The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1848-03-21 00:00:00

LAW INTELLIGENCE,

SOUTH LANCASHIRE SPRING ASSIZES.—The commis..
sion will be opened on Thursday afternoon next, and the
general business of the assizes will commence on Friday,
at eleven o'clock.

*STAFFORD ASSIZES, MARCH 17.—WRITEHOUSE V.
THE LIVERPOOL GAS AND COKE COMPANY.—The plain-
tiff entered into a written contract some time back to sup-
ply, for three years, as many gas pipes, of certain specified
dimensions, as should " be required by the said company."
The agreement further specified that the plaintiff was to
supply the pipes " to be 'ordered by the said company,
within a certain time after receiving notice to that
effect." The price of the pipes in question rose con-
siderably after the contract was entered into, and the
defendants, • according to the plaintiff's statement, or-
dered miles of pipes which they did not want for the pur-
poses of their business, as it was carried on when they
entered into the contract. The plaintiff supplied the pipes,
but claimed the market price for all beyond what ivere
immediately wanted for the defendants' business; the
plaintiff contending that the meaning of the word " re-
quired " in the contract was " wanted." The difference
claimed by the plaintiff was £2749. For the defendants
it was contended that they did actually want all they
ordered, and witnesses were called to prove it ; but when
his lordship was leaving the case to the jury on this view,
the defendants' counsel submitted that it was incumbent
on his lordship to construe the contract. His lordship
being forced to express a decided opinion, said, that by
the contract the plaintiff was bound to supply all the pipes
that were requisite for the defendants in any works which
they wished to carry out under the provisions of their act
of Parliament. The jury thereupon found for the de-
fendants.

Mr. Sergeant Talfourd has been officiating for Mr. Jus-
tice Cresswell on the Oxford Circuit, the latter having
been called from his duties by the indisposition of his sis-
ter.

On Saturday, the Vice-Chancellor dissolved an injunc-
tion which had been granted to restrain the sale of timber
by the Duke of Buckingham and his son, the Marquis of
Chandos. The plaintiff was second mortgagee for £25,000,
and it appeared that the incumbrances on the duke's
estates amounted to no less than £BOO,OOO.
IMPORTANT DECISION.—A decision of considerable
importance was given a few days since at Bristol relative
to the contracting of debts after a party is clearly insol-
vent. The point arose on the examination of a person
who claimed the protection of the court ; but the judge
decided that as the party had gone on contracting debts
when he possessed no means ofdischargingthem, he was not
entitled to protection, and the consideration of the final
order was adjourned eine die.

DAMAGE BY RIOTS.—In the House of Commons on
Tuesday, Sir W. Clay asked whether parties who had
suffered damage by the breaking of their windows, some
of them of a costly character, during the recent distur-
bances in the metropolis, had any claim for compensation
on the county, or from any other authority, and, if so, by
what process I—The Attorney-General, in reply, stated
that by the Act of 7 and 8 Geo. IV., it was made a felony
wantonly and with force to demolish, or begin to demolish,
the buildings therein specified. But in the cases referred
to by the honourable baronet there was no actual demol-
ishing, nor anything to satisfy the words " begin to
demolish." Where the injury, as in the present instance,
was only partial, the hundred would not be liable unless
the acts were done under circumstances which would
satisfy a jury that the demolition would have been com-
plete if the rioters had not been interrupted. Those
elements were wanting here ; therefore the parties had
no remedy at law except against the actual aggressors
for the damage they had sustained.
CHARGES IN BANKRUPTCY.—At the County Court in
Nurth Shields, on Monday last, Mrs. Elizabeth Farmer,
administratrix of the late Mr. James Farmer, Messenger
of the Court of Bankruptcy, Newcastle-upon-Tyne Dis-
trict, brought an action against Mr. Emanuel Taylor.
The action was brought to recover £ll Bs. the amount of
the taxed bill of the messenger of the Court of Bankrupt-
cy, for services rendered to the defendant, Mr. Taylor, as
petitioning creditor, under a fiat against William Hender-
son, pipemaker, North Shields. it was usual for the
f n I !ti eJurt to meet the expenses of working a fiat in
bankruptcy. In this case, however, the funds had been
exhausted by the solicitor's bill, and some other charges.
There was no doubt in point of law, that the petitioning
creditor was liable. Commissioner Fane had decided a
few weeks ago, that the messenger's bill must be paid,
although there were no assets in the hands of the official
assignee. Mr. Wheldon said it was exceedingly hard
upon the defendant. There was no estate, and his client
had already lost a considerable sum. His Honour.—That
may be true but why was the fiat issued ? The messen-
ger had performed certain services, and the defendant put
the machinery of the Court of Bankruptcy in motion.
The jury then returned a verdict for £ll Bs. Mr. Harle
then stated that there was another action in which Mrs.
Farmer was plaintiff, and Messrs. Walker and Turner,
assignees of Henderson, were the defendants. The sum
sought was £2O, the amount of the messenger's bill, for
services rendered after the choice of assignees, who must,
in point of law, discharge the bill. Mr. Wheldon said
this ease was harder than the other. His Honour said
the law was clear, and a verdict was returned for £2O.

Eittraturr.

.....
VARIETIES

The poet Wordsworth is said to be in a state of imbe-
cility, sitting often in moody silence, with his gaze fixed
on vacancy.

GOLD l'ENs.—Nearly one million gold pens, in the
manufacture of which eight hundred pounds of gold are
used, are now annually made in the city of New York.
Douglas Jerrold says, " Assuredly F. M. the Duke of
Wellington and the Earl of Ellesmere have a dash of the
` true prophet.' The French princes have invaded Eng-
land, and taken possession of some of the royal palaces."
IT'S AN ILL WIND THAT BLOWS NO ONE ANY GOOD.
--The disorderly crowds in Trafalgar-square have swept
away the hoarding from the base of the Nelson column !
It needed a supernatural interposition.—The Builder.
A WITTY DEDICATION.-- Mrs. Clarke has Just pub-
lished a volume of proverbs from the works of Shakspeare.
She'dedicates the work—" To D. J., the first wit of the
present age, these proverbs of Shakspeare, the first wit of
any age, are inscribed by Mary Cowden Clarke, of a cer-
tain age, and no wit at all."

DROLL SIMPLICITY OF A. CHILD.—" Ma," said a little
girl about 8 years, " I don't think Solomon was so rich as
the Bible says he was." " Why, my dear, what makes
you think so ?" " Because it says that he slept with his
fathers, and I think if he had been so very rich, he would
have had a bed of his own to sleep in."
Tan LUNGS.—On examination the lungs will be found
full of innumerable little holes, like a sponge. These
holes are the cells into which the air enters when we
breathe. So great is their number that they have been
calculated to amount to 174,000,000, forming altogether a
surface thirty times greater than that of the human body.
lvery one of these cells is provided with a net-work of
blood vessels, by means of which the blood is brought into
immediate contact with the air ovPr every portion.of-thair
surface. When this'grpat amount 4 taken into consider-
ation, we shall feel at once how necessary it is to supply
pure air to the lungs with every breath we qmv.—lfeel(4
of 7'otett'B Gazette.

It is a meat exh— •
• orainary fact, and it will furnish a
lastinz pa •ge in history, that within the space of sixty
years, all the monarchs of France, who reigned within
that period, viz.. Louis the 16th, Napoleon Buonaparte,
Louis the 18th, Charles the 10th, and Louis Philippe,
were dethroned. Louis the 16th was put to death by his
own people in 1793 ; Buonaparte and Charles the 10th
died in exile ; Louis the 18th, after having been expelled
by Buonaparte in 1815, was permitted to return to the
throne, and the last of these, Louis Philippe, has found
an asylum in England. If the son of Louis the 16th,
asyled by the Legitamists, Louis the 17th, was ever really
a king, then the number of dethroned monarchs in suc-
cession would amount to six.

COINCIDENCES.—We are reminded that it was about
March, 1844, that the Prince de Joinville inspected our
southern coast, and published his famous Report, which
excited so Much. disagreeable feeling at the time. In that
Report he remarked, as one result of his inspection, that
in case of hostilities, Newhaven, in !Sussex, would be the
best spot at which to attempt a landing. InMarch,lB4B,
his own parents succeeded in effecting a landing at New-
haven, in Sussex, but under circumstances unforeseen
and unimagined alike h the Prince, his parents, and by
us ! Again ; it was in 1834, that a French traveller, in
reviewing his researches in the East, used these remarka-
ble words :—" Yon see, by this rapid sketch, that the
Ottoman empire is r,o empire at all; that the breath of
life which animated it is extinct. You see that its fatal
and blinded Administration has devoured the race of
conquerors ; and that Turkey is perishing for want of
Turks." Such language, coming from the lips of a
stranger, and one not much habituated to the language
of Scripture; struck many in England with a natural as.
tonishment. For a general consent of almost. all Protes-
tant interpreters (including the Assembly's Annotations
and Matthew Henry's) had connected " the Euphrates"
in Scripture with the Turkish empire; and here a French
savant was sent to give us warning that the Euphrates
was being " 'dried. up"; immediately following which
many v- '

apostle

cly the !wire('
o w ever, a dozen years pass away, and we find this same
French traveller, Lamartine, suddenly borne up on the I
bf_a pnilkiitoug revolution; and zutt4u the I.lq*i.Ota
Iliter of France I—Record,