would carry it as directed, and it is no answer
to say they have never carried to that place
before."

A Lancashire stonemason having gone into
Derbyshire to look out for work, left his box of
tools to be sent after him. Soon afterwards, his
mother took the box to the Lancaster station,
addressed to the mason, and to be left at some
place in Derbyshire. She offered to pay the carriage,
but the clerk informed her that it would be
better for the person receiving the box to do so
The line of the company which received the box
in the first instance, extended no further than
Preston, where it was joined by the line of another
company, which line was joined by another, to
complete the route into Derbyshire. The box,
after leaving the limits of the Lancaster and
Preston line, was lost, and that company disputed
their liability to make it good, because they had
contracted to carry it, they said, no further than
Preston.

The courts ruled otherwise. Lord Cranworth
(then Mr. Baron Rolfe), whose direction to the
jury had been objected to, but which direction
the Court of Exchequer held to be correct, said,
"What I told the jury was only this—that if a
party brings a parcel to a railway station, which
in this respect is just the same as a coach-office,
knowing at the time that the company only carry
to a particular place, and if the railway company
receive it and book it to another place to which
it is directed, prima facie, they undertake to carry
it to that other place. That was my view at the
trial," said his lordship, "and nothing has
occurred to alter my opinion;" adding, "any other
construction would open the door to incalculable
inconvenience." Of course it would. If a common
carrier is, under any circumstances whatever,
liable for the safe delivery of the goods with
which you entrust him, it is sufficient for you to
know that the goods have been lost, without being
called upon to point out the particular part of
the route where they were lost.

There are yet a few more points of railway
law which we will speak of, as concisely as
possible: It is generally supposed that a person
travelling without a ticket can be made
to pay for the greatest distance over which the
train in which he is travelling has passed. This
is not the case: the law only compelling him to
pay for the distance he has actually travelled.

Railway travelling unhappily suggesting the
desirability of "Life Insurance," let us briefly
glance at the common law aspect of this excellent
precaution.

Mr. Francis, in his Annals of Life Insurance,
informs us that thousands of pounds were
insured upon the life of Sir Robert Walpole,
that policies were taken up on the life of the
Pretender, that the sporting gentlemen of the
period speculated upon the lives of his adherents,
the rebel lords; that the escape of Lord Nithsdale
from the Tower threw many policy-holders,
rejoicing at the prospect of that nobleman's
speedy decapitation, into dismay; that "there
was absolutely nothing upon which a policy could
be opened that was not employed as the opportunity
of gambling." As might be expected,
these good old times were too good to last (there
were few analytical chemists in those days, and
the insured life may have occasionally come to a
somewhat premature termination). In the early
part of George the Third's reign the attention
of Parliament was directed to the law of life
insurance; and, from that time, any insurance on
the life of any person, wherein the insurer
has any kind of gaming or wagering interest,
is void. Further, it was then laid down "that
it should not be lawful to make policies on
the life of any person, or any other event,
without inserting the name of the person for
whose benefit the policy was made," and (as the
last clause with which we feel called upon to
deal) "that no one should recover on his policy
more than the value of his interest."

The "interest" here spoken of has been
decided to mean a pecuniary interest. Such an
interest, for example, as Mr. Blank's tailor may
feel in him previous to the payment of his little
account, or, to speak more largely, such an
interest as any of Mr. Blank's creditors may entertain
towards that gentleman. It is not a sentimental
quality, in fact, to which the act alludes,
and, although it permits Mrs. Blank to have an
insurable interest in her husband, it will not allow
that Mr. Blank has such an interest in his son.
The question has been tried in one instance, and,
although it was ingeniously argued that the father
had an interest in his son's life, because he might
reasonably expect to be reimbursed by him for
his maintenance and education, yet the courts
would not admit the construction. "It has been
said," Mr. Justice Bayley remarked, in allusion to
this point, "that there are numerous instances in
which a father has affected an insurance on the life
of his son. If a father, wishing to give his son
some property to dispose of, make an assurance on
the son's life in his (the son's) name, not for his
(the father's) own benefit, but for the benefit of
his son, there is no law to prevent his doing so:
but that is a transaction quite different from the
present, and if a notion prevails that such an
assurance as this one in question is valid, the
sooner it is corrected the better."

As to the clause which enacts that the name of
the person interested shall be inserted in the
policy, we may say that a compliance with this
is essential, and not to be dispensed with on any
account. A person once, the Reports inform us,
insured the life of a lady in his own name, but in
reality for her benefit. After the death of the
lady, the policy was disputed, and subsequently
declared void, Mr. Justice Wightman saying "it
seemed to him that the act required that the
name of the person really interested must appear,
whether the policy be really wagering or not."

To come to the last clause. It was formerly
held that when a creditor insured the life of his
debtor for any sum, he could only, in the event of
the debtor's death, recover the value of his interest