taken entirely from the ancient laws of Rome, and cannot be a subject of reproach to Greece for its harsh and unnatural provisions.

Table 5. Related to inheritances and guardianships, and prescribed successions and distributions.

Table 6. Referred to property and possession; and treated of conveyances of estates and merchandize.

Table 7. Related to trespasses and damages, in which were included injuries to the person or property of another, slanders and murders.

Table 8. Under the title of estates in the country, embraced chiefly disputes about property in the country, and damages.

Table 9. Related to the common rights of the people, such as forbidding privileges, restoring the rights of persons pardoned, bribery, etc.

Table 10. Related to the regulation of funerals and ceremonies to the dead.

Table 11. Treated of the worship of the gods and religion.

Table 12. Of marriages and the rights of husbands.

The laws of the twelve tables were soon found inadequate to the wants of the increasing populace of Rome. Forms were wanted through which to enforce the rights secured, and interpretations were necessary to explain the text. The first evil was remedied by solemn formulæ, prescribed by authority, and designated actions of the law. The second was obviated by the expositions of numerous jurisconsults. The decemvirs were first applied to for these explanations; subsequently the college of pontiffs; and lastly, all, believed capable, were permitted to expound the law, and increase the number of annotations upon its precise sentences. The authority of these interpretations, was determined by the majority of concurring opinions; and a long acquiescence in practice, gave them the force of laws. They thus became the source of the customs and usages of the Roman people.

These actions of the law, or solemn forms to enforce what the law itself prescribed, indifferently known as actus legitimi or legis actiones, embraced not only the means by which was prosecuted to judgment, a right, but every form of act known as legitimate,-whether made before the judge, as in the case of adoption and emancipation,-or where the pre

sence of a judicial officer was not necessary, as in the case of the alienation of land, hereditary accession, and the authorization of a tutor. These actions were rigid in form and terms; they were embraced in a single act and context; they were not permitted to be pursued by proxy; and received neither day or condition. The solemn forms which were required to legitimate these acts, arose from amidst the shadows of early society, when superstitious signs established both public and private obligations. Among these we may relate the following:-that, in espousals, the husband gave an iron ring, as evidence of his control over the person of the wife; a symbol followed to the present day, and varied only in the metal ;-that, on receiving his wife in his mansion, he presented to her fire and water; two of the most essential necessaries of life, indicative of her household duties; that he also presented her the keys of his mansion, which were reclaimed on her repudiation;-that the concontract of gage or pugnus, was made by seizing the fist; and the mandate, by giving the right hand ;---that hereditary succession was made to operate by cracking the fingers; prescription, from possession, interrupted by breaking a branch of a tree; and a small stone thrown against a rock, promising detriment, to oppose its continuation.

These curious forms were locked up from the people, until published by C. Flavius, and from him called the Flavian law. In the language of a civilian, the twelve tables were the theory of the law; the book of actions, its practice.

Subsequently, Elius Sextus collected in a book, called Tripartitorum libro, the texts of the twelve tables, the interpretations connected with them, and the ancient and new actions of the law. This collection was known as the Elian law. Next in order to the laws we have considered, stood the New Laws, by which designation was understood all laws. established under the emperors or the republic, after the adoption of the twelve tables. These were inclusive of the laws made by the people, the senatus consulti, and the constitutions.

The laws made by the people were such as were passed by the centuries, after a decree of the senate; and such as were enacted by the people, without the authority of a senatus consultum. The most important of these laws, were:

The law Attilia, concerning the nomination of tutors by the prætor and tribunes.

The law Lætoria, in favor of minors of the age of twenty-five.

The law Attinia, which prevented usucaption in a thing stolen.

The law Scribonia, which prohibited usucaption of servitudes, (or ownership,) of property situated in the city. The law Cincia, of donations.

The laws Furia and Voconia, upon wills.

The law Glicia, which permitted a will disinheriting an heir without cause, to be attacked: called inofficious, unkind wills.

The law Hostilia, which permitted the action of theft to be prosecuted in the name of those who were prisoners of war, absent on public affairs, or under the care of tutors.

The law Aquilia, relating to the reparation of injuries. The laws Titia and Publicia, which forbad playing for

money.

The law Cornelia, upon the crime of forgery, and against assassins and poisoners.

The law Pompeia, against parricides.

The law Fabia, on stealers of slaves or of free persons. The law Remmia, which prescribed the penalty for slanderers.

The law Papia, regulating marriages.

The law Julia, embracing a great number of regulations. The law Elia Lentia, containing provisions as to the manumission of slaves.

The law Furia, or Furia Caninia, prescribing the number of slaves to be manumitted by law.

The law Falcidia, upon the subject of legacies.

The law Junia Norbana, concerning the formalities in the manumission of slaves.

The Senatus Consulta, were decrees of the senate, sometimes rendered in the exercise of a republican authority, and sometimes a form under which were masked the worst tyrannies of the prince. Those embracing the most essential provisions, and bearing upon the subject in hand, were:

The Senatus Consulta Claudiana, under the reign of Claudius, upon guardianship bestowed by the consuls; upon guardianship cessible to women; condemning to slavery a free woman, for cohabiting with a slave against the consent of the master; and regulating the division of freedmen.

The Senatus Consult Tribellian, upon the successions of fidei commissarius.

The Senatus Consult Pisonean, or Neronian, which subjected the family to torture where the head of it had been assassinated.

The Senatus Consult Turpillian, against accusers who prosecuted collusively or without effect. All these were enacted under Nero.

The Senatus Consult Macedonian, which forbade loans to the sons of families.

The Senatus Consult Pegasian, under Vespasian, preserving to heirs the fourth of the estate, in cases of fidei com. missarius.

The Senatus Consult Junianum of Domitian, to prevent collusion between a master and his slave, by which the latter should appear free.

The Senatus Consult Rubrian of Trajan, prescribing the time within which the heir should free a slave, whom the testator had ordered to be affranchised.

The Senatus Consult Articuleian, under the same emperor, concerning the same affranchisements.

The Senatus Consulta of Hadrian, concerning the petition. of heirship; the things adjoining edifices.

The Senatus Consult Libonian, enacted under Tiberius, avoiding benefits, secured by the writers of wills, to themselves.

The Senatus Consult Tertullian, enacted under Hadrian or Antoninus Pius, (it is disputed which,) giving mothers the succession of their children.

The Senatus Consult Apronian, upon the successions of fidei commissarius. Reputed both to the Antonines and Hadrian.

The Senatus Consult Orphitian, of M. Aurelius, or M. Antoninus, giving infants the successions of their mothers. A Senatus Consulta forbidding marriages between the

tutors or curators.

A Senatus Consulta regulating marriages of senators.-These two last supposed to have been enacted by M. Antoninus.

A Senatus Consulta of Severus, forbidding the alienation of a minor's lands without judicial authority.

A Senatus Consulta of A. C. Caracalla, confirming between husband and wife, donations not revoked before death.

The Senatus Consult Vellianum, probably of Claudius, making void all interventions of women.

The Senatus Consult Plancianum, assigned to Vespasian, where, if one undertook to perform a tacitum fidei commissum, he lost the quarter or fourth.

We proceed to consider the Constitutions of the Empe

rors.

The Constitutions, properly so called, were the declarations of the emperors, made either by decree, edict or epistle. They exercised legislative, administrative or judicial powers. A decree was the determination made of a matter in dispute between parties; the edict was a general law, binding every one; and rescriptæ, which embraced epistles and subscriptions, were answers to public or private consultations. These constitutions were collected in the form of codes. The Gregorian, containing the constitutions of the Pagan emperors, from Septimus Severus or Hadrian to Diocletian and Maximin, and containing thirteen books, divided into titles. The Hermogenian, a supplement to the Gregorian, in perhaps one book quoted by titles; and supposed to contain constitutions of Diocletian and Maximinian, of Valens, Valentinian II., and Constantine the Great. The Theodosian, containing the constitutions of the Christian emperors, from Constantine to Theodosius, and composed of sixteen books, divided into titles and sections. The Justinian, of which there were two,-the old and new. The old code was compiled under the authority of Justinian, upon the plan of the twelve tables, in twelve books, and embraced, in one code, the Gregorian, Hermogenian and Theodosian codes, and the constitutions of Theodosius not embraced in his code, those of his successors, and of Justinian himself. The new code, called the second, was rendered necessary by the improvements in the law following the preparation of the Pandects. It was divided into twelve books, separated into titles.

Another source of the civil law, was the edicts of the prætors and other magistrates. The edicts were often termed Jus Honorarium; and were considered as including the rules of law prescribed by the Prætor Urbanus, and the Prætor Peregrinus. It is necessary here to trace out the origin and authority, or jurisdiction, of these offices.

Like most nations of ancient times, judicial power was, as we have before said, exercised by the kings of Rome, to