Case Name: Cook v. Bondurant and al.
Court: Supreme Court of Appeals of Virginia
Jurisdiction: Virginia
Decision Date: 1888-05-17
Citations: 85 Va. 47
Docket Number: 
Parties: Cook v. Bondurant and al.
Judges: 
Reporter: Virginia Reports
Volume: 85
Pages: 47–48

Head Matter:
Richmond.
Cook v. Bondurant and al.
May 17th, 1888.
Absent, Richardson, J.
Appellate Jurisdiction&emdash;Minimum.&emdash;Where the decree is for less than $500, including interest, the appeal must be dismissed for want of jurisdiction, though the decree provides that certain land be sold unless the debt be paid within a named period.
Appeal from decree of circuit court of Pittsylvania county, entered April 30th, 1887, in the consolidated suits of W. H. Bondurant, trustee, plaintiff, against D. H. Cook, and W. H. Bondurant, trustee, against same. The decree being adverse to Cook, he obtained an appeal here.
John Gilmer, for the appellant.
J. L. Treadway, for the appellees.

Opinion:
Lewis, P.,
delivered the opinion of the court.
This appeal must be dismissed for want of jurisdiction. The decree is for $400, with interest thereon from the 1st day of March, 1886, less $50 as of the 1st day of January, 1886, and costs, which is less in amount than $500. The fact that the land in the proceedings mentioned is ordered to he sold, unless the sum decreed against the defendant is paid within a specified time, is immaterial. As this court has repeatedly decided, the pecuniary demand asserted is, in such a case, the matter in com troversy, and not "the title or boundaries of land"; and when the' defendant is the appellant, as is the case here, the test of jurisdiction is the sum decreed against him. Umbarger v. Watts, 25 Gratt. 167; Harman v. City of Lynchburg, 33 Gratt. 37; Hawkins v. Gresham, ante, 34, and cases cited.
Appeal dismissed.