purpose of inducing the defendant to enter into an agreement to marry the plaintiff'; that the defendant believed these representations to be true, and "as a result of said representations

* the defendant agreed to marry the plaintiff herein." It is also pleaded that these representations wre false and known by the plaintiff to be false at the time he made them. After making other allegations, which it is not necessary to set forth in detail, the defendant demands judgment against the plaintiff for $20,000.

The plaintiff demurred to the defense upon the ground that it was insufficient in law upon the face thereof, and demurred to the counterclaim on the ground that it appears on the face threeof, first, that it is not of the character specified in section 501 of the Code of Civil Procedure, and second, that it does not state facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action.

The learned court below overruled the demurrer to the defense and to the counterclaim. From the judgment entered upon this decision the defendant appeals to this court.

An agreement to marry is essentially different in its purpose from every other contract known to the law. In considering what acts would justify one in abrogating or rescinding the agreement the law keeps in mind the purpose sought to be accomplished by the agreement itself. While undesirable traits or objectionable characteristics would not of themselves constitute a defense to an action for damages for breach of the promise, they might be pleaded in mitigation of damages (5 Cyc, 1002) Where, however, the plaintiff has been guilty of fraud inducing defendant's promise to marry or of fraudulent concealment, these facts may be shown as a justification for the refusal to perform the contract and furnish a good defense to an action for breach of promise of marriage (Di Lorenzo v. Di Lorenzo, 174 N. Y., 467, 472). Bad faith or unfair dealing by one of the parties to the agreement justifies the other in rescinding the contract to marry, and I think it can safely be affirmed that misconduct by one of the parties less than would justify a divorce after marriage would justify a refusal by the other to enter into the contract of marriage. "The agreement to marry," says Mr. Bishop in his work on Marriage and Divorce (sec. 235), is quite distinct in itself, in its nature and consequences, from the mutual consent to present marriage which superinduces the status. It is a mere executory contract founded on a consideration which in the facts of most cases is mutual promises. In the main it is governed by the same rule as contracts relating to pecuniary affairs. The differences come from

the dissimilarities of the thing contracted about. The parties must be persons competent in law to marry; they must act toward each other in good faith, and any deception, fraud or vital mistake will invalidate the agreement in favor of either who is misled; and after the bargain is entered into ill-conduct in one of them of a nature and to a degree not quite definable, yet far less than would be required for a divorce after marriage, will justify the other in rescinding it."

1.

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS OF TO-DAY.

Thou shalt not wait for something to turn up, but thou shalt pull off thy coat and go to work that thou mayest prosper in thy affairs, and make the word "failure" spell "success."

2. Thou shalt not be content to go about thy business looking like a loafer, for thou shouldst know that thy personal appearance is better than a letter of recommendation.

3. Thou shalt not try to make excuses, nor shalt thou say to those who chide thee, "I didn't think."

4. Thou shalt not wait to be told what thou shalt do, nor in what manner thou shalt do it, for thus may thy days be long in the job which fortune hath given thee.

5. Thou shalt not fail to maintain thine own integrity. nor shalt thou be guilty of anything that will lessen thy good respect for thyself.

6. Thou shalt not covet the other fellow's job, nor his salary, nor the position that he hath gained by his own hard labor.

7. Thou shalt not fail to live within thy income, nor shalt thou contract any debts when thou canst not see thy way clear to pay them.

8. Thou shalt not be afraid to blow thine own horn, for he who failest to blow his own horn at the proper occasion findest nobody standing ready to blow it for him.

9.

Thou shalt not hesitate to say "No" when thou meaneth "No," nor shalt thou fail to remember that there are times when it is unsafe to bind thyself by a hasty judgment.

10. Thou shalt give every man a square deal. This is the last and great commandment, and there is no other like unto it. Upon this commandment hangs all the law and profits of the business world. GRAHAM HOOD.

SELF-INCRIMINATION.

That sacred fetich of Anglo-Saxon law, the right of one accused of crime, or who may be accused of crime, to maintain silence as to his own guilt or innocence, was under consideration in the case of Wilson vs. United States, 31 Sup. Ct. 538, where it was held that an officer of a corporation could not, because of his constitutional exemption from self-accusation, withhold from the government the books and papers of the company, even though these might furnish evidence of his guilt. Mr. Justice Kenna dissented. No doubt many lawyers for whom this peculiar feature of English and American procedure has acquired almost a religious sanctity, will join in this dissent.

While the opinion of the majority seems to require no justification, we venture to suggest that the reasoning by which it is supported leaves something to be desired. The argument is that the state, in virtue of its visitorial powers over corporations, has a right of access to the corporation's books and papers, for the purpose of determining in what manner it has exercised its franchise. That, no doubt, is true, but does the right to inspect a corporation's books, for the purpose of discovering violations of its corporate duty, include the right to compel their production for another purpose? Suppose, for instance, that an officer of a bank is accused of embezzling its funds, and, for the purpose of concealing his peculations, or rather, for the purpose of preventing proof of them, he carries off all its books and papers. Clearly, in such a case, the demand by the prosecuting attorney, by a subpoena duces tecum, for the production of the books and papers of the bank in the defendant's hands, would have nothing to do with the state's visitorial power over the corporation, and to justify their compulsory production on that ground would be a mere sham. We might go further and say that, if the right to compel an officer to produce the books of the corporation in his possession rests upon the visitorial power of the state over its creature, the corporation, then their compulsory production, except in a proceeding directly relating to the exercise of this visitorial power, as a criminal action to punish the exercise of an illegal power (supposting that such an action existed) or the execution of a crime, or a proceeding to vacate the charter because of such acts would be a plain invasion of the officer's rights, since the case, manifestly, does not fall within the exception asserted to the general rule against self-incrimination.

The illustration given, of an officer who has stolen the corporation's funds then stealing its books to prevent proof of his crime, shows the unsubstantiality of the court's reasons for a decision manifestly just--one which does not in any way trench upon the principle of the rule, nemo se accusare tenetur. The only logical reason upon which that decision can rest is that the extension of the rule against self-accusation to the compulsory production of books and papers by the witness, is limited to the production of books and papers which belong to him and thus are, in a sense, a part of himself, so that to compel him to disclose them would be equivalent to compelling him to testify against himself. But when the books and papers do not belong to him, but are held by him either in defiance of the rights of their legal owner, or by collusion with the latter, that fact can not give him any proprietary interest in them which would justify him in refusing to produce them when thereto legally summoned. There would, indeed, be something absurd in holding that certain books and papers may be required to be produced, so long as they are in the hands of their lawful owner or in the hands of another to whom he has intrusted them, other than the person of whose guilt they furnish evidence, but that if the latter can acquire the custody of them, no matter how, he can withdraw them from the legal arena. If he may do so, and this is asserted by Mr. Justice McKenna in his dissenting opinion, then the criminal who has wrongfully obtained possession of the books and papers evidencing his guilt, could resist a writ of replevin by the rightful owner, by setting up that, if they got out of his hands, they would furnish evidence to convict him of crime, and therefore that to compel him to deliver them up would be to invade his constitutional privilege!

The conclusive evidence of the unsoundness of the reason on which the Supreme Court has seen fit to rest its decision is found in cases where the books are not corporate books, but the books of private persons other than the defendant. A bookkeeper or other employe of an individual or partnership who might steal the documentary evidence of his embezzlements would have as good a right, and no better, to refuse to produce them, that an officer or employe of a corporation would have.

The privilege against self-accusation has been greatly extended in this country, either by judicial interpretation or legislation-extended far beyond anything dreamed of by the makers of our first constitutions, who intended nothing more than to forbid the interrogation of the accused as a witness. It has been carried to the ridiculous extent of forbidding any comment

by the state on the failure of the defendant to testify in his own behalf-the most conclusive evidence imaginable, and in some states, notably Illinois, this modification of the original and simple rule has been embodied in the positive law. Any decision which retraces even a few steps of the road so unwisely made by the courts is to be commended, and such a decision is Wilson vs. United States.-Nat. Corp. Rep.

A STRANGE MIX-UP,

A member of the Chicago bar tells the following:

A young man by the name of Sterling resides at Dixon, Ill., and raises chickens for sale. From Chicago an eccentric German of somewhat broken English, learning the address of Mr. Sterling, wrote him the following letters:

"Mister Dixon: I understhoot you haf some roostars to sale. A frent of yourn tolt me. How much you charge? I take a tollers worth.

"HEINE PRETZEL,”

"Mister Sterling: I mishsphelled yourn name, and I send it Sterling stead of Dixon I tink. I vant rooasters queek. I go Sterling by Dixon pashenger Tushday night maybe. Met me. "HEINE PRETZEL."

"Excuse my mishtakes Misther Dixon."

"Mister Dixon: Excuse me Misther Dixon I git all mixthed up on yestherday. I don't know yourn name Dixon or Sterling. I vish I writ it down. I haf to gif it up Misther Dixon and the rooasters too. I feel so bat. I go out mit de Dixon phassenger and those railroad fellows say I dream it.

"Bood by Misther Dixon. Excuse my mistakes Misther Dixon.

"HEINE PRETZEL,"

"Misther Sterling: It is all just as plain now Misther Sterling. I see yourn friend. Yourn name is Sterling and you live by Dixon. Sterling is beyont you and de Sterling phassenger runs throe you. Ish not that just as plain. But Misther Dixon I tink de season is now too late for rooasters. I write you next time maybe I take two dollars worth.

"Good-bye Misther Dixon.

"HEINE PRETZEL,"