London Legal Letter.

er lay dead in a room in the court, from an apoplectic attack, it is surmised. Had he lived he would have had to undergo his sen tence forthwith, as there is here no appeal in criminal cases, and thus there is avoided the years of delay which might have been se cured elsewhere by successive appeals and révisais and demands for new trial. The pathos of the tragedy is further illus trated by the circumstance that the attorney general who had refused to prosecute Whit aker Wright justified his position before Parliament a few days after the trial had been concluded. He contended that accord ing to the provisions of the statute upon which the prisoner was indicted there must not only have been misrepresentation in a balance sheet or other document issued by the officials of a company, but that the mis representation must have been with the intent to deceive or defraud shareholders or creditors or to induce persons to entrust or advance property to the company, and that as in this case the false balance sheet was issued solely with intent to better the com pany and its shareholders, the offence was not one within the meaning of the act. He quoted an authority which, strange to say, was not brought to the attention of the learned judge who tried Whitaker Wright. It was that of Lord Chief Justice Cockburn, who in a similar case directed a jury that they could not convict unless they were sat isfied that the acts charged were done with the fraudulent purpose of defrauding the shareholders and the creditors of the com pany. Had the dicta been quoted at the recent trial it is not improbable that it would have had a very different result. Comparisons are often made between the fees of counsel in England and America, and with unsatisfactory results as it is difficult to find any relative standard by which to meas ure upon the result. In this country a firm lawyers would take entire charge of such a

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case as Whitaker Wright's and have the sole conduct of it from start to finish, and would probably charge a fee to cover the entire work performed based in some meas ure upon the result. In this country a firm of solicitors is employed to prepare the case for trial, but upon each hearing before the magistrate and at the trial counsel are re tained, the solicitors usually briefing the ablest and most skilful their clients means will afford. In the Whitaker Wright trial thousands of pounds were doubtless spent by both sides in getting the case ready. Part of this money was "out of pockets for the services of accountants and scriveners, but profit costs of the solicitors must have been very large. It is commonly reported that Mr. Rufus Isaacs, К. С., who with Mr. Avery, K. C, and Mr. Emery Stephenson conducted the prosecution, had 500 guineas, say $2,500 marked upon his brief, with a daily refresher of 100 guineas, which would make his compensation for the actual court work $8,500. In the usual course Mr. Avery would receive a fee of two-thirds the amount of Mr. Rufus Isaac's fee, and Mr. Stephenson's fee would amount to two-thirds of Mr. Avery's fee. If this system was followed, and there is no reason to believe it was not, Mr. Avery received $5,600 and Mr. Stephenson $3,600, or a total of approximately $18,000 for- the three counsels. Mr. Ranson Walker is said to have had no less than 3000 guineas marked on his brief for the defence, but this was, to at least 2000 guineas, a special*' fee and his associates would not, therefore, receive the same proportional amounts. However, it is not improbable that the defendants counsels were paid some thing more, and probably considerably more, than $25,000 for their services. These fig ures are given simply for comparative pur poses. STUFF GOWN.