DEFECTIVE TICKET CARRIERS OF PASSENGERS EJECTION-FORM OF ACTION.-A passenger paid the price of a railroad excursion ticket from Detroit to Quebec and return, and accepted from the company's agent, without reading it, what the latter represented to be such a ticket. The agent however inadvertently stamped upon the return coupon the word "Detroit" above the word "Quebec," instead of vice versa, as was necessary to make it valid. On the homeward journey the conductor refused to receive the ticket, notwithstanding the passenger's explanation, and the latter, having no means to pay the cash fare, was put off at a way station, and suffered much humiliation and inconvenience. Held, that he was not restricted to assumpsit for the breach of contract, but might sue the company in tort for damages. The relation of carrier and passenger subsisted between the parties, and the carrier had entered upon the performance of his contract. The plaintiff had paid the fare demanded, and it was the legal duty of defendant, not only to carry him to Quebec and back to Detroit, but to furnish the plaintiff with a proper ticket, which would evidence the holder's right to transport and protect him against an apparently justifiable evasion of that right by the conductor of the train. Whether or not the plaintiff may be held to have been negligent in failing to detect the error in the ticket is not an inquiry here, in the face of the allegation in the declaration, which the demurrer admits, that the eviction of 'plaintiff was not due to any negligence on his part." The actual contract between the parties was that pleaded, viz., for his carriage from Detroit to Quebec and return. The primary wrong done to plaintiff was the negligent failure to provide him with a proper ticket evidencing the real contract. As between the conductor and the passenger, the ticket has been held to be conclusive evidence of the rights of the passenger. Frederick v. Railroad Co., 37 Mich. 342; Hufford v. Railway Co., 53 id. 118. Yet as between the company and the passenger, the ordinary ticket is not regarded as conclusive evidence of the contract, but as a mere token or voucher to the carrier's servants, who have the conduct of the train, that the holder has paid his fare. Quinby v. Vanderbilt, 17 N. Y. 306; Rawson v. Railroad Co., 48 id. 212; Van Buskirk v. Roberts, 31 id. 661; Henderson v. Stevenson, L. R., 2 H. L. Sc. 470; Railroad Co. v. Harris, 12 Wall. 65; Peterson v. Railroad Co., 80 Iowa, 92, 97. While the defect of the ticket presented exempts the conductor from an action for expelling the passenger, or at least from exemplary damages, when he acts in good faith, and without unnecessary force, it does not protect the company or its passenger agent from an action for a breach of the contract which the agent was authorized to make and did make with the passenger. Railroad Co. v. Pierce, 47 Mich. 277; Murdock v. Railroad Co., 137 Mass. 293; Hufford v. Railway Co., 53 Mich. 118; 64 id. 631; Railroad Co. v. Carr, 71 Md. 135. The passenge: agent was the company's alter ego for the purpose of making the contract of carriage, and for his mistake or negligence in the line of his duty his principal must respond. Mechanics' Bank v. Bank of Columbia, 5 Wheat. 326; Bank v. Stewart, 114 U. S. 228; Railroad Co. v. Rice, 64 Md. 63; Cooley Torts, p. 538; Wood Mast. & S., p. 640. There was a clear violation of the duty of the carrier to the passenger-an invasion, to the latter's damage, of the right which he had purchased-in negligently subjecting him to the indignity, delay and discomfort which on the facts al leged followed his expulsion. Railroad Co. v. Carr, 71 Md. 141. For these no recovery could be had in an action of assumpsit. Goddard v. Railroad Co., 57 Me. 202; Walsh v. Railroad Co., 42 Wis. 23. When the relation of carrier and passenger is once formed, the law annexes to the contract of the carrier certain duties. For the non-performance the passenger may bring an action of tort. The class of cases in which action on the case lies is well stated by Littledale, J., in Burnett v. Lynch, 5 Baru. & C. 609. It is well settled that, when the gist of the action is a tort that arises out of a contract, plaintiff may declare in tort or contract, at his election. The contract in such cases is laid merely as inducement, and as the foundation of the duty in respect to which plaintiff is said to be in default. 1 Chit. Pl. 152, 397; Emigh v. Railroad Co., 4 Biss. 114; Railroad Co. v. Constable, 39 Md. 149; Saltonstall v. Stockton, Taney, 11, 18. 'Wherever," says Lord Campbell, "there is a contract, and something to be done in the course of the employment which is the subject of that contract, if there is a breach of duty in the course of that employment, the plaintiff may either recover in tort or in contract." Brown v. Boorman, 11 Clark & F. 43, affirming 3 Adol. & E. (N. S.) 845. The great weight of later authority also affirms the propriety of this form of action in suits against carriers and bailees. It was adopted in all the Michigan cases cited supra, and in Thomas v. Railroad Co., 72 Mich. 355, in which plaintiff sued for ejection from a train. It is said indeed in Frederick v. Railroad Co., cited supra, that "if the company has, through mistake of its agent, given the passenger the wrong ticket, so that he has been compelled to relinquish his seat, or pay his fare a second time in order to obtain it, he would have a remedy against the company for a breach of contract." But this does not mean, as is evident from the context and the concurring opinious of the judges, that his only remedy is an action of assumpsit. The cases of Railroad Co. v. Griffin, 68 Ill. 499, and Yorton v. Railway Co., 54 Wis. 234, while denying the plaintiff's right to recover the damages claimed for expulsion from a train, are consistent with the right to sue in tort therefor. In the first the plaintiff was, as here, inadvertently given the wrong ticket, which the conductor rejected and demanded his fare. "It was the passenger's duty," says the court, "to pay the fare demanded, and if the company fails to make suitable reparation, he can maintain his appropriate action.” So far as the latter case implies that the expulsion is not the proximate cause of the damages here sought to be recovered, it is not sustained by later authorities. The relation between the tort and its consequences is generally a question of fact, and not of law. Railroad Co. v. Kellogg, 94 U. S. 474. In Yorton v. Railroad Co., supra, the report shows that plaintiff refused to pay his fare, though he had the means, and brought upon himself the illness of which he complained by his own foolish and perverse conduct. That case came again before the court, and is reported in 62 Wisconsin, 367, and the language relied upon in the first opinion is largely qualified. The case of MacKay v. Railroad Co. (W. Va.), 11 S. E. Rep. 737, holds squarely that when the agent has delivered to the passenger a ticket not answering for the trip. which the conductor refuses to recognize, and in default of payment of fare the passenger is put off, the negligence of the agent and the expulsion of the pas senger without unnecessary force will not be a ground of action against the company as for tort. Bradshaw v. Railroad Co., 135 Mass. 407, also holds that an action for tort does not lie for expelling from the car a passenger to whom the company was bound, by an implied contract, to give the proper ticket, but that he must sue in assumpsit. These are the only cases in my knowledge holding this doctrine. They are overborne by the great weight of authority to the contrary. The case of Murdock v. Railroad Co., 137 Mass. 293, where as here the agent represented the validity of a ticket which the regulations of the company forbade the conductor to accept, and he put off the passenger, holds the company liable in tort for the expulsion, and prac tically overrules the case of Bradshaw v. Railroad Co., supra. There is nothing in the cases of Mosher v. Railroad Co., 127 U. S. 390, and Boylan v. Railroad Co., 132 id. 146, to the contrary of what is here decided. There is an obvious and recognized difference between the expulsion from a conveyance of a person who is unprovided with a ticket, and refuses to pay the lawful fare, and that of a passenger who was lawfully on the train or other conveyance, under contract with the carrier. The first has no right of transportation, and his removal from the train in a proper manner and place is not actionable. If the second, for any reason chargeable to the fault of the carrier or its agents, is expelled by the conductor or other servant of the carrier, his clear legal right has been invaded to his damage, and without fault on his part he has suffered an indignity, and perhaps incurred a loss, for which some compensation should be made by the wrongdoer. When he can avoid expulsion by a payment of his fare a second time, it is generally and rightly held that he should submit to that course and reclaim his money from the carrier. This is a concession to the necessities of the carrier's business, because it is impossible, in the safe conduct and operation of ¡railroad trains especially, for a conductor to fully investigate and determine a passenger's right to transportation upon a ticket which he is not authorized to accept. There is no hardship in this requirement to one who has the means to take that course, and he may be rightfully denied damages for an injury he might thus easily have prevented, but where one has not the means at hand to pay a second time, to refer his expulsion, and its unavoidable consequences, to his impecuniosity, rather than to the fault of the carrier, is to punish the traveller who fails to anticipate and provide against a breach of the contract which he has no reason to expect. The recovery of the sum paid for fare and the expenses of detention are not adequate compensation for humiliating expulsion, the consequential delay and discomfort and the more serious consequences to health which often follow exposure to the weather, and for which the courts allow recovery. Yorton v. Railway Co., 62 Wis. 367; Railroad Co. v. Fix, 88 Ind. 381, 389; Craker v. Railroad Co., 36 Wis. 658. U. S. Circ. Ct., E. D. Mich., Oct. 13, 1891. Pouilin v. Canada Pac. Ry. Co. Opinion by Swan, J. 47 Fed. Rep. 858. necessary to the protection of the health, morals and safety of the public. The conduct of railroads is a highly dangerous business. More people are brought in contact with it than with any other dangerous agency. While necessary to the business of the country, and entitled to a proper protection under the law, yet its control by the law is highly essential to the safety and protection of the public, because so many persons come within reach of injury from it. In fact this control is at this time, when railroad transportation is almost the wonder of the day, absolutely neces sary to the safety and well-being of the public; and if those operating railroads cannot be made subject to laws relating specially to them, then the safety and rights of others will be largely at their mercy. If however a law like this one, which meets a particular and public necessity, cannot be upheld as falling within the exercise of the police power, yet there is another ground upon which, to our minds, it can clearly rest. As already said, this statute does not single out a particular individual or corporation, and subject him or it to special burdens or peculiar rules; nor does it do so as to some of those engaged in a particular business, as, for instance, the Chinese in the laundry business, and which the Supreme Court of the United States condemned in the case of Soon Hing v. Crowley, 113 U. S. 703; but it subjects all in a particular business to its provisions, just as a law relative to banks, and the conduct of banking, would subject all in that particular business to its terms. Legislation of like character is to be found upon the statute books of every State. It is said however that railroads are but a single kind of common carriers, and that this statute does not include those operating lines of stage-coaches, canals, etc. If this argument is to prevail, then legislative power to require railroads to fence their tracks, making them liable for the value, or double value, of all stock injured by their trains, and a variety of kindred legislation, which has been upheld by the courts upon the ground that it is necessary to the public safety, cannot be maintained. If it be said however that this legislation is by virtue of the police power, as is that requiring railroads to post their rates, number their cars, disuse steam in cities, ring their bells and blow their whistles at public crossings or in centers of population, under pain of a penalty or liability for injury to persons, yet here we have a business or agency possessing some rights not generally enjoyed by others; one CONSTITUTIONAL LAW-DEATH BY WRONGFUL ACT. peculiar to itself, and more largely affecting the public -The provision of the General Statutes of Kentucky, than another; one extremely hazardous, and attended chapter 57, section 1, which gives a right of action to by dangers peculiar to it; from the necessity of the the representatives of one not in the employment of case, if for no other reason, it should be regarded as the railroad company, who shall lose his life through sui generis; that those engaged in it should in law be the negligence or carelessness of the operators of such held to be a separate and distinct class, like bankers; railroad, does not render the section unconstitutional, and that a law may be therefore made to apply to them as authorizing such an action against railroads alone. generally. Such a statute affects all similarly situated; It has been so often said that the law should always it imposes the same burden upon all in the like busiaim at equal rights and privileges; that it should afford ness, and therefore affords equal protection. While in the same rule for the rich and the poor, the high and the broad sense of the term it is special legislation, the low, that it would not bear repetition but for the yet it is not of such a character as to fall within the importance of its being always observed. Undoubt- constitutional inhibition. This view, it seems to us, edly partial legislation is inimical to justice and free is fully sustained by the case of Railway Co. v. Mackey, government. The same burden should be imposed 127 U. S. 205, and is also supported by the reasoning in upon all under the like circumstances. The Legisla Railway Co. v. Beckwith, 129 id. 27. The first case reture cannot, for instance, impose a different or addi- lates to a Kansas statute, which provides: "Every railtional penalty upon one litigant, in case of failure, from road company organized or doing business in this what it does upon all other litigants. It cannot select State shall be liable for all damages done to any ema particular individual from a class or a locality, and ployee of such company in consequence of any neglisubject him to special burdens or peculiar rules differ- gence of its agents, or by any mismanagement of its ent from those imposed upon others of the same class engineers or other employee, to any person sustaining or same locality. If however legislation like that now such damage." It was held that it did not deprive the in question cannot be upheld as constitutional, then railroad company of its property without due process much necessary legislation, and which is vital to the of law; that it did not deny to it the equal protection interests and safety of the public, must fail. of the law, and was not in violation of the fourteenth lice power of a State certainly extends to all matters amendment to the Constitution of the United States. The po Ky. Ct. App., Nov. 10, 1891. Louisville Safety Vault & Trust Co. v. Louisville & N. R. Co. Opinion by Holt, C. J. CRIMINAL LAW-INCEST-EVIDENCE.-On trial for incest, acts of sexual intercourse prior to the specific act charged in the indictment may be proved by the State. The decisions establish the doctrine that it is competent to prove previous acts of familiarity between the parties, although they culminate in the act of sexual intercourse. State v. Markins, 95 Ind. 464; Ramey v. State, 127 id. 243; Thayer v. Thayer, 101 Mass. 111; State v. Bridgman, 49 Vt. 202, and cases cited; State v. Pippin, 88 N. C. 646; State v. Kemp, 87 id. 538; Bish. Stat. Crimes, $ 680. Sup. Ct. Ind. Nov. 19, 1891. Lefforge v. State. Opinion by Elliott, J. * * DEEDS-BOUNDARY-RIPARIAN RIGHTS.-The owners of a mill dam and pond conveyed land on the west side thereof, describing the boundaries in the deed as "running easterly * to low-water mark, on the west side of Fox river [the mill pond]; thence running northerly along the low-water mark on the said westerly side of Fox river," etc. Held, that the grantees took only to low-water mark and not to the center thread of the river. In principle this case is decided in Greene v. Nunuemacher, 36 Wis. 50. That was a case for abatement of the nuisance created by a distillery. One part of the damages was for corrupting the waters of the Kinnickinnic river, and rendering them unfit for use by the plaintiff as a riparian proprietor on said river. The deed by which the plaintiff held his premises described his land as "running along the bank" of said river. The present chief justice said in his opinion: 'For according to the description of the premises as given in the deed, there is reason for saying that they are limited to the river bank, and do not in fact include the bed of the stream or the waters of the same." Chief Justice Ryan, then at the bar, was counsel for the appellant, and cited the following authorities to the point that the description of plaintiff's land limits the same to the bank of the creek: Ang. Water-Courses, §§ 8, 26; Cary v. Daniels, 5 Metc. (Mass.) 236; Crittenton v. Alger, 11 id. 281; Starr v. Child, 20 Wend. 149; 4 Hill, 369; Hatch v. Dwight, 17 Mass. 289; Starr v. Child, 5 Den. 599. This shows that the point was well considered by the court. The language "along the bank" is not as certain and specific as the language along low-water mark." In the following cases the line is limited by the description, and no part of the bed of the stream is conveyed: "Thence north-easterly up the west bank of Pine creek." Murphy v. Copeland (Iowa), 1 N. W. Rep. 691; 10 id. 786, and cases cited. To and along the bank." Halsey v. McCormick, 13 N. Y. 296; People v. Supervisors (Ill. Sup.), 17 N. E. Rep. 147. "As far as highwater mark" is the outer line of the overflow of a mill pond so described in the conveyance. Jones v. Parker (N. C.), 5 S. E. Rep. 383. "To the Genesee river; thence northwardly along the shore of said river." Starr v. Child, supra. In Murphy v. Copeland, supra, it was held that “along the bank" was equivalent to "along low-water mark," and the same in Halsey v. McCormick, supra. In Cook v. McClure, 58 N. Y. 437, the language is: "To a stake near the highwater mark of the pond, running thence along the high-water mark of said pond to," etc., and it was held that the line was limited at high-water mark, and would not extend even to low-water mark. This case is exactly in point. In Bradford v. Cressey, 45 Me. 9, the language is: "Thence east until it strikes the creek on which the mill stands; thence south-westerly on the west bank of said creek," and it was held that "the grantee was restricted to the bank of the creek." The line so described is a monument and fixed bound ary. Ang. Water-Courses, § 25. Wis. Sup. Ct., Nov. 17, 1891. Allen v. Weber. Opinion by Orton, J. NEGLIGENCE-INJURY TO LICENSEE.-(1) Where defendant passively allows plaintiff, not a passenger, to pass at her pleasure across its station grounds and platforms, plaintiff is not a trespasser. She knew that the place where she was travelling was not a public way, but the platform of a railroad passenger station. She was not a passenger of the railroad, and had no business to do at the station, but was merely using the station grounds and platform as a short cut to facilitate her passage home. Whether her act was or was not a trespass depends upon the attitude of the defendant toward her and those who were accustomed to use the station in a similar manner. It may properly be inferred that the defendant knew of, and passively allowed, the plaintiff and the public to pass at their pleasure across the station grounds and the platforms from one street to the other. On the other hand, it cannot be said that any invitation or inducement was extended by the defendant to the plaintiff or to the public to use the station grounds and platforms as a short cut in travelling from street to street, or for any other purpose than that for which they were designed and adapted in connection with the railroad. It was apparent that the place was a railway passenger station, and not a way for foot travel. No arrangement or fitting of the grounds or platforms is shown which would convey to any one the idea that the platform was a part of Prescott street or of Lincoln square, or of any public way, or that those in charge of it invited its use for other than railroad purposes. The platform was not contiguous to Prescott street. It led from Lincoln square to the station building, and did not connect the two streets. It was obviously a part of the railroad station, and for the use of railroad passengers. The use for which it was apparently designed required the land to be left open and easily accessible from the public streets. Besides this, the plaintiff knew that it was a passenger station, and was not in fact induced to believe that she was walking over a public way. The fact that the defendant made no attempt to prevent travel across the station grounds and platform, as a short cut between the public streets, was not an invitation to use them for that purpose. Galligan v. Manufacturing Co., 143 Mass. 527; Reardon v. Thompson, 149 id. 267. It follows that the plaintiff's rights are to be determined upon the theory that she was neither a trespasser nor a person induced or invited by the defendant to enter its premises, but a licensee merely, knowingly using the defendant's land and structures for a purpose solely in her own interest, and for which she knew they were not intended, and entering upon them without invitation, and without right, by her voluntary act, and with the bare sufferance of the owner. The case is not one of a concealed peril or of a trap designedly laid. The exceptions do not show that the door was not easily distinguishable from the platform of which it formed a part, and the use for which it was designed must have been apparent upon inspection. (2) The general rule is that a bare licensee has no cause of action on account of dangers existing in the place he is permitted to enter, but goes there at his own risk, and must take the premises as he finds them. Reardon v. Thompson, 149 Mass. 268; Parker v. Publishing Co., 69 Me. 173. No duty is cast upon the owner to take care of the licensee, or to see that he does not go to a dangerous place, but he must take his permission with its concomitant conditions and perils, and cannot recover for injuries caused by obstructions or pitfalls. Hounsel v. Smyth, 7 C. B. (N. S.) 731; Batchelor v. Fortescue, 11 Q. B. Div. 474; Sweeny v. Railroad, 10 Allen, 368. 372. "An opening, not concealed otherwise than by the darkness of the night, is a danger which a licensee must avoid at his peril." Holmes, J., in Reardon v. Thompson, ubi supra; Sullivan v. Waters, 14 Ir. C. L. 460, 475. The plaintiff cannot complain that th defendant, in lawfully using its station and appliances as they were apparently designed and adapted to be used, so changed their condition without her knowledge as to make the place dangerous to her when she attempted to use it in a manner inconsistent with the use which the owner chose to make of it. The defendant was under no obligation to her to light the place or put up a barrier, or to give warning that the condition of the door made it dangerous for her to attempt to pass. The opening was not a trap, but an ordinary and usual means of access to a cellar, and so far as the plaintiff was concerned, the defendant owed her no duty to keep it closed rather than open. Metcalfe v. Steamship Co., 147 Mass. 66; Heinlein v. Railroad Co., id. 136. Sup. Jud. Ct. Mass., Nov. 25, 1891. Redigan v. Boston & M. R. Co. Opinion by Barker, J. RAILROADS-NEGLIGENCE-INFANT-ACCIDENTS AT CROSSINGS. As it approached the crossing of another railroad in a city of five thousand inhabitants, a freight train stopped not to exceed a minute, so as to block one of the principal streets of the city near a public school building. A boy seven years old tried to climb over the cars. He was not seen by the train men. usual or proper places on the cars for the operation of the train, they would not, in the performance of their usual or general duties, have been watching or looking out to prevent children or others from climbing on or under the cars when the train was in motion or when it momentarily stopped. Kan. Sup. Ct., Oct. 10, 1891. Atchison, T. & S. F. R. Co. v. Plaskett. Opinion per Curiam. WILL-UNBORN CHILD OMITTED.-The General Statutes of Kentucky, chapter 113, section 25, provide that if, when a will is made, the testator has a child living, and a child is born afterward, such after-born child, if not provided for by any settlement, and either provided for nor expressly excluded by the will, but only pretermitted, shall succeed to such portion of the testator's estate as it would if the testator had died intestate. A testator when he made his will had a child living with him. His wife was also living with him, and was seven months gone with child. Without expressly excluding the living child by name, or mentioning any fact that tended to show that the unborn child was excluded, the testator made his wife the sole beneficiary of the will. Held, that this was an exclusion of the unborn child. It makes no difference in what form such intention may be expressed in the will. It may be by direct words of exclusiou, or it may be gathered from the whole will that the testator intended to exclude the after-born child, and if thus gathered it is "expressly excluded" by the will. Does such intention appear from the will? We think it does, for it appears that at the time the testator made his will he had a child about seven years old living with him. His wife was living with him, and had daily intercourse with him, and who was about seven months gone with child, the appellant, and without disinheriting the living child by name, or mentioning any fact that tends to show that said child was particularly excluded. the testator intentionally omits it from the provisions of his will, and makes its mother the sole beneficiary of the will. Now, as said, the living child not having been excluded by name, but clearly intentionally excluded by the context of the will, which would have equally excluded as many living children as be might have had, does it not follow that the afterborn child was likewise intentioually excluded from the provisions of the will? We think it was, for as intimated it is evident that the exclusion was not intended to apply to the particular living child alone, but to all the testator's children as a class, and it would be an anomaly to hold that all the testator's living children-infants and all-were intentionally excluded as a class in the interest of the testator's wife, and the child thereafter born, by reason of the accidental time of its birth, was not intentionally omitted. Such a construction would defeat the evident intention of the testator. So it seems to be the correct rule that if it clearly appears from the will that the testator intended to omit all his children as a class, not some of them, from the provisions of his will, such intention will include the after-born child unless it appears that it was not the intention to exclude it. And as it appears from the will that the testator intended to exclude all his children as a class from the provisions of his will, and to make his wife the sole object of his bounty, we must hold that the appellant was included in this expressed intention. Ky. Ct. App., Oct. 29, 1891. Leonard v. Enochs. Opinion by Bennett, J The train started and he was thrown off and injured. The jury found that the company was negligent, in that the trainmen knew that the crossing was frequented by children, and were not on the lookout. Held, that there was no evidence of negligence on the part of the company. The stop at the railroad crossing was both necessary and lawful, in order to prevent any collision with other trains which might have been on the Rock Island road. In stopping no statute or city ordinance was violated or disregarded. The object of having brakemen upon the train is to enable them to be in a position where they may handle the brakes, give signals, etc. The lookout to be kept by the engineer, fireman and trainmen is generally ahead of the train. If the boy had been seen upon the car by the trainmen, then it would have been their duty to have exercised proper care in not running over or injuring him. But when a train momentarily stops at a crossing, and the trainmen are not needed in the operation of the train at their respective stations, it cannot be said the company is guilty of negligence, because although the train itself is properly operated, the trainmen are not given express instructions to keep away thoughtless children from climbing under or upon the train. If it were the duty of the trainmen to keep a lookout to prevent thoughtless children from climbing on or under their train when crossing the public street at a slow rate, or when momentarily stopping in a public street before crossing another railroad, then the brakemen or trainmen, instead of being at their usual or proper places upon the cars to handle the brakes, give signals, etc., should be upon the ground near by the several cars of the train, watching the cars or patrolling the ground around the cars to prevent children and others from getting on or under them. The jury do not find that the trainmen should have been upon the ground watching or patrolling the train. No such claim is made. If the train had stopped an unnecessary length of time, and become an obstruction upon the street, as in the Pennsylvania case referred to, or if the train in stopping at the street violated any city ordinance, any municipal provision or any statute of the State, negligence could be imputed and a liability based thereon. The only alleged negligence found by the jury was that the brake-THE men or trainmen were not at their proper places. Nothing else was found. If they had been at their NOTES. IIE men and women of all climes, wherever the Eng. lish language has been spoken or Shakespeare has been read, bave for three hundred years approved and admired the course of Portia in Shylock v. Antonio, and it must be, at this late date, a bold man who would seek to set aside this verdict of mankind and detract from the fame of Portia by calling her a little pettifogger and a trickster. She is not so regarded and will not be. We do not admire the style of the late Judge Love, and give the following extract as an example. He says: "How that captivating little pettifogger, Portia, was so successful in pulling the wool over the eyes of the duke and his high and mighty magnificoes, passes all comprehension. Even the unlearned Portia must have laughed in her sleeve at their high mightinesses as a set of magnifico jackasses whose long ears she could cram with such nonsense as that a valid contract could be made to commit willful and deliberate murder.'-Chicago Legal News. Miss Braddon, like the late Wilkie Collins, makes sure of her law before using it as material in her novels. In the latest-and by no means the least interestingof her ingenious stories, "Gerard; or, the World, the Flesh, and the Devil," we see a good deal of a firm of London solicitors whose practice is both extensive and highly respectable. The characters of the two partners are cleverly contrasted, but Miss Braddon asks her readers to believe too much in the good nature of London solicitors when she describes a hard-headed Lincoln's Inn family lawyer drawing checks for £500 in favor of "a claimant" whose identity, though pretty clear, had not been established. Unlike most lady novelists however this authoress knows what invalidates a will, and the fact of marriage after execution of a will, having this effect is made good use of in the dénouement of the plot. Not a little of the power and flavor of her novels may be traced to the fact that "Miss Braddon," the novelist, is identical with Mrs. Maxwell, the capable and intelligent femme d'affaires and the valued friend of many clever men in the three learned professions, as well as in the fields of literature and art.--London Law Journal. THE FIFTH LESSON. HEN the reporter writes with a pencil, he should obtain one of medium hardness only; keep it sharpened, and use it with soft or uncalendered paper. For general purposes it is better to use a pen, the pencil in exceptional cases only. Speed in short-hand is of no consequence unless what is written can be read afterward. Legibility, or readability, depends in part upon the accurate forming of the characters. To do this it is not necessary to write them slowly; on the contrary, experienced stenographers produce the more perfect outlines with a somewhat rapid movement, just as an experienced penman executes the most graceful curve by a quick stroke rather than by slowly drawing it. The student should learn at the outset to write the characters rather than draw them. Nevertheless the beginner needs time at first, and ought to form each character a number of times, with care and deliberation, until the outline is firmly impressed upon his mind before attempting to write it quickly. Afterward write it rapidly, and continue doing so until it can be done both accurately and quickly. In line 1 the first letter has the force of th in three, and is called ith; the second, the force of th in those, and is called the. When s has the sound of z, as in was or goes, it is called z, and expressed by a thickened stem. Sis most commonly expressed by the circle, but the curve is needed when an initial vowel pre cedes, as in ace, line 7, or a final vowel follows, as in sew, line 8. In line 3, the first letter, called ish, has the force of sh in bishop, or ti in motion. When struck upward it is called shay. The second, called zhe, is equiv alent to 8 in pleasure. The curves in line 4 are called way and yay, and are the same as the consonants w and y. H, always written upward, is called hay, and ng, ing. Shaded m, called emp, is equivalent to mp or mb, as in temple, or tumble. Upward r, called ray, is used more than the down-stroke. It is quicker, oftener secures a good angle, and prevents word-forms from extending too far below the line. When the circle s occurs between two straight stems, it is placed outside the angle, as in geyser; at all other times it is, if possible, placed inside the curve. The circle is put on the left of up-strokes hay and ray. Exercise-Moore hide rate heap road ride going reap saw ease reach rake rose. Sentences. 1. This boy's name is Jake, and he has a and rake by his side. 2. He will take the rope and go tie the cow. 3. This boy's name is James, and he has a spike and a nail. 4. Milo will take them and file them for two hours. |