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? description that must be thus generally understood should have a more certain basis than a mere fact, because ignorance of fact can always be used as an excuse or defense. It must be based upon the law, and this may be upon an express statute authorizing the description, or it may be upon common law, or, what is the same thing, custom. Sir William Blackstone said, in substance, that was the pride of the English common law that it was but the customs of the people, adopted by themselves, and resting upon immemorial usage. 1 Bl. Comm. 73, 74. There is a clear distinction between usage, however general, and custom. Usage is local practice, and must be proved. Custom is general practice, judicially noticed without proof. Usage is the fact. Custom is the law. There may be usage without custom, but there can be no custom without usage to accompany or precede it. Usage consists of a repetition of acts. Custom arises out of this repetition. Usage is the evidence of custom. Usage is inductive, based on consent of persons in a locality. Custom is deductive, making established local usage a law. Whart. Ev. § 965; And. Dict. Law, ‘Custom’ and ‘Usage.’ From these definitions it would seem to follow that there may exist a usage that would affect or control a contract, and yet not reach the dignity of a custom or law; and it has been so ruled. Carter v. Coal Co., 77 Pa. St. 290; Morningstar v. Cunningham, 110 Ind. 333, 11 N. E. Rep. 593. These distinctions between’ usage and custom have not always been observed. The words are often used interchangeably, and not a little confusion has followed this inadvertance. But if we give proper prominence to the thought that one is fact, and the other law, the intricate question in this case, arising upon an attempt to plead and prove usage, is, to my mind, resolved without difficulty. Law, speaking without reference to the exceptions, is not a subject of proof. Inno branch of the law is certainty and uniformity more imperatively demanded than in that branch that deals with the transfer of title to real property. A description which is not good in every portion of the state can be good in no portion. From the very definition of usage it is