think it would. In such cases the possession is the possessor's only reliance, for he may be powerless to put his claim of title upon the record. In Sugden on Vendors (vol. 1, 6th Am., from 10th London ed., p. 265, § 22), it is expressly stated, and numerous authorities are cited in support of the statement, that if a tenant, during his tenancy, changes his character by having agreed to purchase the estate, his possession amounts to notice of his equitable title as purchaser. Among the cases cited we find Daniels v. Davison, 16 Ves. 249, where it is held that the possession of a tenant, who had taken it under a lease for a term of years, and, during the pendency of the lease, made a contract with his lessor for the purchase of the reversion, was notice in itself to a subsequent purchaser (the lease being still unexpired), not only of a tenant's interest under it, but likewise of his equitable title to the estate under his contract for the purchase. To the same effect is Allen v. Anthony, 1 Mer. 282, and our own cases of Hottenstein v. Lerch, supra, and Rowe v. Ream, supra. Moreover, it now appears that Anderson, the lessee, was not himself in the possession. He had died two years or more before the sale to Brinser, and his widow and children were in the possession. The term of the lease had expired; and it would not be, we think, presumed in favor of a purchaser, in the absence of proof, that the heirs were holding over. Penn. Sup. Ct., Oct. 7, 1889. Brinser v. Anderson. Opinion by Clark, J.

JEWELRY-A testator after giving pecuniary and other legacies, including the sum of £100 to D., and including certain books, wine and plate, gave "all the rest of the furniture and effects" at the house in which he resided to D., and devised and bequeathed the rest, residue and remainder of his estate and effects to T. A sum of £2,740 in bank-notes, certain stock receipts, certificates of railway stock, and some jewelry, besides the usual furniture and appointments, were found in his house after his decease. Held, that the bank-notes, securities and jewelry did not pass to D. under the gift of the rest of the furniture and effects at his house, but were included in the residuary gift to T. The principle of the decision of Wood, V. C., in Gibbs v. Lawrence, 30 L. J., Ch. (N. S.) 170, and of the master of the rolls of Ireland in Campbell v. McGrain, Ir., 9 Eq. 397, shows that such context exists here. The first case decides this, reading from the summary in the marginal note, "A bequest of all and singular my household furniture, plate, linen, china, pictures, and other the goods, chattels and effects which shall be in or upon or about my dwelling-house and premises at the time of my decease.' Held, not to include a sum of money found in the house." The sum was £460 in bank-notes and gold. The second case, reading again the marginal note, was "A testator bequeathed all his estate and interest in his dwelling-house, together with all his household furniture, plate, linen and all other effeets therein to E. M., and the residue of his property to two other persons. Held, that a sum of money found in the house at the testator's death did not pass under the bequest to E. M." Eng. Ch. Div., Aug. 6, 1889. Re Miller; Daniel v. Daniel, Opinion by North, J.

NOTES.

THE following story of Judge Maine, of the United

States Supreme Court, has been going the round of the papers: An extravagant young man had called upon him, and after a few remarks had passed between them, the judge looked up and asked: "Brother Lightweight, why don't you get married?" "Because

Your letter speaks about "hard work," and "rising at the bar;'

I read it, Edith, at my window, smoking a cigar!
And I'm to work while you're away?-a likely thing indeed;
Yes, I'm in one Assizes case-that one in Adam Bede.

You can believe or disbelieve me, Edith, as you please,
A fellow's work's all bosh unless a fellow's mind's at ease;
And studying Cross Remainders Over is no use, I fear,
While you're in France, and I'm a cross remainder over here.
Don't, Edith, write about myself; I want to hear of you,
And what you're doing day by day, and also how you do;
And whether Mrs. Armington (whom I don't like and shan't)
Is really acting like a friend, or only like an aunt;

And takes you, Edith, everywhere, and shows you what

to see,

And in society performs what's due to you-and me: Nor, while her own long girls are push'd wherever she can get,

Permits you to be talk'd to by the billiard-playing set.

And, Edith, as she's full of spite (she is, from wig to toes, And hates me for that harmless sketch that show'd her Roman nose);

Inform me if those vicious innuendoes she contrives,
And talks at briefless barristers, and pities poor men's wives,

Or if she ever gives you, Edith, darling, half a hint
(There's nothing that a woman wouldn't do with such a

You'll call me such a worry, Edith, but it is not fun
To be stuck in Temple chambers when October has begun;
So pity for a lover who's condemned in town to stay,
When she-and everybody else—are off and far away.

I wander in our gardens when the dust makes all things dim, The gardener tells me not to smoke, but much I care for him;

And paper buildings, Edith, in a sketch by fancy drawn, Grows an old baronial mansion, with the grassplot for its lawn.

-Once a Week.

The Albany Law Journal.

W

ALBANY, MARCH 1, 1890.

CURRENT TOPICS.

E have received from Mr. J. Newton Fiero drafts of two bills which he proposes to introduce in the present Legislature. The one is to provide for a commission to propose amendments to the judiciary article of the Constitution, in accordance with the recommendation of the State Bar Association. The main section of the bill is as follows: "Section 1. The governor, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall designate thirty-six persons, four from each judicial district, except the first, from which eight persons shall be named, who shall constitute a commission for the purpose of proposing to the Legislature, at its next session, amendments to the sixth article of the Constitution. Provided, that no amendments shall be proposed to any other article thereof. No more than one-half in number of the persons so appointed from each district shall be members of the same political party." This action is desirable for the purpose of deliberate consideration of the question of adding to the number of Supreme Court justices, but should not stand in the way of adopting the bill already pending for a permanent increase of the number of judges of the Court of Appeals.

The other proposed bill is entitled "An act to facilitate the business of the Supreme Court in the third judicial district," and the main sections are as follows: "Section 1. The justices heretofore elected to the Supreme Court in and for the third judicial district shall meet at a place to be designated by the presiding justice of the General Term of the third department within twenty days after the passage of this act, and designate two persons, residents of the district, belonging to different political parties, who shall be attorneys and counsellors at law of at least ten years' standing, as referees in and for such judicial district, a certificate of which appointment, signed by a majority of the justices elected in said district, shall be filed with the secretary of State. Section 2. It shall be the duty of such referees so to be appointed, and their successors, to hear and decide all actions or special proceedings, the place for the trial or hearing of which shall be in the third judicial district, which may be referred to them for that purpose either by the Supreme Court, or any justice thereof, or by the consent of the parties thereto, or upon approval of the surrogate of any county in the district, and to perform such other duties as referee as may be assigned to them by the court or a justice thereof in any such action or special proceeding. They shall have the same powers as are conferred upon referees by the Code of Civil Procedure, and shall perform their duties in the same VOL. 41- No. 9.

manner now re

quired by law. The Supreme Court in and for said third judicial district is further authorized and empowered, in its discretion, to order and direct the issues in any action pending in said court in said district which is triable by the court without a jury to be referred to said referees, or either of them, to hear and decide the same, and such power may be exercised by said court, at Circuit, at Special Term or at General Term." These referees are to act until others are appointed in their stead, or until the justices shall certify to the secretary of State that their services are no longer needed. We are opposed to this bill on constitutional grounds and on grounds of policy. The constitutional objection ought to suffice. We dwelt on it on another occasion so fully that it is hardly worth while now to do more than reiterate our conviction that the measure is unconstitutional. It is impossible to spell out of the Constitution any warrant for the judges to farm out to referees the business which the Constitution requires them to transact, or to appoint referees except as authorized by the Code of Civil Procedure in particular cases as they arise. The question-to dignify it by a description to which it seems hardly entitled - was not raised in the case of the present Second Division of the Court of Appeals. Nobody dreamed that power could be conferred on the judges of the Court of Appeals to constitute a commission by any means short of a constitutional amendment. The two emergencies are exactly parallel. But the measure seems to us extremely impolitic as a practical evasion of the constitutional requirement that judges shall be elected by the popular We really do not care to have our judges appoint our judges. It may also well be objected to the bill that it is limited to the third judicial district, and that relief is needed just as much in the other districts. We are inclined to believe that the permanent increase of the judges of the Court of Appeals and the release of the seven now detained in the Second Division will afford the necessary relief, but if any thing more is needed, it is better to let the constitutional commission devise it, upon considerate reflection, discussion and inquiry, in accordance with the mandates of the Constitution, and with a view to permanency and adequacy.

vote.

In spite of the sarcasm of an English law journal that our Court of Appeals had deemed it worth while" to decide that the murderer of a testator could not profit by the will of his victim, it seems that an English court has "deemed it worth while " to consider the same question. Mr. Austin Abbott, in a note to Riggs v. Palmer, 23 Abb. N. C. 483, cites the case of De Tourville, in the English Court of Appeal, 1880, whose wife had made a will in his favor, and of whose murder he had been convicted, Her next of kin opposed his taking under the will. Mr. Abbott says: The case does not appear to be reported. The only account of it I have been able to find, besides that given below, and some mention of it in a contemporary journal, is the following from the Solicitors' Journal, August 3, 1878, vol. 22,

p. 784. On Wednesday (July 31) Mr. Glasse made an application in Re De Tourville, before Vice-Chancellor Malins, that the depositions of the witnesses who gave evidence on the trial of De Tourville in Austria for the murder of his wife might be brought into Chambers to be used as evidence in support of a question of law which was to be raised respecting the will of Madame De Tourville. The vice-chancellor said: 'I understand the question of law is this: whether, when a man knows that his wife has made a will in his favor, and then murders her in order to hasten the devolution of his interest, whether that avoids the bequest in his favor under the will? I have always considered that this court is satisfied with proof of the conviction having been arrived at according to the laws of the foreign country. The effect of my having the depositions before me would amount to my having to try the man for murder.' Mr. Bristowe, Q. C., stated that the evidence of the conviction of De Tourville had been presented before the benchers of the Middle Temple for the purpose of disbarring him, and when they found that the appeal from the decision of the trial had been refused, and that the only chance of a reprieve rested upon the clemency of the emperor, the benchers had actually disbarred him. Mr. Glasse said that the question had been very fully considered by several eminent counsel, who had formed an opinion that the court could not be satisfied with the evidence of a conviction in Austria, but that the depositions must be given in evidence. The vice-chancellor thought that in these circumstances he could not refuse to have the evidence produced, and acceded to the application and ordered the case to stand for Monday next (Aug. 5). The decision is thus stated in Curiosities of the Search-Room,' a Collection of Wills, etc., London, 1880, p., 277 (American edition, Franklin Square Library, Harper & Bro., No. 392, p. 44.) The vice-chancellor (Malins) refused the application for a commission, on the ground that the question of law should first be determined whether, in his position, De Tourville should lose the benefits conferred on him by the will, and directed an amendment of the pleadings for that purpose. The case was further complicated by the fact that previous to his conviction De Tourville had (not perhaps so cleverly as he thought) assigned his interest under the will to another person. The master of the rolls and Lords Justices James and Bramwell however reversed the decision of the vice-chancellor, and granted the application for a commission, the master of the rolls remarking that he was at a loss to understand why the application should have been refused.'" Mr. Abbott clearly points out the fallacy of the dissent in the New York case, as follows: "The action was not ejectment to recover the property, but to enjoin the defendant from claiming the property; it was not to nullify the statute, nor to interpolate a judicial exception into it, but to obtain a decree that in this case it was inequitable to allow the defendant to take advantage of the statute of wills and of the will made under it. The relief sought was injunctive in its nature. The effect of

is as old as the origin of equity itself. The harshness of common-law rules has now been so far mitigated, largely in consequence of a long course of such equitable interference, that equitable interference has of late been chiefly engaged in relieving against legal procedure, or in cases to which legal procedure does not reach. But the earlier English chancery jurisprudence gives many instances of the intervention of equity against allowing an indisput able rule of law to be invoked or enforced by a particular individual." The case is clearly distinguishable from those where a wife, divorced for her fault, has been adjudged to take under a pre-existing will of her former husband, who died without revoking it.

It has been resolved by the Executive Committee of the judicial centenary celebration to publish an account of the proceedings in a volume. This will include not only the various addresses, but biogra phies of the forty-four members of the Supreme Court, written by prominent members of the bar selected from different States, and accompanied by portraits of the subjects. This biographical part of the scheme seems to us very admirable, especially in respect to the portraits, which will give the volume permanent and unique interest and value even beyond that contributed by the other parts. The members of the court have interested themselves in the portraiture, and already have put the committee on the track of original portraits of all the justices. Procuring reproductions of these will involve some delay, but it will be fully compensated by the superior interest which they will give the volume. Portraits of the great lawyers are rare and hardly accessible. The publication of such as those of Greenleaf and Jeremiah Mason and others have done much to bring the Green Bag into favor. The collection in the chambers of our Court of Appeals is invaluable. The most interesting picture in the State Law Library is a photographic group of the old Superior Court of New York - Duer, Hoffman, Bosworth, etc. - which we have never seen elsewhere, and which must be now unattainable. Such a picturegallery of all the members of the Supreme Court from its foundation will render this publication desirable and entertaining long after people shall cease to read what the speakers said. The painter always outlives the orator, and there is no gallery so interesting as one of portraits. Their fashion never passes away. So we hope the committee will be patient and persistent in this particular matter, and thus make sure that the record will be sought and looked at a hundred years hence, when the court shall next be celebrated.