SQUIRE ATTOM'S DECISIONS Attention will be now given to number six, which is very important. VI. The court's temptation in aggra vated cases to give expression to unprece dented views, has to be constantly strangled in view of more satisfactory cost adjust ments. This a propos the test of the age of a minor, given in Kids Chum, No. —, Vol. — (circulation guaranteed), to the effect that one cannot determine the age of a youth by the thickness of the dirt on his hands. This case is later than the familiar one illus trating the maxim under view. There (O. v. B. 3 Rabbit, 503) a minor, by claiming to be of age, procured stock (not a live stock case) from trustees having the duty to hold it for him till his majority. After attaining such age, upon suit brought by him to com pel the trustees to forget that in his infancy they had paid some of the stock over, and to pay a like amount again, the court ap plied the maxim. They held that although in law the baby had been incapable of ac cepting the stock, taking it in the under handed way he did, showed such a condi tion of the hands that the court could not wait for him to clean them, even if he could have done so. In view of the untarnished equities t'other side the fence, the muddy work the complainant was drawn into doing in performing his part of the contract, has rendered him not altogether presentable to a. court of equity; and the claim that de fendant saw him stake out the line will not avail. (See further.) VII. It seems there had been no division fence for many years. There came a time when a fence seemed desirable. The kind selected — • a low picket — would have been
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all right to substitute for one there at time of contract. But with respect to any fence at all at this late day, the court cannot but believe that the desire for a fence was really grounded in causes that could not be so well satisfied as with a high board one, and one in which the contract specifications and drawings call for the calking of all cracks, and adequate reinforcement of all knot holes, both sides, lest they too fall out, affording eyelets for curiosity, loopholes for enmity, and portholes for gunnery. Though no affair of the court, we throw out the hint with view to future fence arrangements — a hint that the court would throw out any where, on the street even, and without costs. VIII. With the complainant's knowledge, if not encouragement, there must have de veloped on his side the lot line a rampant taste for open work; and the cow took to the lace in his neighbor's yard from the promptings of a family trait. Defendant's reputation is saved by evidence that the lace is an heirloom, and not in use, but that his wife gets it out to clean once or twice every hundred years. IX. The equities, the fence, the cow, and the lace, are all with the defendant. Com plainant has some right to the fence, but it is not equitable, and its location is prob ably not suited to his convenience. De fendant will have judgment for his counter claim, and complainant is left to his remedy as to the cow. In addition to this liberty the latter also has the costs — to pay, and the constable is not far distant. Maxim Affirmed. Davenport, Ia., February, 1907.
