Page:An essay on the transfer of land by registration.djvu/47

 to the present system of conveyancing, are a hindrance in the transaction of our private affairs, seriously reducing the value of landed property in Ireland, and obstructing the free investment of capital in land and landed securities.

"We are of opinion that the Landed Estates Court, though affording some alleviation in the case of large estates, fails to provide an effectual remedy for many of the evils complained of. Titles, which, at considerable expense and delay, have been cleared of complexities by being passed through that Court, are left to be dealt with subsequently under the same system of conveyancing which induced those complexities, and consequently, in a short period of time, become embarrassed and deteriorated by similar accumulations.

"We therefore think that the Landed Estates Court Act requires to be supplemented by some measure which will enable future dealings with land to be conducted with security, expedition, and economy."

The Bill above referred to was introduced into the House of Commons by the Right Hon. W. Monsell, now Lord Emly, endorsed by the Right Hon. Col. Herbert and Sir Colman O'Loghlin, and was read a first time late in the session of 1863, rather with a view to inform the House upon the subject than with any hope of its being carried beyond that preliminary stage, it being understood that the Government proposed to deal with the question in the next session.

Unfortunately, the legal gentlemen who undertook to revise my Bill of 1863, preparatory to its reintroduction in the following session, deemed it politic, in order to propitiate Lord Westbury and induce him to undertake the carriage of it through the House of Lords, to import into it certain provisions of his own measure, which were antagonistic to the principle of registration of titles, and my remonstrances were ignored. The result may be learned by reference to the evidence of Mr. Denny Urlin, an English barrister, formerly examiner in the Estates Court, Ireland, and for ten years in