Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 1.djvu/86

7 8 FEDERAL REPORTER. �transaction, ia a reasonable and proper one, because in many caees, as the court says in the case of Baker, 14 N. B. E. 436, "parties intend that the debtor shall preserve a nice equi- librium between acquiescenoe and co-operation," and under Buch circumstances the rôle is so difficult that slight indicia auffice to show that it bas failed. In such cases courts are justiûed in being critieal to detect these indicia, and should accord them ample "weight when discovered." �Guided by this rule, which, as we bave seen, has the sanc- tion of the supreme court, we may proceed to look into the circumstances of this case. Publicity was given to the failure of the bankrupt on the second day of November, 1876, when his stock of goods was seized under the executions. That he was insolvent — that is, unable to meet his paper as it matured in the ordinary course of business — on and before September 23, 1876, is, I think, established beyond the necessity of dis- cussion. The testimony shows that throughout the summer of 1876 his business was duU ; that unusual measures were from time to time necessary to enable him to proceed success- fully, and that, in fact, during that season, and at a time con- siderably anterior to his aetual failure, failing circumstances began to be developed. That the defendants were charge- able with reasonable cause to believe the debtor to be insolv- ent, and that most of them knew that he was insolvent when they commenced their suits, is in my judgment equally well established. As we bave seen, four of the suits were begun on the same day ; two of them were begun on a later day, namely, October 12, 1876, and all the judgments were simul- taneously entered. The executions were also simultaneously issued and levied, so that it appears to have been the intent that all of these judgment creditors should stand with refer- ence to themselves upon an equal footing, and that all should secure an equal preference over other creditors who had no knowledge of these proceedings and were taking no steps to obtain security. �The defendant Albert E. Coe was the bankrupt's father, living in the state of New York, and I am convinced that, in ��� �