267 



LIEN, MARITIME. 



LIFE, MEAN DURATION OF. 



258 



more favoured, because less prejudicial to the interests and course of 

 commerce. 



Lien, as known to the common law, is conditional on possession 

 of the goods being in the same hands as the right of lien. It 

 ceases to exist the moment that possession is parted with. And 

 though possession may have been lost unawares, the lien cannot be 

 revived by getting possession again. Possession must be actual 

 but the loss of it may be constructive. If goods in the hands of a 

 wharfinger be transferred to another name in the wharfinger's books, 

 though not removed from their place in the warehouse, the previous 

 holder thereby loses his lien. Or if he who has the lien procures 

 them to be taken in execution at his own suit, or ships them for his 

 principal on his account and risk, the lien h gone past recovery. 



The possession must have been fair and legal in its commencement 

 for any lien ever to attach. For if fraud or a trick be used to obtain 

 possession, or otherwise it commences wrongfully, the object being to 

 gain a lien, that object is thereby effectually frustrated. 



The foundation of lien must be a present existing claim ; and if 

 the person who has such a claim, nevertheless agrees to give credit, 

 either with or without a bill of exchange for the amount, he waives 

 his lien and can never again resort to it. Moreover, there may be 

 a custom to give such credit, as in the case of the Thames ship- 

 wrights, so that in the absence of express contract to the contrary, 

 no lien arises. The person may even waive his lien by omitting all 

 mention of it at the same time that he asserts an inconsistent claim 

 to the goods, in presence of the sheriff; and in many other ways, a 

 waiver of this right may take place. 



With regard to real property, there is this remarkable difference, 

 that notwithstanding the contract of sale, and the execution of the con- 

 veyance by the vendor, he retains in equity what is called the ven- 

 dor's lien on the estate for the purchase money, or any part thereof 

 that still remains unpaid. And, on the other hand, if a good title to 

 the estate sold is not made by the vendor, the purchaser has in equity 

 a lien on the estate for the money paid by him as deposit or part of 

 the price. 



Lien, which is not disturbed by the party, is not affected by the 

 statute of limitations. For the lapse of time, by force of the statute, 

 merely bars the remedy by action ; but this natural remedy which the 

 creditor retains in his own hand remains intact, and the debt continu- 

 ing, there is no reason in the lapse of time why he should not continue 

 to retain the security. 



LIEN, MARITIME, differs from the foregoing in two particulars. 

 Ita existence is altogether irrespective and independent of possession 

 of the chattel which is the subject of it. Its enforcement is not 

 possible, otherwise than by legal process. As may be supposed from 

 the name, it applies to ships, freight, and cargo, and is a charge created 

 sometimes by implication of the law maritime, sometimes by the 

 express contract of the parties themselves. 



The occasion of its existence is very various. Seamen have always 

 had a lien on the vessel for their wages, without express stipulation to 

 that effect in the shipping articles. Masters, after being long excluded 

 from this advantage by the common law of England, have been placed 

 on the same footing in this respect with the common sailor by the 

 recent statute, the 17 & 18 Viet. c. 104. The collision of one vessel 

 with another becomes immediately the occasion of lien on the offending 

 ship for the injury sustained by the other. In like manner, salvage, 

 towage, and pilotage, severally originate by intendment of the law a 

 lien on the benefitted vessel for the value of the labour bestowed on it. 



All these are instances of maritime lien by implication of the law 

 maritime. There is another for which in view of the law of most 

 foreign nations any express contract is rendered unnecessary by a 

 similar implication of the law maritime of those several countries ; but 

 in the view of our maritime law, consequent on the restraint and re- 

 pression exerted on it by the municipal law through the common law 

 courts of England, bottomry, as it is called, has no valid existence 

 except when it is created by the written contract of the parties, no 

 matter in what quarter of the world or what country the claim may 

 have accrued in. Bottomry is nothing more than a maritime lien on 

 the hull and tackling of the ship, usually created for money borrowed, 

 or for necessaries supplied, or repairs done to the vessel, in order to 

 enable her to complete the voyage. 



This kind of lien is indefeasible by any change of ownership not 

 effected by sale and transfer under a decree of a court of competent 

 jurisdiction ; in all other cases of transfer the charge travels with the 

 vessel into new hands, and no ignorance of the purchaser on occasion 

 of the sale is a defence to proceedings for its recovery. It necessarily 

 supposes, however, the existence of the vessel. If the ship is lost it 

 perishes with her ; and some liens at least, bottomry for instance, are 

 such that they involve no personal claim against the owners, and no 

 debt therefore survives the loss of the vessel. Hence it is that maritime 

 risk is a necessary ingredient of a valid bottomry bond. It is enforce- 

 able against the ship only on condition of the vessel surviving the 

 voyage named in the instrument. 



Although this charge is indefeasible except by the destruction of the 



property on which it is laid, yet the maritime law in the equitable 



spirit requisite to the administration of law in human affairs exacts 



x-e on the part of the claimant in the enforcement of his rights. 



The Court of Admiralty is the only tribunal with a jurisdiction capable 



ARTS AUD SCI. DIV. VOL. V. 



of enforcing this claim. In the other courts of this country, suits are 

 between persons who, when property is concerned, assert a jus ad rem. 

 The object of admiralty proceedings is a jus in re ; the subject of the 

 proceedings is the res itself the ship : and the first step in those 

 proceedings is the arrest of the vessel, to place her corporeally in the 

 possession of the court. The adjudication which closes the proceedings 

 is not personal, but of the thing, adjudging it to be discharged of the 

 alleged claim or condemning it to be sold for the behoof of the 

 claimant. 



It cannot but happen sometimes that a plurality of such charges in 

 different hands exist upon the same ship. This occasions the necessity 

 for considering the priority of equities, which are not always, or even 

 usually, in the order of the priority of charge. For instance, if a 

 British vessel before departing on her homeward voyage is obliged to i 

 have recourse to bottomry, say in India, and afterwards putting in to 

 St. Helena in a disabled state is obliged again to borrow on bottomry, 

 and at a subsequent period of the same voyage is driven into another 

 port in a condition to require repairs for which the master executes a 

 third bottomry bond, the court, when the subject of the liens is not 

 equivalent in value to the sum of the bonds, ranks these claims in the 

 order of their equity, the last effected to be paid first, and the first last, 

 on this presumption, that the later charge preserved the subject of the 

 prior liens, which, although postponed in the order of payment, are 

 really in a preferable condition than if the vessel had been entirely 

 lost. Commerce is also favoured by such a rule. The ship is saved, 

 and the merchandise on board is carried to its destination ; whereas 

 both nmst have perished for want of a lender under any other rule. 

 Cases of a much more complicated character do occur, and the rule is 

 not so plain, nor the consideration requisite to assign them to the 

 proper rule so easy. There is this peculiar to wages, that the lien for 

 them ranks first for payment. On so difficult a question, however, we 

 must refer the reader to some such work as ' Abbott on Shipping,' by 

 Serjeant Shee, for a full consideration of it in application to actual 

 cases. 



LIEUTENANT is an officer who discharges the duties of a superior, 

 in his name and during his absence ; and who acts immediately in sub- 

 ordination to him when he is present. 



Thus, in military anairs, the lieutenant-general and the lieutenant- 

 colonel are respectively the subordinate grades to the general and 

 colonel, though in process of time the lieutenant-colonel has come to 

 be the officer actually in command of a regiment, the colonelcy being a 

 sinecure appointment. The lieutenant of a company is also imme- 

 diately subordinate to the captain, in whose absence he has the same 

 powers. In the British service the lieutenants of the three regiments 

 of foot-guards have the rank of captain ; in the royal regiment of 

 artillery, and the corps of royal engineers, there being no ensigns, the 

 subaltern officers were formerly distinguished as first and second 

 lieutenants, but are now all styled lieutenant, the juniors having the 

 pay of second lieutenant. The rank of second lieutenant is still con- 

 tinued in the royal marines. But in fusileer regiments which formerly 

 had this rank, it has been changed to that of ensign. 



In Ward's ' Animadversions of War ' (1639), it is said, " A lieutenant 

 is an officer of high credit and reputation, and he ought in all respects 

 to bee well indoctrinated and qualified in the arts military, and not 

 inferior in knowledge to any officer of higher authority ; for an un- 

 skilful captaine may better demeane himselfe with an experienced 

 lieutenant than an unskilful lieutenant can fadge with a skilful 

 captaine." 



A lieutenant in the royal navy takes rank as a captain in the army, 

 and the number appointed to ships of war varies with the rate of the 

 ship. A ship of the first rate has eight lieutenants, besides supernu- 

 meraries ; those of the second, third, &c., rates, have respectively one less 

 than the number appointed to the preceding rate ; so that a sixth-rate 

 vessel has three : sloops and bomb-vessels have only two. The 

 monthly pay of a first-lieutenant of seven years' standing, in ships of 

 the first three rates, and that of lieutenants commanding gun-brigs, 

 schooners, and cutters, is lls. per day. The monthly pay of other 

 lieutenants, for ships of all rates, is 10s. per day. 



LIEUTENANT-GENERAL. [GENERAL.] 



LIEUTENANT, LORD and DEPUTY. [LORD LIEUTENANT.] 



LIFE, MEAN DURATION OF. This is commonly called the 

 expectation of life, which, properly speaking, it is not. Of a thousand 

 lives of equal goodness, any one may expect to live as long as he has an 

 even chance of living, that is, till 500 are extinct. This period has 

 been denominated the probable life. 



The mean duration of life, or the number of years which, one person 

 with another, are enjoyed by individuals of a given age, is found from 

 the tables of mortality, which give, out of a certain number born, the 

 number who are left at every successive birthday. If the absolute 

 average law of human life were given, and if <pxdx represented the 

 chance of an individual aged n living precisely x moments of time, 



ihenf<t>xdx, taken from x=0 to x the longest possible term of 



life, would correctly represent the average duration of life in persons 

 aged n years. The tables, however, are so imperfect that it is not 

 worth while to attempt the accurate application of the preceding 

 formula, or to use more than the roughest of the processes which will 

 described in QUADRATURES, METHOD OF. The theoretical imper- 



