CORRESPONDING SOCIETIES. ADH 
classes of society, much of the evil which the law is said to have engen- 
dered may be removed, and the way paved for an extension of the law 
more in consonance with modern feeling and enterprise ? 
With the view of showing that improvement might be accomplished 
by a more efficacious administration of the present law, and by employing 
to a greater extent the powers already possessed by the authorities, the 
following remarks are submitted for consideration. 
The natural feeling that the apprehension, or the detention, of derelict 
property carries with it the right to possess, has, in mature systems of 
jurisprudence, given place to the knowledge that the right to possess by 
no means follows upon a detention. In some instances only, as is well 
known, does legal ownership follow the mere fact of possession or 
detention. When however there is found property uncared for, and 
lacking visible guardianship, the natural feeling that ownership should 
follow upon possession asserts itself so strongly as sometimes to stifle 
conscience. Efforts to find an owner are, in consequence, relaxed, and 
the assurance assumed that the law, when indeed a thought is given to 
it in such a case, is on the side of the finder. 
In the case of gold and silver that have been put by with a view to 
reclamation and all knowledge of the deposit, or of the depositor, has 
vanished, the treasure accrues in jure regali to the Crown. When the 
Crown has transmitted its rights, treasure trove passes to the Crown’s 
assignee. 
By the law of treasure trove, then, the rights of the finder, whatever 
they may be, are postponed to those of the Crown, so that the law of first 
finding is ousted. 
As already mentioned, it is deplored by many that the Crown steps in 
and secures the result of a find. It is assumed that were this exception 
to the law of first finding removed, the finder would proportionately be 
benefited by not being deprived of what in justice, it is said, belongs to 
him, and that the risk of a consignment to the melting-pot of unique 
articles, ancient and modern, would be so lessened as practically to be 
non-existent. 
That the truth of this assumption is more than doubtful a cursory 
examination of the law of first finding will suftice to show. According to 
that law, the instances when the finder of derelict property becomes its 
owner by the mere fact of finding and taking possession are by no means 
common. Whether in the absence of all knowledge, actual or constructive, 
of the loser, a finder may assume the favoured position of owner depends 
largely upon the locality of the find and the position that the finder bears 
towards that locality. Probably the case which is most favourable to the 
finder is when the property has been lost on the highway or in a shop to 
which the public has had access. On the other hand, it is clear that those 
who are employed on private land cannot retain, as against the owner 
of the site, articles found during the course of their duties. 
Further it is highly improbable that a mere tenant could legall y hold 
finds from his landlord’s estate as against that landlord. We are also all 
conversant with the difficulties of settling the rights of a finder as regards 
property found in quasi-public places, such as promenade piers, tramcars, 
and the like ; for the fact of finding by no means concludes the matter. 
Tn the result it is unsafe to dogmatise upon the ownership of lost property 
when found by one to whom the owner is unknown or practically 
unknowable. A settlement of the question can only be had in this, as 
