Commissioners of Her Majesty's Treasury shall be a debt to Her Majesty, and in either case may be recovered accordingly. The Corrupt Practices Act, 1883 (46 & 47 Vict. c. 51), contains many provisions respecting corrupt and illegal practices at elections which are punishable upon summary conviction before the election court, and therefore do not come within scope of the present work. By a proviso to s. 43 in the case of corrupt practices the defendant has an option of being tried by a jury, and by sub-s. (5) he is then triable upon indictment, and it is presumed is liable to the punishments provided in s. 6. By the Ballot Act (35 & 36 Vict. c. 33, s. 25), and the Municipal Corporations Act (45 & 46 Vict. c. 50), Part IV., certain disqualifications and penalties are affixed to candidates and voters guilty of corrupt practices, which by the interpretation clause means bribery, treating, undue influence, or personation, as described in the Corrupt Practices Act, 1883; and by s. 78 of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882, a person guilty of a corrupt practice at a municipal election shall be liable to the like actions, prosecutions, penalties, forfeitures, and punishments as if the corrupt practice had been committed at a parliamentary election. The expenses of the prosecution are provided for in the case of municipal elections by s. 84 of the Municipal Corporations Act. In the Ballot Act there appears to be no provision for the expenses of prosecutions for corrupt practices other than personation (see post, "False Personation"); but the expenses of *prosecutions for corrupt practices under the 17 & 18 Vict. c. *348] 102, are provided for by sect. 10 of that Act. Bribery at elections for members of parliament is also an offence at common law, punishable by indictment or information, and it was held that the statute 2 Geo. 2, c. 24, which imposes a penalty upon such offence did not affect that mode of proceeding. R. v. Pitt, 3 Burr. 1339; 1 W. Bl. 380. The following cases were decided before the recent statutes. Where money is given it is bribery, although the party giving it take a note from the voter, giving a counter note, to deliver up the first note when the elector has voted. Sulston v. Norton, 3 Burr. 1235; 1 W. Bl. 317. So also a wager with a voter, that he will not vote for a particular person. Lofft, 552; Hawk. P. C. b. 1, c. 67, s. 10 (n). Where a voter received money after an election for having voted for a particular candidate, but no agreement for any such payment was made before the election, it was held not to be an offence within the 2 Geo. 2, c. 24, s. 7 (repealed). Lord Huntingtower v. Gardiner, 1 B. & C. 297, 8 E. C. L. As to the payment of the travelling expenses of voters, see 1 Russ. Cri. 321, 5th ed.; the cases there cited; Cooper v. Slade, 25 L. J., Q. B. 324; and 46 & 47 Vict. c. 51, ss. 13-23, 48. By the 31 & 32 Vict. c. 125, s. 17, on the trial of an election petition, unless the judge otherwise directs, evidence of corrupt practices may be given before proof of agency. Bribery in other cases. As to the offence of attempting to bribe officers of justice, see 1 Russ. Cr. 309, 5th ed.1 See also tit. "Offices," post. See also tit. "Elections," post. 26 & 27 Vict. c. 29, s. 6, enacts: "In any indictment or information for bribery or undue influence, and in any action or proceeding for any penalty for bribery, treating, or undue influence, it shall be sufficient to allege that the defendant was, at the election at or in connection with which the offence is intended to be alleged to have been committed, guilty of bribery, treating, or undue influence, as the case may require; and in any criminal or civil proceedings in relation to any such offence, the certificate of the returning officer in this behalf shall be sufficient evidence of the due holding of the election or of any person therein named having been a candidate thereat. See Reed v. Lamb, 6 H. & N. 75, a case decided before the passing of this Act; R. v. Varle, 6 Cox, C. C. 470, a case of an indictment for personating a voter at an election; and R. v. Clarke, 1 F. & F. 654. An indictment for attempting to bribe a juror is sustained by proof of an offer of services made to the juror. A writing containing the offer is admissible in evidence. Caruthers v. State, 74 Ala. 406. Where the grand jury has been improperly influenced, upon evidence thereof the indictment will be set aside. People v. Sellick, 4 N. Y. Crim. Rep. 329. Their affidavits that they were not influenced are inadmissible. Id. Indictment for not repairing. Upon an indictment for a nuisance to a public bridge, whether by obstructing or neglecting to repair it, the prosecutor must prove, first, that the bridge in question is a public bridge; and secondly, that it has been obstructed or permitted to be out of repair; and, in the latter case, the liability of the defendants to repair. Proof of the bridge being a public bridge. A distinction between a public and a private bridge is taken in the 2nd Institute, p. 701, and made to consist principally in a public bridge being built for the common good of all the subjects, as opposed to a bridge made for private purposes, and though the words "public bridges" do not occur in the 22 Hen. 8, c. 5 (called the statute of bridges), yet as that statute empowers the justices of the peace to inquire of "all manner of annoyances of bridges broken in the highways," and applies to bridges of that description, in all its subsequent provisions, it may be inferred that a bridge in a highway is a public bridge for all purposes of repair connected with that statute. 1 Russ. Cri. 530, 5th ed. A public bridge may be defined to be such a bridge as all His Majesty's subjects have used freely and without interruption, as of right, for a period of time competent to protect themselves, and all who should thereafter use them, from being considered as wrong-doers, in respect of such use, in any mode of proceeding, civil or criminal, in which the legality of such use may be questioned. Per Lord Ellenborough, R. v. Inhab. of Bucks, 12 East, 204. With regard to bridges newly erected, the general rule is, that if a man builds a bridge, and it becomes useful to the county in general, it shall be deemed a public bridge (but see the regulations prescribed by the 43 Geo. 3, c. 59, s. 5, post, p. 354), and the county shall repair it. But where a man *builds a bridge for his own private benefit, although the pub*350] lie may occasionally participate with him the use of it yet, in it does not become a public bridge. R. v. Inhab. of Bucks, 12 East, 203, 204. Though it is otherwise if the public have constantly used the bridge, and treated it as a public bridge. R. v. Inhab. of Glamorgan, 2 East, 356 (n). Where a miller, on deepening a ford through which there was a public highway, built a bridge over it which the public used, it was held that the county was bound to repair. R. v. Inhab. of Kent, 2 M. & S. 513. A question has sometimes arisen whether arches adjacent to a bridge, and under which there is passage for water in times of flood, are to be considered either as forming part of the bridge, or as being themselves independent bridges. Where arches of this kind existed more than 300 feet from a bridge, on an indictment against the county for non-repair of them, and a case reserved, the Court of King's Bench held that the county was not liable. R. v. Inhab. of Oxfordshire, 1 Barn. & Ald. 297 (n). The rule laid down by Lord Tenderden, C. J., in the latter case was, that the inhabitants of a county are bound, by common law, to repair bridges erected over such water only as answers the description of flumen vel cursus acqua, that is, water flowing in a channel between banks more or less defined, although such channel may be occasionally dry. But where a structure, called Swarkestone Bridge, was 1,275 yards long; at the eastern end were five arches under which the river Trent flowed; at the western end eight arches, under one of which a stream constantly flowed; the rest of the space consisted of a raised causeway, at different intervals, in which there were twenty-nine arches, under most of which there were pools of water at all times, and under all of which the water of the Trent flowed in time of flood. There was no interval of causeway between the arches of the length of 300 feet. The county of Derby had immemorially repaired the whole structure. On an indictment against the inhabitants of the county for the non-repair of the structure, describing the whole as a bridge, it was held that it was properly so described, and that the verdict was properly entered for the crown. R. v. Inhab. of Derbyshire, 2 Gal. & Dav. 97. Before the 43 Geo. 3, c. 59, a bridge had been built over a stream of water. The stream was never known to be dry, but in the winter its depth only averaged two and a half feet. It was a part of a sheet of water crossing low land, and at the place where the bridge crossed it, it was confined by embankments to prevent it from overflowing the adjoining meadows. Cresswell, J., left it to the jury, whether this structure was a bridge, for if so, their verdict must be for the crown. If it had been erected for the convenience of the public in passing over the stream of water, it was a county bridge, and rendered the county liable to repair it, though the bridge might not have been necessary for the convenience of the public when it was built. R. v. the Inhab. of Gloucestershire, Carr. & M. 506, 41 E. C. L. In the following case, a question arose whether a bridge for foot-passengers, which had been built adjoining to an old bridge, for carriages, was parcel of the latter. The carriage-bridge had been built before 1119, and certain abbey lands were charged with the repairs. The proprietors of those lands had always repaired the bridge so built. In 1765, the trustees of a turnpike road, with the consent of a certain number of the proprietors of the abbey lands, constructed a wooden foot-bridge along the outside of the parapet of the carriage-bridge, partly connected with it by brickwork and iron *pins, and partly resting on the stonework of the bridge. Held *351] that the foot-bridge was not parcel of the old carriage-bridge, but a distinct structure, and that the county was bound to repair it. R. v. Inhab. of Middlesex, 3 B. & Ad. 201, 23 E. C. L. Where the trustees under a turnpike act built a bridge across a stream where a culvert would be sufficient, yet if the bridge become upon the whole more convenient to the public, the county cannot refuse to repair it. R. v. Inhab. of Lancashire, 2 B. & Ad. 813, 22 E. C. L. Semble, that an arch of nine feet span without battlements at either end, over a stream usually about three feet deep, is a culvert, and not a bridge to be repaired by the county; and if the parish have pleaded guilty to a former indictment, which described it as part of the road, they are concluded by having so done. R. v. Whitney, 3 Ad. & E. 69, 30 E. C. L.; 7 Č. & P. 208, 32 E. C. L. But a foot-bridge consisting of three oak planks, about nine or ten feet long, and carrying a public footpath over a small stream, is not such a bridge as the county is bound to repair as a county bridge. R. v. Inhab. of Southampton, 21 L. J., M. C. 201. The public may enjoy a limited right only of passing over a bridge; as where a bridge was used at all times by the public, on foot, and with horses, but only occasionally with carriages, viz., when the ford below was unsafe to pass, and the bridge was sometimes barred against carriages by means of posts and a chain; it was held that this was a public bridge, with a right of passage limited in extent, yet absolute in right. R. v. Inhab. of Northampton, 2 M. & S. 262. A bar across a public bridge locked, except in time of flood, has been ruled to be conclusive evidence that the public have only a limited right to use the bridge at such times, and it is a variance to state that they have a right to use it "at their free will and pleasure." R. v. Marquis of Buckingham, 4 Camp. 189. But where a bridge passed over a ford, and was only used by the public in times of floods, which rendered the ford impassable, yet, as it was at all times open to the public, Abbott, C. J., ruled that the county was bound to repair. R. v. Ínhab. of Devon, Ry. & Moo, N. P. C. 144. Proof of the bridge being a public bridge-highway at each end. At common law the county is bound prima facie to repair the highway at each end of a public bridge, and by the statute 22 Hen. 8, c. 5, the length of the highway to be thus repaired is fixed at thirty feet. If indicted for the non-repair of such portion of the highway, they can only excuse themselves by pleading specially, as in the case of the bridge itself, that some other person is bound to repair by prescription, or by tenure. R. v. Inhab. of West Riding of York, 7 East, 588; 5 Taunt. 284. The inhabitants of Devon erected a new |