Page:Abolition of the Vice-Royalty of Ireland.djvu/22

18 statements I have made. Lord Langdale uses these words:—

"'The extent, variety, and importance of the business to be transacted, is more than sufficient to distract and overpower the most vigorous attention, if attempted to be conscientiously applied. In this state of things, what has been found most pressing has been attended to; the rest has been neglected, and the consequences have been, delay of justice in the Court of Chancery, delay of justice in this House, the neglect of many of those great duties which consist in the superintendence of the law, and the administration of justice; and the transfer of others of those duties to the office of the Secretary of State for the Home Department.'—Parl. Deb. on Appellate Jurisdiction, June 23, 1836."

These, then, are the conclusions of one of the most eminent and experienced members of that profession from which the highest legal dignitaries must be drawn: and it cannot be too much to conclude with him, that to relieve on the one hand a great office, so overwhelmed with duties as to be beyond the compass of mortal powers; and on the other to withdraw from a laborious department one branch of its present functions, not originally or necessarily connected with it, but undesignedly superadded by the force of necessity to its legitimate operations—would be, if a practicable, an useful, and desirable consummation. The eminent authority whom I have cited would establish a new, or revive an ancient, officer of State, who should bear the responsibility of this branch of public affairs under the title of Lord Keeper; leaving to the