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1. In deducing this history the student must not expect authorities to be constantly cited; as practical knowledge is not so much to be learned from any books of law, as from experience and attendance on the courts. The compiler must therefore be frequently obliged to rely upon his own observations; which in general he has been studious to avoid, where those of any other might be had. To accompany and illustrate these remarks, such gentlemen as are designed for the possession will find it necessary to peruse the books of entries, ancient and modern; which are transcripts of proceedings that have been had in some particular actions. A book or two of technical learning will also be found very convenient; from which a man of a liberal education and tolerable understanding may glean pro re nata [for that occasion] as much as is sufficient for his purpose. These books of practice, as they are called, are all pretty much on a level, in point of composition and solid instruction; so that that which bears the latest edition is usually the best. But Gilbert's history and practice of the court of common pleas is a book of a very different stamp: and though (like the rest of his posthumous works) it has suffered most grossly by ignorant or careless transcribers, yet it has traced out the reason of many parts of our modern practice, from the feudal institutions and the primitive construction of our courts, in a most clear and ingenious manner.
2. Finch. L. 237.
3. Flet. l. 2. c. 34.
4. Mirr. c. 2. § 5.
5. Finch. L. 257.
6. Append. No. III. § 1.
7. Append. No. II. § 1.
8. Finch. L. 189. 252.
9. Stiernh. de jure Gothor. l. 3. c. 7.
10. Mod. Un. Hist. xxii. 45.
11. Jan. Angl. l. 2. § 9.
12. Spelman of the terms.
13. c. 3. de temporibus et diebus pacis [concerning the times and days of peace].
14. c. 3. § 8.
15. c. 53.
16. See pag. 58.
17. c. 5. § 108.
18. Registr. 19. Salk. 627. 6 Mod. 250.
19. 1 Jon. 156. Swann & Broome. B. R. Mich. 5. Geo. III. et in Dom. Proc. 1766.
20. Feud. l. 2. t. 22.
21. de mor. Germ. c. 11.
22. Stiernh. de jure Goth. l. 1. c. 6.