1,     *'
HOX. FEANOOIS XAVIER MARTIN.
33
protection of wives, incautiously engaged for the contracts of their husbands, rests upon a Roman Senatus Consultum—their ultimate rights in the property acquired during the marriage, upon the customs of the erratic tribes that overrun Gaul, and were carried by the Visigoths across the Pyrenees. The wisdom of Alphonso is found infused into many of the institutions which owe their origin to Alfred the Great. The common law has paid back a part of what it had borrowed from the Itoman Jurisprudence. The commercial law, standing out almost independently of the Code, rests in a great rnea-
more imperfect than the Code, it was far superior to anything that any two individuals could have produced early enough to answer the expectations of those who employed them."
Judge Martin says—" The Fue.ro Viejo, Fuero Jnzgo, Partidas, Recopilaciones, Leyes de las Indias, Autos Jlcordados, and Royal Schedules remained part of the written law of the territory, when not repealed expressly, or by a necessary implication."    And he adds :—
" Of thes» musty laws the copies were extremely rare; a complete collection of them was in the hands of no one, and of very many of them not a single copy existed in the province."
" To explain them, Spanish commentators were consulted, and the Corpus Juris Civilis, and its own commentators were resorted to, and to eke out any deficiency, the lawyers, who came from France or Hispaniola, read Pothier D'Jlguesseau, Dumaulin," &c.
The result of the labors of Messrs. Brown and Moreau Lislet was a Digest, containing upwards of 500 pages, printed in English and French, and divided into three books, of which the first treats of persons; the second of things or estates ; and the third of the different manner of acquiring the property of things. Each book is subdivided into titles, and each title into chapters and articles. This Digest is the groundwork of the Civil Code actually in force in Louisiana, from which it does not differ very essentially.
Louisiana having become a State in 1812, organized in 1813 a Supreme Court, composed of three judges, which, in conformity with the 2d section of the 4th article of the Constitution of the State, had " appellate jurisdiction only, which iuri^dictioyi ^Jiall extend to (ill civil cases wlien the matter in disoutc shall exceed the sum of three hundred dollars." It is from this period that the jurisprudence of the State began to assume some definite form, and to extend itself so as to embrace the numerous controversies which soon arose among an intelligent, commercial, and litigious population.
The Supreme Court thus formed and constituted, had most arduous and difficult duties to perform—duties which required, besides the patience, learning and integrity always requisite to discharge the functions of a judge, incessant an-1 laborious researches into the ancient jurisprudence of Rome, France and Spain, joined to a thorough knowledge of constitutional law, and an intimate acquaintance with the habits and wants of the people, on whom the decisions were to operate.
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