Directory_and_Chronicle_1892 — Page 313

RULES OF PROCEDURE TO BE OBSERVED IN HER MAJESTY'S

SUPREME COURT FOR CHINA AND JAPAN

IN ADMIRALTY.

Whereas it is of urgent necessity that Rules of Procedure in Admiralty causes should be framed for the guidance of suitors, and whereas, by virtue of provisions contained in 26 and 27 Vict., c. 24 (“An Act to facilitate the appointment of Vice- Admiral and officers in Vice-Admiralty Court in Her Majesty's possessions abroal,” &c., &c.), which provisions are, by the 54th section of the China and Japan Order in Council, 1865, extended to the Supreme Court in China and Japau, the sail Suprete Court, as a Vice-Admiralty Court, has jurisdiction in (amongst other things) the matters following:-

(1) Claims for Seamen's wages:

(2) Claims for Master's wages, and for his disbursements on account of the ship; (3) Claims in respect of pilotage;

(4) Claims in respect of salvage of any ship, or of life or goods therefrom; (5) Claims in respect of towage;

(6) Clains for dainage doue by any ship;

Claims in respect of bottomry or respondentia bonds;

(8) Claims in respect of any mortgage where the ship has been sold by decree

of the Vice-Admiralty Court, and the proceeds are under its control;

(9) Claims between the owners of any ship registered in the possession in which the Court is established, touching the ownership, possession, employment, or earnings of such ship;

(10) Claims for necessaries supplied, in the possession in which the Court is established, to any ship of which no owner or part owner is domiciled within the possession at the time of the necessaries being supplied; and (11) Claims in respect of the building, equipping, or repairing within any British possession of any ship of which no owner or part owner is domiciled within the possession at the time of the work being done;

It is ordered that, for the regulation of the practice and procedure to be observed in the Supreme Court as a Vice-Admiralty Court, the following Rules shall be established:

1. All proceedings in Admiralty must be so headed. Nors.—Proceedings "' in Admiralty " are either in rem or in personam.

Actions in personam shall be conducted in the same way as all other actions of a similar nature, according to the Rules of Procedure prevailing in the Supreme Court in matters of Law and Equity. The following outline of procedure will, therefore, be understood to refer only to actions

that is against the Res, in other words, the subject-matter of the action.

SE FER,

2. The name and nationality of the ship against which the proceedings are taken must appear, as also that of the master; and when the owners are known, their Dames and residences should likewise be given.

NOTH.-To give the Court jurisdiction in claims Nos, 10 and 11 (se above) the fact of the owners not being domiciled within the jurisdiction of the Court should be stated.

3. Any number of persons having common interest may join in one action accord ng to the practice of Admiralty Courts in England; and there may, in accordance with the same practice, be one action against several Rɩ s.

NOTE--Such consolidation of separate claims may likewise be ordered on the application of the defendant, or by the Court of its own motion.

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4.-Proceedings in rem must be commenced by an application for the arrest of the Res. This application must state the nature of the debt or claim and the amount