des many most important subjects--the laws of inheritance, for
example, and the land laws, which are determined by the native customs,
and which, for obvious reasons, we cannot touch. When two or three gaps
to which he pointed (the law of 'Torts,' for example) had been filled,
we should have as much codification as 'would be required for a length
of time.' The Statute Law of India would then be comprised in four or
five octavo volumes, and the essential part of it in five or six Acts,
which might be learnt in a year of moderate industry. A young civilian
who knew the Penal Code, the Succession Act, the Contract Act, the two
Procedure Codes, the Evidence Acts, the Limitation Act, and the Land
Revenue Acts of his province would know more than nineteen barristers
out of twenty when they are called to the bar; and all this would go
into a moderately sized octavo volume. His successor, he thought, would
be able to accomplish all that was required. He observes, however,
emphatically, that a process of re-enactment would be always required.
It is necessary to keep laws steadily up to date, having regard to
decisions of the courts upon new cases, and to any legislative changes.
No important Act should be left without amendments for more than ten or
twelve years. A constant process of repairing is as necessary to a
system of legislation as it is to the maintenance of a railway.

I am, as I have already said, incompetent to form any opinion as to the
intrinsic value of these codes. One able critic, Sir C. P. Ilbert, in
the 'Law Quarterly,' observes that their real merit is that they were
'suitable and sufficient for the needs which they were intended to meet.
What was urgently needed for India was a guide for the judge or
magistrate who has had no legal training, who derives little or no
assistance from the bar, and who has to work at a distance from a law
library.' Fitzjames's legislation, he thinks, was 'admirably adapted'
for advancing the previous Indian system a step further; although his
codes might not meet the requirements of the present generation of
English lawyers. Sir C. P. Ilbert, I may add, speaks very strongly of
the 'educational value' of the Contract Act in particular, as shown by
his experience of Indian Civil Service examinations. He thinks that
Fitzjames's other writings and codes have a similar merit. A gentleman
of high judicial position and very great Indian experience has expressed
to me his high admiration