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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW.
66
RECENT LEGAL
DECISIONS.
[PREPARED FOR THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW.]
NEGOTIABLE INSTRUMENTS — RIGHTS
DORSEE—BURDEN OP PROOF.
OP
IN-
1. The plaintiff being in possession of a nego-
tiable note, properly indorsed, it will be pre-
sumed that he owns and acquired the note in
good faith for full value in the usual course of
business before maturity, without notice of any
circumstance that would impeach its validity ;
and where the defendant, who is the maker of
the note, claims that the plaintiff does not so
hold it, it devolves upon him to prove his
claim.
2. The evidence examined, and held to be in-
sufficient to sustain the finding that the holder
was not an innocent purchaser of the note in
suit.
First Nat. Bank of Cobleskill v. Emmitt, Su-
preme Court of Kansas, January 6th, 1894.
CORPORATE STOCK — ASSIGNMENT — TRANSFER
ON CORPORATION BOOKS—RIGHTS OF
ATTACHING CREDITORS.
1. The obligor on a bond deposited with
plaintiff a certificate of corporate stock as col-
lateral security, and subsequently assigned such
certificate to him, in trust for the obligees on
the bond, in consideration of a release from
liability thereon; the assignment providing
that the obligor should not be released till a
perfect, unincumbered title should be transferred
to plaintiff on the books of the corporation.
Plaintiff accepted the certificate, and repeatedly,
but ineffectually, demanded such transfer on
the books. Held, that the absolute title passed
to plaintiff, as against creditors of the obligor.
2. Equity will not permit assigned corporate
stock to be attached by creditors of the assignor,
because not transferred on the books of the cor-
poration within 60 days after assignment, as re-
quired by Gen. St. 1883, § 269, where the as-
signee had used due diligence in demanding
such a transfer, but the company has neglected
to make it.
Weber, Sheriff, et al., v. Bullock, Supreme
Court of Colorado, October 16th, 1893.
CONTRACTS—BREACH—DEFAULT IN PAYMENT-
RESCISSION—QUANTUM MERUIT.
Default in a payment on a contract for work
is a breach justifying a rescission and action of
quantum meruit by the contractor.
Porter, et al., v. Arrowhead Reservoir Co.,
No. 19,245, Supreme Court of California, De-
cember 24th, 1893.
LIABILITY OF INDORSER OF PROMISSORY NOTE
AS AFFECTED BY MORTGAGE OPTION
CLAUSE HASTENING MATURITY.
A note signed by three as makers was secured
by a trust deed by only two of them, conditioned
that on default in the interest the whole princi-
pal should at once mature, notwithstanding
anything in the notes. The payee being also
beneficiary of the deed, indorsed over the note
and assigned the deed. Default in interest was
made, and the deed foreclosed before the ma-
turity expressed in the note. Held that, since
the third maker was no party to the deed, and
so not yet in default on the note, the indorser's
estate could not be sued on the note for the
deficiency.
Heisler v. Lyon, Court of Appeals of Colorado,
November 13th, 1893.
FOREIGN CORPORATION AS PAYEE AND INDORSER
OF NEGOTIABLE PAPER.
1. It is no defense against negotiable paper in
the hands fc of an innocent purchaser that the
payee was a foreign corporation, which had
failed to comply with the statutory conditions
for doing business in the State, and that the
paper grew out of business transacted there by
it. 56 Fed. Rep. 260, affirmed.
2. Under the [system of pleading established
by the Pennsylvania statute of 1887, plaintiff's
averment that he obtained negotiable paper
sued on, before maturity, for value, is sufficient,
when not denied, to establish bona fides; and,
on a rule for judgment for want of a sufficient
affidavit of defense, he is not required to further
show that he was unaware of the particular
illegality set up.
3. The fact of obtaining negotiable paper be-
fore maturity, for value, raises a presumption
that the holder is ignorant of any illegality
affecting it, and relieves him of the necessity of
averring such ignorance.
Press Co., Limited, v. City Bank of Hartford,
U. S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Third Circuit,
November 3d, 1893.
CONVEYANCE IN TRUST—RIGHTS OF GRANTOR'S
CREDITOR'S—ATTACHMENT OF
GROWING CROPS.
1. Where land is conveyed by the owner to
another in trust to reconvey to the grantor's
wife, or such person as the grantor may there-
after designate, and the grantee has no interest
in the lands, but afterwards executes such trust
by a conveyance to the grantor's wife, as be-
tween grantor and his creditors such lands will
be treated as his property until reconveyed by
the trustee ; and the fact that such trust rests in
parol, and is therefore not enforceable under the
statute concerning trusts and powers, does not
change the rule.
2. Annual crops which are the product of in-
dustry and care, sown by the owner of the soil,
are, while growing and immature, personal
property subject to attachment and sale for the
debts of the owner.
Polley v. Johnson et al., Supreme Court of
Kansas, December 9th, 1893.
THE RAVAGES OF A PANIC.
The receivers for railroads in the nine years
previous to 1893 scheduled bonds and stocks
issued amounting to $2,094,500,000. For the
single year 1893 the receivers have scheduled
$1,288,000,000 for bonds and stocks. This is
nearly double the casualties of the Eastern panic
year of 1884. The mileage of 1884 was 11,000 ;
that of 1893, 23,000 !—Bankers' Monthly.
HOW TO IMPROVE THE
PIANO.
A Few Pointers.
f
MPROVEMENTS in pianofortes are always
a live topic, and the following sugges-
tions by Mr. Oscar Moericke, and the subse-
quent answers, which appeared recently in a
German trade paper, will be found of interest:
I. A smaller keyboard for small hands. The
white keys need not be broader than the black
keys, and the octave stretch on such a key-
board would be equivalent to the stretch of a
sixth on the present keyboard. There would be
no necessity in this case of unlearning anything,
as there is in the Janko keyboard. The part of
the key inside the instrument could preserve its
present breadth.
II. The addition of a high B flat, B and C
keys. Most pianists would willingly get rid of
the low A, B flat and B keys, as the vibrations
of these low wires lack clearness. Moreover, a
low C is sufficient for all musical requirements,
while the absence of a higher B flat, B and C
renders four-handed playing unsatisfactory, as
these notes are common on the piccolo. By ad-
ding these upper notes all our pianos would
have a compass of seven octaves.
I III. Division of the pedals. (Pianists who
use the forte pedals as a footstool need not
trouble themselves about this suggestion.)
Others well know that when the primarios use
the forte pedal, the secundarios must of neces-
sity accept the situation. With a divided pedal
the primarios could use the pedal without affect-
ing the bass part.
A correspondent answers Mr. Moericke in a
later number of the same journal in this wise :
I. That the first proposal is impractical, be-
cause such a keyboard would be one for a child's
piano ; that a child who had learned to play on
it would have to unlearn if placed at an ordinary
piano ; and that children, or grown up people
with children's hands, had better leave Liszt or
Beethoven alone ; the Janko would be much
better.
II. The second innovation of additional upper
keys is valuable and presents no difficulties.
The principle is already accepted by many
makers who construct a seven and a quarter
octave keyboard.
III. In this third suggestion Mr. Moericke
proposes a cure for a weak point in pianos.
This plan of dividing a pedal into equal parts—
a right and left piano, and a right and left forte
pedal, capable of being coupled when necessary
—deserves all commendation. Some technical
difficulties will have to be overcome, but the
trouble in obviating them will be well repaid.
Stop the Paper.
Nowadays, when a subscriber gets so angry
because the editor differs with him on some
trivial question, that he discontinues his sub-
scription and '' stops his paper,'' we remind him
of a good anecdote of the late editor of a well-
known London evening paper.
Passing down Fleet street one morning, the
editor met one of his readers, who excitedly ex-
claimed, '' Look here, sir, after the article
you published this morning I shall stop your
paper!''
"Oh, no," said the editor, "don't do
that."
'' Yes ; my mind is made up; I shall stop the
paper." The angry subscriber was not to be
appeased, and they separated.
Late in the afternoon they met again, when
the editor remarked, "Mr. Thompson, I am
very glad you did not carry out your threat this
morning.''
'' I did; I went to the office and had it
stopped."
"You are surely mistaken. I have just come
from there, and the press was running and busi-
ness was booming."
"Sir," said Thompson, very pompously, " I
mean I intended to stop my subscription to your
paper.''
" Oh ! " ejaculated the editor, with a twinkle
in his eye, '' I thought you were going to stop
the running of the paper, and deprive me of a
living."
THE A. H. Whitney Co., of Quincy, 111., has
certified to a decrease of capital stock from
$100,000 to $30,000, and the number of directors
has been decreased from seven to five.
THK. total value of the exports of music, mu-
sical instruments and strings, from the district
of the United States Consulate General at
Frankfort-on-the-Main, during the quarter
ended December 31st, 1893, was $25,250.
On the Rialto.—First Actor : "We were play-
ing ' Hamlet,' and business got so bad that we
had to disband." Second Ditto: "The ghost
didn't walk, eh? " First Actor: "Yes, begad
he did, walked back with the rest of us."