ΤΟ

THE HONOURABLE

JOHN BANNISTER GIBSON, LL.D.,

CHIEF JUSTICE OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA,

THIS EDITION

ОР

BACON'S ABRIDGMENT OF THE LAW

18,

WITH HIS PERMISSION,

MOST RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED

BY

THE EDITOR.

ADVERTISEMENT.

In presenting to the profession this edition of Bacon's Abridgment, the editor deems it requisite to say that his labours have extended no further than to add the principal American cases to the English copy. All the cases which have a bearing upon the point under consideration have been examined, and those which would elucidate it have been added. His additions are marked with the Greek letter at the beginning, and with the same letter inverted thus, at the end of each note. This is the matter for which he is responsible. Occasionally he has introduced extracts from acts of Congress, where he deemed that such extracts would be useful to his professional brethren.

Such notes as were added by Judge Wilson to a former edition of this work, have been retained, where the matter had not already been imbodied in the work by the English editors. They will be found between braces, thus, { }.

Having frequently felt the want of an index, which the arrangement adopted in the construction of the work seemed to render indispensable: the editor has made one, which will be found at the end of this volume.

At the end of the last volume, it is proposed to give a general index of the whole work.

Philadelphia, February, 1842.

J. B.

PREFACE

TO

THE SEVENTH ENGLISH EDITION.

THE last edition of Bacon's Abridgment was published in 1807; but that edition was merely a reprint of the fifth edition, published in 1798. The task, therefore, devolved on the editors of the present edition, of incorporating into the various titles of the work the decisions and statutes which, during thirty-three years, have so materially qualified, confirmed, and reversed the law as laid down in the last corrected edition. To the profession, for whom the work is designed, the extent and labour of this task will, in a great degree, account for the delay which has occurred in the publication of the present edition. The second, third, and fourth volumes were prepared by the former editor, Sir Henry Gwillim, above ten years since, and were then printed; but his ill state of health preventing his proceeding with the work, the completion of it was intrusted, several years ago, to the present editor, who is responsible for the first, fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth volumes; and for the "ADDENDA," which it became indispensable to append to the three volumes printed by Sir Henry Gwillim. The improvements made by that gentleman in the edition of 1798, in correcting and verifying the references, in retrenching repetitions and redundancies, in expunging unintelligible passages, and generally, in purifying and perfecting the text, left comparatively little to be done by the editors of this edition, except (what indeed was of itself difficulty and toil sufficient) the introduction into the work of the decisions pronounced by the several courts and of the statutes enacted since the edition of 1798. In executing this task, in the five volumes for which he is answerable, the present editor has endeavoured to adapt