of loss, which is the present condition of the Publication. These few, out of many assignable reasons, will shew that the slow progress and the actual discontinuance of the Old Series of the Reports was not the effect of mere indolence or caprice. How then will the Editor account for the appearance of a New Series of a publication under such auspices? He will not attempt it. He can only remind the objector, that habit is the tyrant of the mind; that even despair does not quit without reluctance a post long occupied with hope; that there is some unseen link of undefinable attachment binding the labourer to the ungrateful soil on which his best years have been wasted-which arrests and fetters the person in despite of the judgment: if it should be called by the unfriendly name of infatuation, it might be difficult to find a defence against the charge. Upon the question of the merits and demerits of the occupation to which the Editor has sacrificed more than half the average period of life, he has stated all that the limits of a Preface admit in that which is prefixed to the PREFACE. former series of the Reports. He has there also assigned his reasons for the suspension of the Publication through the first eight years, during which he was attending the House of Lords as a collector of notes. With respect to this new Series, it is proper to inform the Profession of an alteration which has taken place in the plan of the Publication. The body and substance of the work will consist of English and Irish cases. The Scotch cases, or such of them as deserve the attention of the Profession in England, will be shortly abstracted in an Appendix. Originally it was the Editor's intention, in order to form a perfect Record of Cases in the House of Lords, to notice every appeal and writ of error; even those which are brought obviously for mere delay. The execution of that purpose, to a certain extent, will be seen in the volume which now issues from the press. Whether this plan will be pursued in the succeeding volumes, or upon what plan (if continued) the work will be carried on, must depend upon future events and the suffrages of the Profession. |