Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 13.djvu/11

BIOLOGY ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNIOA. INFANT INFANT, in law, is a person under full age, and there fore subject to certain disabilities not affecting persons who have attained full age. The period of full age vanes widely in different systems, as do also the disabilities attaching to non-age. In Roman law, the age of puberty, fixed at fourteen for males and twelve for females, was recognized as a dividing line. Under that age a child is under the guardianship of a tutor, but several degrees of infancy are recognized. The first is absolute infancy in the literal sense speechlessness ; after that, until the age of seven, a child is infantise proximus ; and from the eighth year to puberty he is pubertati proximus. An infant in the last stage could, with the assent of his tutor, act so as to bind himself by stipulations ; in the earlier stages he could not, although binding stipulations could be made to him in the second stage. After puberty, until the age of twenty-five years, a modified infancy was recognized, during which the minor s acts were not void altogether, but voidable, and a curator was appointed to manage his affairs. The difference between the tutor and the curator in Roman law was marked by the saying that the former was appointed for the care of the person, the latter for the estate of the pupil. These principles of course apply only to children who are sui juris. The patria potestas, so long as it lasts, gives to the father the complete control of the son s actions ; and tutorship and curatorship were devices for protecting those who were free from the potestas, but unable by reason of infancy to control their own affairs. The right of the father to appoint tutors to his children by will (testamentarii) was recognized by the Twelve Tables, as was also the tutorship of the agnati (or legal as distinct from natural relations) in default of such an appointment, Tutors who held office in virtue of a general law were called legitimi. Besides and in default of these, tutors dativi were appointed by the magistrates. These terms are still used in much the same sense in modern systems founded on the Roman law, as may be seen in the case of Scotland, noticed below. By the law of England full age is twenty-one, and all minors alike are subject to incapacities. The period of twenty-one years is regarded as complete at the beginning of the day before the birthday : for example, an infant born on the first day of January attains his majority at the first moment of the 31st of December. The incapacity of an infant is designed of course for his own protection, and its general effect is to prevent him from binding him self absolutely by obligations. In the matter of contracts, the statement has generally passed current that an infant s contracts, except when they arc binding for special reasons, are either void or voidable, i.e., null, ab initio, or capable of being nullified by the infant at his choice. Contracts, for example, which cannot be beneficial to the infant are said to be absolutely void. A bond with a penalty is for this reason declared to be void. On the other hand, it is alleged by the more recent text-writers that the words void and voidable have not been carefully distinguished, and that a contract is often described as void when it is only meant that it is not binding. On this theory all the con tracts of an infant might bo described as voidable at his option except those few which are absolutely valid. On his voidable contracts an infant may sue if he chooses to j do so, but may not be sued. Of the contracts of an infant which are binding ab initio, the most important are those re lating to "necessaries." The word is used in an extended signification to cover " articles fit to maintain the person in the particular state, degree, and station in life in which he is." Whether a particular thing is necessary or not is a question of fact to be decided by a jury, but it is fur the judge to say whether it is prima facie of a descrip tion such that it may be a necessary. It has been ruled by judges, without consulting the jury, that the follow ing articles were not necessary : expensive dinners sup plied to an undergraduate in his private rooms ; a pair of solitaire studs costing 25, and a goblet costing 15, for a baronet s son ; a chronometer worth . 68, for a lieutenant in the navy ; ornaments to the value of 137. On the other hand, an undergraduate has been allowed a gold watch as a necessary ; and liveries for an officer s servant, money paid to release an infant from ejectment or distress, and necessaries for an infant s wife have .all been held to be necessaries of an infant. An object, in itself of a character to be pronounced a necessary, may in particular cases be declared not necessary, e.g., if the infant is already supplied with things of the kind. A sealskin waistcont may be a necessary to an infant of good fortune, but not if he has half a dozen such garments in his pOMCftrion XIII. i