must, for want of space, be invariably rejected. Anonymous communications are not requested.

QUERIES.

26. Is there property in dogs under the laws of Missouri? Can a city council adopt an ordinance requir ing the chief of police to "kill every dog he may find without a tag showing that the city tax has been paid?" Can property be destroyed, simply because the owner refuses or neglects to pay the taxes thereon? W.

27. A, the bona ide holder of B's promissory note, at its maturity demands payment from B. The latter gives A an order or draft for the required sum on C, a merchant in the same place. A thereupon surrenders the note to B, and presents the order or draft to C for payment. C takes this order or draft and gives to A his check on his bank in the same locality. The bank dishonors and refuses to pay the check. A tenders this check to C, demands surrender of the draft and is refused. What is A's remedy against B and against C, supposing that A gives B notice of C's conduct within a reasonable time? H. H.

28. A having an execution against B for $3,000, caused it to be levied on three separate parcels of real estate belonging to B, worth about that sum, and advertised the same for sale in one lot. B requested both A and the sheriff to sell the three parcels separately, which they refused to do, and the property was sold by the sheriff in one lot to A for $1,000. Shortly afterwards A resold the property for more than $3,000. B having died, a now sues his administrator for the balance of $2,000, which he claims to be still due on his execution. Can the administrator maintain a bill in equity to restrain the suit, claiming that A has been already paid out of the proceeds of the real estate, and that the three parcels would have brought enough at the sheriff's sale to satisfy the execution if they had been sold separately as requested? Cite authorities.

H.

30. A, a citizen of Alabama, and B, a citizen of Virginia, entered into a contract by which the former agreed to deliver to the latter, by a given date, a certain amount of Confederate States bonds at four dollars per thousand. At the time and place agreed on for delivery Confederate bonds were selling at ten dollars per thousand. There was a failure on the part of A to deliver. The agreement and breach occurred in 1881. Will an action lie in a Federal or State court for the breach of such a contract? Montgomery, Ala.

T.

These two volumes include part of the decisions of the Missouri Supreme Court rendered at the October Term, 1880, those rendered at the April Term, 1881, and a part of those rendered at the October term, 1881. The cases are well and carefully reported, and the mechanical execution of the volumes is excellent. We have spoken elsewhere in this issue of some of the particulars, in respect to which, grave imperfections are to be found in these volumes.

AMERICAN DECISIONS. The American Decisions, Containing the Cases of General Value and Authority Decided in the Courts of the Several States from the Earliest Issue of the State Reports to the year 1869. Compiled and Annotated by A. C. Freeman. Vols. 33, 34, 35 and 36. San Francisco, 1882: A. L. Bancroft & Co. These volumes of this most excellent series cover the period between the years 1838 and 1841, inclusive. The cases selected for reporting in these volumes are, as they have been throughout the series, really leading cases, and the notes are condensed and thorough and, above all, are upon topics of live practical interest, among which are: "What is Gaming; " "Liability of Infants for their Torts; " "When is Probate of Will, or Letters of Administration, Void for want of Jurisdiction; " "Alluvion;" "Power of the Judiciary to Issue Mandamus against the Governor; " "Right of Vendor to Reclaim Goods Fraudulently Purchased," and "Necessity of a Levy to Sustain a Sale," in volume 33; "Attorney's Liability for Negligence and Want of Skill; "Amendments Varying or Altering a Cause of Action;" "Liability of Bank as Collecting Agent:" "By-Laws and Municipal Ordinances," and "Judgments against Trustee, to bind Cestuis que Trust" in volume 34; "Master's Liability for Servant's Torts;" "Misconduct of Jurors, as Ground for New Trial;” “Regulation of the Sale of Intoxicating Liquors by the State; “Ancillary Administration" and "Interpleader in Equity," in volume 35; and "Employer's Liability for Inju ries to Servant through the Negligence of his Fellow Servant," and "Unexecuted Will, How far Valid," in volume 36.

RECENT LEGAL LITERATURE.

MISSOURI REPORTS. Reports of Cases Argued and Determined in the Supreme Court of the State of Missouri. Thomas K. Skinker, Reporter. Vols. 73 and 74. Kansas City, 1882: Ramsey, Millett & Hudson,

NOTES.

-Lord Wellesley's aid-de-camp, Keppel, wrote a book of travels and called it his Personal Narrative. Lord Wellesley was quizzing it, and said to Lord Plunkett: "Personal narrativewhat is a personal narrative, Lord Plunkett? What should you say a personal narrative meant?” Plunket answered: "My Lord, you know we lawyers always understand personal as contradistinguished from real,”—James' Curiosities of Lur and Lawyers.

ST. LOUIS, SEPTEMBER 15, 1882.

CURRENT TOPICS.

Probably the most extraordinary case, in the books, of the misconduct of jurors in the indulgence in intoxicating liquors, is People v. Gray, recently decided by the Supreme Court of California. The prosecution was for murder, and during a period of eight days occupied by the trial and their deliberations, the jury sustained the drain upon their phys ical and nervous systems by the consumption of seventeen and a half gallons of beer, two gallons of wine, and two flasks of whisky, besides wine and whisky drank at their meals. It appeared from the evidence that all the drinking by the jurors was without the permission of the court, or the consent of the defendant or of the counsel engaged in the cause, and in fact without the knowledge of either of them; that all the beer, wine and whisky drank were procured by such of the jurors as desired it of their own motion and at their own expense. The evidence further afforded strong reason to suspect that one of the jurors drank so much while deliberating on the verdict as to unfit hina for the proper discharge of his duty.

Say the court: "The decisions as to how far drinking by a juror while in the discharge of his duties as such, at his own expense, without the permission of the court, or the consent of the party, is such misbehavior that the verdict should be set aside and a new trial granted, are not uniform. In Iowa and Texas no drinking at all is allowed. See State v. Baldy, 17 Iowa, 89; Ryan v. Harrow, 27 Id. 494; Jones v. State, 13 Tex. 166. It is held in these cases that if any liquor is drank while the juror is in the discharge of his duties, the verdict can not stand. In each of the cases cited the drinking was done after the cause was submitted to the jury to deliberate on their verdict. In State v. Baldy, a juror in charge of a bailiff went to a grocery store to purchase some tobacco, and while there drank a glass of ale or lager beer, and then returned with the bailiff to the juryroom, In Ryan v. Harrow, a civil case, two of the jurors drank intoxicating liquors, In

Vol, 15-No, 11,

whisky, which they drank. The verdicts in these cases were set aside. These cases all hold that courts will not inquire whether the juror was affected by what he drank or not; that the only sure safeguard to the purity and correctness of the verdict is that no drinking shall be allowed. This rule is supported by the following cases: Davis v. State, 35 Ind. 496; Leighton v. Sargent, 11 Foster, 119; State v. Bullard, 16 N. H. 139; Pelham v. Page, 1 Eng.,535; Griggs v. McDaniel, 4 Harrington, 367; People v. Douglass, 4 Cow. 26; Brant v, Fowler, 7 Cow. 562. The law seems to have been settled in New York to the same effect as in Iowa and Texas, until Wilson v. Abrahams, 1 Hill, 207, which was a civil case, as its title imports. In that case during the trial and before the cause was submitted to the jury for their consideration, and the jurors were allowed to separate, one of the jurors during an adjournment for dianer on the second day of the trial, went into a tavern and drank about half a gill of brandy. In the opinion of the court, Bronson, J., states the conclusion arrived at: When in the course of the trial, a juror has in any way come under the influence of the party who afterwards has the verdict, or there is reason to suspect that he has drank so much, at his own expense, as to unfit him for the proper discharge of his duty, or where he has so grossly misbehaved himself in any other respect as to show that he had no just sense of the responsibility of his station, the verdict ought not to stand. But every irregularity which would subject the juror to censure, whether in drinking spirituous liquor, separating from his fellows, or the like,should not overturn the verdict unless there be some reason to suspect that the irregularity may have had an influence on the final result.'

It may well be doubted whether it was the intention of the court, in Wilson v. Abrahams, to establish a rule in capital cases different from that held in Iowa and Texas. We express ourselves in this way in consequence of the guarded language of the opinion. The opinion opens by stating the rule in civil cases -and when it comes to remark on the case of People v. Douglass, in the 4th Cowen, holding a rule similar to that established in Iowa and Texas, it is said that the case under consideration is distinguished from it, and

the feature of distinction first mentioned is that it is a capital case. The cases cited by counsel either follow the rule in the Iowa and Texas cases, or Wilson v. Abrahams. If any

have gone further in a direction opposed to Ryan v. Harrow and Jones v. State, above cited, we are not disposed to follow them.

It is not necessary in this case to say which rule should be adopted as the law in this State; but following the rule of Wilson v. Abrahams, "that where there is reason to suspect that" a juror "has drank so much as to unfit him for the proper discharge of his duty," the verdict ought not to stand. In our judgment, there is strong reason to suspect this of one of the jurors, and therefore a new trial should be had. It should be added here that if it is necessary that intoxicating liquors of any kind should be drank by a juror, application for leave to do so should be made to the court, who can make such allowance as will be proper. Jurors should not be allowed

ble of being understood as charging the giving of poison with intent to kill; and where that meaning is attributed to them by proper innuendoes, and there is sufficient evidence to support a finding that they were so intended, a nonsuit should be denied.2 The objection that the words spoken were not slanderous per se, and that their meaning could not be enlarged by innuendoes, was met by a large array of counter authorities concerning the effect to be given to defamatory language.3 After stating that the case under consideration was clearly distinguishable from certain cases named, and more analogous to others mentioned, it was pointed out that here the objectionable language had been uttered during the last sickness of plaintiff's husband, and when she was his sole nurse; and that the crime of poisoning was a State prison offense. The evidence tended to prove that the husband's brother, in connection with the words complained of, had called the plaintiff a "termagon,'' and be

5

4

RECENT PHASES OF DEFAMATION.

The many anomalies in the law of libel and slander cause the progress of decisions on the subject to be watched with special interest. The recent contributions of the courts to the subject are, therefore, presented to the practitioner in the belief that they will arrest his attention from the outset, as combining matters of practical concern with those of curious investigation. The settled modern doctrine has recently been reiterated and newly applied, that in slander, in determining whether words are actionable per se, they are to be taken in the sense in which they would naturally be understood by those who heard them.1 The words, "she is slow poisoning her husband," it was further held, are capa

1 Campbell v. Campbell, 11 N, W, Rep, 456, Wis. Sup, Ct., Jan, 10, 1882,

ter, said, "Wait until he is dead; my brother in Oshkosh will skin her alive, and I will see her in prison." The trial court could, therefore, not do otherwise than hold that the words spoken were capable of the meaning ascribed to them by the innuendoes, and the jury were justified by the evidence in holding that such meaning was truly ascribed to them. Hence the nonsuit was properly denied. 7

In case of libel, also, the general rule is that the ordinary popular meaning of the language alleged to be libellous, is to be taken

V.

2 Ibid.

3 Somers v. House, Holt, 39; Roberts v. Camden, 9 East, 95; Hankinson v. Bilby, 16 M. & W. 443; Peake Oldham, 1 Cowper, 275; Blagg v. Sturt, 10 Ad. & El. (N. S.) 899, were cited by the court. Reference was also made to Strader v. Snyder, 67 Ill. 406; Goodrich v. Davis, 11 Met. 478; Montgomery v. Dudley, 3 Wis. 709; Weil v. Schmidt, 28 Wis. 137.

4 Frank v. Dunning. 38 Wis. 270; Weil v. Altenhoften, 26 Wis. 708; Vliet v. Rome, 1 Pin. 413; Bloss v. Tobey, 2 Pick. 320; Carter v. Andrews, 16 Pick. 1: Snell v. Snow, 13 Met. 278.

5 Weil v. Schmidt, 28 Wis. 137; Cottrill v. Cramer, 43 Wis. 242; and particularly, Ward v. Reynolds, cited Cowper, 298: Peake v. Oldham, 1 Cowper, 275; Geary v. Bennett (Wis.), 10 N. W. Rep. 602, the watered milk case elsewhere outlined herein.

6 In regard to the proof that the term used was designed to be applied to the plaintiff, the court cited Miller v. Butler, 6 Cush. 72; Leonard v. Allen, 11 Cush. 241; 2 Greenl, Ev., sec, 417; Davis y. Hartley, & Exch, 200.

7 Campbell v. Campbell, supra,

to be the meaning of the publisher; but a foundation may be laid for showing another or different meaning. To say or publish of a merchant anything that imputes insolvency, inability to pay his debts, the want of integrity in his business, or personal incapacity or pecuniary inability to conduct it with success, is slanderous or libellous per se, if without justification, and general damages may be recovered. When the alleged libel is only actionable as to special damages, it must appear to be of such a character that the special damage alleged may be the natural and proximate, though not necessary, consequence of the publication. 8

That the imputation of an indictable offense is slander which is actionable per se, is a principle re-asserted in a late decision which presents some interesting features. The words alleged in the complaint to have been falsely and maliciously spoken concerning the plaintiff, were that he "sent two loads of his store goods to the Black Hills with his mule teams and started a store there, and then set fire to and burned his store building to get the insurance." Defendant was also charged with saying of plaintiff, that he burned his store, and that defendant knew it and would swear to it. In considering the propriety of a demurrer to the complaint, on the ground that it did not state facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action, the appellate court said that in an action of slander, if the words alleged to have been spoken of the plaintiff, when taken in their plainest and most natural sense, and as they would be ordinarily understood, obviously import the commission of crime punishable by indictment, such words are actionable per se. 10 Construing the complaint according to this rule, the words alleged to have been spoken imputed the doing of an act which, by the terms of the local statute, constituted an indictable felony, and they were actionable in themselves without other averments, as of special damages, waich were presumed, or that the plaintiff had a store which was insured, and that it was

8 Newbold v. Bradstreet, Baltimore Ct. App., noted 7 South. L. Rev. 603; from Reporter for Aug. 10, 1881. 9 West v. Hanrapan, 10 N. W. Rep. 415; Minn. Sup. Ct., Oct. 29, 1881.

10 Montgomery v. Deeley, 3 Wis. 623; Case v. Buckley, 15 Wend. 327; St. Martin v. Desnoyer, 1 Minn. 156, are the cases cited in support of this passage in the opinion.

burned, for these facts were necessarily implied in the accusation of the commission of a crime; and here the question was not whether a crime had been committed in fact, nor was the complaint to be construed as an indictment charging crime. One might be accused of murder or arson, and the accusation would be slander, although no homicide had been committed and no building burned.

To charge a person with fraudulently con-verting money to his own use, is similarly actionable per se, as being calculated to exclude him from society. This is true, whether the words used charge a crime punishable by law or not. 11 So, the charge that another "used and embezzled moneys for his own wrongfulness, and I will prove it, and he is unfit to be the minister in our pulpit," is actionable per se. It contains the imputation of a debasing act which may exclude him from society, and also a charge calculated to injure him in his trade, office or profession. 12 Similarly, where the statute makes it an offense, punishable with fine and imprisonment in the county jail, to knowingly furnish. watered milk to any factory, to be manufactured into butter, it has recently been ruled that words charging that offense are for that reason actionable per se. The language used concerning the plaintiff included this: "There is foreign substance in your milk, similar to water, and it is water. The amount of water in your milk is one-eighth or one-tenth." It was charged that at another time the defendant said to a neighbor of the plaintiff that his milk was watered, and that the watering of the milk by him caused, when it was brought to the factory, a loss of seventy-five cents per day to defendant, by reason of the water ad. ded. 13 The court said that the offense defined in the statute was, contrary to the contention for the defendant, clearly one involving moral turpitude, and subjecting the offender to an infamous punishment; and that it had repeatedly held that to charge a person with an offense so punishable was slanderous and actionable per se. 14 The opinion then

11 Franklin v. Brown, 14 Cent. L. J. 47; S. C. Ga., Jan. 31. 1882.

12 Elsas v. Browne, S. C. Ga., Jan. 31, 1882; 25 Alb. L. J. 499.

13 Geary v. Bennett, 10 N. W. Rep. 662; S. C. Wis., Nov. 22, 1881.

14 Citing Mayer v. Schleichter, 29 Wis. 646; Ranger v. Goodrich, 17 Wis. 78; Tether v. Dautermann, 26

proceeded to show that the objection that the plaintiff was not charged with having knowingly furnished watered milk, could not be sustained in view of the addition of the words that the milk was watered by the plaintiff himself, which implied that he knew of the adulteration. The point was illustrated by the instance of a charge of selling a horse which the vendor had stolen, and the rule as to the construction of the language used in cases of the kind under consideration, reported to be that the "words complained of are to be taken in the sense which is most obvious and natural, and in which those to whom they were spoken were most apt to understand them."15 A different view seems to have been taken where defendant charged plaintiff with "bearing down" the scales when defendant's stock was weighed, and "lifting up" when plaintiff's was weighed. The first part of the charge imputed, according to a late decision, an act of wanton mischief which was of no benefit to plaintiff, and hence was not a charge of fraud; and altogether the offense of using false pretenses was not charged, unless it was stated that plaintiff was weighmaster and had charge of the weighing.16

An interesting instance of a libellous publication was recently presented by a statement in a newspaper, which charged attorneys at law, in their conduct touching the defense of a client against a criminal prosecution, with "betraying and selling innocence in a court of justice," and with doing acts in their profession which should cause them "to be held up to the world as derelict in their sense of honor and obligation," and unworthy of "trust and confidence." The client was a woman charged with the murder of her infant child. The imputation was distinctly made against the lawyers that they were unfaithful in the management of the case; that they compelled the accused to sign an order on her guardian for $75; and that, without any knowledge of the facts of the case, they hurried up her examination, and finally advised her to plead guilty to the charge made against her. 17 The Wis. 518; Montgomery v. Decley, 3 Wis. 709; Gibson v. Gibson, 43 Wis. 23.

15 Quoting and approving Montgomery v. Deeley, 3 Wis. 709.

16 Wilkin v. Thorp, Sup. Ct. Iowa, April 6, 1881, noted 15 Am. L. Rev. 420; since reported, 55 Iowa, 609.

17 Ludwig v. Cramer, 10 N. W. Rep. 81; Sup. Ct. Wis., Oct. 18, 1881.

court before which these facts were developed on appeal, considered it unneccessary to observe that such language published concerning attorneys, touching their professional conduct, was grossly libellous. It clearly conveyed imputations injurious to their professional character in the management of the cause with which they were intrusted; nay, more; it charged them with having betrayed the interests of their helpless client, which, by the obligations of their oath of office, as well as by every principle of duty and honor, they were bound to protect and defend to their utmost ability. The suggestion that the article in question was privileged, as being in the nature of a report of a proceeding in a court of justice, was regarded as untenable, because the article did not profess to be a true and fair report of a proceeding in court, but was a direct attack upon the conduct of the attorneys in the management of the case. But an article for a newspaper, written by the plaintiff as a gratuitous puff of himself, and published at his request, can not be held to be a malicious libel by reason of a printer's mistake therein occurring without wrongful intent; and it was competent for the defendant to show that the facts alleged were true; and it was for the jury to say whether the article was really libellous. 18

The

It has lately been again decided in Wisconsin, that words accusing a married woman of being a prostitute are actionable per se.19 A curious point was presented where defendant in an action for slander lately decided, was charged with saying of the plaintiff that she slept with a man not her husband. words were held actionable per se. The proof, however, showed the statement to be that such person was in bed with her. It was held that the want of correspondence between the allegation and proof raised a mere question of variance, and was Lot a failure of proof.

20

Interesting for comparison with the com

18 Sullings v. Shakespeare, Sup. Ct. Mich., noted 7 South. L. Rev. 603, from Reporter for Aug. 17, 1881. 19 Klewin v. Bauman, 10 N. W. Rep. 398; Wis. Sup. Ct., Nov. 3, 1881, following Ranger y. Goodrich, 17 Wis. 78; Benaway v. Conyne, 3 Pin. 196 (3 Chandler 214); Mayer v. Schleichter, 29 Wis. 646; Gibson v. Gibson, 43 Wis. 23.

20 Barnett v. Ward, 36 Ohio St. 207. A false charge of sodomy is not slanderous in itself, under the laws of Ohio. Melvin v. Weiant, Id. 184.