added (at p. 52): ‘From this it follows that the Placaats of [September 26] 1658 (2 G. P. B. 2515) and [February 24] 1696 (4 G. P. B. 465) and others in pari materia, merely renewing the earlier Placaats are likewise of no application at the present day.’ On the other hand, in De Vries v. Alexander (1880) Foord at p. 47, de Villiers C. J., referring to Herbert v. Anderson said: ‘The Court could only have intended to confine their decision to those portions of the Edicts (of 1515 and 1580) which are of a fiscal or of a purely local nature. So far as they had been incorporated in the general law of Holland, and were not inapplicable here, they were equally incorporated in the law of this Colony.’ Applying this principle, the learned Judge held that the 9th Art. of the Placaat of September 26, 1658, formed part of the law of Cape Colony.
In British Guiana the question arose in 1905 as to the validity of a gift by will to a Roman Catholic bishop: (a) for offering masses for the soul of testatrix; (b) for the benefit of Roman Catholic churches. The full Court (Bovell C.J., Lucie Smith, and Hewick JJ.) held that the Acts of: (1) October 28, 1446; (2) July 6, 1515; (3) March 20, 1524; (4) October 16, 1531; (5) May 4, 1655; (6) October 14, 1655; have never been part of the law of these Colonies (De Freitas v. Exor. of Jardim (1905) Brit. Gui. Off. Gaz., vol. xxii, p. 1193). [For Cape law herein see Act No. 11, 1868.] On the other hand, the Placaat of September 26, 1658, has been held to be in force in British Guiana (Liquidator of the Brit. Gui. Ice Co. v. Birch (1909) Brit. Gui. Off. Gaz., vol. xx, p. 3). ‘There was nothing in the original circumstances of this Colony which would show that this part of the Roman-Dutch Law was unnecessary, unsuitable, or inapplicable, or that cases could not reasonably be expected to arise in which the Placaat or any riiles founded thereon would be appropriate. … It is obvious that the mere non-existence of any concrete case to which the law could be applied at the date of the Colony's foundation would not be a sufficient reason for holding that the Placaat and rules based thereon were not introduced here, as similar reasoning would prove the non-introduction of some of the most elementary laws for the preservation of life and property’ (Bovell C.J., Hewick, and Earnshaw JJ.).
For Ceylon Law see Karonchihamy v. Angohamy (1904)
