minor, without authority from his parents or guardian, it does not matter that the defendant did not know that such person was a minor. He is bound to know whether such person be a minor or not: Farmer v. The People, 77 Ill.

JUDGMENT. See Constitutional Law.

LANGUAGE.

English the only Legal Language where no other is specially Mentioned. -Where a statute of the state requires a publication to be made in a newspaper," in the absence of any provision to the contrary, a paper published in the English language is to be understood as intended, and a publication in a paper printed in any other language is not a compliance with the statute: City of Cincinnati v. Bickett, 26 Ohio St.

LIMITATIONS, STATUTE OF. See Estoppel.

NATIONAL BANK.

Illegal Interest-Recovery back-Rights of Parties not affected by State Usury Laws.-The knowingly taking or receiving by a national bank of a rate of interest greater than is allowed by law upon a loan of money, does not entitle the person paying the same to have it applied as a payment of so much of the principal, in an action brought to recover the principal debt more than two years after such payment was made: Higley et al. v. First National Bank of Beverly, 26 Ohio St.

The rights and liabilities of the parties in such case are prescribed in the National Bank Act, and cannot be controlled by state legislation: Id.

Before judgment, the penalty allowed for the taking or receiving of usurious interest by a national bank does not bear interest: Id.

Surplus Capital of National Banks-Power of a State to Tax.Chapter 49, section 5, of the General Statutes, subjecting the surplus capital on hand of banking institutions to taxation, is applicable to banks organized under the Act of Congress establishing national banks, approved June 3d 1864-13 Stats. at Large 111-as well as to banks established by the legislature of this state: First National Bank v. Peterborough, 56 N. H.

The taxation of the surplus capital of such banks, in excess of the amount they are required by said act to carry to their surplus fund semiannually, is not prohibited by Congress, and is not an encroachment upon the constitutional powers vested in the Federal government: Id.

The taxation of such surplus by state authority is not the taxation of the means or agencies employed by the general government for the execution of its constitutional powers, but is the taxation of the property of such agents. The right to tax such property has never been surrendered by the states to the general government: Id.

RAILROAD. See Constitutional Lau.

SHERIFF.

Sheriff's Return-May be contradicted.-The sheriff's return of service on original process does not in Illinois import absolute verity, but

is only prima facie evidence of the truth of the matter therein recited, and consequently may be put in issue, before judgment, by plea in abatement: Sibert v. Thorp, 77 Ill.

STATUTE. Sec Language.

year

Interpretation by legislative Journals-Internal Revenue-Tax on Corporations. Under the Internal Revenue Act of July 1870, which enacts that " there shall be levied and collected for and during the 1871, a tax of 24 per cent. on the amount of all interest paid by corporations, and on the amount of dividends of carnings hereafter declared by them," and which directs that such interest and dividends shall not, after the 1st of August 1870, be taxed under prior acts; interest paid and div idends declared during the last five months of the year 1870, are taxable, as well as those declared during the year 1871, it appearing that income of other sorts was meant to be so taxed, and there being no apparent reason why income derived through corporations should not be taxed like income generally: Blake v. National Banks, 23 Wall.

A badly-expressed and apparently contradictory enactment (such as the one above mentioned), interpreted by a reference to the Journals of Congress, where it appeared that the peculiar phraseology was the result of an amendment introduced without due reference to language in the original bill: Id.

STREAM.

Boundary-Middle Thread.-Where, in a deed of conveyance, the middle of a known stream is called for as the boundary line between adjacent proprietors, the thread of such stream, notwithstanding it may have been changed in its location by attrition and accretion, will control the courses and distances named in the conveyance, and will continue to be the boundary line between the lands of the respective proprietors: Niehaus v. Shepherd, 26 Ohio St.

SURETY.

Trust-Co-sureties.-The plaintiffs and the defendants, all but F were stockholders in the White Mountains Railroad Corporation. The corporation was indebted to the extent of about $100,000, was insolvent, and the stockholders supposed themselves to be individually liable for its debts. The parties to this suit, and others, being desirous of reliev ing themselves from their liabilities, formed a plan, the object of which was to procure a discharge of those liabilities on the best terms practicable. In pursuance of this plan they executed bonds, and placed them in the hands of F., the condition of which was substantially as follows: "The condition of this obligation is and it is payable upon the perform ance of the following conditions and stipulations, viz. The above bounden John G. Sinclair is to be discharged from all liability on a subscription, signed by him in 1855, for the purpose of purchasing the claims against the White Mountains Railroad, which has not been effected, and then the creditors of the White Mountains Railroad are to deposit with the said Farr legal and proper discharges or assignments of all their several claims against said corporation and its sureties, to be held by said Farr, in trust for and subject to the order of said creditors, until such an amount as may be necessary to pay the several sums that said creditors may agree to accept for their several claims against said

corporation and its sureties has been secured or pledged, to the satisfaction of said trustee, and then to hold said claims so assigned as aforesaid, for the use and benefit of all those who contribute towards the purchase of the same, for the purpose of compelling those stockholders in said corporation, who do not contribute anything towards making up the sum necessary to purchase said claims, to pay their proportion thereof;-now, whenever the said Farr shall be satisfied that all the claims against said corporation, or as near that as the nature of the case will admit, have been discharged or assigned as aforesaid, and held by him for the purposes aforesaid, and shall have notified us in writing of the same, which notices may be sent to us by mail if not given personally, then we are to pay to said Farr, or to his order, the penal sum named in the foregoing bond, within the time stipulated therein, with interest from the time of such notice-then this obligation shall be void :" Sinclair v. Redington, 56 N. H.

The defendant stockholders, having purchased in the outstanding liabilities of the corporation for about $10,000, succeeded in collecting about $30,000 from the corporation, and enough to indemnify them against all their outlays and expenses in the transaction. F., having given the notice mentioned in the foregoing condition, proceeded to put the bonds in suit for the benefit of the defendant stockholders: Held, that the relation of co-sureties existed between the plaintiffs and the defendant stockholders; that the debts, as against the plaintiffs, were discharged, and that the defendant stockholders had no claim against them but for indemnity, which they had already received; that the bonds were not collectible; that the trustee was functus officio, and should be enjoined from collecting the bonds: Id.

TAXATION. See National Bank.

UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT. See Constitutional Law.

USURY. See National Bank.

Mortgage-Interest on Interest.-Where one purchases land subject to a mortgage lien, and, as part of the consideration, agrees to pay the mortgage debt, he cannot defend against the mortgage on the ground of usury: Cramer v. Lepper et al, 26 Ohio St.

Under a contract for the payment of interest at a specified rate annually, upon default of payment, interest on the interest will be computed at six per cent. Id.

VENDOR AND PURCHASER.

Vendor's Lien- Bankruptcy Statute of Limitations.—Where a party agrees to sell land to another, and, as consideration therefor, the vendee gives his promissory notes, payable at a future date named, and the vendor gives his bond conditioned that on the payment of the notes he will convey the premises in fee to the vendee, but makes no deed, the legal estate remains, until the payment of the purchase-money, in the vendor, and he has, by the law of those states where such liens are recognised, a "vendor's lien." The vendee has an equitable title only; one indeed which he can sell or devise, but one which, if the purchasemoney is unpaid, he cannot sell so as to exclude the vendor's right to have payment of it. Any purchaser from the vendee who assumes to

pay the notes takes the same title that the vendee had; that is to say, an equitable title, the land being still charged with the payment of the purchase-money: Lewis v. Hawkins et al, 23 Wall.

A discharge of such purchaser from the vendee under the Bankrupt Act will relieve such purchaser from paying the notes, but it will not give him a legal title in fee to the lands. That title, subject to the equity of the vendee, or of the purchaser from him, remains in the vendor: Id.

A statute of limitations barring suits for the recovery of real estate after a certain lapse of time, does not apply to a case like that above described. The vendec, or the purchaser from him, stands in the rela tion of a trustee to the vendor for the unpaid purchase-money (or, as the matter is looked upon in some states, stands in that of a mortgagee), against whom the statute does not run: Id.

If the notes are not paid, the vendor may apply by bill in equity against the vendee and the purchaser from him, tendering a good deed. and ask that they pay the purchase-money at short date or be foreclosed from setting up any right to the land, and that it be sold and the proceeds applied to paying the purchase-money: Id.

Where confessedly the title of a party claiming land as owner, and who has agreed to sell, is denied by the vendee and a dispute has taken place about title, so that a tender of a deed would be a useless ceremony, costs on a bill filed to enforce the payment of the purchase-money must abide the result of the suit: Id.

If the purchaser from the vendee be dead, leaving a widow, his executrix, and heirs-at-law to whom with her his real estate has descended, they ought to be made parties defendant to any bill to foreclose: Id.

LIST OF NEW LAW BOOKS.

DELAWARE.-Reports of Cases in the Court of Chancery, during the time of Chancellor Ridgley, 1814-1829; compiled by Hon. DANIEL M. BATES, late Chancellor of the state. Vol. 1. Philadelphia: T. & J. W. Johnson & Co. 8vo. $8.

KANSAS.-Reports of Cases in the Supreme Court. Vol. 14. By W. C. WEBB. Topeka: G. W. Martin.

MARYLAND.-Reports of Cases in the Court of Appeals. Vol. 42. By J. SHAAF STOCKETT. Baltimore: W. K. Boyle & Son.

NEBRASKA-Reports of Cases in the Supreme Court. Vol. 4. By Gur A. BROWN. Des Moines, Iowa: Mills & Co.

NEVADA. Reports of Cases in the Supreme Court. Vol. 10. By C. F. BICKNELL and THOS. P. HAWLEY. San Francisco: A. L. Bancroft & Co.

NEW YORK.-Kelly v. Marsh. A Rhymed Record of Proceedings in the Supreme Court of New York. 12mo. pamphl., pp. 35. New York: McDivett, Campbell & Co.

PARSONS.-A Series of Essays on Legal Topics. By JAMES PARSONS, Professor in the Law Department of the University of Pennsylvania. 8vo. pp. 153. Philadelphia: Rees Welsh.

WISCONSIN.-Reports of Cases in the Supreme Court. Vol. 39. By 0. M. CONOVER. Chicago: Callaghan & Co.

THE

AMERICAN LAW REGISTER.

SEPTEMBER 1876.

DRUNKENNESS AS AN EXTENUATION IN CASES OF MURDER.

THE relation of drunkenness to moral agency is one of those vexed questions with regard to which the opinions of moralists have ever been at variance, and upon which their conclusions are to-day not more harmonious than they were when the matter may have first attracted their attention. Jurists, too, have differed very widely among themselves as to the degree of guilt which may attach to deeds perpetrated by agents who had voluntarily yielded to an appetite whose indulgence they well knew would destroy their reasoning powers and rob them of all prudence and selfcontrol. So great disagreement have the laws of different times. and of different nations shown upon this question that we may find. intoxication variously regarded as leading to acts done under its influence almost every shade of guilt, from that slight degree of moral laxity of which the laws of most countries take no notice, to the baseness and turpitude which would render it an aggravation of the offence. Accordingly as the spirit of the age upon which their lot was cast inclined toward the doctrine that " mercy and reformation," rather than "severity and annihilation," should be the rule of society in dealing with its criminals, mankind have been disposed to look upon drunkenness as an excuse, a matter of indifference or an aggravation of guilt. In England, for instance, in the days of Lord COKE (4 Bl. Com. 25), when all the (505)

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