156 msronr or PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND.

possible, by any proceeding in law or equity, to give efl'ect to the wish of the Prince Edward Island legislature, by enabling the proprietors or tenants to show cause why Her Majesty’s assent should or should not be given to the pro— posed bill for giving efi'ect to the award of the commissioners. In their replies to the questions put, the law otlicers of the Crown, Sir \Villiam Atherton and Sir Roundell Palmer, said that they did not consider the term “ award" applicable with any propriety to the report of the commissioners of inquiry. ‘VThere was no reference or submission, properly so-eallcd. The gentlemen who signed the letter to the duke, dated the thirteenth of February, 1860, were incompetent to bind the general body of proprietors of land in Prince Ed- ward Island, and had not attempted or professed to do so. And on the other hand, it was clear that they (lid not pro- pose or intend by that letter to bind themselves individually, unless the general body of proprietors would he also hountl. The writer has put some of the words of the law otiicers of the Crown in italics, in order that the reader may specially mark them as bearing upon subsequent remarks which he intends to offer. The law officers were further of opinion, upon the snbstancevof the case, that the commissioners had not executed the authority which alone was proposed to be conferred upon them on the part of' the landowners who signed the letter of the thirteenth February, 1860; and that a recommendation that the price to be paid by a tenant for the purchase of his land should be settled, in each particular instance in which the landlord and tenant might differ about the same, by arbitration, was not, either literally or sub- :stantially, within the scope of' that authority. The law officers of the Crown thus fortified the position taken by the Duke of Newcastle and the proprietors, in reference to the award of the commissioners.