VoT LX No. 2706. 
NEW YORK, DECEMBER 7, 1901. 
$1 PER YEAR. 
THE VALUE OF A SEEDSMAN S GUARANTEE 
FOUL WEED SEEDS IR GRAIN. 
Who Pays for the Damage? 
We give below a brief history of an interesting legal 
case which was tried last Spring in Niagara Co., N. Y. 
We venture to say that thousands of our readers have 
before now brought weed seeds to their farms in grain 
which was not properly cleaned. They 
will want to know what remedy, if any, 
there is at law for such damage. We are 
indebted to D. B. Brong.of Lockport, for 
the facts in this case. 
W. H. Bell owns several farms near 
Lockport. In the Spring of 1900 he de¬ 
cided to seed a field of 22 acres, part of 
a farm containing 100 acres, to oats. 
He received a catalogue from F. B. 
Mills, a seedsman, and saw therein an 
account of the “Record Breaker” oats, 
which were highly praised. Mr. Bell 
had bought goods of Mills before with 
general satisfaction. The following 
statement was printed in the catalogue; 
MY GUARANTEE. 
1 guarantee that all seeds and other 
goods sent out from my establishment 
shall reach the purchaser safe, in good 
condition, be fresh and true to name, to 
grow if properly planted, and if such 
should not prove the case, I will refill the 
order free of charge, providing sulllclent 
proof is given me within a reasonable time. 
I cannot guarantee crops and will not be 
held responsible for them. 
After reading this Mr. Bell ordered 60 
bushels of the oats—16 of which were 
for his son. There was so much delay 
about the delivery of the oats that Mr. 
Bell was obliged to write and then tele¬ 
graph for them. They finally came in 
early May, long after the ground was 
ready. Mr. Bell hauled them himself 
from the railroad station, untied the 
bags, which held three bushels each, and 
poured half of each bag out into smaller 
bags so as to have IVz bushel in each. 
The bags were then put at distances 
along the field so as to be handy for 
drilling. He did this himself, so that he 
knew that no weed seed got into the 
oats on his farm. In each bag he found 
a card which read as follows. He ad¬ 
mits that he read this: 
T exercise the greatest care to have all 
my seeds, potatoes, bulbs, plants, etc., 
fresh, pure, clean and true to name, and 
if such should not be the case, I will refill 
the order free of charge providing suf¬ 
ficient proof is given me within a reason¬ 
able length of time. I cannot guarantee 
crops and will not be held responsible for 
them. If these goods are not accepted on 
these terms, they must be returned at 
once. p. B. MIL 1 L.S. 
When the first few bags were opened 
Mr. Bell and two hired men sampled the 
oats—that is, they took up a double 
handful and let them run through their 
fingers. They were looking at the oats to see if they 
were plump and clean, and not looking for weed seed. 
At the trial much was made of this examination. The 
seedsman’s lawyer claimed that if any weed seed had 
been there a careful examination would have shown 
it. He claimed that the statement made by Mr. Mills 
in his catalogue, where he said that the oats were 
“well cleaned” and the statement made on the card 
found in the bags, did not amount to a warrant, but 
that it was left with the farmer to accept or reject 
the oats as he saw fit after a thorough examination. 
He claimed in effect that Mr. Bell might have found 
the weed seed if he had made a proper search for it, 
and returned the oats without sowing them. 
On the other hand, Mr. Bell’s lawyer said that the 
law implies a warranty because a seedsman who has 
been for years in the business “is supposed to possess 
superior knowledge on the subject.” The purchaser 
has the right to rely upon this superior knowledge 
and judgment. Therefore, when the seedsman states 
that the seeds are clean and pure or “well cleaned,” 
the buyer has a right to rely upon his statement and 
make but a casual examination. One witness also tes¬ 
tified that after the bags nad been shipped and 
handled as these were the little seed would naturally 
work down, so that a very careful examination of 
the top of the bag would fail to show them. The judge 
who tried the case charged the jury that there was an 
implied warranty in Mills’s statement, and it was for 
the jury to decide whether the farmer gave the oats 
a fair examination when he took up handfuls and 
looked at them as they trickled through his fingers. 
It was so late in the season that Mr. Bell started 
seeding at once. His hired man drove the drill. When 
all but about three acres were seeded, the hired man 
discovered small seed in the oats. He had filled the 
drill too full, and in scraping the oats back from the 
cover he found the little black seeds. Mr. Bell was 
absent, and the hired man used his own judgment 
and went on seeding. When the owner returned the 
oats were nearly all in, the last two 
houts going in with his consent. Mr. 
Bell then had some of the oats cleaned 
and sent tue seed to Mills, asking what 
they were and stating that he was 
anxious to keep foul stuff out of his 
farm. To this Mills replied that the 
seeds looked like turnips, but that he 
could not see how it could possibly get 
into the oats, as he was careful to have 
all grain cleaned. On June 6 Mr. Bell 
wrote that he was sure that the oats 
were full of wild mustard. He had tried 
for years to keep his farm clean, and he 
felt that he had been damaged. Mr. 
Mills tnen sent a man to look at the 
field, and on his return advised Mr. Bell 
to hire help at once and pull the mus¬ 
tard out by hand. If proof could be fur¬ 
nished that the weed seeds were in the 
oats Mills said he would pay for the 
labor. In the meantime Mr. Bell had 
consulted with several good farmers, in¬ 
cluding our old friend, J. S. Woodward. 
These men found the field alive with the 
mustard, which was growing in the seed 
drills with the oats. They showed him 
the folly of trying to pull 22 acres of 
mustard by hand, and advised him to 
plow both oats and mustard under and 
cultivate frequently. Mr. Bell then con¬ 
sulted a lawyer, who after some corre¬ 
spondence with Mills (who still claimed 
that the crop could be pulled out) of¬ 
fered to turn the whole field over to 
Mills to clean in any way he saw fit. If 
Mills declined this offer Bell proposed 
to take the best and cheapest means for 
cleaning the field. To this Mills made 
no reply, so Bell plowed and cultivated, 
and finally brought suit for 52,000 dam¬ 
ages against Mills. 
At the trial Mr. Bell and his hired 
men told how the oats were bought, ex¬ 
amined and drilled; how the mustard 
came up and how it was plowed under 
and cultivated. Mr. Woodward and 
other farmers testified to seeing the 
mustard, and showed the dangerous 
character of the plant, and how difficult 
it is to kill it out. These farmers swore 
that in their judgment the farm was 
worth at least 520 an acre less than it 
was before the mustard seed went into 
it. Tne various catalogues, circulars 
and letters were also put in evidence. 
The defence consisted of a long series 
of objections and a statement by Mr. Mills. His law¬ 
yers objected to nearly everything. Every time a 
witness started to show that wild mustard or other 
weeds injured a farm the lawyers objected, but were 
overruled. They also objected when Mr. Woodward 
and other farmers told the best way of killing weeds. 
Mr. Mills made a general statement about his seed 
business. These oats were grown for him by a farmer. 
Mills himself never saw the sacks, did not personally 
know what was in them, and could not say that there 
was not weed seed in them when shipped. He ex¬ 
pected the purchaser to examine them, but did not 
know whether his patrons were competent to detect 
FRUI’ra OF CATTLEY GUAVA. Fig. 360. See Page 823 
