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THE GREEN BAG
of opinion. The case under consideration is, the court says, the first case involving that well-known doctrine which has come before it for decision. The case contains little argument that is not already familiar to every one who has taken the trouble to examine the cases presenting the differ ent views as to the duty of the landowner main taining a dangerous and attractive instrumentality upon his land. After a review of all of the leading cases and a rather brief discussion of the prin ciples involved, it is concluded that under {he common law rule that a landowner owes no duty to a trespasser, a railroad company is guilty of no negligence in maintaining an unlocked and un fastened turntable on its premises at a distance of from fifty to three hundred feet from public grounds, and hence is not liable for an accident causing the death of a child, twelve years of age, who trespassed upon such ground. Walker's Admr. v. Potomac F. & P. R. Co., 53 Southeastern Reporter, 113. PATENTS. (Constitutional Law.) Wis. — A statute which has several counterparts in other states has been declared unconstitutional in Wis consin in the case of J. H. Clark Company v. Rice, 106 Northwestern Reporter, 231. The Wisconsin statute declares that all promissory notes given for any patent, patent right, or interest therein, shall have written or printed thereon in red ink the words, " The consideration for this note is the sale of a patent, patent right, or interest therein," and provides that any person who shall sell a patent or patent right without complying with the statute shall be liable to a penalty equal to the face of the note, and that all notes or other evidences of indebtedness taken as required by the provi sions of the statute shall be non-negotiable and subject to all the defenses in the hands of an inno cent holder that would exist if they had not been transferred. This statute is declared to be void because in conflict with United States Constitu tion, Art. i, { 8, providing that Congress shall have the power to secure to inventors for a limited time the exclusive right to their discoveries, and with Rev. St. U. S. § 4898 (U. S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 3387) declaring that every patent or interest therein shall be assignable in law by an instrument in writing, and that the patentee or his assigns or legal representatives may in like manner grant and convey an exclusive right under the patent to the whole or any specified part of the United States. Several courts have reached the same conclusion. Ex parte Robinson, Fed. Cas. 9932; Woollen v. Banker, Fed. Cas. 18,030; Castle v. Hutchinson, .25 Fed. 394; Pegram v. American Alkali Co., 122 Fed. 1000; Crittenden v. White, 23 Minn. 24; Cranson v. Smith, 37 Mich. 309; Rumbley v. Hall, 107 Ky. 349, 54 S. W. 4.
PLEDGE. (Stock Brokers.) N. Y. C. App. — In Content v. Banner, the New York Court of Ap peals, reversing both the trial court and the Appel late Division (88 New York Supplement, 1095), holds where a stock broker advances all the money and buys securities for a customer, a written notice to the customer to take up the securities so bought or supply margins for carrying them, and stating that unless he does so before a certain date the broker will sell the. stock for his account and hold him responsible for the loss, is defective where it contains no statement as to the time or place of sale, and that in the absence of any agreement dispensing with notice a sale " on the curb" constitutes a conversion, though the customer has failed to respond on the date stated. The fact that the stock broker instead of requiring a margin advanced the whole amount of the purchase is held to render the relation between the parties that of pledgee and pledger, so that the same for malities with respect to notice of sale must be given in this instance as would be required in the case of any other pledge. PRACTICE. (Appeals.) Idaho. — " This is a novel case of mistaken identity — novel because the bewildered refugees, two soulless corporations of diverse origin, in their flight from a decree in equity (a thing abhorred by corporations), be came so completely lost in the labyrinth of names that the plaintiff has been thence ever wont to turn the restraining clauses of her decree upon the twain with but a single name, so indiscriminately that they are driven hither to tell their story." So says Judge Ailshie in his opinion in Shephard v. Cceurd'Alene Lumber Co., 83 Pac. Rep. 601. The facts appeared to be as follows: The action was commenced and prosecuted to judgment by de fault in Idaho against a domestic corporation named the " Cceur d'Alene Lumber Company. Limited," but in the findings it was recited that the defendant was a Washington corporation, and throughout the findings and judgment the word "Limited," was omitted. There was, in fact, a Washington corporation by the name of the "Coeur d'Alene Lumber Company," and it ap pealed from the judgment which through this mis take was entered against it. At the hearing on appeal it was admitted by the plaintiff that the interchange of names and the finding that defend ant was a foreign corporation was a mistake or clerical error. Under these circumstances it is held that it was proper to remand the case to the trial court with instructions to correct and modify the judgment so that the decree might run against the true defendant. PROPERTY. (Oil Lease — Construction.) W. Va. — An exception in an oil and gas lease receives
