British subject, though resident out of the jurisdiction, the Court is clearly of opinion that she is entitled to the benefit of the rule.

The justification on the ground of policy for the court's decision is well set out in the concluding portion of the judgment of Mr. Justice Trueman: "In principle I can see no reason why the plaintiff should not be allowed to continue the action in forma pauperis. The hardship to the defendant that such a course may involve is the same as that which is commonly experienced where a person resident within the jurisdiction, having no means, brings an unsuccessful action. The public interest that the Courts should be open to suitors regardless of their means is properly held to outweigh the individual hardship that may result. This attitude of the Courts, Lord Haldane remarked not long ago in an application by a poor plaintiff for leave to appeal from a judgment of this Court to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, enters into the very bones of the law."

J. T. H.

WHAT CONSTITUTES A SEALING?-The recent decision of Mr. Justice Mowat in Re Buff Pressed Brick Co. Limited,' is the latest judicial pronouncement, as to what constitutes a "sealing' of a document. The principal case referred to therein is the judgment of the late Chancellor Boyd in Re Bell & Black. One of the text-book authorities cited in the latter decision is Matthews on Presumptive Evidence, and this refers to a statement contained in Sugden on Powers. The latter in turn purports to be based upon a decision in R. v. Inhabitants of St. Paul's. It will therefore be advisable to trace this chain, in order to see how the decision was arrived at.

The question in the last-mentioned action was whether a certain order, which required to be " under the hands and seals" of the Justices, was so executed. It appeared that the form of order used was a printed one, and the stationer was employed to impress marks in ink by means of wooden blocks, before the forms were used. These marks were the size of an ordinary seal, and the Court held that the adoption of them by the Justices constituted a sufficient sealing.

The learned author of Sugden on Powers uses the following language:"It is not necessary that an impression should be made with wax or with a wafer. If the seal, stick, or other instrument used be impressed by the party on the plain parchment or paper, with an intent to seal it, it is clearly sufficient; and therefore where the instru

156 O.L.R. 33.

21 O.R. 125.

3 (1845) 9 Jurist, 442.

ment is a deed, and it is stated in the attestation to have been sealed and delivered in the presence of witnesses, it will, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, be presumed to have been sealed, although no impression appears on the parchment or paper. This, I am told, Lord Eldon decided when in the Common Pleas." I have not been able to trace the decision of Lord Eldon above referred to, and it probably was not reported.

The statement of the law in Matthews on Presumptive Evidence is as follows:-"The fact of sealing likewise will be presumed; and this not only in cases where the deed is lost or torn, but also where no mark or impression on the parchment or paper appears; provided only that the attestation notice the solemnity to have been complied with. The reason is that, to constitute sealing, the use of wax, or of a wafer, is not essential; it is sufficient if the seal, stick, or other instrument be impressed by the party on the plain parchment or paper, with an intent to seal."

This latter statement is abridged by the Chancellor in Re Bell & Black as follows:-"In Matthews on Presumptive Evidence, it is said the fact of sealing will be presumed, even in cases where no mark or impression on the paper appears, provided that the attestation notice the solemnity to have been complied with. The reason is that it is sufficient if the seal, stick, or other instrument be impressed by the party on the plain paper with an intent to seal." The Chancellor also quotes the following from the judgment of Spragge, V.C., in Hamilton v. Dennis':-" There must, I take it, still be something affixed to, or impressed upon the document, denoting that it is intended as a seal, or as standing for the seal of the party executing. Probably the word sealed,' in the attestation clause may not be sufficient, but there being something impressed or affixed in the position ordinarily occupied by a seal, and which is there for no other purpose than as a seal, I apprehend the Court will hold it to be a seal." The "something" is indicated in the further reference to this case infra.

In re Sandilands, it was held that a deed was proved to have been "sealed," though no seal was affixed to it, because pieces of ribbons were attached to the places where the seals should be, and the attestation clause stated the deed to have been "signed, sealed and delivered." On the other hand, in Re Smith, Oswell v. Shepherd, a document, purporting to be a bond, bore the words "sealed with my seal," and the attestation clause was to the effect that the

document had been "signed, sealed and delivered

by the obligor.

It did not appear that a seal had in fact ever been affixed, and there was no mark, wafer or seal visible upon the face of the document:Held, that the Court could not, under the circumstances, presume that the document had been sealed. In Marchant v. Morton, it was decided that the presence of a seal opposite the signature of a party to a deed, is prima facie evidence that he signed and delivered the document as his act and deed.

In our own Courts, it was held in Nagle v. Kilts, that a circular flourish with the word "seal" inscribed is not a legal "seal.” In Clement v. Donaldson," the defendant had signed the deed, and afterwards marked the paper with the end of a poker opposite his name, but did not formally acknowledge the mark as his seal, and it was held not to be a sealed instrument. In Whittier v. McLennan,1o it was decided that, where a seal was set opposite to the name of the party signing, the document must be treated as under seal, although the testatum was "I hereby subscribe myself." In Hamilton v. Dennis (supra) the deed had been duly signed by the parties, but instead of any wax or wafer being affixed thereto for seals, slits had been cut in the parchment, and a ribbon woven through, so as to appear on the face of the document at intervals, opposite one of which each of the parties to the deed signed, and it was held to be a "seal." In Thompson v. Skill, it was apparently conceded by Falconbridge, C.J., that the memorandum of agreement therein sued on was under seal, citing Re Bell & Black (supra). In the Court of Appeal, however, Thompson v. Skill,12 Garrow, J.A., who alone made any reference to this point, said:" My present impression decidedly is, that the printer's scroll, with the printed words 'L. S.' within the scroll, is not, in this case, and on the evidence or lack of evidence, a seal or the equivalent of a seal, and, consequently, that the document is not a deed. at all.

In Farmers Bank v. Sunstrum,13 Clute, J., said:" I do not think that the application for stock was intended by either of the parties to be under seal. It does not purport to be signed under seal. There is the form of a seal printed upon the paper, but no reference is made to the seal, and from the evidence I am satisfied that is was not in

(1901) 2 K.B. 832. Taylor, Ont., 269. 9 U.C.R. 299.

10 13 U.C.R. 638.

11 12 O.W.R. 1033.

12 13 O.W.R. 887 at p. 889.
13 14 O.W.R. 288, at p. 290.

29-C.B.B.-VOL. III.

any way drawn to the defendant's attention, nor do I think as a fact that the instrument was intended by the parties to be under seal.” Finally, the Divisional Court, in the case of Connor-Ruddy Co. v. Robinson-Whyte Co., where the word "seal" was printed in an open oblong opposite the owners' signature, held it was not an instrument under seal.

14

In the above case of Re Buff Pressed Brick Co. Limited, there were seals opposite the signatures of other subscribers, but none opposite the signature in question. In the body of the instrument, however, were the words "Witness our hands and seals." Mr. Justice Mowat cited extracts from the Chancellor's decision in Re Bell & Black, including the latter's quotation from Matthews, that "the fact of sealing will be presumed, even in cases where no marks or impression on the paper appears, provided that the attestation notice the solemnity to have been complied with." He, however, omits the remaining sentence of the quotation, that "the reason is that it is sufficient if the seal, stick, or other instrument be impressed by the party on the plain paper, with an intent to seal." I assume, therefore, that he did not look upon the latter quotation as qualifying the former. He also omits the Chancellor's further statement, in the Bell & Black case, that "we have the visible impression made by the pen in forming the circular scroll, and inscribing therein the word 'seal,' which it was admitted was done by the person executing with the intent to place his seal to the document, and to adopt that scroll as his proper seal thereto."

The learned Judge's conclusion was that the instrument in this case, being under seal, formed a specialty debt, and that the defence of the Statute of Limitations therefore failed. This judgment seems to dispense with even the physical act described by both Sugden and Matthews, of applying or "impressing " a seal, stick, or other instrument on the paper with the intention of "sealing" it, even though without leaving any visible mark on it. As the decision has not been appealed from, it establishes, in this Province, a minimum formality of execution now necessary to constitute an instrument a deed. Its practical importance, in one of many other ways, is illustrated by the judgment of the Court of Appeal in Nelson Coke and Gas Co. v. Pellatt, 15 which held that an application under seal, for stock in a company, is not revocable. M. J. G.

14 19 O.L.R. 133.

15 4 O.L.R. 481.

BOOKS AND PERIODICALS.

Publishers desiring reviews or notices of Books and Periodicals must send copies of the same to the Editor, care of THE CARSWELL COMPANY, LIMITED, 145 Adelaide Street West, Toronto, Canada.

Gaelic Law. The Berla Laws; or The Ancient Irish Common Law. By M. J. Macauliffe, Barrister-at-law, Dublin; Hodges, Figgis & Co., Publishers to the University, 1925.

This little book contains a translation of the "Book of Aicill," which is contained in the third volume of the Ancient Brehon Laws of Ireland, published in 1873, and one of the six volumes of these laws prepared by the Irish Government Commissioners between the years 1865 and 1901. In 1894 Mr. Lawrence Ginnell, a Barrister of the Middle Temple, published a small volume dealing with the first four books, and in 1923 Dr. Sophie Bryant published a more elaborate work, covering the contents of the six volumes. This latter book was critically reviewed in Studies," an Irish Magazine, in March, 1924, and also in "The Month," an English Magazine, of the same date. The burden of the criticism was mainly directed against the defective translations made by the Commissioners, and a demand was made for the completion by the Government of a new translation, which had been commenced by Professor Thurneysen.

While the Book of Aicill is probably the most ancient portion of the Brehon Laws, it is not the most extensive, as that title justly belongs to the Senchus Mor." The latter was a code compiled between the years 438 and 441, by a body of experts composed of three Kings, three Brehons and three Bishops, one of the latter being St. Patrick. The Book of Aicill consisted originally of fourteen "Articles," to which ten Chapters," were subsequently added. In Mr. Macauliffe's "Introduction," he says:-" It contains the ancient Irish Common Law altered and amended in many respects, not only by the "new knowledge," which introduced many new rulings and new judgments, but more especially by the codes which had from time to time been promulgated, the most important of which was the code or Cain Law of St. Patrick, also known as the Senchus Mor." It may be argued by some very practical persons that a knowledge of these laws is no longer of any advantage to us moderns, but the same objection might be raised to many of the most interesting questions dealt with by learned men of the present day. It is therefore, refreshing to find scholars who have both the ability and the leisure to furnish us with an intimate glimpse of the legal and social conditions of a past age. M. J. G.

A Concise Treatise on Private International Law Based on the Decisions in the English Courts. By John Alderson Foote, K.C. Fifth edition by Hugh H. L. Bellot, M.A., D.C.L. London: Sweet & Maxwell, Ltd. Toronto: The Carswell Company, Limited, 1925.

The title of this book serves to remind us that the term "private international law" persists notwithstanding that it has been criticised