Coke, Sir

EDWARD, an eminent English legist, and institutional writer, B. in Norfolk, 1552. He was called to the bar in 1578. Next year he began his career of fame and practice by being appointed recorder of Lyons Inn. He was appointed recorder of Norwich in 1586, and of London in 1592. He had not, however, held the office for a year, when he resigned it on being appointed solicitor-general. In 1594 he became attorney-general. He had in such difficult times much very serious and laborious busine to transact as a crown lawyer. He has been subject not unjustly to reproach for his overbearing and insulting demeanor to the unfortunate victims of the crown prosecutions, and especially towards Sir Walter Raleigh. He was a man of haughty manners, severe spirit, and irritable temper, and he had little toleration for anything standing in the path of what he deemed his duty. But his severity was not dictated by subserviency to the court, and no influence in the corrupt reign of James could prompt him to go out of the line of his duty. He was made chief-justice of the common pleas in 1606, and of the king's bench in 1613. After spending his old age in wealthy retirement, he died in 1633. His celebrated Institutes of the Laws of England, which grew out of a commentary on "Little ton's Treatise on Tenures," has made him the great oracle of English law. His expre ions, however antiquated they may appear, are deemed sacred, and are always embodied where their substance has not been superseded by changes of the law, in the works of subsequent commentators. Coker Creek, in Tenne ee, a village of Monroe co., 155 m. E.S.E. of Nashville. Col arco. [It.] ( Mus.) With the bow, in contra dist i no tion to pizzicato. Col'arin, n . ( Arch .) The small frieze of the capital of the Tuscan and Doric column, placed between the astragal and the annulets.