152 EXAMPLES OF ADJUSTMENT. labors of the special experts employed in State Street and elsewhere for this purpose. Emerigon, Stevens, Benecke, Abbott, Kent, Parsons, Flanders, and others, give instances of their mode of adjusting general average losses; and in the case of Padelford v. Boardman (4 Mass. 555), a practical illustration may be found. But, perhaps, I may not better serve the student than by citing leading cases, and subjoining two or three recognized and well-established examples of adjustment, in arithmetical form, selecting only such cases as have at some period been doubted, controverted, denied, or much discussed and considered by persons presumed competent to the task. Such are the cases of intentional or voluntary stranding, adjustment at foreign ports, wages, provisions consumed, ammunition expended, and expense of repairs and refitting at an intermediate port or port of refuge or distress. My selections will be confined to New York and Massachusetts in this country, barely referring to the supposed case in England, whereby the learned author of Abbott on Shipping illustrated the doctrines contained in his text at the early period of its first publication. Other hypothetical cases may be resorted to for illustrating the principles in the adjudged cases to be applied to practical adjustments. I. In 1808 (4 Mass. supra), the average produced was as follows: General Average to be adjusted by contribution, namely: Pilotage, $40; Entry, $3.50; Harbor master, $1.25 $44.75 39.59 Surveys, $13,98; Wharfage, $19.50; Small stores, $6.11 $245.19 As $7050: $245.19 : : $4000 : $139.11 II. Another instance is an hypothetical case of general average adjustment put in the text of Abbott on Shipping (p. 506 or 608 of the later edition). A ship, bound for Hull, is compelled in the Downs to cut her cable; then struck the Goodwin Sands, which forced the captain to cut away his mast, and jettison part of the cargo; and in so doing, other portions of the cargo were damaged. Hence it appears that each person interested will contribute 10 per cent. toward the whole loss. III. A third statement is taken from 8 Law Rep. 366. Statement of General Average Case of the Ship George. Nett proceeds of cargo saved, received by Messrs. Josiah Macy Loss on Vessel, Cargo and Freight, by the voluntary stranding, to be accounted Vessel receives amount contributed for $9,133.05 $1,496.65 Mutual Safety Insurance Company on one third $68,927 54,828.62 HENRY W. JOHNSON, Insurance Broker. In the two former chapters, on collision and salvage, I have studiously forborne to draw liberally, or even to a qualified extent, from those ancient sources of maritime law the foreign ordinances. Indeed, but little is found, either in the laws of Oleron, Wisbuy, or the Hanse Towns, of sufficient value on these subjects to have justified encumbering the pages of this treatise with exact abstracts or precise verbal extracts from those Codes. As provision is there made only for damage happening to vessels in harbor or at anchor, I shall content myself with a mere reference to articles. As Mr. Justice McLean says (6 McLean, 576, supra), "average contribution is the creation of the maritime law, and is founded in the great principles of equity." Accordingly in regard to general average, the subject of the present chapter, it is deemed useful to change the plan and extend it. Much of the existing modern 156 ENGLISH AUTHORITIES NOT NUMEROUS. decisions defining, applying, and enforcing the principles of maritime law to subjects of general average, is abstracted almost bodily from the French Ordinance of Louis XIV. and imported into the more recent reports. When Lord Tenterden wrote his treatise on Shipping, he stated in the text that there were but few adjudications upon the subject. His precise language was, that "the English courts of justice furnish less of authority on this subject than any other branch of maritime law; there being only three reported cases of questions between the parties liable to contribution, in the first instance, and very few of questions between the party so liable and the insurer, from whom indemnity has been sought." Magens and Park had respectively published their works. And, at the time when this author, then Mr. Charles Abbott, prepared his original preface in January 25, 1802, it sufficiently appeared from all the law and authority accessible to the student or author, that a contributory tax, in cases of wreck, stranding, or jettison, could be levied or assessed upon goods saved, and which thereby became legally subjects of a general average. In its details, this law is chiefly derived from the foreign ordinances, but more particularly from that of Louis XIV. The laws of Oleron and Wisbuy supply but a moderate portion of the general law. That portion will be found in "les articles 8 et 9 des Jugemens d'Oleron," and "les articles 20, 21 et 38 de l'Ordonnance de Wisbuy." Valin says, that there is a single article of the French ordinance that is incomparably more exact than all of these five articles together; they only providing, in substance, that, if the master wish it, jettison is allowable |