never felt more sanguine of ultimate success in the enterprize in which I have lately been engaged,, than at the present moment; and I cannot but entertain a confident hope that England may yet be destined, to succeed in an attempt which has for centuries past engaged her attention, and interested the whole civilized world, to or 11419941 big We have little to observe as to the style and character of the Nar rative of the late voyage; the first is plain, unaffected, and perspi cuous; the latter such precisely as might have been expected by those who have perused the account of the former voyage; full and, precise in all the descriptions of objects, and minute in all the transactions and events of the Expedition rather too minute, we should say, for the general reader; but Captain, Parry, like bis pres decessor, Vancouver, leaves nothing behind him for another to do. The detail of astronomical and meteorological observations, with various phenomena connected with them, the description of objects of natural history, and other scientific researches, he has, wisely we think, omitted in this account of the voyage, reserving theur for a future publication as an Appendix; but the volume is illustrated,

We shall ere long be in possession of the geography of the northern coast of America, which ought not to have remained a blank on the charts of the nineteenth century. Even Siberia, which stretches to a higher latitude, has long been known and described,' though not, perhaps, with accuracy, while two points only of the wide extended coast of America were ever visited, and one of these placed several degrees of latitude beyond its proper position, and the other, in all probability, not placed correctly. To ascertain this latter point, and to explore the coast from thence to Icy Cape, is an enterprize which we understand Captain Franklin has volunteered to undertake, while his friend and former associate, Dr. Richardson, intends to accompany him as im as far as the mouth of Mackenzie River, and to examine the interjacent coast between it Copper Mine River, returning by the Copper Mountains, and the field of coal which! has been described to crop out along the bank of the Bear Lake; and, in short, to complete the collection and description

is

understood, that Captain Lyon of the natural history of North 2212519 28

volunteered to proceed in

gun-brig to

Repulse Bay, to cross over from thence to the Polar Sea, and to carry on the survei the coast to Cape Turnagain, where Captain Franklin was obliged to stop These discoveries are

arts and sciencesy of the enlightened age, and the rapid strides that are making in

government

patronage

and redound to the honour of the they are carried on. We do not despair of seeing the day when this spirit of enterprize will have conducted some adventurous Englishman to the very northern extremity of the earth's axis. To reach the North Pole from the worth part of Spitzbergen, with the united aid of a couple boats, half decked, and sledges, to carry each other in turns asice or water may occur, would, as we conceive, neither be so difficult not so d gerous an enterprize as that which was undertaken and performed by the Russian: Baron Wrangel, on sledges alone. From Hackluyt's Headland to the Pale is only 600 geographical miles. Allowing a speed only of fifteen miles a day (of twentyfour hours, always light) it would only require forty days; so that if a little vessel, like the Griper, which has already been at Spitzbergen, should arrive there in, the begining of June, the boats might reach the Pole, and return to her with ease by the end of August. So little is this of a visionary project, that Captain Franklin proposed to ans dertake it; and indeed there is not a naval officer who has seen the ice, and knows what it is, hut will admit of its being feasible, and who would not cheerfully volunteer to make the attempt.

and

and embellished with a number of well executed and characteristic prints from the pencil of Captain Lyon, who, we perceive by a note of Captain Parry, is about to publish his account of the voyage, which will probably contain a more free and familiar description of the 'Esquintaux, their domestic habits and character, than was perhaps thought consistent with the gravity of the authentic aud historical Narrative.

ART. XII.—Observations on the Judges of the Court of Chancery, and the Practice and Delays complained of in that Courty London. - 1823. pp. 68.

THE

THE Law's delay has been a complaint ever since England has, had law. Poets, play-writers and novellists have made it thie subject of facetious allusion; disappointed litigants and disgraced, practitioners have used it as a peg on which to hang their indivi-¡ dual malignity; theorists, who have never weighed the difficulty s of adjusting conflicting claims, balancing contradictory statements, and unravelling complicated rights, have reprobated a, delay the causes of which they did not understand; and many wise and able men have admitted that the delay does sometimes amount to an evil, although they are unable to devise any plan by which i suits can be accelerated without endangering the security of individual rights, and the general confidence in the law.

Nor is it in England alone that this problem has been jocularly or seriously treated. Every nation which enjoys a free and im-": partial administration of law, also suffers the inseparable inconvenience of delay, and that inconvenience is generally in proportion to the merits (in other points) of its legal system. We hear little complaint of delay in Russia; in Turkey, we apprehend, there is none at all. Frederic of Prussia, when he was modelling his in- jd stitutions, attempted to give rapidity to justice-he might as well i have attempted to make round square; and there are some well. known instances in which his desire to do right speedily, led torb substantial and permanent wrong. France, whose system of civil or justice was excellent, complained, as we do, of the delays of the, law, and the chicanery of practitioners; but this was set right at , 3 the revolution: and during the reigns of Robespierre and Tallien,bos all processes, both criminal and civil, advanced with a rapidity as that at first delighted, and soon after astonished the reformers. themselves,-

• Whose heads fell headlong, wondering why they fell.' In short, it is the infirmity of human nature that falsehood, vio lence and wrong are prompt and sudden; while the elucidation of

truth,

truth, the proportioning of reparation, and the development of justice, are difficult, complicated and slow.

But it has been reserved for our days to see this popular com plaint assume a more commanding tone, and receive a degree of countenance which (to our knowledge at least) it never had befores Individual legislators, as well as committees of both houses of parliament, have, for some years past, been occasionally employed on this subject; and even the government itself has, by the appointment of an additional judge in equity, admitted the necessity of doing something to remedy this inconvenience, and seems there by to have given encouragement to propositions for doing more. We have always doubted the constitutional propriety of the creation of the office of Vice-Chancellor, and we more than doubt its expediency and advantage. Notwithstanding the zeal and ability of the leamed person appointed to that office, it has not (whatever a other good it may have done) accomplished the object for which it was specifically instituted; and there even seems reason, ter apprehend that it has had a tendency to increase rather than dimisto nish the quantity of equity business: but one useful effect this experiment will have had, if it teaches us how little we ought to tool rely on the most plausible propositions; how slow we ought to be in admitting expedients into our legal system;how uncertain of it is that any alteration of that system will produce the presumed. advantages;—and how certain it is to produce some inconveniences which never were contemplated...

Let it not be supposed that we deny that the administration of our law, like all other human institutions, must be affected that is, altered in its practical details by time and circum stances; or that the internal situation of this country has been, of within the last century, so essentially changed as to vary, in a most) important degree, the proportion which existed between the legabon business to be done and the means of doing it. It will be seende in the progress of this Article that we are fully convinced of this change, and that the views we take of the case are mainly d directed by such conviction; but we wish in the first instance bre to warn the public against imputing to our legal system as a fault, that which is really its merit-the diffusion of wealth and wel the extension of rights which have grown up under its protection, i and the confidence which it universally inspires as a real, impare ill tial, and substantial measure of equity and justice. We also wishadi to warn the country against such a supposition as, that the ineo ada conveniencies which are occasioned by an increase of business. are to be remedied by an increase of judges, and that, because I there may be twice as much business as in Lord Thurlow's st VOL. XXX. NO. LIX. time,

S

re

time, and thrice as much as in Lord Hardwicke's, the proper medy would be the appointment of two or three Lord Chancellors. If, whenever a clamour against the administration of justice happens to be excited, the government and the judges are to make a compromise between their conscientious duty and their desire to satisfy popular demands, it is not hard to see that such clamours will become more frequent from every partial success, and that what with admitting this and altering that the constitution of England will be undermined, and the venerable fabric of our legal system (like the actual courts in which it is administered) will be so amended and improved' by the hands of modern artists, as to be no longer fit for the purposes for which it was erected. We will, however, fairly confess that, althougli we think it right to throw out these suggestions, we derive consolation and confidence on this topic, from a quarter which does not at first sight appear likely to afford any; we mean the exciters of these clamours themselves. They do not, we are satisfied, wish to alter the law-they have no desire to subvert the constitution: they are actuated by mere personal motives-by a desire to retaliate on the present Chancellor for being blind to their merits, or by the hope of awakening him to a due sense of their importance -they are far from wishing to overturn the system, they only want to profit by it-they have no enmity to the serjeant's coif or the silken robe, they only wish to wear them-they have as little desire as we have to overthrow the bench of justice, they are only anxious to mount it: and accordingly,

We find that the ancient and general complaint against the whole course of the law, is now concentrated in an impeachment of the practice in Chancery; and that all the charges which, from time immemorial, have been made against the Chancery, are now levelled personally and directly at the individual Chancellor."

The delay, the expense, the anxiety, the ruin, which other men in other times have attributed to the proceedings of the court, are now charged upon the judge; every thing else is kept out of sight the necessity of the forms in which justice is slowly, in order to be safely, administered-the passion and pertinacity of men in defending rights or in inflicting wrongs-the indolence, ignorance, or chicanery of practitioners-the complication of the kind of cases which come into chancery,-all these are now passed over in respectful silence, and the whole evil is discovered to arise from the doubts, hesitations and delays of the Earl of Eldon.

We will not waste our readers' time in an eulogy upon this venerable and excellent judge-one of the greatest, we believe, of a series of great men, who, for the last 150 years, have presided in

the