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in the words and figures following; viz. "315 tons and a quarter of alum in several storehouses, at 112 pounds and a half to the hundred weight."—And at the bottom of the said schedule, a memorandum was made, that the 16th of March 1703, possession of the premises and utensils, with the stock of alum, was given to, and accepted by the said William Ward.

On the 24th of February 1720, the duke died; leaving the respondent the duke, his son, and heir, of very tender years; and having made his will, and appointed the other respondents his executors and trustees, and upon his death the premises in lease to Ward descended to the infant duke.

The second lease being near expiring, and the appellant having in many instances broken several of the covenants, particularly by having entirely neglected one of the alum mines, and totally demolished it, and having cut down and destroyed great quantities of timber trees, and lopped and topped divers others, and threatening to commit other waste, and strip the [584] estate of all the underwood, and pull down the several houses that were built upon the premises; and the appellant making no provision, to deliver up his stock of alum, utensils, implements, and other things, at the end of the lease, particularly the 315 tuns and a quarter of alum mentioned in the said schedule, or to perform the other covenants and agreements; the respondents, the executors and trustees, and the appellant had, in the beginning of the year 1724, several meetings, in order to persuade the appellant to do justice to the infant duke, and to perform all the covenants and agreements in the lease, according to the true intention of it; but the respondents perceiving their endeavours would be fruitless, and that the appellant's intention was to evade coming to any final determination, that so the lease might be expired before he did any thing, they therefore thought themselves bound in duty to bring a bill, and one was accordingly brought in the court of Chancery, in the infant duke's name and their own, against the appellant, for a specific performance of the covenants in the lease; and in such hill, the demand of having the 315 tuns and a quarter of alum delivered to the respondents was particularly made and insisted on.

The appellant, in his first answer, admitted the making of the last lease and the schedule, and that the lessees possessed the stock of alum and other things mentioned in the schedule annexed to the said lease, except as after mentioned; and that they had been in possession and enjoyment of the demised premises, ever since the making the lease; that the schedule to the second lease, was the same as the schedule annexed to the first lease: he also admitted, that, by the terms of the lease, he, at the expiration of the term, was obliged to deliver up to the duke and his heirs, the stock of alum and other things in the lease and schedule thereto annexed mentioned, and all houses, edifices, and buildings, belonging to the premises. But in relation to the 315 tuns and a quarter of alum, he conceived that the same quantity of alum ought not to be left upon the premises, for the benefit of the respondents at the end of the term; for that it was the apparent intent, purport, and true meaning of the lease, that the lessees should leave, surrender, and yield up to the duke and his heirs, as large and good a stock of alum made, coals, kilp, and other things, as the late duke did bargain and sell by the lease to the lessees; and he insisted, that by virtue of the exception of the lease, the quantity of 315 tuns and a quarter of alum was exceptioned and reserved out of the grant, bargain, and sale, thereby made to the lessees, of all the stock of alum, coals, and other things.

On the 2d of March 1724, the cause was heard before Sir Jeffrey Gilbert and Sir Robert Raymond, two of the lords commissioners for the custody of the great seal; when the appellant departed from what he had insisted on in his answer, viz. that by [585] the construction of the lease, the 315 tuns and a quarter of alum was not at all to be delivered; and, to the respondents very great surprize, started up a pretence, that by a paper, which he then proved only as an exhibit, it appeared that a great quantity of alum had been formerly delivered to the duke, and that these 315 tuns and a quarter were part thereof; so that the late duke had many years ago received this quantity of alum, which was to be delivered only at the expiration of the lease: but the court, upon inspecting this paper, and observing the same to be razed in several places, and the appellant not having insisted thereon, or on the delivery of the alum in any of the pleadings, which, if true, was impossible to have been forgot, but on the contrary insisting, that it never was intended to be delivered,