36$ Timehri. 



schemes of colonization, irrigation and drainage have materialized, 

 and as His Excellency no doubt is considering at the moment as 

 a supplement to his present project, or even as its accompaniment, 

 the colony by acting as a united community, by taking the necessary 

 risks, and even by facing large initial financial sacrifices, will secure 

 the full realization of its legitimate ambitions. No doubt those to 

 whom His Majesty has entrusted the privilege of advising him will 

 give him experienced and cautious counsel. These ambitions are 

 beyond the possibilities of even the largest and richest of the West 

 Indian islands. 



While emphasizing our distinct interests and referring to the neces- 

 sity for attending to them without reliance on anybody but ourselves, I 

 think the fate of British Guiana will always be bound up with that of 

 the British West Indian islands and that every effort should be made to 

 promote co-operation and closer union. The Conferences on Agricul- 

 tural, Quarantine, Customs and other questions have shown what can be 

 done without political union. Political union is distant but I do not see 

 why it can be called wholl}' unrealizable. West Indian particularism is 

 vanishing and in the past has owed a great deal to the particularism of 

 the various administrators quite as much perhaps as to the short- 

 sighted jealousies of the little island communities. The creation of a 

 West Indian Chamber of Commerce for which Mr. Davson has laboured 

 so energetically and successfully will do still more to call attention to 

 this essential identity. Only with some megaphone of central authority 

 can we make ourselves heard above the roar of the modern commercial 

 world. 



The Common Court ok Appeal. 



The West Indian Appeal Court if created and the abolition of 

 Roman-Dutch law will do their part. The fact that bench, bar, and 

 business community nowadays combine to forget the existence of 

 Roman-Dutch law since the retirement of the older school of Judges 

 (many of whom like Sir Henry Bovell had given serious study to 

 our Common Law) does not render the continuance of its debris 

 any the less a menace and a danger. The system is anomalous and 

 a colony where one law exists and another law is administered by 

 tacit consent can hardly be said to be equipped for modern commercial 

 requirements. It certainly is not fitted for intercolonial or international 

 trade. Nothing scares off a capitalist or investor more than any uncer- 

 tainty as to the law. Local merchants take the precaution of staying out 

 of litigation. Only last month English law was introduced as regards 

 sale of goods. The Explanatory Memorandum set out in some detail the 

 radical alterations which it effected, but the Ordinance hardly created a 

 ripple on the surface of commercial life. Its effect had been anticipated 

 by the practice of merchants, who however do not wish a succession of 

 cases like Synada Bee v. Craigcn to call attention to the necessity for 

 reform. The uncertainty and confusion of the law cannot be evaded by 

 our pretending that the common law is English or that piecemeal attempts 

 to alter it have not had the most curious consequences. 



