Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 10.djvu/170

158 FPDBEAL REPOETBB. �" On being discliiirged f rora arrest, Jackson expressed an unwillingness to retum on board ship and asked for his discharge, and the captain consenting, he was accordingly discharged, the ship paying intothe consulate onemonth's extra wages. �[Signed] ' Tiioa. B. Van suben, Consul General. �"jMiuary 31, 1879." �The proceedings before the consul were duly certified and read upon the trial. The consul's certificate of the discharge of Jackson, "according to law," on January 31, 1879, was also proved, together with the receipt by the consul of one month's extra wagea. �Alexander e Ash, iot libellant. �Henry Heath, for claimant. �Bhown, D. J. The consul at Yokohama had jurisdiction of pro- ceedings to discharge the seaman upon his own application and with the master's consent. His certificate of such a discharge, duly proved and authenticated, is therefore conclusive, and bars any claim by the libellant to subsequent wages. Goffin v, Weld, 2 Low. 81 } Lamb v. Briard, 5 Abb. Adm. 367; Tingle v. Tucker, Id. 919. �The proceedings before the consul do not show that any question was made before him concerning the wages which might be due to the libellant up to the time of his discharge, or that any inquiry or consideration was given to that subject. The libellant is, therefore, not precluded by those proceedings from claiming anything to which, upon the merits, he may be entitled. Hutchinson v. Coombs, 1 Ware, 65 ; The Nimrod, Id. 9. �The affray on the morning of September Ist was the resuit of repeated quarrels between the cook and the steward during the two months previous. The steward is shown to have been of a quarrel- some disposition, and he was discharged at Yokohama. According to the libellant's account of the affray upon the trial, after high words between them in the galley the steward had rushed out, and presently came back to the door of the galley with one hand in his pocket, hold- ing the handle of a knife, recognized by the cook as having a long blade, and with violent language challenged him to corne out and fight; that the cook asked him what he had in his pocket, and told him to go away; that the steward then rushed towards him; and that the libellant thereupon, believing his life in danger, standing in the doorway of his own room leading from the galley, fired at him twice with a pistol. The steward testified before the cunsul that the cook had first challenged him to fight, and that he had afterwards ��� �