A judge of H. M. Supreme Court lamented, the other day, that the parties before him had not asked for a jury. Well, of course, it does make things easier for a judge. He has to give reasons for his decisions, a jury needn't. But the eneral public, at least those who ave had. any experience of "going to law," will probably agree with Mr. Justice Riddel of Ontario, quoted in the report of the American Bar Association's President. He tells us that the French Canadians are amazed that people so practical as the English can leave the decision of their cases to the kind of people who usually compose juries, and according to Mr. Justice Riddel the jury, in French Canada, appears to be on its way to taking place with the dodo as a fabulous monster now extinct. "The saving of time—and wind," he says, is enormous. One can easily believe it. The underlying principle of the jury is, presumably, that of safety in numbers, for one thing, where evidence confitets; and for another 3o rests on the idea that law and equity are, contrary to the popular belief, a matter of common sense. But weighing evidence is a pretty ticklish job, and one trained mina is at least as good at it as twelve untrained and probably better. Not only in French Canada are men growing doubtful of the merits vf jury trial,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.