HIGH COURT OF MADRAS. 



115 



Council for the settlement of their disputes about eighteen 

 months previous to the arrival of the new Charter. The 

 expediency of such an institution ceasing, its functions also 

 ceased ; the Grovernment returning to such suitors as had 

 causes depending in it at the time the fee they had been 

 obliged to advance for the purpose of carrying them on, and 

 leaving it to them to renew them as they might be advised 

 under the new Charter. The papers of the Cutcherry were 

 deposited by the Grovernment with the Recorder. 76 The 

 Mayor's Court having consisted of a Mayor and nine Alder- 

 men, the Court of the Recorder was composed of the Mayor 

 and three of the Aldermen, the Recorder presiding. His 

 presence was made generally essential to the exercise of the 

 Court's jurisdiction, but with a power of delegating his 

 authority to the other members of the Court in his absence. 

 The Recorder, either with the Mayor or with any one of the 

 Aldermen, constituted a Court for every purpose of the Char- 

 ter. The jurisdictions created by it were similar to those of 

 the Supreme Court at Calcutta, and the details very much the 

 same. In settling the appointments of the Court, it was 

 determined not to have Pundits or Moulavies as referees 

 in Native Law, but to trust rather to other sources of inform- 

 ation as questions in either Code might arise. The same 

 course in this respect was followed in the Supreme Court, 77 

 but in the Court of Sudder and Foujdary Adawlut and the 

 Courts subordinate thereto, which were established about the 

 same time for the administration of justice in the Mofussil, 

 Mahomedan and Hindu Law Officers were until 1864 

 required to attend to expound the law of their respective 



76 llth October 1799. Correspondence, vol. i, pp. 167, 168. A search 

 was made lately for these papers among the records of the High Court, but 

 they were not found. 



77 Preface to Sir Thomas Strange' s Notes of Cases at Madras. 



