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 London Legal Letter Chief Justice) and Mr. B. R. Heator, who is the solicitor of the executors in London of the estate of the late Mr. Augustin Daly. What they will recommend or how absolute security can be attained so long as credulous clients refuse to take any responsibility upon themselves for the safety of their fortunes, remains to be seen. The American system of making trust companies administrators and guardians and trustees is practically unknown here, and no trustee or fiduciary agent of that character is privileged to take or is allowed a commission for handling the affairs of an estate. It would seem wiser to allow respon sible agents a commission than for dishonest solicitors to take the principal. No little excitement has been created by the recent divorce and remarriage of Earl Russell in Nevada. It is to be hoped, in the interest of common decency, that pro ceedings will be instituted in this country to determine the worthlessness of these western states' divorce decrees. They can ' only be obtained by frauds upon the court of so pal pable a nature that the merest tyro in the law aught to be able to detect them, and yet the judge of the District Court of Nevada in which Earl Russell obtained his decree is presumably not a tyro. Earl Russell is a peer of the English realm. He went to Nevada, bought a tract of land and almost forthwith, instituted proceedings for divorce from the Countess Russell, on the ground of her desertion of him. For years he had been in the divorce courts here defending or pros ecuting actions relating to his domestic status. The last of these was a cause célè bre in the House of the Lords which was decided less than three years ago. It was an action brought by the Countess for resti tution of conjugal rights and there was a counter demand for judicial separation on the ground of cruelty. This is reported in 1897, Appeal Cases, 395. In the face of these facts the judge considers an English earl to be a dona fide resident of Nevada, who is ignorant of his wife's address (for the service

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upon her was by publication), and upon his uncorroborated evidence grants him a decree of divorce. Needless to say that the Earl, within forty-eight hours, delaying only long enough to marry the lady who was his inti mate friend in England and who by an odd coincidence obtained at the same term of the same court a decree against her husband, returned to England to resume his life here and his duties in the House of the Lords. Such juggling with justice ought to be resisted with the same condemnation in the United States that it receives in this country. Crim inal proceedings for bigamy against the Earl are talked of, but it is doubtful if that con viction would result, as the defence would probably be that the accused was advised by counsel learned in the law that such a divorce as he afterwards obtained in America was a good divorce, and that his marriage being valid in Nevada was valid everywhere, or in other words that whatever he did was done in good faith and after counsels' advice. The Bar Council, in its recently issued annual report, refused to approve the sug gestion of a shortening of the very long summer holidays which arc now' imposed upon all barristers. The courts now close on the 1 2th of August, and do not reopen until the 29th of October. During this long period of nearly eleven weeks the busy, as well as the briefless lawyer must idle, whether they like it or not. At the annual meeting of the Bar last week, a resolution to alter the date and term of the vacation from the I2th to the ist of August, was carried by a large majority. But an amend ment to reduce the vacation by making it end on September 30, which was warmly supported by Sir Edward Clarke, was re jected. It was argued that the English Courts sat only 11 5 days in the whole year, and that if the amendment was car ried the Bar would still have a vacation of eight weeks and five days — longer than that enjoyed by the legal profession in any other country. Sir Edward Clarke expressed