215 



SAINT ANTHONY'S FIRE. 



SALE. 



be observed, when we say that nothing should be asked of saints but 

 their prayers for us, the question is not about the words, but the sense 

 of the words. For, as far as words go, it is lawful to say, ' St. Peter, 

 pity me, save me, open for me the gate of heaven ; ' also, ' give me 

 health of body, patience, fortitude, Ac.,' provided that we mean ' save 



the Roman Catholic church is explicitly stated in the council of Trent : 

 " Though the church has been accustomed sometimes to celebrate a 

 few masses to the honour and remembrance of saints, yet she doth 

 not teach that sacrifice is offered to them, but to God alone, who 

 crowned them ; wherefore neither is the priest wont to say, I offer 

 sacrifice to thee, O Peter, or Paul, but to God." (Sess., 22.) 



The Lives of the Saints have been written in the ' Acta Sanctorum,' 

 51 vols. fol. [BOLLANDCS, JOHN, in Bioo. Drv.] ; and in Alban Butler's 

 ' Lives of the Saints,' 12 vols. 8vo. 



SAINT ANTHONY'S KIKK. [ KKVMITI.AS.] 



SAINT EI.M'i'S KIRK. [LIGHTSI..] 



SAINT MARTHA WOOD. [BRAZIL WOOD.] 



SAINT VITI'S'S DANCE. [CHOHEA.] 



SAL ALKMBROTH. [MKRCURY. Bichloride of Mercury.] 



SAI. AMMONIAC. [AMMONIUM, Chloride of.] 



SAL KNIXUM. [PoTASSifM : BuulpkateofPotaA.] 



SAI. MIKAI'.ILE, a name formerly applied to sulphate of soda. 



SAL I'KI'NKI.LA. [POTASSIUM. Xitrale of Pottah.] 



SAI.K i- that transaction by which the ownership of property is 

 transferred to the buyer, in consideration of a money payment by him, 

 or on his behalf, to the seller. Such transfer of ownership may some- 

 times be made, although the property does not belong to the seller ; 

 as in the case of sales in open market, which are valid, though made 

 by parties wholly without title to the property, or authority to sell it; 

 and sales by factors and agents duly authorised. Under the present 

 bead it is proposed to treat only of the law relating to the simple act 

 of sale, it being assumed that the parties to the sale are legally 

 qualified to effect it. Persons in certain conditions are by law in gome 

 cases restrained and in others disabled from buying and selling, but 

 these restrictions and disabilities form no port of the law of sale ; they 

 rather to those branches of the law, such as infancy, bank- 

 ruptcy, insolvency, coverture, lunacy, alienage, Ac., which create and 

 dank '!; m 



Generally, all thing* may be the subject of sale ; but there are gome 

 exceptions, guch are a mere title to lands of which a party is not in 

 possession, a presentation to a living actually vacant, the pay of a naval 

 or military ollicer, and gome other things. 



Property is distributed under the two heads of real and personal pro- 

 perty, which differ materially in many respects ; and the mode* of effect- 

 ing the sale of each of these kinds of property likewise materially dill'er. 

 Some incidents, however, are common to a sale both of real and 

 personal property. 



No sale in valid so as to be capable of being enforced unless 



1st. The parties to it act with good faith ; 



2nd. Unless there is consent in each of them ; and, 



3rd. No Rale is valid the subject of which is illegal, or which in- 

 volves an illegal transaction, or has for its object an illegal act. 



With respect to the fint principle, it is a maxim of the common 

 law that fraud vitiates all contract*. The fraud may be, with respect 

 to the property, the subject of sale, either of a positive character, such 

 as wilful imsdescription of it in some material particular by the seller, 

 or negative, such as a designed concealment of defects and incum- 

 brancr*. In these cases the contract of sale cannot be enforced, not- 

 withstanding express stipulations that the property shall be taken with 

 all its faults, or that mustatements shall not invalidate the gale, but 

 shall be provided for by compensati"ti. 



Whit i- a material particular, will of course depend upon the 

 subject-matter of the sale and the circumstances of the case. A mis- 

 dtucriptiipn of the situation of an estate, a statement that a public- 

 house which was bound by covenant to purchase beer of a particular 

 brewer was a free jiublic-house, that a long leasehold estate was free- 

 hold , have been held to be material. Under this head may be adduced 

 as an instance the employment of more persons than one to make 

 false biddings at an auction no behalf of the seller. Such persons are 

 commonly called puffer- h person may lawfully be employed 



'it the interests of the seller by merely buying in the property 

 at a predetermined sum. Bat the bidding of more than one has the 

 effect of inducing an incorrect opinion as to the value of the estate, 

 and such bidding, being fraudulent, invalidates the sale. In like 

 manner fraud on the part of the buyer will have the same effect ; as 

 where be prevents other persons from purchasing by fraudulently 

 misrepresenting the nature of the property, or attempts to obtain 

 possession of it with a design not to pay for it; or where, -when 

 negotiating the sale, he knows himself to be insolvent, or makes pay- 

 ment by cheques or bills which he knows will not be honoured, Ac. 

 These are instances of fraud which is intended to operate only on one 

 of the parties to the sale. Bat the same effect may be produced wlicru 

 the fraud in intended to operate on other persons not parties to the 

 side ; as where a sale is attempted to be made by a seller for the pur- 

 pose of defrauding bis creditors. If in such case the buyer participate 



in the fraudulent intention, the sale will be invalid. In an action at 

 law, the question whether fraud has existed is to be determined by the 

 jury. 



2. There must be consent in each of the parties to the sale. This 

 rule involves the proposition that each must be a free and intelligent 

 agent : no sale therefore can be valid where either of the parties was 

 under coercion by violence or imprisonment, or bodily fear, or was 

 lunatic, or idiot, or utterly intoxicated. Again, in order that a buyer 

 may be a legally consenting party to a sale, he must be truly informed 

 in all material particulars as to the property which is the subject of 

 sale. This must be understood of such particulars as he cannot by 

 reasonable care and observation inform himself upon, for a man has no 

 legal protection against the consequences of his own carelessness and 

 negligence. If, however, he has been deceived in any other particulars, 

 even unintentionally, by the buyer, he cannot be said to consent to 

 the bargain. The consent which he gives is to the purchase of such 

 property as has been described to him, and the consent therefore 

 cannot relate to the property which is the subject of the sale, if it 

 differs in material points from what has been described. Thus in the 

 common case of a horse warranted sound, the consent is to buy a sound 

 horse, and the buyer cannot be considered to have consented to buy an 

 unsound horse. If therefore the horse is manifestly unsound, a party 

 cannot be compelled to carry into effect his contract to purchase it. 

 The case is the same with an estate said to be tithe free, which in 

 reality is not so, or with any other property the description of which, 

 as stated, varies materially from the truth. Where indeed the variance 

 from the description is obvious, and the buyer has had an opportunity 

 of inspecting the property and afterwards chooses to complete the 

 purchase, the contract will not be invalid. The reason of this rule is 

 manifest, for the legal presumption is that ordinary diligence has been 

 used, where it might and ought to have been used, and there is there- 

 fore no ground for supposing an absence of the buyer's consent. 



In cases where there is no fraud, and a possibility of variance from 

 the description is contemplated in the conditions of sale, the sale may 

 still be valid notwithstanding the existence of such variance, for in 

 this case both parties knowingly take the chance of the variance being 

 either favourable or adverse to them. As when for instance it is 

 stated that an estate consists of so many acres, Ac., be the same more 

 or less, Ac. If the conditions of sale contain a provision that com- 

 pensation shall be made for such variances when they are ascertained, 

 then the party in whose favour they turn out to be, will be bound to 

 make guch compensation. If, however, from the circumstances of the 

 case it should appear that such compensation cannot be made, the sale 

 cannot be enforced against the purchaser, forasmuch as the terms to 

 which the parties consented are impossible, and there is therefore 

 nothing to which the consent is applicable. 



A court of equity will in some cases compel a buyer to complete hi* 

 bargain, on the condition of the seller making him compensation in 

 respect of those matters in which there is a variance, even although 

 there i no provision txi that effect in the conditions of sale. The 

 principle on which this is done is, that parties ought to carry into 

 effect what was substantially their intention. This power of the 

 court therefore is not exercised where the variance is material, or where 

 the attainment of the particular matter in which a variance exists 

 really was the main object of the purchase. The common terms of 

 exaggerated praise in which persons speak of the property that they 

 have to sell, is not such misdescription as will make a sale void. lu 

 cages where property is agreed to be sold by one contract, in one lot, a 

 buyer cannot be compelled to take some part of it without the rest. 



S. No sale is valid if the subject matter of it is illegal or prohibited, 

 or if an essential part of it is an illegal transaction or involves an illegal 

 act. A sale of treasonable, blasphemous, or obscene publications is 

 void, for the acts of treason, blasphemy, and obscenity are legally 

 punishable. A sale of property known by the seller to be intended to 

 be used for illegal purposes is void, such as drugs to be used for the 

 adulteration of provisions, or a house to be occupied for the purposes 

 of prostitution. Sales for the purpose of avoiding the forfeiture to 

 the crown incident upon judgment after a conviction for felony, are 

 void. Sales to an alien enemy are unlawful, although a power exists 

 in the crown to grant licences legalising such sales. Offices of public 

 trust, such as those which are connected with the administration of 

 justice or government, either in the United Kingdom or in the 

 dependencies upon it, cannot lawfully be made the subject of sale. 

 The enactments affecting the sale of various articles are too numerous 

 to be referred to here. It may, however, be laid down generally that 

 where a thing is prohibited and made unlawful by statute, a contract 

 for the sale of such thing is void, even although the statute does not 

 enact that it shall be so, but only attaches a penalty to an infringement 

 of its provisions. Sales of contraband articles are also void ; and 

 evi'ii in the case of a foreigner selling goods abroad, to be delivered 

 in tliis country, the sale will be invalid, if he be cognisant of and 

 aiding in an attempt to introduce them into this country in contra- 

 vi-nti'in of the revenue laws. A sale of pn>]>erty in the ordinary course 

 of a party's trade is void if made on a Sunday, although the sale of 

 the same article by another person whose ordinary dealings are not 

 in such matters would be valid. 



In case of a sale of lands, it is assumed that the seller has a good 

 title to them, and that he will deliver over the title-deeds to the 



