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commission applicable only to Port Phillip; and Bates opened no court, civil or criminal. The Van Diemen's Land Courts existed under the same letters patent as those extant in New South Wales. The Criminal Court and the Civil Court of the continent might sit in the island, but never sat there. Litigants were compelled to seek justice in Sydney or go without it. Doubts were raised as to the power to establish courts in Van Diemen's Land at all. When the statute (27 Geo. III., cap. 2) was passed to enable the Crown to constitute a Court of Criminal Judicature at Sydney, Bass's Straits were unknown, and the power seemed limited to "the eastern coast of New South Wales or some one or other of the islands adjacent." Van Diemen's Land was not on the east coast, and was adjacent to the south coast. Necessity overruled doubt. A community in which a man could not be executed, could not be supposed to exist. Under a new Charter of Justice issued in 1814 provision was made for a Lt.-Governor's Court and a Deputy Judge-Advocate in the island; and Macquarie sent Abbott (late of the New South Wales Corps) to act in that capacity. He was empowered with two assessors chosen by the Governor to decide causes not exceeding £50, and until he arrived in 1815 there had been "no authority for the trial or determination of civil causes in the settlement."^[1] He opened his court in 1816. The limited jurisdiction was found inadequate. A voyage to Sydney was costly, and consumed time. Means of communication were rare. The scope of Abbott's court was, by common consent, extended. The colonists broke up their claims, and took several securities not exceeding £50. Though actions were thus multiplied they were decided on the spot. There was no appeal from Abbott's court, and he prided himself upon administering law according to what was right without care about technicality. He listened, however, with complacence, to professional men. We are told that his decisions generally commanded respect. He permitted convict attorneys to appear before him "merely in virtue of the authority given to them by their employers." "As late as November 1821 no free professional person had arrived at Hobart Town to