216 Timehri. 
the anglicizing tendency has been such that the joke goes that the arrival of a 
judge long versed in and wedded to the Roman-Dutch jurisprudence caused sach 
dismay that urgent measures were taken to remove him by rapid promotion to 
another colony. In South Africa, too, the difference of opinion which arose in 
1904 between the Cape and Transvaal Supreme Courts on the all-important ques- 
tion of causa (oorzak) or consideration in contract shows the inconvenience 
and danger to commerce arising from a system differing so radically from ‘has 
o! English law. In Tembu v. Webster the Supreme Court presided over by Sir 
Henry de Villiers, now Lord Villiers of Wynberg (from that delightful home where 
| have had the honour of his hospitality in past days), followed a series of 
decisions of the Cape Supreme Court beginning with Alexander v. Pe ry in 1874. 
Tt held that causa or oorzak was virtually equivalent to the English valuable cor- 
sideration necessary to a simple contract, 7.e., one not solemnly entered into under 
seal. The Transvaal Supreme Court presided over by Sir James Rose Innes had 
already held in the same year that the causa which would support a contract in 
Roman-Dutch law need not be the valuable consideration of English law but that 
any serious promise to perform an act would constitute a binding agreement. 
In British Guiana a similar view was held in De Cairos v. Gaspar and in Ceylon in 
Lipton v. Buchanan. Here then at the very basis of all commercial transactions 
we find the Roman-Dutch fortress divided. Lord de Villiers’ Court is in a 
minority but nobody will question the eminence of that great jurist and his 
dominant position as the doyen of the administrators of the Roman-Dutch 
jurisprudence. 
APPEALS AND FEDERATION. 
If the upholders of the Transvaal views are right, and the views of the able 
Chief Justice of the Transvaal are supported by the majority we are separated 
in this colony by a great gulf from the English principles of contract. Moreover | 
as the Full Court hears all matters of more than $2,500 in value there is_ 
virtually no appeal except to the Privy Council. Almost as urgent as the pro- 
vision of such an Appeal Court is the reconstruction or abolition of the Full 
Court with the grant of the full jurisdiction of a Supreme Court Judg¢ 
to its individual members, reduced by the present system of limited juris 
diction to a wholly unnecessary inferiority of status. If Roman-Dutei 
law were abolished the creation of a special Appeal Court for the Weft 
Indies and Guiana would be vastly facilitated. The Federation of thoe 
countries would be considerably advanced. My suggestion is that the Con- 
mercial’ Committee should consider the matter and invite the opinions of 
the legal fraternity. In this respect the views of the learned Chief Justce 
Sir Henry Bovell, a careful and conservative student of both bodies of 
jurisprudence, should be sought through the Executive and carefully weigled. 
Upon the necessity for removing the débris of this once magnificent strucure 
raised by the jurists of Holland there is virtual unanimity among the lealers 
of the profession in both its practising branches. Perhaps my friend, Mr. J. A. 
V. Abraham, stands alone in having a good word to say for it and evel he 
admits that it is only a magnificent ruin. 
| 
