AT annapolis before revolution 41

to examine as well the record and process aforsaid as the mat-
ters aforesaid above for errors assigned, and that the judgment
aforesaid may in all things be affirmed &c.

Then, after a time, and often after a very long
time, would come the hearing and the decision.
The judges voted separately, sometimes announc-
ing reasons, but usually not doing so; and they
noted dissents as judges still do. The Governor
voted last. They often took time for reflection
and consultation, and in such cases the entry was
made: curia advisari vult; and this caused a con-
tinuance to the next term of court. The formal
judgment rendered consisted of a written recital
of the steps in the presentation of the case for de-
cision, concluding with a statement of the decision
in about the form already quoted from Chew v.
Tench. The form given in the appendix of 3
Blackstone's Commentaries is the same, and dis-
penses with any need of repeating here. There
were never any written opinions or statements of
reasons for decision. Perhaps lay judges would
not have filed any if it had been customary for
professional judges in England to do so; but it was
not customary even with the professional judges.
Both in England and America, as will be seen,
written opinions were developments of the last few
years of the eighteenth century and the first of the
nineteenth.

There was no new trial given in case a judgment
for a plaintiff was reversed; a new suit was his
only recourse. But the Court of Appeals when
the case permitted entered the judgment which
they found should have been entered by the court
below and would order execution issued. The