OPINION.

WRIT OF ERROR to the Superior Court in and for New Castle County.

Action of replevin was brought in the Court below by the defendant in error in which it sought to recover from the Journal Printing Company, plaintiff in error, the possession of a certain printing press, or the value thereof, basing its right to so recover upon the written instrument, as set out in the report of the case in the Court below.

The jury rendered a verdict in favor of the plaintiff below for $4000. Whereupon motions were made on behalf of defendant below for a new trial and in arrest of judgment, which motions the Court below refused.

After argument by the respective counsel, the Supreme Court announced their decision as follows:

NICHOLSON, CH. :-In the case of Journal Printing Company vs. The Duplex Printing Press Company the Court have arrived at a unanimous conclusion, which I will now announce. The judgment of the Court below is affirmed. Inasmuch as the reasoning of the Court below has been approved by the Supreme Court, we have not deemed it necessary or expedient to prepare an opinion but simply sustain the opinion of the Court below.

Judgment below affirmed.

FALL SESSIONS,

1900.

ELLA MAY JONES, v8. FLETCHER C. JONES.

Divorce-Petition-Affidavit-Notary Public-Seal of office—

Practice.

The certificate of a Notary Public before whom an affidavit is taken must bear his official seal. Without such seal there is no proper affidavit, and the petition which it purports to support will be dismissed.

(October 20, 1900.)

LORE, C. J., and GRUBB, J., sitting.

William P. Shockley for petitioner.

William L. Gooding for respondent.

Superior Court, Kent County, October Term, 1900.

PETITION FOR DIVORCE.

Counsel for respondent moved to dismiss the petition for the divorce filed in the above stated case, for the following reason:

"That the affidavit annexed to the petition of the said Ella May Jones is incomplete and in sufficient in law, in that the certificate of the Notary Public before whom the said affidavit is alleged to have been taken, does not bear the seal of the said Notary Public."

Rev. Code, 240.

Mr. Shockley asked leave to amend said petition and affidavit, stating that they were filed by consent.

SYLLABUS.

LORE, C. J.:-The petition is dismissed on the ground that there is no proper affidavit on the part of the petitioner.

STATE vs. JAMES JACKSON.

Criminal Law-Indictment for Burning Barn-Evidence-Confession-Inducement-Preliminary Hearing-IntentHow Proved-Malice-Defendant of Tender Age-Presumption of Law-Reasonable Doubt.

1. At the trial of defendant, who was indicted for burning a barn, it was proposed to prove what defendant said at his preliminary hearing before the Justice when the owner of the barn which was burned said to him, the best thing he could do was to tell the truth and he would get out of it better or get through with it better. Held inadmissible.

2. From the mere fact that the defendant (being a person of tender years set the barn on fire, the jury may not conclude as a presumption of law, that it was done maliciously. But being over the age of seven years (in this case fourteen) the law presumes that he is capable, and in ascertaining whether the intent existed and whether the act was wilful and malicious, not only the act itself, but all the circumstances surrounding the case may be considered, including the intelligence of the defendant, his conduct before and after setting fire to brush near the barn, and everything relating to or connected with the transaction.

(October 24, 1900.)

LORE, C. J., and GRUBB, J., sitting.

Robert C. White, Attorney-General, for the State.

EVIDENCE-OPINION.

Henry Ridgely, Jr., for the defendant.

Court of General Sessions, Kent County, October Term, 1900.

INDICTMENT FOR BURNING A BARN.

At the trial, George Krebs, a witness produced on behalf of the State, was asked by the Attorney-General if the accused made. any statement at the preliminary hearing given him before the Justice of the Peace in Frederica, concerning the burning of the building and replied that he did. The witness was further asked whether any inducements were held out or threats made to the defendant before making such statements; to which the witness replied: "My father asked him why he burned the buildings down and he said he did not burn them down. My father told him the best thing he could do was to tell the truth and he would get out of it better, or get through it easier. My father owned the barn and he asked the Justice the privilege of asking Jackson a few questions."

Mr. Ridgely objected to the witness detailing anything that the prisoner may have said, on the ground that the above testimony showed a sufficient inducement.

Stephens' Digest of Law and Evidence, 78-note 2.

LORE, C. J.:-This was while the defendant was having a preliminary hearing on this particular charge when this was stated to him. The objection is sustained.

William Krebs, the father of the preceding witness, stated that the defendant worked for him on his farm where the barn was burned and was very disobedient and careless. On one occasion, a few days before the burning of the barn, he said to the boy, "Jim, why don't you try to do a little something?" The latter said: "I would not work to please you." The witness then called him a

CHARGE.

"black whelp" and the defendant said, "I will cause you trouble for that."

Another witness testified that the defendant told him on the day of the fire in reply to a question as to how this thing happened -"I will tell you all about it Mr. Wilcuts. There was a pile of brush back of the barn and I went back there and set fire to it to burn it and it caught from the brush pile to the barn." The witness further stated that he asked the defendant if Mr. Krebs had told him to do that when he left and the defendant replied, "No sir, he did not." And being asked why he did it the defendant replied, "I saw it was there in the way and I thought I would get it out of the way." The witness further testified that he said to the 'defendant, "You see what you have done, don't you?" and the defendant replied, "Yes, sir; and I am sorry for it."

Mr. Ridgely requested the Court to instruct the jury that where a person of tender age (14 years old in this case) is accused of a crime the essence of which is the intent, such intent could not be inferred under the principle of law that every one is presumed to know the consequences of his own act.

LORE, C. J., charging the jury:

Gentlemen of the jury:-James Jackson, the prisoner at the bar, stands charged in this indictment with having, on the 19th day of May of the present year, in South Murderkill Hundred, in this county, feloniously, wilfully and maliciously burned a certain barn, the property of one William Krebs; and also that in that act he burned up certain property therein named.

It is incumbent on the State to make out the crime, that is that the barn was fired and burned maliciously and wilfully by the prisoner at the bar. In other words, that the barn, being the property of a person other than the prisoner, was set on fire and burned and that this boy was the cause of it.

It appears by the testimony on behalf of the prisoner, and is