154 



THE PREDECESSORS OF THE 



required from time to time by their sufficient warrant to be 

 filed of Record in the Supreme Court to name and appoint 

 some sufficient person resident in the town of Madraspatnam 

 to be the Attorney of the East India Company, upon whom 

 process against the Company might be served, and in default 

 of such appointment the Court was authorised to name an 

 Attorney for the Company, upon whom process should be 

 served. It would appear from this to have been intended 

 that the Government Solicitor should be appointed by the 

 Local G-overnment, but the appointment was always made by 

 the Court of Directors up to 1858, and since then has been 

 made by the Secretary of State in Council, the right of the 

 Court of Directors to make the appointment having been 

 recognised and confirmed by the Statute 53 Geo. Ill, c. 155, 

 s. 81. A warrant of Attorney was until lately given by the 

 Governor in Council to the gentleman appointed by the 

 Court of Directors, and was filed by him in Court ; but this 

 practice has now been discontinued, it probably being consi- 

 dered unnecessary after it had been enacted by Act II of 

 1855, s. 8, that all appointments appearing in the Government 

 Gazette might be proved by the production of the Gazette. 



The Supreme Court continued for some time to occupy the 

 same building in the Fort as that in which the Court of the 

 Recorder had been held, but in 1817 it was removed to the 

 premises in Bentinck's buildings next to Messrs. Arbuthnot 

 & Co.'s offices and then known as the old Marine Tard. In 

 1836 it was again moved into the eastern half or front part 

 of the building now occupied by the High Court and Small 

 Cause Court, and which had been built for the Board of Trade 

 not long before the East India Company was deprived of its 

 trading powers by the Charter Act of 1833 (3 and 4 "Will. IV, 

 c. 85). The western half was occupied by the Commissariat 

 chiefly as wine godowns until 1850, when the southern end 

 was allotted to the Court of Small Causes and the northern 



