cells. 4
Printed exclusively for the use of the Colonial Office.
No16
CONFIDENTIAL.
The Judgment of the Master of the Rolls in the case of the Bishop of Natal v. Glad-
stone.
TITT
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
C.O.885
Reference -
3PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
THIS is a suit instituted by John William Colenso, claiming to be Bishop of Natal, against the trustees of the Colonial Bishoprics' Fund, praying that the annual income of the fund appropriated for the endowment of the Bishopric of Natal may be paid to him. The Defendants do not deny that the Plaintiff is in some sense Bishop of Natal: the defence is, in substance, that no legal diocese of Natal has been created, that the title of Bishop of Natal conferred on the Plaintiff is little more than nominal, that the funds entrusted to the Defendants were subscribed for the endowment of a bishopric
in Natal, in which the Bishop was to preside over an Episcopal Church identical with the United Church of England and Ireland, and where the Bishop had legal jurisdiction according to the prin- ciples of the English ecclesiastical law. They contend that this object has wholly failed, for that by recent decisions of the Privy Council it has been esta- blished that the person on whom has been conferred · · the title of Bishop of Natal can exercise none of
these functions. Such is a short outline of the defence pleaded by the Defendants.
It will be necessary for me, in order to arrive at
a satisfactory determination in this case, to consider,
in the first place, what the duties and functions of a Bishop of the Church of England are.
In the second place, to what extent the Letters- Patent of the Crown have failed in enabling the Plaintiff to perform these duties and to exercise these functions within the Colony of Natal, having
B [99]