and this name of the court has ever since re mained. In 1842, the office was made elective, the effect being to supplant those persons who were lawyers with others not trained to the law. The jurisdiction of the Probate Court in Maine was conf1ded, under the charter of 1 69 1, to the governor and council, who ap pointed probate judges in each county. Prior to this the recorder of the province, who was generally the clerk of the County Court, recorded wills and administrations with the records of that court. The records of York County show, as early as 1635, how the juris diction was exercised from the first incep tion of the government in Maine. In June, 1635, the inventory of the "estate of Richard Williams, servant to Mr. Matthew Craddock," was taken and confirmed by de position in 1660. The conflict of jurisdiction, which harassed the province after the revolution of 1642 in England until the charter of 1691, was made the ground for acts of confirmation. Accordingly we find, in May, 1648, a decree passed confirming to Payton Cooke the administration granted him by the court in 1640, held under Gorges' authority. In March, 1784, after the Constitution of 1780, the legislature passed the first probate act, establishing a Probate Court in each county. The judge and register were appointed by the governor and council, and an appeal was allowed to the Supreme Court. For nearly a century, beginning with Joshua Scottow in 1687 to Jonathan Sayward 1775, there were only nine judges of this court in the Province of Maine. Scottow was both register and judge, and one register, Joseph Hammond, became judge after five years' service. After the separation from Massachusetts, this court was continued by the act of March 20, 1 82 1. The judges had the same tenure of office as the judges of common law courts, — for life, but were paid, as also were the re gisters, by fees assessed upon the business of their courts. In 1826 the fee table was
abolished, and fixed salaries — an excellent provision — established in their place. In 1839, the life tenure was abridged to seven years, and in 1855, both judges and re gisters were made elective by the people every four years. This court remains substantially in the same form and with the same powers as thus established -r with, however, the added duties of a court of insolvency, taking the place of a bankrupt court since the repeal of the United States bankrupt law. IV. The Supreme Judicial Court of Maine was organized in 1820 by the appointment of one chief-justice, Prentiss Mellen, and Na than Weston and Wm. P. Preble, associate justices. Their tenure of office was during good behavior, but not to exceed seventy years in age. The nisi prius system was retained until 1847, when an additional jus tice, Wells, was appointed. Chief-Justice Mellen presided until 1834, when, having at tained the age of seventy, he became consti tutionally disqualified, and was succeeded by Nathan Weston, with Parris and Emery, associates. A constitutional amendment having been adopted in 1839, limiting the judicial tenure to seven years, he retired in 1 841, when he was succeeded by Ezekiel Whitman, who resigned in 1848. In 1852 an important change, quite radi cal, was made in the judicial system of the State. The District Court, created in 1839, was abolished, as before stated, and the busi ness of that court was transferred to the Supreme Court, then increased to seven judges. The change thus introduced, with the addition of another justice, is the system which now prevails. Chief Justice Whitman's successor was Ether Shepley, an associate justice, who re tired at the end of seven years, in 1855, and was succeeded by John Searle Tenney, who also served one term, until 1862, and Chief-
