Case ID: mass_105/html/0021-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "By the Court.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Francis Hayes vs. Charles Wilson.
    in an action for work done for the defendant, the plaintiff, to support an item in his bill of particulars, for- “sixty-one days’ work on house, &c., $122,” may prove days’ work done in grading the ground about the house, if the defendant has not moved for a more definite specification.
    Contract on an account annexed for work done for the plaintiff. The second item of the account was as follows: “ September 13, 1869. To sixty-one days’ work on house, &c., $122.”
    At the trial in the superior court, the defendant contended that to sustain this item the plaintiff could be permitted to prove only work done on the house itself. But Eevens, J., permitted the plaintiff to testify, in support of it, that he worked several days for the defendant “ in grading about the house,” besides working on the house ; and instructed the jury “ that if the plaintiff had satisfied them that he had done days’ work on the house itself, and also about the house in grading and preparing the ground for it, he might recover under this item for all the days thus proved, not exceeding the number of days charged.” The jury found for the plaintiff, and the defendant alleged exceptions.
    
      G. W. Bartlett, for the defendant.
    The plaintiff, in hia proofs, is limited to the bill of particulars. Babcock v. Thompson, 3 Pick. 446. No significance can reasonably be imputed to the character “ &c.” in the item in question ; and so there was a variance. Robbins v. Otis, 1 Pick. 368. Fitzgerald v. Jordan, 11 Allen, 128. With the utmost liberality of construction, either its significance must be limited to structures connected with or related to the house, like outbuildings; or it must be construed to mean “ and other days’ work,” in which event only one particular of the item could be proved. Jones v. Ilsley, 1 Allen, 273.
    
      W Griswold W. A. Gile, for the plaintiff,
    were stopped by the court.
   By the Court.

The second item in the bill of particulars was sufficient to authorize the admission of proof of the plaintiff’s work on the grading about the house ; the defendant not having moved for a more definite specification.

Exceptions overruled.