plaintiff or sending for an officer, and it appeared that, when questioned as to how she acquired her pocketbook, she remained without restraint to be questioned. The court said: "While actions of this kind, as a rule, are peculiarly for the jury to determine, yet when the evidence is overwhelmingly against any unlawful detention, and tends very strongly to show that the plaintiff was the culprit instead of the defendants, we are impelled to intervene to prevent the defendants being mulcted in damages unjustly." In S. H. Kress & Co. v. De Mont (1920) - Tex. Civ. App., 224 S. W. 520, an action for damages for false imprisonment, it appeared that the plaintiff, who had made several purchases in the defendant's store, was followed therefrom by Mrs. Ramsey, one of the defendant's employees, who stopped her, asked what she was doing with the goods from the Kress store in her basket, and, on being told that they had been paid for, ordered the plaintiff to come back and prove it. The plaintiff returned to the store, and was conducted from one place to another therein by Mrs. Ramsey, who kept in touch with her arm. The court reversed the judgment for the plaintiff, holding that no case of false imprisonment had been made out, and the statutory definition of the term in the Penal Code was recited, as follows: "(1039) False imprisonment is the wilful detention of another against his consent; and where it is not expressly authorized by law, whether such detention be effected by an assault, by actual violence to the person, by threats, or by any other means which restrains the party so detained from removing from one place to another as he may see proper. (1040) The assault or violence may be such as is spoken of in defining the offense of assault and battery. (1041) The impediment must be such as is in its nature calculated to detain the person, and from which he cannot by ordinary means relieve himself." The court said: "Since no threat of any sort was mentioned or involved here, that form of the offense thus denounced, and with

which succeeding article 1042 of the Code deals, need not be given further mention or consideration. Neither were the other essential requirements of these statutes met. There was no actual violence to the person,merely a touching of the arm,-no injury inflicted, nor intent to visit one shown, and so no assault within the meaning of the preceding article 1008. Moreover, the court's definition stops short of advising the jury what the nature and extent of the impediment must be, while the evidence not only wholly fails to disclose the existence in Mrs. Ramsey of an ability, purpose, or effort to overcome or circumvent any resistance by ordinary means on Mrs. De Mont's part, but affirmatively repels any such suggestion; indeed, the appellee herself repeatedly admits that she used no means of any sort to relieve herself, but willingly went back. The impediment here, therefore, was nothing but the order of a frail, elderly, and smaller woman to another, which the latter, though conscious of its lack of authority because based on an untrue imputation, and without any attempt to relieve herself, chose to submissively accept as a compelling command. That could not be said to have been a hindrance of such nature as was calculated to detain a woman like Mrs. De Mont, and one from which she could not by ordinary means have relieved herself. One may not in such circumstances supinely submit to the mere verbal direction of another, and then recover damages as for false imprisonment."

In Carroll v. Gimbel Bros. (1921) 195 App. Div. 444, 186 N. Y. Supp. 737, appeal dismissed in (1922) 238 N. Y. 528, 138 N. E. 433, an action for false imprisonment, the court did not discuss the question of detention, but reversed a judgment for the plaintiff on the ground, inter alia, that she had not established a cause of action against the defendant; that the verdict was against the weight of the evidence. It appeared that the plaintiff had been charged with the theft of thimbles, and reconducted from the street to the defendant's store, and to a room

therein, where she was searched, and several articles, alleged to have been stolen, were taken from her, and after about half an hour she was released. There was considerable evidence showing the plaintiff's guilt and her confession.

re

In Shinglemeyer v. Wright (1900) 124 Mich. 230, 50 L.R.A. 129, 82 N. W. 887, it appeared that the plaintiff visited the defendant's office, where he charged her with the larceny of a bicycle, but put her under no restraint, whereon she telephoned for a police officer, who took her to the station house, following the charge of larceny. The plaintiff was leased, however, on failure to identify her as the woman who had checked the wheel at the railway station. It was held that the plaintiff could not hold the defendant liable for false imprisonment; that the officer alone was liable for any illegal restraint on her liberty, and he was present at the plaintiff's and not at the defendant's request.

Atchison, T. & S. F R. Co. v.

Hinsdell (1907) 76 Kan. 74, 12 L.R.A. (N.S.) 94, 90 Pac. 800, 13 Ann. Cas. 981, a case not within the scope of the annotation, was an action for false imprisonment brought by Hinsdell. It appeared that the plaintiff, who was the general owner of certain property which he had shipped over the defendant's railroad, unlawfully took the property from the car, where the company had a right to hold it for the payment of the freight, an act constituting larceny; that he was arrested by an officer without process, at the instance of the defendant's agent, and held in custody from Saturday afternoon until Sunday morning, when he was discharged without further proceedings. The court was of the opinion that the testimony was consistent with the idea that the plaintiff had been rightfully arrested, and that, the goods having been returned, he was discharged before having been detained for an unreasonable time, these facts of themselves not giving the plaintiff a right of recovery. R. S.

the estate of the testator sufficient to enable him to have issues tried as to the validity of the codicil.

Reilly v. Dougherty, 60 Md. 276; 40 Cyc. 1241; Brewer v. Barrett, 58 Md.

contestant of a will must have some direct legal or equitable interest in the decedent's estate in privity with him," such "as heir, purchaser, or beneficiary under another will, which would be destroyed or injuriously affected by the establishment of the contested will."

The statutes of this state do not define the class of persons who are entitled to maintain caveat proceedings, but this court has done so in a number of decisions, including Brewer v. Barrett, 58 Md. 587; Munnikhuysen v. Magraw, 57 Md. 172; Safe Deposit & T. Co. v. Devilbiss, 128 Md. 182, 97 Atl. 367.

In Brewer v. Barrett, supra, this court said: "It is clear that a stranger or one having no interest in the property of a testator has no right to caveat his will. Interest in the property is the very foundation of the right to caveat."

And in Safe Deposit & T. Co. v. Devilbiss, supra, the court said, speaking through Judge Thomas: "It would seem clear upon principle that only those who have an interest in the property of the testator in the event the will is annulled are entitled to caveat his will, or to issues relating to its validity, and that the right of caveators to maintain their suit should be established before such issues are transmitted to a court of law for trial. Both of these propositions have, however, been distinctly settled in this state."

The exact question here presented, whether an executor whose appointment has been revoked by a subsequent will or by a codicil to the will by which he was appointed can maintain caveat proceedings against the later will or the codicil revoking his appointment, when, in the event of the annulment of the will or codicil, the only benefit or advantage accruing to him therefrom would be the right to serve as executor and to receive in compensation for his services such commissions as might be allowed him, has never been before this court, or at least our attention has not been called to any case in which it was presented. The fact

that such question has not been presented to this court, we think, is largely due to the existence of the above-mentioned rule, which is the recognized law of this state.

Mr. Joseph, of the Maryland bar, in his work, Contest on Wills, p. 5, says: "The generally conceded rule as to the right to caveat is whether the caveator would be entitled to the property (of the testator) in the event that the will is set aside."

The question, however, has been before the courts of other states. In Re Stewart, 107 Iowa, 118, 77 N. W. 574, the court said: "We have no statute defining the qualifications of those who may contest the probate of a will, but we understand the general rule to be that such action can be taken only by one who would have a beneficial interest in the estate, if there was no such will. This rule has received our express recognition heretofore in Kostelecky v. Scherhart, 99 Iowa, 120, 68 N. W. 591. See also Re Langevin, 45 Minn. 429, 47 N. W. 1133; Reid v. Vanderheyden, 5 Cow. 719; Meyer v. Fogg, 7 Fla. 292, 18 Am. Dec. 441. The fact that an executor is to receive compensation out of the estate cannot be said to give him an interest therein, for he gets this only in return for services rendered. He is expected to give full value therefor. It is claimed, however, by appellants, that an executor has, by virtue of his office, a property interest in the personal estate. Any such interest is a mere naked trust upon which no such right as that here claimed can be predicated."

In support of his contention the appellee has cited other cases and authorities; while the appellant has supported his contention by the citation of cases which appear to be in conflict with Re Stewart, supra, but little assistance can be obtained from these decisions which turned upon the statute of the particular state in which the case was tried, when the statutes of the different states differ in the language employed.

The appellant, a member of the

Baltimore bar, was unknown to the testator until the day next preceding the execution of the will, when he was introduced to the testator by the president of the Mercantile Bank of Baltimore, at whose suggestion the appellant had been sent for to come to that bank to draft the will of the testator. On the next day the will was executed, and the appellant, who drew the will, was therein appointed executor, to serve without bond, with authority and direction to sell all the real estate of the testator and to pay all the proceeds therefrom to those named in the will to receive it.

The wife and his only children, the appellee and his sister, who take under the will with the codicil thereto, would also have taken in the same proportions under the will had the codicil not been executed. The codicil wrought no change in the will, except to substitute the son, the appellee, for the appellant, an apparent stranger to the testator, as

I. Introductory, 326.

II. Administrators, 326.

III. Executors, 328.

I. Introductory.

As to the right of public administrator or state to file caveat to or contest will, see annotation in 18 A.L.R. 79. The question whether one's right to contest a will survives to his executors or administrators is beyond the scope of the annotation.

The decisions on the present question are in conflict. Apparently the diversity of conclusions reached is due chiefly to a difference in the views taken as to who are interested persons, as that term is used in the statutes generally in regard to the parties who can maintain an action to contest a will. And frequently the particular phraseology of the statute under which the decision was rendered is not stated.

II. Administrators.

On the one hand, it has been held that one appointed administrator has the right to oppose the probate of a subsequently discovered will of the decedent, and to appeal from the decision of the probate court establishing the will. Re Cornelius (1854) 14 Ark. 675.

And in Re Davis (1905) 182 N. Y. 468, 75 N. E. 530, the court approved the doctrine that the right to administer the estate is a sufficient interest to entitle the person in whom it is vested to contest the probate of a will, in holding that an administrator of a resident of New York, appointed in another state under a claim that the decedent died intestate, was entitled to intervene in a proceeding in New York and oppose the probate of an alleged will of the decedent. It was said: "The assets were of great value, and the administrator had a personal