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 BAG BAYLEY, JOHN B. Commentaries on the laws of England, in the order, and compiled from the text of Blackstone, and embrac- ing the new statutes and alterations to the present time. 8vo. Lon- don. 1840. Few works have been more frequently epitomized, dissected, and mutilated, than the Commentaries of Sir William Blackstone. Some of the adapters of " the Commentaries," assume to cull the flowers of their author without disturbing the general body of the text; others omit cer- tain portions and substitute what they deem of more importance ; and a third class are the condensers, who affect to make Blackstone say in a few words, what the learned author requires a chapter to unfold. Mr. Bayley's Commentaries has the latter reputation. lie has applied the pruning knife so assiduously, that scarcely a leaf or branch remains of " The Commentaries." Four volumes are packed into one, and his book is a bold abridgement of a work that, as it is, the most enlightened jurists have pronounced a model of excellence of legal composition, and wonderful accuracy in the statement of legal principles. 4 Jurist, 644. BAYLEY, SIR JOHN. A summary of the law of Bills of Ex- change, Cash Bills, and Promissory Notes. 5th ed. Edited by Francis Bayley. Bvo. London. 1830. 2d American edition. Boston. 1836. No department of the law has been more rapidly developed in modern times, than that relating to Bills of Exchange and Promissory Notes, as a comparison of the first with the last edition of the above work will show. The first edition of Bayley on Bills is a mere pamphlet, whilst the last is a stout 8vo. of more than 600 pages. There have been two American editions of Bayley's Bills, edhed by W. Phillips and S. E. Sewall. 8vo. Boston. 1820. 1836. The editors ably and faithfully performed their duty, by adding somewhat to the body of the work, and making a careful collection of notes of American and English decisions. " Bayley on Bills, is no doubt'an admirable specimen of accurate deduc- tion of the principles to be extracted from reported decisions, and of con- cise and lucid statements of those principles. So far as it goes, it is unrivaled for clearness and correctness ; but from want of breadth in its plan, it treats very cursorily many important points, and leaves others altogether untouched." It has maintained a high rank among elementary treatises, and until recently was used as a text book in Dane Law School, at Harvard University. It is, in the United States, now nearly superseded by later works upon the same subject. 15 A. J. 496 ; 4 U. S. L. Gazette, 302; 3 Kent's Com. 74, 127. BAYLEY, FRANCIS. A treatise on fines and recoveries, with a table of cited cases, and copious notes. 8vo. London. 1828, Mutual Life Ins. TC '■>piiiiy i of New Yc I