SHERIFF (SCOTLAND). In Scotland the duties of the sheriff are not, as in England, almost entirely executive. He exercises an extensive judicial authority, and a large portion of the general litiga tion of the country proceeds before this class of local judges. In earlier times his authority appears to have been merely of an executive cha racter, and, appointed by the crown, he was the person to whom the royal writs, issuing from the supreme courts, were usually directed. Ile was the ordinary conservator of the peace within the local limits of his authority. He was an important fiscal officer, having in the general case the duty of levying the feudal casualties, forfeitures, and other items of revenue ; and by statute he was vested with the power of mustering the military force of the country to the weapon-showing. In very early times, hil tenure of office appears to have been limited by the grant ; at a period comparatively later, the office became, in the general case, hereditary. The act for abolishing heritable jurisdictions in Scotland (20 Geo. II., c. 43), was passed for the purpose of abolish ing all those remnants of the feudal courts of Scotland which were hereditary, or in any other shape of the nature of property ; of bring ing all judicial offices within the appointment of the crown, and their holders under responsibility to the public. By the same statute, the sheriff is authorised to appoint one or more substitutes ; and at the present day there is a substitute in every county, and in the larger counties there are two or more. Both, the sheriff and his substitute are Lawyers, but the latter is the local resident judge, the former generally frequenting the courts in Edinburgh, where he hears appeals from his substitute, and making occasional visits to his county. By the Jurisdiction Act it was provided that each sheriff should reside in his county during four months in each year ; this provision fell into desuetude, until by the 1 & 2 Vict. c. 119, it was enacted that each sheriff should remain in attendance ou the court of session, but should hold eight courts in his county during the year. The sheriffs of
Edinburgh and Lanark are exempted from attendance on the court of session, in the understanding that the business of their respective courts is sufficient fully to occupy their time.
In civil questions an appeal lies from the sheriff-substitute to the sheriff, but wherever the former is a sound lawyer and an indus trious man, the privilege is seldom used. From the state in which the profession of the bar of Scotland has been for many years past, several of its members have been induced to accept the office of sheriff substitute as vacancies have occurred. Formerly the office fell to country practitioners, who, not quite contented with the emoluments, eked them out by private practice ; a state of matters seriously detri mental to the equal administration of justice. In some instances, even retired officers in the army or unprofessional country gentlemen were the best qualified persons who would uudertake the office. No sheriff substitute can now act as a law-agent, conveyancer, or banker; he is not removable, except with the consent of the lord president and lord justice clerk of the court of session, and must not be absent from his county more than six weeks in one year, or more than two weeks at a time, unless he obtain the consent of the sheriff who must then act personally or appoint another substitute. In one or two instances, as in that of Kirkcudbright, the person who exercises the function of sheriff is called the Stewart. This designation owes its origin to certain peculiarities of territorial tenure which cannot be briefly ex plained and are subject to doubt and dispute. After the Reformation, the sheriffs were generally appointed commissaries of the local com missariat districts which most nearly conformed with their respective jurisdictions, and in 1823 (4 Geo. IV. c. 97) the commissariat functions were appointed to be merged in those of the sheriff.