My dear Sir,—You are so tolerant of correspondents with grievances, that I venture to say a few more words, in reply to your note about Law Reform. In November next the Judicature Bill will come into operation. The preamble recites this incontestable fact, “that it is expedient to make provision for the better administration of justice in England.” Now, the two salient features of the incessant clamour for Law Reform are these—1st, an increased conviction of the sanctity of property; 2nd, a proportionate decrease in the estimate of human life. For years past the English people have spent incalculable money and talk in trying to induce Parliament to give them safe titles to their land, and sharp and instant means of getting in their debts: the Land Transfer Bill is in answer to this first demand, and the Judicature Bill to the second. Meanwhile the Criminal Code may shift for itself; and here we have, as the outcome of centuries of vulgar national flourish about Magna Charta, Habeas Corpus, and much else, the present infamous system of punishing crime by pecuniary penalties. Now the spirit of this evil system is simply this: “A crime is an offence against society. Making the criminal suffer pain won’t materially benefit society, but making him suffer in his pocket will;” and so society elects to be battered about, and variously maltreated, on a sliding scale of charges, adjusted more on medical than moral principles. No doubt it is very desirable to have a title-deed to your thousand acres, no bigger than the palm of your hand, to be able to put it in a box, and sit upon it, and defy all the lawyers in the land to pick a flaw in your title; quite a millenium-like state of things, but liable to be somewhat marred if your next door neighbour may knock you off your box, stab you with a small pocket-knife, and jump on your stomach, all with grievous damage to you, but comparative immunity to himself. We are one day to have cheap law, meanwhile we have such cheap crime that injuries to the person are now within the reach of all. I may be a villain of the first water, if I have a few spare pounds in my pocket. From a careful survey of lately reported cases, I find I can run away with my neighbour’s wife, seduce his daughter, half poison his household with adulterated food, and finally stab him with a pocket-knife, for rather less than £1000. Stabbing is so ridiculously cheap that I can indulge in it for a trifling penalty of £1. (See Southall’s case.) But woe be to me if I dare to encroach on my neighbour’s land, prejudice his trade, or touch his pocket; then the law has remedies, vast and many, and I shall not only incur pecuniary penalties that are to all effects and purpose limitless, but I shall be made to suffer in person also.