were made respecting the conduct of the business, and the manner
of fixing from time to time the price of the cane. The thirteenth
article was as follows: "The price of cane as above determined shall
be paid as follows: Two and fo dollars per ton shall be paid every
Monday for the cane delivered during the preceding week, until the
delivery is completed. The balance, if any, per ton, shall operate as
a lien and privilege to the full extent of such balance on the first
bounty money received by the parties of the second part on sugar
produced from cane ground at the Barbreck sugar-house, and the said
parties of the second part covenant and agree to consecrate solely to
the payment of such balance all bounty payments so received by them,
until the whole of the said balance shall have been paid." The
twentieth article was as follows: "The parties of the first part agree
to keep all such books and records as are required by the United States
Government in relation to the bounty, and to furnish to the parties
of the second part all the details which may be necessary to enable
them to effectuate their bounty rights." The lessees, with the consent
of the lessors, transferred their rights and their interests under the
lease to a corporation which assumed their obligations thereunder.
This corporation became involved and a receiver was appointed in an
equity suit brought by the Burdon Company. The lessors intervened
in this suit, claiming that their claim for the balance due on the
purchase price, and also their claim for cane delivered to the lessees
were secured by a lessor's privilege, under Louisiana law, on the
property of the lessees at the sugar-house, and the latter also by an
equitable lien on any bounty that might thereafter be collected by the
receiver. The Circuit Court decided that the intervenors were en-
titled to the lessor's privilege, and to an equitable lien on the bounty.
An appeal having been taken from this decision, the Circuit Court
of Appeals certified the facts to this court and propounded the
following questions: "First. It being shown that the cane sold by
appellees, J. U. Payne & Company et als., to the Ferris Sugar Manu-
facturing Company, Limited, pursuant to the contract between the
parties, was grown on lands not embraced within the limits of the
premises leased to the Ferris Sugar Manufacturing Company, Limited,
are the appellees, under the laws of Louisiana, considered in connection
with the provisions of the contract, entitled to the lessor's privilege
to secure the payment of the purchase price of such cane? Second.
Under the terms of the thirteenth article of the contract between the
Paynes and the Ferrises, and to secure the payment of the price of
the sugar-cane sold and delivered under said contract, have the
appellees H. M. Payne, J. U. Payne and the members of the firm of
J. U. Payne & Company, an equitable lien upon the bounty money
collected from the United States by the receiver in this suit? Third.
If the second question shall be answered in the affirmative, can such
equitable lien, under the laws of Louisiana, be so enforced in the

present suit as to appropriate the bounty money to the payment of
the claims of the Paynes, to the exclusion of the general creditors of
the Ferris Sugar Manufacturing Company?" To these several
questions the court now make answer as follows: (1) The first
question is answered in the negative; (2) The second question is
answered in the affirmative; (3) The third question is answered
in the affirmative. Burdon Sugar Refining Company v. Payne, 127.
District of Columbia. See CHAMPERTY.

1. The clear import of the language of Rev. Stat. § 2320 is to give to a
tunnel owner, discovering a vein in the tunnel, a right to appropriate
fifteen hundred feet in length in that vein; which right arises upon
the discovery of the vein in the tunnel; dates by relation back to the
time of the location of the tunnel site; may be exercised by locating
the claim the full length of fifteen hundred feet on either side of the
tunnel, or in such proportion thereof on either side as the locator
may desire; and is not destroyed or impaired by the failure of the
owner of the tunnel to adverse a previous application for a surface
patent before the discovery of the vein. Enterprise Mining Co. v.
Rico-Aspen Mining Co., 108.

2. Enterprise Mining Co. v. Rico-Aspen Mining Co., 167 U. S. 108, affirmed
and applied, and the court further decides that the failure of the tun-
nel owner to mark on the surface of the ground the point of discovery
and the boundaries of the tract claimed does not destroy his right to
the veins he discovers in the tunnel. Campbell v. Ellet, 116.

MUNICIPAL CORPORATION.

1. In 1887, the municipal authorities of Defiance authorized the erection
of bridges over the Wabash Railroad, and about eighteen feet above
its track, by the railroad company, to take the place of two existing
bridges. In 1893, the common council of Defiance changed the grade
of the streets crossing on said bridges to the level of the railroad, and
changed the approaches to it by causing them to descend to the level.
of the railroad. Held, that the common council acted within its powers
in changing the grade of the streets in question, and that the railroad
company had no legal right to complain of its action. Wabash Rail-
road Co. v. Defiance, 88.

2. The legislative power of a city may control and improve its streets, and
a power to that effect, when duly exercised by ordinances, will over-

ride any license previously given, by which the control of a certain
street has been surrendered. Ib.

3. In this case, it was purely within the discretion of the common council

to determine whether the public exigencies required that the grade
of the street be so changed as to cross the railroad at a level. Ib.
4. A State, being the creator of municipal organizations, is the proper
party to impeach the validity of their creation, and, if it acquiesces
in the validity of a municipal corporation, the corporate existence
thereof cannot be collaterally attacked: this rule is recognized in
Texas. Shapleigh v. San Angelo, 646.

5. An absolute repeal of a municipal charter is effectual so far as it abol-
ishes the old corporate organization; but when the same, or substan-
tially the same inhabitants are erected into a new corporation, whether
with extended or restricted territorial limits, such new corporation is
treated as in law the successor of the old one, entitled to its property
rights, and subject to its liabilities: this view of the law has been
accepted and followed by the Supreme Court of Texas. Ib.
6. The disincorporation by legal proceedings of the city of San Angelo did
not avoid legally subsisting contracts, and, upon the reincorporation
of the same inhabitants and of a territory inclusive of the improve-
ments made under such contracts, the obligations of the old devolved
upon the new corporation. Ib.

7. The Texas act of April 13, 1891, c. 77, as construed by the Supreme
Court of the State, must be regarded, as respects prior cases, as an
act impairing the obligation of existing contracts. Ib.

8. Under the facts disclosed by this record, the new corporation is sub-
ject to the obligations of the preceding corporation, as existing legal
obligations, in manner and form as they would have been enforceable
had there been no change of organization. Ib.

NATIONAL BANK.

1. Section 41 of the National Banking Act imposing certain taxes upon
the average amount of the notes in circulation of a banking associa
tion, now found in the Revised Statutes, is not a revenue bill within
the meaning of the clause of the Constitution declaring that "all bills
for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives,
but the Senate may propose or concur with amendments as on other
bills." Twin City Bank v. Nebeker, 196.

2. Whether in determining such a question the courts may refer to the
journals of the two Houses of Congress for the purpose of ascertain-
ing whether the act originated in the one House or the other is not
decided. Ib.

3. The national banks in Philadelphia organized, for their convenience, a
Clearing House Association, with rules for its business set forth in
detail in the statement in the opinion below. Among these rules, one

provided for the deposit of securities in fixed amounts by each bank
as collateral for their daily settlements; and another for the hours in
the day in which settlements were to be made, and the mode of mak-
ing the exchanges. The Keystone Bank made its deposit in conform-
ity with the rule; but, having become indebted to the clearing house
by reason of the receipt of clearing house certificates to a large
amount, the securities deposited by it were surrendered, and were re-
deposited by it as security for the payment of the certificates. In the
clearing of March 19, 1891, the Keystone Bank presented charges
against other banks to the amount of $155,136.41, and the other
banks presented charges against it for $240,549, making the Keystone
Bank a debtor in the clearing for $75,359.08. In accordance with the
rule, the Keystone Bank between the hours of eleven and twelve paid
the $75,000 in cash or its equivalent, and gave its due bill to the man-
ager of the clearing house for the fractional sum of $359.08, which
was deposited by the manager and checked against by him as cash.
In the runners' exchange of that day, the Keystone Bank owed a
balance of $23,021.31, which balance it settled by giving its due bill
to the manager for deposit in accordance with the system above
stated. In operating the clearing on the morning of March 20, the
Keystone Bank, through its runner, delivered to the respective clerks
of the various banks packages containing claims held by the Keystone
Bank amounting to $70,005.46, and the settling clerk of the Key-
stone Bank received from the runners of the other banks packages
containing $117,035.21, leaving the Keystone Bank debtor in the
clearing for $17,029.75. The packages containing the demands
which the Keystone Bank held against other banks, and which had
been delivered to the agent of each of those banks, were by them
taken away at the termination of the clearing. The packages con-
taining the charges presented against the Keystone Bank, which in
the aggregate amounted to $117,035.21, instead of being taken away
by its settling clerk, were, under the arrangement which we have
stated, turned over by him to the manager of the clearing house, to
be retained until at the hour named the Keystone Bank paid the
balance due by it. Before the hour for making the payment, how-
ever, the Keystone Bank, by order of the Comptroller of the Cur-
rency, was closed, and subsequently was placed in the hands of a re-
ceiver. On the failure of the Keystone to make the payment of
$17,029.75, the committee of the association instructed the manager
to call on the banks, by whom claims had been presented against the
Keystone, "to redeem the packages against the Keystone Bank."
The manager thereupon gave the proper notification, and the various
banks notified sent their checks and redeemed the packages in ques-
tion. Among the obligations for $117,035.21, however, were due bills
amounting to $41,197.36. These due bills came from the fractional
amounts arising by the settlement made on the morning of the 19th,

to wit, $359.08; for the due bill given at the runners' settlement on
the morning of the 19th, $23,031.44; and for due bills given to vari-
ous banks during the course of business on the 19th, amounting to
$17,806.84. Thereupon, and as part of the same transaction, the
manager paid from the $70,005.36, which by his settlement sheet
appeared to the credit of the Keystone as owing from other banks
to the Keystone Bank for the checks surrendered by that bank, the
amount of the due bills referred to, viz., $41,197.36. This left to the
credit of the Keystone the sum of $28,808.10, and this amount was by
the manager, acting under direction of the committee of the associa-
tion, credited on the loan certificate account of the Keystone Bank
with the association. In a suit by the receiver of the bank to deter-
mine the rights of the parties, Held, (1) That the claim of the re-
ceiver that the Keystone Bank was entitled to be paid $70,005.36 of
credit, irrespective of the outstanding due bills which it had been
expressly agreed between the parties were to be paid by way of set-off
in the clearing, was without foundation. (2) That the Clearing
House Association, having been in possession of the $28,808.10 as the
fiduciary agent of the Keystone Bank without a lien or right upon it,
its appropriation of the same after the insolvency of the Keystone
Bank to the debt owing for loan certificates was obviously a prefer-
ence within the inhibition of the statute against preferences in the
cases of insolvent banks, Rev. Stat. § 5242. Yardley v. Philler, 344.
4. The statutes of the United States relating to the organization and
powers of national banks prohibit such banks from purchasing or
subscribing to the stock of another corporation, although they may,
as incidental to the power to loan money on personal security, accept
stock of another corporation as collateral, and thus become subject to
liability as other stockholders. California Bank v. Kennedy, 362.
5. The want of such authority may be set up by a bank to defeat an
attempt to enforce against it the liability of a stockholder. Ib.
See JURISDICTION A, 7;

TAX AND TAXATION, 5 to 9.

PATENT FOR INVENTION.

✓ 1. If an application has been made for a patent for an invention, and the
applicant has once called for action, he cannot be deprived of any
benefits which flow from the ultimate action of the tribunal, although
that tribunal may unnecessarily, negligently or even wantonly, if that
supposition were admissible, delay its judgment. United States v.
American Bell Telephone Co., 224.

2. Maxwell Land Grant case, 121 U. S. 325, affirmed and followed to the
point that a suit between individuals to set aside an instrument for
fraud can only be sustained when the testimony in respect to the
fraud is clear, unequivocal and convincing, and cannot be done upon