TREATISE ON THE LAW OF EVIDENCE. BY S. M. PHILLIPPS, ESQ. OF THE INNER TEMPLE, BARRISTER AT LAW. FIRST AMERICAN, FROM THE SECOND LONDON EDITION ; WITH NOTES AND REFERENCES TO AMERICAN BY JOHN A. DUNLAP, COUNSELLOR AT LAW. TO WHICH IS ADDED, THE THEORY OF PRESUMPTIVE PROOF, &c. NEW-YORK: PUBLISHED BY GOULD, BANKS, & GOULD, AND BY W. GOULD & co. ALBANY. G. F. HOPKINS, PRINTER. BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the eighteenth day of July, in the fortyfirst year of the Independence of the United States of America, Gould, Banks. and Gould, of the said District, have deposited in this office the Title of a Book, the right whereof they claim as proprietors, in the words following, to wit: L. S. "A Treatise on the Law of Evidence. By S. M. Phillipps, Esq. of the Inner Temple, Barrister at Law. First American, from the second London edition; with Notes and References to American Authorities. By John A. Dunlap, Counsellor at Law. To which is added, The Theory of Presumptive Proof, &c." In conformity to the Act of the Congress of the United States, entitled "An Act for the encouragement of Learning, by securing the copies of Maps. Charts, and Books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies, during the time therein mentioned." And also to an Act, entitled "An Act supplementary to an Act, entitied an act for the encouragement of Learning, by securing the copies of Maps, Charts, and Books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies, during the times therein mentioned, and extending, the benefits thereof te the arts of designing, engraving, and etching historical and other prints." THERON RUDD, Clerk of the Southern District of New-York. ADVERTISEMENT. SEVERAL additions and alterations have been made in the present edition of the following Treatise. Some parts of the work, which appeared to be treated in too concise a manner, have been enlarged, and the whole has been carefully revised. In consequence of the length of time, which the former edition took in passing through the press, many cases had been reported before its publication, which it was not possible to introduce; these, and the other cases upon the subject down to the present period, are now inserted. MIDDLE TEMPLE, ADVERTISEMENT OF THE AMERICAN EDITOR. THE design of the editor was, principally, to collect the decisions of the different courts in the United States, connected with the subject of the following work, the undoubted merit of which, justly entitles it to a preference to all former treatises on the law of evidence. The exuberance of the subject itself, and a solicitude to insert every thing which could be deemed useful, have swelled the notes greatly beyond what was originally expected and intended: and yet the learned reader will perceive that they might have been made still more extensive; that much has been omitted by design, and much, no doubt, through inadvertence. All the American works of celebrity and merit have been carefully consulted, and though some others, of a contrary description, have been entirely neglected, yet it may not be improper to apologize for a number of references to loose and obscure reporters. A few additional English authorities have been collected, and in two or three instances it has been attempted to supply, however imperfectly, some omissions of the author-omissions arising not from ignorance or carelessness, but from his desire to compress the work; and it is not unlikely that, |