REPORTS OF CASES ARGUED AND DETERMINED IN THE High Court of Chancery, FROM THE YEAR 1789 TO 1817. 29 to 57 GEO. III. BY FRANCIS VESEY, JUNIOR, ESQ. VOLUME I. COMMENCING IN THE SITTINGS AFTER HILARY TERM, 29 GEO. III. THE SECOND EDITION. Omne jus, quod est certum, aut scripto, aut moribus constat. Dubium æquitatis Quintilian, de Jure Civili. LONDON, PRINTED AND SOLD BY SAMUEL BROOKE, 35 PATER-NOSTER ROW; SOLD ALSO BY MESSRS. BUTTERWORTH & SON, FLEET STREET; PREFACE ΤΟ THE SECOND EDITION. IT is not necessary to state circumstances, beyond the Editor's control, which have delayed another Edition of this Work. The inconvenience, that has resulted from the delay, may in some degree be compensated by the effect, that this Edition is not hastily brought out without the opportunity of preparation; but has grown up gradually under an attentive observation of what has been passing in Westminster Hall, with ample time for careful revision and examination of the Authorities., In availing myself of that opportunity I am not conscious of negligence; and I cannot without injustice and ingratitude omit this occasion to acknowledge the liberal assistance of my Friend Mr. BEAMES; the value of whose assistance, previously well established, may be farther estimated by his able Exposition of the Practice of the Court of Chancery, its defects, and proposed amendments, in the Explanatory Paper, annexed to the Report under the Chancery Commission, of which he was a Member. THE general plan of this Edition is to give the greatest scope of information in the most convenient and compendious form, by Notes; studiously avoiding the repetition of long lists of cases; and by the selection of such as contain collections of Authorities supplying a chain of reference, that may secure to the Student the means of tracing his subject to its source; and to the practising Lawyer that important object, the economy of time. The occasional expression of my own opinion, perhaps of some use in suggesting or promoting inquiry, never assuming the disguise of authority is at least harmless. IN reviewing these Volumes I find with satisfaction the occasion for correction to arise chiefly from the great alteration of the Law, by Statute as well as decision, since they were first submitted to the Profession; and that this Work, commenced at an early age, and prosecuted under difficulties peculiar to its nature, has sustained during more than thirty years the unremitted attention and pointed scrutiny of a learned and critical Tribunal, unassailed by censure, with a single exception; where it appears to be comprehended under the following general stricture upon Modern Reports in a Pamphlet, that has recently excited considerable notice : "REDUNDANCY is the vice of the age; and "it appears in every thing. Perhaps it is no where 66 more "more striking than in the length of Modern Reports. What Peere Williams would have com"pressed in a single page, in a Modern Report may occupy half a volume. The length indeed of "Modern Reports is a serious evil; and a great "obstruction to the dispatch of business. A case "in Peere Williams may be read in five minutes; "and its import perfectly comprehended. It may "take as many hours even to read over a Modern "Report; and in the mass of matter it may be "difficult to discover the import of the whole."* To the Author of these remarks, profoundly versed in the principles of Equity, and familiar with the Practice of the Court of Chancery, as he appears to be, it seems almost superfluous to point out the obvious causes of wide difference between ancient and modern works of this nature; that the transactions of modern times are utterly incapable of any thing like that compression, which the more simple dealings and habits of our Ancestors admitted; that the establishment of Principles in the early period took a much less extended range than their application in more recent times through a series of Authorities, often fluctuating and discordant, to the various and complicated affairs, resulting from the *Considerations suggested by the Report made to his Majesty 'under a Commission authorising the Commissioners to make certain * inquirics respecting the Court of Chancery.' (P. 64, 5.) |