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III BROWN.
EVERARD v. ASTON [1717]

that the value of the estate was considerably more than what was due to the respondent at the time of the foreclosure.

But to this it was answered (J. Pratt, T. Vernon), that by the decree, the appellant's husband had near nine months given him to sell or redeem, and no court is obliged to enlarge the time, without a proper application for that purpose; but the pretence of the time not being enlarged, was totally groundless; for, in fact, the time for a sale or redemption had been twice enlarged, and no less than two years was allowed for that purpose. That equally false and groundless was the other pretence, of Northmore's colluding with the respondent; for there was neither any proof in the cause to support it, nor did the appellant's husband ever make any complaint of that kind, although he lived eight years after the decree. That as to the respondent's promises of accounting and re-conveying, it was not only very improbable, that after he had been at the expence of obtaining a decree, he should agree to waive or take nothing by it; but he had expressly denied, by his answer, his having ever made any such promise and agreement, either to the appellant or her husband; and what the appellant's witnesses had attempted to prove, was nothing more than what had occasionally passed [560] in conversation with third persons or strangers, and not with the appellant or her husband, nor at any meeting, treaty, or agreement concerning the redemption or re-conveyance of the premises. That no such parol evidence ought to be admitted to lay open a decree of foreclosure, after so great a distance of time; for, should a precedent of that kind be once introduced, and a decree signed and inrolled be discharged or done away by parol evidence of casual conversation, without any note or memorandum in writing, it would not only make all proceedings in courts of equity to foreclose, vain, and fruitless, but would render the property acquired under such decrees extremely precarious; and would be attended with very mischievous consequences to mortgagees, who, (as in the present case,) relying on the decree, and apprehending themselves absolute owners of the estate, had laid out large sums of money in repairs and improvements, but had not for many years together kept any account of rents and profits. And as to the pretended over-value of the estate, there was no sufficient proof made of it, nor do witnesses generally differ more in any thing than in their imaginary calculations or estimates of the value of estates: but if the fact had really been so, yet an over-value was not apprehended to be any bar to a foreclosure; nor was an estate always to lie open, if the party thought fit to neglect his redemption in a reasonable time: and therefore, and as the appellant's husband had during all his life-time acquiesced under the decree, the respondent hoped his title would not now be impeached, or he made accountable to the appellant, whose only claim was that of his being the voluntary devises of an equity of redemption, which had been duly and regularly foreclosed, near 17 years ago.

Accordingly, after hearing counsel on this appeal, it was ordered and adjudged, that the same should be dismissed; and the decree and other proceedings therein complained of, affirmed. (Jour. vol. 19, p. 604.)



[561] Case 7.—Sir Redmond Everard, Bart.,—Appellant; Elizabeth Aston, Spinster,—Respondent [25th February 1717].

[Mews' Dig. vi. 403; 658.]

[A mortgagee of part of an estate in Ireland, files his bill of foreclosure in the court of Chancery in England, and obtains the usual decree. A mortgagee of other part of the same estate files his bill of foreclosure in the court of Chancery in Ireland; and on hearing this cause, the defendant's counsel desired that the decree of the court of Chancery in England might be read, to the intent that the decree of the court of Chancery in Ireland might be made agreeable thereto but this request was refused, because the present plaintiff, though a defendant in the former cause, was not brought to hearing in that cause, and consequently no party to the said decree.]

Viner, vol. 12. p. 113. ca. 47.

Sir John Everard, Bart. the appellant's father, being seised in fee of the town and lands of Knockelly, Killknockane, and Barrett's-town, and other lands in the county of

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