a petition against any one or more partners of the firm without including the others." By sect. 112 the property of partners is to be vested in the same trustee.

Sect. 113 provides that "Where a member of a partnership is adjudged bankrupt, the Court may authorise the trustee to commence and prosecute any action in the names of the trustee and of the bankrupt's partner, and any release by such partner of the debt or demand to which the action relates shall be void; but notice of the application for authority to commence the action shall be given to him, and he may show cause against it, and on his application the Court may, if it think fit, direct that he shall receive his proper share of the proceeds of the action, and if he does not claim any benefit therefrom he shall be indemnified against costs in respect thereof as the Court directs."

Sect. 115 provides that partners may take proceedings or be proceeded against under the Act in the name of the firm, and sect. 123 that a "receiving order shall not be made against any corporation, or against any partnership or company registered under the Companies Act, 1862."

Joint Stock Companies.-A brief notice of the organisation required by the recent Acts of Parlia ment seems all that need be inserted in this treatise. By sect. 6 of the Companies Act, 1862, any seven or more persons associated for any lawful purpose may, by subscribing their names to a memorandum of association, and otherwise complying with the requisitions of this Act in respect of registration, form an incorporated company with or without limited liability.

By the 4th sect. of the same Act no company, association, or partnership consisting of more than twenty persons shall be formed for the purpose of carrying on business that has for its object the acquisition of gain, unless it is registered as a company under the Act, or is formed in pursuance of some other Act of Parliament, or of letters patent, or is a company engaged in working mines within and subject to the jurisdiction of the Stannaries.

CHAPTER IX.

ON THE CONTRACT BETWEEN MASTERS AND COLLIERS.

Ir is very important to the employer of labour, and also to the labourer himself, that they should have a clear comprehension of their mutual rights and duties. To this end it will be useful to state in the outset that a contract or agreement is where a promise is made on one side, and assented to on the other, or where two or more persons enter into an engagement with each other by a promise on either side. This contract, when not made by deed, is not binding in law, unless it is founded upon a consideration, by which is meant some compensation or return to be reciprocally given by the person to whom the promise is made. But any kind of reciprocity, whether benefit bestowed or disadvantage sustained by the person to whom the promise is made, will prevent the contract from being invalid.

The consideration need not be such as in fairness would be adequate; that is a matter for the partner to the agreement. The Courts will not inquire, for example, whether a workman's wages are too low, or

whether the agreement is too much in favour of one of the parties. In many contracts of service the consideration is not expressed. The parties have in their minds certain usages or customs. They do not state them, but assume and take them for granted as wellunderstood elements in the contract.

In general a simple contract—that is, one that is not set forth in a deed-may be either written or verbal. But the Statute of Frauds (29 Car. II. c. iii. s. 4) enacts that in some cases a note or memorandum of the agreement shall be made in writing, and signed by the party to be charged therewith, or by some person thereunto by him lawfully authorised; as to where there is any agreement that is not to be performed within a year from the making thereof. There are other contracts comprised in the same section, but as they hardly have any relation to collieries they are not referred to now.

It is important to notice the distinction between express and implied contracts. Express contracts are those which are openly uttered or written at the time of the making of them. But there is a large class of contracts which are implied, that is, depend for their terms and their force upon a mere construction of law. The general rule is, that the law will imply that a man actually promises to fulfil that which he ought to fulfil. For example, if A. employs a person to do any work for him, but nothing is said about payment, the law steps in and supplies the want of an express promise by implying that A. will pay the workman so much as his labour deserved. So any person who undertakes to execute any special work, impliedly

undertakes to do it in a workmanlike manner; and he who takes upon himself any office, employment, or duty, is supposed by the law to undertake that he will perform it with integrity. On the other hand, if a person is employed to perform any work which it is not his ordinary and usual business or art to do, the law implies no such general undertaking, and leaves it to be made the subject of a special arrangement between the parties.

Another rule relates to the competency of persons to bind themselves by contracts. "Infants," that is, persons under twenty-one years of age, are allowed by law to make binding contracts which are for their benefit and advantage. Contracts of hiring and service are, primâ facie, of this kind. But if the contract is unfair and prejudicial the infant is not bound. Parliament has of late years interposed with reference to the hiring and service of women and boys in collieries. The statute 35 & 36 Vict. c. lxxvi. enacts various limitations, which will be found in the Act annexed to this edition.

CONTRACTS BY AGENTS.

In speaking of contracts it has been hitherto assumed that they are made between the principal parties themselves; but a contract of any kind may he entered into either by the parties in person, or by their agents lawfully authorised. An agent is a person authorised by another to do acts or make engagements for him in his name. The person who