Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 6.djvu/464

432 few eyes do see, and ever striving to reproduce in his works his own impression of magical dreamy beauty. His works, like those of Millet, are mostly touched with sadness; but while Millet is stern and almost savage, Corot is always tender and delicate. In his chosen field he stands almost alone and unrivalled. Among his works are Yue d ltalio (1834); Souvenir des environs de Florence (1839) ; La Danse des Nymphes ; Soleil couchant dans le Tyrol (1850) ; Effet de Matin ; Dante et Virgile ; Macbeth ; Agar au Desert; Sjleil levant; Souvenir d ltalie ; Le Repos ; La Solitude (1866) ; Un Matin a Yille d Avray (18G8) ; Una Danse Antique ; and Le Bucheron. The two last mentioned were exhibited, after his death, at the Salon of 1875. In the social circle Corot was one of the frankest and most genial of men. His favourite relaxation after a long day s work was the theatre, where to the last he is said to have followed the performance with the fresh delight of a child. Naturally of a generous disposition, he gave away with a large hand the wealth which flowed in on him in his later years ; and many a touching tale is told of distress relieved and sad hearts comforted by his ministrations. The affec tionate regard generally felt towards him is shown in the designation &quot;le Pere Corot&quot; by which he was commonly known. In 1874 he lost a beloved sister; and after this sharp blow he never recovered his former gaiety of heart. One of his last acts was the gift of a pension to the widow of his brother artist Millet, who had died not long before. In December 1874 a gold medal designed for the occasion was presented to him by many French artists in token of honour and esteem. Corot died at Paris, after a long period of failing health, February 22, 1875.  CORPORATION. A corporation is an association of persons which the law treats in many respects as if it were itself a person. It has rights and duties of its own which are not the lights and duties of the individual members thereof. Thus a corporation may own land, but the individual members of the corporation have no rights therein. A corporation may owe money, but the corpora tors as individuals are under no obligation to pay the debt. The rights and duties descend to the successive members of the corporation. This capacity of perpetual succession is regarded as the distinguishing feature of corporations as compared with other societies. One of the phrases most commonly met with in law-books describes a corporation as a society with perpetual succession and a common seal. The latter point, however, is not conclusive of the corporate character. {{ti|1em|The legal attributes of a corporation have been worked out with great fulness and ingenuity in English law, but ths conception has been taken full-grown from the law of Home. The technical term in Roman law corresponding to our corporation is collegium; a more general term is universitas. A collegium or corpus must have consisted of at least three persons, who were said to be corporate habere co}~pus. They could hold property in common and had a CDmmon chest. They might sue and be sued by their agent (xyndicus or actor). There was a complete separation in law between the rights of the collegium as a body and those of its individual members. The collegium remained in ex istence although all its original members were changed. It was governed by its own by-laws, provided these were not contrary to the common law. The power of forming collegia yas restrained, and societies pretending to act as corpora tions were often suppressed. In all these points the collegia of Roman closely resemble the corporations of English law. There is a similar parallel between the purposes for which the formation of such societies is authorized in English and in Roman law. Thus among the Roman collegia the following classes are distinguished: (1) Public governing bodies, or municipalities, cimtates ; (2) religious societies, such as the , collegia of priests and Vestal Virgins ; (3) official societies, e.g., the scribce, employed in the administration of the state ; (4) trade societies, c.g.,fabri, pidores, navicularii, &amp;lt;tc. This class shades down into the societates not incorporated, just as our own trading corporations partake largely of the character of ordinary partnerships. In the later Roman law the distinction of corporations into civil and ecclesias tical, into lay and eleemosynary, is recognized. The latter could not alienate without just cause, nor take land without a licence a restriction which may be compared with our statutes of mortmain. All these privileged societies are what we should call corporations aggregate. The corpora tion sole (i.e., consisting of only a single person) is a refine ment of our own, for although Roman law held that the corporation subsisted in full force, notwithstanding that only one member survived, it did not impute to the succes sive holders of a public office the character of a corporation. When a public officer in our law is said to be a corporation sole, the meaning is that the rights acquired by him in that capacity descend to his successor in office, and not (as the case is where a public officer is not a corporation) to his ordinary legal representative. The best known instances of corporation sole are the king and the parson of a parish. The conception of the king as a corporation is the key to many of his paradoxical attributes in constitutional theory his invisibility, immortality, &amp;lt;tc.}} The Roman conception of a corporation was kept alive by ecclesiastical and municipal bodies. When English lawyers came to deal with such societies, the corporation law of Rome admitted of easy application. Accordingly, in no department of our law have we borrowed so copiously and so directly from the civil law. The corporations known to the earlier English law weremainly the municipal, the ecclesiastical, and the educational and eleemosynary. To all of these the same principles, borrowed from Roman jurisprudence, were applied. The different purposes of these institutions brought about in course of time differences in the rules of the law applicable to each. In particular, the great development of trading companies under special statutes has produced a new class of corpora tions, differing widely from those formerly known to the law. The reform of municipal corporations effected by the Act of 1837 has also restricted the operation of the principles of .the older corporation law. These principles, however, still apply when special statutes have not inter vened. But the extent and importance of .Parliamentary legislation on corporations have withdrawn the attention of writers from corporation law pure and simple, and there has been no book on that subject since Mr Grant s, pub lished in 1850. Two earlier treatises by Mr Kyd and Mr Willcocks may be mentioned. American lawyers have dealt more satisfactorily with corporations, and special reference may be made to Abbott s Digest of Corporation. Law. The legal origin of corporation is ascribed by Grant to five sources, viz.. common law, prescription, Act of Parlia ment, charter, and implication. Prescription in legal theory implies a grant, so that corporations by prescription would be reducible to the class of chartered or statutory corpora tions. A corporation is said to exist by implication hen the purposes of a legally constituted society cannot be carried out without corporate powers. Corporations are thus ultimately traceable to the authority of charters and Acts of Parliament, The power of creating corporations by charter is an important prerogative of the Crown, but in the present state of the constitution, when all the powers of the Crown are practically exercised by Parliament, there is no room for any jealousy as to the manner in which it may be exercised. The power of chartering corporations belonged also to subjects who had jura regalia, e.g., the- 