is not apparent. The thing to be guarded against is not the invasion of the defendant's rights, for he stands here absolutely without any, except the common interest every citizen has in preserving the proper line of distinction that divides the jurisdiction and limits the powers of the several courts. What is to be avoided is an unnecessary trespass upon the province of the common-law tribunals, and this is to be tested by the simple query whether they offer a full remedy for the wrong complained of.

But there is another ground upon which this proceeding may be sustained. In Fells v. Read, 3 Ves. 70, the snuff-box was deposited with the defendant as a member of the society, upon certain terms, to be redelivered upon the happening of certain events. Lord Rosslyn held that under these facts the defendant was a depositary on an express trust which, upon a common ground of equity, gave the plaintiff title to sue in that court; and in this he was supported by Lord Eldon, in the subsequent case of Nutbrown v. Thornton. According to the proof in our case, the papers and documents claimed were left with the defendant under the express understanding that they were to be redelivered whenever the plaintiff should see fit to resume the business of his then profession in this city. It is then the case of direct confidence violated-a spell sufficiently potent to call into vigorous activity the authority invoked.

As to the second question, it is perhaps enough to say, that when once a court of equity takes cognizance of a litigation, it will dispose of every subject embraced within the circle of contest, whether the question be of remedy or of distinct yet connected topics of dispute. If the jurisdiction once attaches from the nature of one of the subjects of contest, it may embrace all of them, for equity abhors multiplicity of suits. Thus in the case last cited, the chancellor ruled that where a person is found wrongfully in possession of a farm, over which the court had undoubted power, and also in possession of the stock upon it, at the same time and under the effect of the same wrong, the court will undoubtedly make him account for and deliver back the whole. In the case at bar the surveying instruments and office furniture stand in the same category with the maps, drafts, etc.; were delivered to the defendant at the same time, and are withheld by an exertion of the same wrong. In short, they enter into and make part of the same transaction, and may, therefore, be the objects of the same measure of redress. Decree affirmed.

EQUITY JURISDICTION TO RECOVER CHATTELS. -As a general rule, equity will not take jurisdiction to recover specific chattels: See Lining v. Geddes, 16 Am. Dec. 606; but if the chattels have some special value to the owner, over and above any pecuniary estimate, equity will entertain a suit for their recovery, or specific performance of a contract concerning them: Id.; 3 Pome. roy's Eq. Jur., sec. 1402, where the principal case is cited. In Foll's Appeal, 91 Pa. St. 437, the court, in stating that it knew of no instance in Pennsylvania in which a court of equity had decreed a specific performance of a contract for the sale of stock, cited and distinguished the principal case, on the ground that the latter came within the well-recognized exception to the rule that equity will not entertain a suit to recover specific chattels; besides, in that case, the property was deposited on trust. The exception to the general rule of equity in regard to the recovery of chattels is kept within narrow grounds. This fact probably gave rise to the citation of the principal case in Smaltz's Appeal, 99 Id. 312, where it was said that the courts of Pennsylva nia will not entertain equity jurisdiction for specific performance where there is an adequate remedy at law in damages, and the occasion for the remark, that "care should be taken that there be no unnecessary encroachment on the province of the courts of common law." The decision of the principal case is perhaps a little remarkable as coming from the courts of a state with such narrow equity powers as those of Pennsylvania. But in Finley v. Aiken, 1 Grant's Cas. 92, which was an action for specific performance of a contract for the sale of land at the suit of the vendor, the principal case was cited on the point, that the action in question ought to be maintainable in Pennsylvania, since the equitable remedy should be encouraged, because better than the action of covenant, which was bungling and inadequate.

TRUSTS IN PERSONALTY will be enforced: Kimball v. Morton, 43 Am. Dec. 621; 3 Pomeroy's Eq. Jur., sec. 1402, citing the principal case. The principal case is also cited in Simes v. Everson, 46 Pa. St. 309, in which it was held that the district court had jurisdiction of a bill in equity to compel the redelivery of a note given to the payees and holders by the maker, on condition and under agreement that it should be specifically surrendered in case of the failure of a contemplated arrangement, the arrangement having failed, and the complainant having retransferred the consideration received from the respondents, according to the agreement. As to establishing the trusts by parol, see Kimball v. Morton, supra, where the cases in this series are collected. Express trusts in personalty are not abolished by the revised statutes of New York, abolishing all but certain kinds of express trusts: Kane v. Gott, 35 Am. Dec. 641.

JURISDICTION OF EQUITY ONCE ATTACHING, EXTENDING TO ENTIRE CONTROVERSY: Chichester v. Vass, 4 Am. Dec. 531; Middletown Bank v. Russ, 8 Id. 164; King v. Baldwin, Id. 415; Hughlett v. Harris, 12 Id. 104; Candler v. Pettit, 19 Id. 399; Dugan v. Cureton, 31 Id. 727; Irvine's Heirs v. McRee, 42 Id. 468. In the last case it was held that equity had jurisdiction to decree the possession of land, when a controversy about the title had been properly brought in that court. The principal case is a leading one in Pennsylvania, on the proposition that if a court of equity obtains jurisdiction for any purpose it will retain it for all, and is cited to that effect in Shollenberger's Appeal, 21 Pa. St. 340, to show that if the orphans' court-essentially a court of chancery-had decreed a balance in the guardian's favor on settlement of account, be might have a writ of fieri facias to collect the balance out of the ward's estate; in Gloninger v. Hazard, 42 Id. 401, on the general proposition that since discovery was peculiarly a chancery jurisdiction, equity, to prevent a

multiplicity of suits, will, when it has acquired jurisdiction for this pur pose, entertain the suit and dispose of every connected topic-i. e., decree an accounting, when discovery is sought; in Souder's Appeal, 57 Id. 502, on the point that when money is paid into court on a judgment, and is claimed by different persons as owners of the judgment, the question of ownership may be determined by the court itself or submitted to a jury; but if the ownership of an incumbrance arises legitimately in a proceeding to make distribution, it may be determined in the proceeding itself, as one of the incidents of distribution, thus avoiding prolongation and circuity of action; in Marvine v. Drexel, 68 Id. 368, to the effect that when a sale of land by executors, in a manner which would be ruinous to the complainant, who was jointly interested with the testator, by virtue of an agreement, in the proceeds of the land to be sold by the testator, was restrained, a sale in such manner as would serve the joint interests of the parties would be decreed; in Allison & Evans' Appeal, 77 Id. 227, where damages were sought to be obtained, on an injunction granted to restrain boring for oil; in Winton's Appeal, 97 Id. 395, to the point that equity has power to enforce its own decree in reference to a subject over which it has obtained jurisdiction, without being obliged to have recourse to the assistance of a court of law; and in Morss's Appeal, 97 Id. 396, to the effect that if an absolute deed has been decreed by equity a mortgage, a sale of the mortgage will be ordered, not by virtue of the power of equity to decree a sale at the instance of the mortgagee, but because where jurisdiction has once attached, it embraces within its grasp all powers and remedies necessary to give effect to the equity which is invoked.

BROWNFIELD v. BROWNFIELD.

[12 PENNSYLVANIA STATE, 136.]

WHERE NAME AND DESCRIPTION IN DEVISE ANSWER IN SAME DEgree to EACH OF TWO OBJECTS, the intention is a pure question of fact, and does not depend in any degree on legal direction.

TO REMOVE LATENT AMBIGUITY IN WILL, acts and declarations of a testator in respect to the thing given are admissible; also, the relative amount of advancements, and the differences in value of portions of land devised to children, are proper subjects for consideration.

EJECTMENT. The action was brought by John Brownfield against Isaac Brownfield to recover a piece of land in the shape of a triangle, containing about thirty acres, inclosed between two lines, laid down in the accompanying draft as E H and E F, and meeting at E, near the west side, and a third line, drawn from H to F. The question was as to which of the two lines, E H and E F, constituted the boundary between the parties. The line E H ran a few degrees north of, while the line E F ran a greater number of degrees south of, due east. The entire tract of land, embracing the portion in controversy, had been patented to Thomas Brownfield, who afterwards, in

consideration of love and affection, conveyed the north-eastern part of it to his son John. The remainder of the tract is termed thehome place," and includes the premises in question. A further conveyance of a small part of this "home place," with a saw-mill and water right, had been made to John by his father, on a money consideration. Thomas Brownfield, by his will, devised to his son Isaac, the southern portion of the "home

Race.

A

E

Due east.

F

place," "beginning at the saw-mill race [E], four perches south of the dwelling-house, near said saw-mill, and thence supposed nearly an east course to a post, a corner of John Brownfield's and my home place, and the other part of my home place I give and devise to my eldest son John and his male heirs." Evidence was offered by the defendant, showing that there was a post corner at each of the two places, H and F, thereby raising a latent ambiguity in the will; whereupon the plaintiff offered to show by the executor and scrivener of the will, that the testator intended the line to run to the post corner at F, to the admissibility of which the court sustained an objection. The plaintiff then proposed to prove by the deposition of Anne Brownfield, a daughter of the testator, that her father had

told her how he meant to make his will, and that the division line between John and Isaac was to run to the post corner at F; that she saw him stake off that line, and after he had done so, told her he had staked it up to John's corner at F; and that she subsequently went and saw the stakes up to that corner. This evidence was rejected by the court. Evidence was then offered by the plaintiff to show the relative values of his and Isaac's portions of the land, and the circumstances which induced the father to make the gift referred to to John. The court also refused to admit this evidence. There was a verdict and judgment for the plaintiff. The direction to the jury, for which error was assigned by the defendant, is stated in the opinion.

Miller, Deford, and Veech, for the plaintiff in error.

J. K. Ewing, N. Ewing, and Fuller, contra.

By Court, GIBSON, C. J. The key to the difficulty in this case is, that it arises from a latent, not a patent, ambiguity, produced not by the words of the will, but by circumstances col· lateral to it. Had the contemplated monument of the division between the brothers been described as the "post, a corner of John Brownfield's and my home place," the definite article would have indicated the existence of an apprehension that there was no other post corner which answered the description; and the ambiguity caused by the testator's ignorance of the fact, and not by any uncertainty in his words, would clearly have been a latent one. Is it less so, when, using the indefinite article, he describes the monument as a post corner? It is plain he supposed that there was only one such; for had he known there were two, he surely would have specified the intended one by reference to peculiar circumstances connected with it. Nothing could be more indefinite than a bequest simply to John Smith; yet it would be unambiguous, standing on the words of the will, though it might be otherwise standing on extrinsic circumstances; and a contest about the identity of the legatee would be determinable as an unmixed question of fact, the court having no more to do with it than to inspect the evidence pertinent to it, and pass it to the jury. As regards the corner, the contest in the court below was such; and the question to be solved was one of fact, which did not depend in any degree on legal direction. "Yet," said the judge, referring to the diagram, "the location of the line on the ground is for you. Was F a post corner? If it was, I think the will directs to that