RHODESIA is administered by the British South Africa Company. A Royal Charter was granted to this company on the 29th of October 1889, the principal commercial objects being the extension northwards of the railway and telegraph systems of Cape Colony, the encouragement of emigration and colonisation, the promotion of trade and commerce, and the development and working of mineral and other concessions. The capital of the company was originally £1,000,000 ; in 1893 it was increased to ,P2,000,000 ; in 1895 to £2,500,000 ; and in 1896 to £3,500,000. On the 24th of April 1898 it was authorised to be increased to .P5,000,000, and the authorised capital stood in 1909 at £9,000,000, of which £6,000,000 has been issued. Since then, by January 1910, about £3,000,000 were issued. The estimated revenue, accruing chiefly from mining, trading, and professional licenses, stand-holdings, and postal and telegraph services, amounts for 1909-10, on balance with the expenditure, to .P591,000. The river Zambezi divides Rhodesia into Northern and Southern, which include Matabeleland and Mashonaland. There are also North-Western and North-Eastern Rhodesia. See SOUTH AFRICAN SECURITIES.
years to which a person may have attained is often a point i of importance considering such person's legal rights and obligations. For example, he or she is an infant until the age of twenty-one years has been attained, and cannot until then, generally speaking, acquire rights or incur obligations under contract. For most civil purposes the full age of both man and woman is twenty-one years. At this period, other things equal, they may enter into possession of their real and personal estates, manage and dispose of them at their discretion, and make contracts and engagements. Unless he is of full age a man cannot sit in the House of Lords, nor be a member of the House of Commons, nor be admitted into any of the learned professions. Ile cannot be ordained as a priest until twenty-four, nor be a bishop until thirty years of age. An infant cannot make a valid will. An infant can be a witness in a court of law when he can appreciate the nature of an oath and his moral responsibility. Though an infant cannot contract to bind himself, he may be an agent and enter into contracts on behalf of others. So may an infant be appointed executor, but he cannot act until he has attained full age. An infant who has not completed thirteen years is bound to be in receipt of education.
There are also Acts of Parliament protecting children from being allowed to work in the streets or in factories under certain ages. So also does the law specially protect women in a varying degree according to their age. As to matrimony, a woman may consent to marriage at
twelve, and a man at fourteen years of age ; though parties under the age of twenty-one years cannot actually marry (except in Scotland) with out the consent of their parents or guardians. With respect to criminal offences the law regards fourteen years as the age at which a person is competent to distinguish between right and wrong. Under the age of seven years a child is not in any case responsible by law for an offence committed by hint; but above that age and under the age of fourteen, if it clearly appears that a child is conscious of the nature and wicked ness of the crime he commits, he may be tried and punished for it. In cases relating to dealing with settled property it is often an essential question whether et- not a particular woman is past child-bearing. A married woman of forty-nine, a widow of fifty-five, and a spinster ortifty three, have each been held to be past that period. But a woman aged fifty four, who had been married only three years, was not so presumed. A man above the age of sixty may be excused front serving on a jury.
is a branch of law of most far-reaching interest to business men, who have always at some time or other during their career to carry on commercial transactions either through an agent of their own or with the agent of another. Equally in the simplest and the most com plicated of affitirs, the most trivial and time most important, do we find the agent, as necessary as nbicititous, and recognised and accepted by all. There are almost as many varieties of agents as there are classes of employment, yet employment is not the same thing as agency. Employment consists in the putting of another to do a certain act for the employer. Agency is some thing more : it is an employment to do something in the place of the em ployer, so as to place the employer, who is called the principal. in legal relationship with others, who are styled third parties. Amongst the different classes of agents are auctioneers, stockbrokers, factors, insurance brokers ; each of which and others will be treated of elsewhere separately. Though, necessarily, there are these many kinds of agents, yet for 014 pur poses of a general treatment of the subject, they may be divided into three great classes :—(1) Special: those whose duties are limited to a specific act, e.g. to buy a particular thing ; (l) General: those who may do any acts within certain limits, e.g. an agent to manage a business; (3) Universal: those whose authority is unlimited, and may do anything on behalf of their principal.