This collection of essays was written to mark the retirement of Francis Reynolds, Fellow and Tutor in Law at Worcester College, Oxford, and Professor of Law in the University of Oxford (my own tutor from 1972 until 1976). Francis Reynolds is also editor of the Law Quarterly Review , and has previously edited this Quarterly , which recently celebrated its quarter-centenary.

In the preface, the editor observes that the short title is something of a misnomer, since the book is “not concerned with the ancient body of law known as the lex mercatoria ”. Rather, the coverage is intended to reflect Francis Reynolds’ own interests, “English commercial law in an international context”, as is suggested more accurately by the full title. In brief, the book is effectively a collection of 17 articles, written by people who are among the most eminent in the field.

Most of the contributors are well-known to Francis Reynolds; no fewer than three names I recognize from my own student days (Sir Stephen Tomlinson, Richard Whish and Paul Craig), to whom also Francis Reynolds would have been tutor. Anthony Guest, Sir Guenter Treitel and Peter Ellinger contribute, as does Francis Reynolds, to Benjamin’s Sale of Goods, while Brian Davenport and Brian Coote have obviously been known to him for many decades.

Each contribution is self-contained, much as an article would be in this Quarterly , or indeed in the L.Q.R. No overall theme appears to have been editorially imposed, yet the book has a definite focus, all contributions being related, to a greater or lesser extent, to Professor Reynolds’ areas of interest. In the case of the first two contributions, the relationship is very direct; that of the late Brian Davenport, on the classification of contract terms, refers directly not only to Professor Reynolds’ first published article in (1963) 79 L.Q.R. 534 but also to his work as adviser to the Law Commission on its work on sale of goods, which led to the enactment of the Sale and Supply of Goods Act 1994, while Brian Coote’s chapter on deviation refers extensively to Francis Reynolds’ Butterworth Lecture on the subject in 1990. There then follow two contributions (by Lord Hobhouse and Hugo Tiberg) on agency, whose appropriateness is obvious in the light of Bowstead and Reynolds’ Law of Agency , 16th edn (1996). The link then becomes less obvious, but Chapters 5 to 8 (Nicholas Gaskell, Malcolm Clarke, Lindsey East and Stephen Tomlinson) all have a maritime flavour, whereas 9 and 10 (Jan Hellner and Peter Ellinger) could reasonably be classified as international trade. There follow four chapters (by Gerhard Dannemann, Adrian Briggs, Anthony Guest and Sir Roy Goode) on the conflict of laws, another of Francis Reynolds’ interests. The link in Richard Whish’s chapter, on EC and UK competition law, and Paul Craig’s, on contract, public law and accountability, is more tenuous, though both were tutored by Francis Reynolds, up to B.C.L. level. Finally, there is a chapter by Sir Guenter Treitel on the Contract (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999, but returning to a maritime theme, since it is written with particular reference to the law of carriage of goods by sea. (Since carriage by sea issues are often governed by the Carriage of Goods by Sea Act 1992, the chapter concentrates on areas where the 1992 Act may not apply but the 1999 Act might.)

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