634 THE CHANCELLOR'S CASE.—1 BLAND.

To have accepted the amount, which the treasurer proposed to
pay, under the Act of 1792, ch. 76, would have been a total aban-
donment of the ground taken by the Senate; and it might have
been construed into a clear admission by the Chancellor, that the
House of Delegates, or the Legislature could, constitutionally,
diminish the Chancellor's salary at their pleasure. Such an aban-
donment he could not make—and he felt himself forbidden from
making any such admissions. He deemed it a sacred respect he
owed to the Senate, a co-ordinate branch of the "trustees of the
public," not to abandon the ground they had taken in his behalf;
and, he held it to be a proper regard to himself, and a solemn duty
he owed to the Constitution, not to make any such admissions; or
to suffer any act of his to influence or embarrass the consideration
or determination of this, the most important question, that has
ever yet been presented to the General Assembly of Maryland.

It is not in Chancery as at common law, where the Court's docket
exhibits a complete list, and a full account of all its business. A
Court of Chancery does not, like a Court of law, move forward
all its business from term to term, from stage to stage, and peri-
odically; it is continually open; always accessible; and may be, at
any time, engaged in business; it has no recesses, no resting places.
There are many cases in Chancery, which, although soon brought
to a termination, in relation to the immediate object for which they
were instituted; yet, as to other purposes may be * opened
678 and reopened; and, from the nature of things, and to
answer the purposes of justice, must be kept open and depending
for many years. The adjustments under the late Spanish treaty -
called up, and recently gave rise to much litigation, in cases that
had slumbered for nearly thirty years; and, in which the parties,
or their survivors had been dispersed over half the Union.

The labours of the Chancellor are not, like those of a Judge of
a Court of common law, spread out and displayed before the pub-
lic, by calling in witnesses and jurymen to be present and to par-
take in them. The whole weight of his duties fall upon himself,
and upon himself alone. The anomalies and the intricacies in the
administration of justice are. poured out upon him; and he is left
unaided and alone to ascertain the course which justice requires to
be pursued, according to the established principles of equity as
they arise out of the complicated facts of each case. The Chan-
cery is the great property Court of the State. And a vast propor-
tion of the individual rights to the soil of Maryland are only to-
be found in that Court. Perhaps, it would not be hazarding too
bold an assertion to say, that one-half of all the titles to lands in
Maryland, when traced from the present holder to their origin,
will be found to have some one or other of the links, in the chain
of title, resting in the Court of Chancery, (w)

(w) It has been said, that most of the estates in England, once in thirty
years, pass through the Court of Chancery.—(16 Howell's State Tri. 417.)