A.—4,

4

sonable that the rule was discharged. I then asked the Court to declare that it had amounted to an injunction while it lasted, in which case the three months' limitation in the Statute would not'have run during that period. The Court refused to do anything of the kind, stating that the arbitrator's hands had never been tied, and that, whatever evil consequences might result to Mr. Sclmltz from not proceeding with the award, it was my duty to have avoided those consequences by advising him correctly as to the meaning of the order. Charge 11.—That <:the Court tied up another client who had obtained a verdict of a jury^in'his favour until his opponent had time to issue, and did issue, a writ in a cross-action for matter decided by that verdict, and until that opponent got judgment against him, and he finally became a bankrupt." This occurred in the cases of Peters v. Joseph and Joseph v. Peters. I may add that in a previous case (that of Pole v. Tonks) the Chief Justice was guilty of causing similar hindrances tojMr.JPole, until Tonks was enabled to make away with his property, and the successful plaintiff, Pole, became a bankrupt. I charge that the Chief Justice so acted with the object of depriving Pole of the fruits of his verdict; and the same Judge afterwards upheld a fraudulent deed of Tonks', contrary to such clear principles of law that I cannot but believe that he was actuated by corrupt motives. Charge 12.—That, when Judge Bichmond found that a person really, though not ostensibly, a defendant, had sat on a jury to decide in his own cause, he refused to set aside the verdict, although that verdict was based upon a quibble, and was manifestly against the moral right and equity of the case. This was the case of Leach v. Johnston, in which Mr. Charles Johnston, who was interested in the property the right of possession of which was in dispute, and who would have to contribute to any costs and damages recovered, sat on the jury. The conduct of Mr. Justice Eiehmond throughout that trial, and afterwards, on the motion to'set aside the verdict, was such as, in my opinion, affords proof that he was acting corruptly, and not from mere error of judgment. The juryman referred to, and a fellow-juryman, acting by his direction, next day following the verdict, induced the plaintiff, an illiterate woman over seventy years of age, to sign an agreement by which she settled (as she thought) the action for £400, and on certain other terms. All this was shown to Judge Eiehmond, on the motion I made to set aside the verdict, and prevent the defendant from entering up judgment against her in the teeth of his own agreement to pay her £400. But Mr. Eiehmond not only refused to set aside the verdict, but did so without a word of reprobation for such conduct, leaving the poor woman a helpless victim in the hands of a judgment creditor who, on his own acknowledgment, is really her debtor for £400. I am prepared to prove all these charges, and I shall also be prepared to show, by numerous examples, the systematic misconduct of the Judges towards my clients, and that they have abused their powers with the evident purpose of driving me from the profession. To enable me to do this, however, it will be necessary to include in the investigation the conduct of the Bcgistrar and Deputy Begistrar of the Court, whose acts towards me can only be accounted for by assuming them to have taken no step but in concert with the Judges, and in some instances under their direct orders. I have, &c., The Hon. the Colonial Secretary. George Elliott Barton. (Enclosure.) [From The Kern Zealander, May 29, 1878.] PETEES V. JOSEPH. TO TIIE EDITOR OF " THE NEW ZEALANDER." Sir, —Mr. Peters' bankruptcy having terminated his litigation, leaves me at liberty to review the Chief Justice's judgment, published last week. Were I addressing an audience of lawyers, instead of the general public, I could prove the Chief Justice's judgment to be as unsound in law as it is in morality. But I shall not here discuss it from a lawyer's point of view, but on broad principles of justice and common sense, so that every man who can discern right from wrong may judge for himself. Those who have read the argument you so fully reported last week will no doubt have noticed that whenever I attempted to inform the Court of the facts elicited at the trial, the Chief Justice hurriedly stopped me. I now find, to my surprise, that in his judgment on Friday he makes the freest use himself of the materials he shut me out from using. He appears to have ransacked Mr. Jusiico Bichmond's notes of the trial to support his argument in this carefully-worded and twice-reserved judgment, and he also uses the evidence of a witness whom the jury must have entirely discredited. He says : " The debt, as found by the jury, was £908 ; while the value of the goods seized was, on the evidence of one of the plaintiff's witnesses, £514. His (plaintiff's) own evidence, put the value higher, but less than the debt secured." Now, there is no rule of law better.established than that which declares the evidence not credited by the jury shall not be afterwards credited b}' a Judge. According to the passage quoted above the Judge credits a witness who swore that Peters' whole stock-in-trade only amounted to £514. The public will be surprised when I inform them that the testimony of the plaintiff himself placed the value of his stock at £1200 at the least, and although much of it was damaged and broken in removal, and sold as it lay in undistinguishable heaps, it fetched, at what may be called a slaughter sale, £452 14s. 4d. The public will also bo surprised to learn that the learned Judge hag not even correctly ascertained the amount of the debt, when he states it at £908. All the jury found respecting the debt was that at the time Joseph and Co. seized Peters' goods the debt they were then entitled" to demand amounted to