on Law, as contained in
judicial decisions from the time of Edward II (1307), filled about
twelve hundred more. The work of examining, digesting, and
consolidating this enormous mass of legislative and legal lore was
taken in hand (1863) and has been slowly progressing ever since.

The Judicature Acts (1873, 1877) united the chief courts in a single
High Court of Justice. This reform did away with much confusion and
expense. But the most striking changes for the better were those made
in the Court of Chancery (S147) and the criminal courts.

In 1825 the property belonging to suitors in the former court amounted
to nearly forty millions of pounds.[1] The simplest case might require
a dozen years for its settlement, while difficult ones consumed a
lifetime, or more, and were handed down from father to son,--a legacy
of baffled hopes, of increasing expense, of mental suffering worse
than that of hereditary disease.

[1] See Walpole's "History of England," Vol. III.

Much has been done to remedy these evils, which Dickens set forth with
such power in his novel of "Bleak House." At one time the prospect of
reform seemed so utterly hopeless that it was customary for a prize
fighter, when he had got his opponent's neck twisted under his arm,
and held him absolutely helpless, to declare that he had his head "in
chancery"!

611. Reforms in Criminal Courts and in the Treatment of the Insane.

In criminal courts an equal reform was effected, and men accused of
burglary and murder are now allowed to have counsel to defend them,
and the right of appeal is secured; whereas, up to the era of
Victoria, they were obliged to plead their own cases as best they
might against skilled public prosecutors, who used every resource
known to the law to convict them.

Great changes for the better have also taken place in the treatment of
the insane. Until near the close of the eighteenth century this
unfortunate class was quite generally regarded as possessed by demons,
and dealt with accordingly. William Tuke, a member of the Society of
Friends, inaugurated a better system (1792); but the old method
continued for many years longer. In fact, we have the highest
authority for saying that down to a pretty late period in the
nineteenth century the inmates of many asylums were worse off than the
most desperate criminals.

They were shut up in dark, and often filthy, cells, where "they were
chained to the wall, flogged, starved, and no