Stubbings vs. O'Connor and others. In harmony with the spirit of that agreement, the widow and children of John O'Connor, immediately upon his death, opened the store, and continued the business in the name of the estate, under the supervision of George E. O'Connor, the same as before such death—bought new goods and mixed them with the old goods, and sold indiscriminatingly,- not only for years after the widow and George were appointed administrators of the estate, but during the few weeks intervening between such death and such appointment; and from July 31, 1889, such business was so conducted with the knowledge and consent of the plaintiff. Under the repeated rulings of this court, it is very manifest that upon the death of John O'Connor, intestate, his right, title, and interest in the property and business in question did not descend to his heirs, but became vested in his administrators, inmediately upon their appointment; and such vesting related back to the time of such death. Melms v. Pfister, 59 Wis. 192, and cases there cited; Miller v. Tracy, 86 Wis. 333; Meyer v. Garthwaite, 92 Wis. 575; Hall v. Hall, 98 Wis. 199. The result is that the widow and heirs at law, as such, had no legal right to the property. Their continuance of the business and the purchase and sale of goods, as mentioned, can only be justified under the authority of George and his mother as administrators. There is no pretense that they ever entered into any contract of partnership with the plaintiff. There is no ground for holding that upon the death of John O'Connor the plaintiff continued or assumed to continue the business for a day or at all,- much less that the defendants, or any of them, ever acted as the agent or agents of the plaintiff in conducting such business. We must hold that after the death of John O'Connor the business was conducted by the administrators alone for the benefit of the estate. The views thus expressed dispose of a number of questions urged by the defendants. The court allowed two claims of the defendants, reducing Stubbings vs. O'Connor and others. the amount of the note and mortgage at the time they were given to $13,309.22. Of course, that reduced the amount of. each of the five coupon notes correspondingly. The court allowed the counterclaim for goods sold and delivered to the plaintiff prior to the death of John O'Connor, with interest, which amounted at the time of making the findings to $962.77. The court also allowed the payment of $1,000 made July 17, 1890, to be applied on the first coupon note as of that date, and also allowed $116.29 as accrued interest on that note, and also allowed $387.50 as accrued interest on the coupon note falling due April 10, 1891. Those two coupon notes fell due prior to July 15, 1891, when the plaintiff exercised his option and declared the whole amount secured by the notes and mortgages as due and payable. By virtue of declaring such option the whole amount became due and payable; and we perceive no rule of law authorizing interest upon interest which subsequently matured, and which, according to the findings, amounted at that time, in the aggregate, to $683.40. The statute declares that, in the computation of interest upon any note, "interest shall not be compounded, nor shall the interest thereon be construed to bear interest, unless an agreement to that effect is clearly expressed in writing and signed by the party to be charged therewith." R. S. 1878, sec. 1689. This court has gone so far as to hold that interest coupons attached to a note or bond bear interest, upon default in payment when due. Mills v. Jefferson, 20 Wis. 50; Cleveland v. Burnham, 64 Wis. 361; Nash v. Meggett, 89 Wis. 493, 494. We certainly cannot extend the rule thus announced. The contract is very exacting and oppressive. While parties must be allowed to make their own contracts so long as they are made understandingly and not in violation of law, yet there is no reason in the case at bar for allowing interest not specifically provided for in the contract. By the Court. That portion of the judgment of the circuit court allowing such excess of $683.40 is reversed, and the Butler vs. The State. judgment in all other respects is affirmed. No costs are allowed to either party, except that the appellants must pay the fees of the clerk of this court. BUTLER, Plaintiff in error, vs. THE STATE, Defendant in error. February 4- March 14, 1899. Appeal and error: Abandonment of assignment of error: Criminal law and practice: Statement of offense in complaint: Selection of jurors: Evidence: Insanity: Reasonable doubt: Instructions to jury: Im material errors. 1. An assignment of error not argued will be treated as abandoned unless it presents a palpable and obvious error prejudicial to justice. 2. A complaint made before a justice of the peace, which alleges in the language of the statute that the defendant did wilfully, feloniously, and with malice aforethought kill and murder a certain person, is sufficient to give the justice jurisdiction upon the preliminary examination. 3. The statute providing for the selection of names of jurors by jury commissioners is not invalid because it curtails the right which supervisors formerly had to furnish a jury list. 4. On the trial of an issue as to the sanity of a person charged with murder the admission of a physician's testimony that cuts on the body of the victim appeared to have been made by a sharp instrument and that death occurred from a fracture of the skull and hemorrhage, was not prejudicial to defendant, where those facts were wholly undisputed throughout the case. 5. An instruction that insanity, to constitute a defense, must be such a perverted and deranged condition of the mental and moral faculties as to render a person incapable of distinguishing between right and wrong, or not conscious, at the time, of the nature of the act which he is committing, or such a complete destruction, other than voluntary, of his will that his actions are not subject to it but are beyond his control, is held to state correctly the rule of law most favorable to defendant. 6. An instruction in a criminal case that a reasonable doubt is a doubt for which a reason can be given based on the evidence in the case, is correct. 7. An instruction defining a reasonable doubt as being, among other things, "such a doubt as would govern and control a reasonably Butler vs. The State. prudent man, and deter him from acting or deciding in his own most important affairs and concerns of life," is not erroneous. 8. A mistake, in charging the jury that a reasonable doubt is one which, after a consideration of all the evidence in the case, "leaves the minds of the jury in that condition that they can say that they feel an abiding conviction, to a moral certainty, of the truth of the charge,”— using the word "can" instead of "cannot,”— is held not to have been a material error, where it is evident from the circumstances and the remainder of the charge that the jury could not have been misled thereby. 9. An instruction that, if there is one single material fact in the case proved to the satisfaction of the jury by a preponderance of the evidence which is inconsistent with the guilt of the defendant, this is sufficient to raise a reasonable doubt and justify an acquittal, is not erroneous as tending to imply that unless some substantive fact is proved by the preponderance of the evidence it will not raise a reasonable doubt, where full and accurate instructions were given as to the persistency of the presumption of innocence, the propriety of the most charitable and merciful construction of the facts, and the necessity that every reasonable doubt should be removed before conviction would be justified. ERROR to review a judgment of the circuit court for Waukesha county: JAMES J. DICK, Circuit Judge. Affirmed. D. J. Hemlock, for the plaintiff in error. For the defendant in error there was a brief by the Attorney General, and oral argument by R. F. Hamilton, second assistant attorney general. DODGE, J. The plaintiff in error, on December 20, 1897, was convicted of murder in the first degree for the killing of his wife on the 5th of July in that year. There was no dispute as to the fact that he slew her with two or more blows of an ax. He was tried upon a preliminary issue of insanity, and, being found sane, was then tried upon the issue of his guilt, and from judgment and sentence upon conviction brings this writ of error. Twenty-two assignments of error are presented in plaintiff in error's brief, more than half of which are not argued, either orally or in the brief; and we shall assume from that Butler vs. The State. fact that they are abandoned, and shall not consider them. This court ordinarily will not assume the labor of searching for grounds to support assignments of error which counsel deem unworthy of argument, though we should not, for that reason, ignore an assignment which presented a palpable and obvious error prejudicial to justice. 1. It is claimed that the complaint before the justice, upon which the preliminary examination was had, was insufficient. It alleges, in the language of the statute, that the plaintiff in error "did wilfully, feloniously, and with malice aforethought kill and murder one Mary Butler." This is sufficient in a complaint before a justice, where only a substantial statement of some offense is necessary to give the justice jurisdiction. R. S. 1878, sec. 4776; State ex rel. De Puy v. Evans, 88 Wis. 260; Annis v. People, 13 Mich. 511. Indeed, in Allen v. State, 85 Wis. 22, such allegation was held sufficient, in an information, to support a verdict of murder in either the first, second, or third degree. 2. The fifth assignment protests against the present jury law, providing for selection of names by jury commissioners. No ground is pointed out except that it curtails the right of supervisors of the different towns to furnish a jury list. That right, when it existed, was purely statutory, and could, of course, be withdrawn in the discretion of the legislature. 3. The sixth assignment complains that, upon the trial of the issue of insanity, a physician was allowed to testify that the cuts upon the body of the victim appeared to be made by a sharp instrument, and that death occurred from a fracture of the skull and hemorrhage. These facts were so wholly undisputed throughout the case that the testimony could not have been prejudicial to the defendant at any stage of the case. 4. Under the sixteenth assignment plaintiff in error assails that portion of the court's charge on the question of sanity in which the jury were instructed that insanity means "such a perverted and deranged condition of the mental and moral |