ADMIRALTY COURT. This court—whose functions are now exercised by the probate, divorce and admiralty division of the high court of justice, constituted in 1873-5—was created to try and decide maritime causes. Formerly, the maritime courts of England were divided into the instance court and the prize court—separate tribunals, though usually presided over by the same judge. In the prize court, the judges authority to hear and decide questions as to prizes of war was under a special and separate commission, issued at the commencement of each war; and the court itself existed only during the war, or until the litigations to which it had given rise were brought to a conclusion. In this respect it. differed from the instance court, which was a permanent institution. The jurisdiction in question of booty of war, and the distribution thereof, has now, however, been conferred on the A. C. itself, and the prize court and its jurisdiction and practice were regulated by 27 and 28 Viet. c. 25. By another statute, jurisdiction relating to the attack and capture of pirates is vested in the A. C. in this country, and in the vice-A, courts abroad (13 and 14 Vict. e. 26,.27). Whilst there was a lord high admiral, the judge of the A. C. usually pre sided in virtue of a patent from him; but since the office has been intrusted to com missioners, the judge holds a direct commission from the crown under the great seal. By 3 and 4 Viet. c. 63, s. 1, the dean of the arches is authorized to sit for the judge of the A. C. in certain cases; and all barristers and solicitors were admitted in 1859 to practice in both courts. The proceedings of the A. C., like those in ecclesiastical courts, were originally based on the civil law, and upon this account it was usually held at doctors' commons. But it is merely as the basis of the earlier mercantile codes, such as the Rhodian laws and those of Oleron, and by no means exclusively, that the civil law is of authority in these courts. Questions of the utmost nicety in the law of nations fall to be decided by maritime courts iu time of war; and it was as an A. judire that many of time most remarkable of lord Stowell's famous judgments were pronounced. The appeal from the A. C., which was originally to the king in chancery, and afterwards certain commissioners of appeals, chiefly of the privy council, and not of judges delegated by that body, is now to the court of appeal created by the judicature act of 1873-5. The jurisdiction of the vice-A, courts in the colonies and foreign dominions
of the queen has been extended and defined, and their procedure regulated by statutes of recent date. Appeals from these courts formerly lay to the A. C. in England, and were also competent to the queen in council; like those from the A. C. itself, they are now carried to the court of appeal, like all other matters. The civil jurisdiction of the A. courts was greatly extended by 3 and 4 Vict. c. 66, and later statutes to 27 and 28 Viet. c. 25. It now extends generally (and the county courts also exercise part of it) to disputes between part-owners of a ship, suits for mariners' and officers' wages, suits for pilotage, suits on bottoniry and respondeutia bonds, and relating to salvage, wreck, collision of ships, etc. County courts are expressly prohibited from entertaining ques tions of prize, questions arising under the act, for the suppression of the slave-trade, or questions of A. jurisdiction by way of appeal. In criminal matters, the A. C. formerly took cognizance of piracy and other offenses on the sea, or on the coasts beyond the limits of any county, and, concurrently with the common-law courts, of certain felonies committed in the main stream of great rivers below the bridges. The criminal jurisdic tion of the A. is regulated now by the criminal law consolidation acts generally. All offenses mentioned in those acts committed within the jurisdiction of the A. shall be dealt with, inquired of, tried and determined in any county or place in England or Ireland in which the offender shall be in custody, in the same manner in all respects as if had been actually committed in that county or place. Since the passing of these enact ments, the criminal jurisdiction of the A. C. may be regarded as obsolete. There is a separate court of A. in Ireland. The A. C. of Scotland has been abolished, and its ordinary jurisdiction transferred to the court of session, the court of justiciary and the sheriffs; questions of prizes, captures, condemnations, and the like, being vested exclu sively in the high court of A. in England.