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    "source_title": "Encyclopaedia Britannica (1911)",
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    "chunk_id": "1911:lawes:df7ad324c0d5",
    "title": "LAWES",
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    "verified_text": "lawes, sir john bennet, bart. (1814-1900), english agriculturist, was born at rothamsted on the 28th of december 1814. even before leaving oxford, where he matriculated in 1832, he had begun to interest himself in growing various medicinal plants on the rothamsted estates, which he inherited on his father's death in 1822. about 1837 he began to experiment on the effects of various manures on plants growing in pots, and a year or two later the experiments were extended to crops in the field. one immediate consequence was that in 1842 he patented a manure formed by treating phosphates with sulphuric acid, and thus initiated the artificial manure industry. in the succeeding year he enlisted the services of sir j. h. gilbert, with whom he carried on for more than half a century those experiments in raising crops and feeding animals which have rendered rothamsted famous in the eyes of scientific agriculturists all over the world (see agriculture). in 1854 he was elected a fellow of the royal society, which in 1867 bestowed a royal medal on lawes and gilbert jointly, and in 1882 he was created a baronet. in the year before his death, which happened on the 31st of august 1900, he took measures to ensure the continued existence of the rothamsted experimental farm by setting aside £100,000 for that purpose and constituting the lawes agricultural trust, composed of four members from the royal society, two from the royal agricultural society, one each from the chemical and linnaean societies, and the owner of rothamsted mansion-house for the time being. law merchant or lex mercatoria, originally a body of rules and principles relating to merchants and mercantile transactions, laid down by merchants themselves for the purpose of regulating their dealings. it was composed of such usages and customs as were common to merchants and traders in all parts of europe, varied slightly in different localities by special peculiarities. the law merchant owed its origin to the fact that the civil law was not sufficiently responsive to the growing demands of commerce, as well as to the fact that trade in pre-medieval times was practically in the hands of those who might be termed cosmopolitan merchants, who wanted a prompt and effective jurisdiction. it was administered for the most part in special courts, such as those of the gilds in italy, or the fair courts of germany and france, or as in england, in courts of the staple or piepowder (see also sea laws). the history of the law merchant in england is divided into three stages: the first prior to the time of coke, when it was a special kind of law--as distinct from the common law--administered in special courts for a special class of the community (i.e. the mercantile); the second stage was one of transition, the law merchant being administered in the common law courts, but as a body of customs, to be proved as a fact in each individual case of doubt; the third stage, which has continued to the present day, dates from the presidency over the king's bench of lord mansfield (q.v.), under whom it was moulded into the mercantile law of to-day. to the law merchant modern english law owes the fundamental principles in the law of partnership, negotiable instruments and trade marks. see g. malynes, _consuetudo vel lex mercatoria_ (london, 1622); w. mitchell, _the early history of the law merchant_ (cambridge, 1904); j. w. smith, _mercantile law_ (ed. hart and simey, 1905).",
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