Page:Select Essays in Anglo-American Legal History, Volume 1.djvu/321

 9. HOLDSWORTH: THE LAW MERCHANT 307 quisitlon of Queenborough was held In order to ascertain certain points of maritime law. ^ We shall see that the new court aroused the suspicions of Parliament and that its juris- diction was limited by statute. ^ But the part of the Black Book dealing with the procedure and practice of the court (which dates from the 15th century) shows us that its juris- diction is becoming settled.^ Under Henry VIII. the court of Admiralty considerably extended and settled its jurisdiction. In that reign much attention was paid to naval matters. Trinity House was incorporated in 1516. Deptford dockyard was constructed at about the same period. The records of the court began in 1524.* It was settled in 1585 that the judge of the court of Admiralty, though a deputy of the Admiral, did not cease to be judge during a vacancy of the office of Admiral.^ The criminal jurisdiction of the court was extended; and just as the crown had asserted its jurisdiction in ecclesiastical mat- ters, so it asserted an increased jurisdiction, through the court of Admiralty and the Council, in maritime and com- mercial causes. The Council records show how close was the connexion between the Council and the Admiralty. ^ During the Tudor period the court sat at Orton Key near London Bridge.'^ Later it sat, like the Ecclesiastical Courts, at Doctors' Commons.^ We shall see that the deter- mined attack of the Common Law Courts in the 17th century left the court with but a small part of the jurisdiction which it had asserted under the Tudors, and denied it the status, which It had formerly possessed, of a court of record.^ • Black Book of the Admiralty i 132 seqq. • Below. •1178-220; 246-280; 345-394. • Select Pleas of the Admiralty i Ivii. • Ibid ii xii. • Dasent i 154, 155; iii 149, 467, 469; vii xviii; xiv xxviii; xx xiv-xvi; xxiv 196, 356, 385-393, 403-405. • Select Pleas of the Admiralty i Ixxix ; Bl. Comm. iii 69. • In fact the judpe of the court of Admiralty and the Dean of the Arches were often the same person (Anson, the Crown, 417). 3, 4 Vict, c. 65 § 1 provided that the Dean might sit for the j udge of the Admi- ralty court. • Select Pleas of the Admiralty i xlv. A writ of supersedeas, issued in 1364, implies that it is a court of record. The contrary was stated, Coke, 4th Instit. 135; cp. Sparks v. Martyn (1668) 1 Ventris 1,