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II BROWN.
EDWARDS v. CARROLL [1760]

or not. As to the sum of £218 2s. O½d. the same had in fact, as appeared by the report, been applied to the sums in the eighth schedule, whereby £1502 19s. 4½d. which before such application was due to Mr. Edwards and his wife, was reduced to £1284 17s. 4½d. And as to the annuity and yearly allowance being mere voluntary bequests, that could be no reason against allowing interest, all legacies being in their nature voluntary; and this objection came with an ill grace from the respondent, who himself took by much the largest share of the testator's bounty under his will, and on the foundation of that right, was now contending against the allowance of interest upon bequests made to the testator's widow under the same will.

And as to the sixth objection, what had been offered in answer to the third and fourth objections, was apprehended to contain a full answer to this.

But if any of the matters objected to were such as in their nature were errors, and on a recent application would have been deemed so yes now after so long an acquiescence by the respondent under the said decrees of the 30th of June 1720, the 28th of June 1726, and the 13th of November 1728, it being no less than twenty-two years from the time of his coming of age to the time of filing. his bill of review; it appeared highly unreasonable, and might be a very dangerous precedent, that such a bill should meet with any countenance or encouragement from a court of equity; and especially, as the respondent himself had done several acts, and made several payments on the foundation of those decrees, orders, and reports. Besides, the unravelling of the accounts, and going into the same anew, after so great a length of time, and the death of parties, must be attended with the greatest inconveniencies, and might be very injurious to the appellant; the administration of the personal estates both of the testator and Mr. Edwards, by their respective executors, might thereby be greatly disturbed, and the appellant be unjustly suspected of, and made liable to a devastavit of his testator's estate.

On the other side it was said (C. Pratt, A. Forrester), that the decree being inrolled, whereby there could be no rehearing, the party was left without remedy but by bill of review; not calculated to introduce new matter, or new evidence, but for rectifying errors apparent on the face of the record, and by which record only the errors were to be tried; those assigned by the respondent's bill, tended to impeach two decrees, wrongfully charging his inheritance; the demurrer was general, in nullo est erratum, which admitted all the charges in the bill, and only denied the consequences, i.e. admitted the proceedings to be as charged, but contended they [106] were not erroneous, or at least not substantially so. But it was apparent error in the court to proceed against the respondent the infant devisee, without having the will proved, or even produced; so it was in the officer, to take accounts of matters not at all referred to him by the decree of the 30th of June 1720, such as the accounts of legacies, of interest, and of costs, which were not prayed even by the original bill; and the two subsequent orders of the 28th of June 1726, and the 13th of November 1728, were equally erroneous, being grounded solely upon two reports not at all within, or warranted by the directions of the original decree. That if the officer had been warranted in making an allowance of interest, his manner of doing it was apparently erroneous; he had made annual rests upon the £50 annuity, the house rent and taxes, charging each year's arrear with interest at £7 and £8 per cent. from 1713 to 1720, and at the last period only deducting from the balance the £218 received ten years before, and equivalent to four years arrears, to which it ought to have been immediately applied; and what was still more extraordinary, this allowance of interest was upon a mere voluntary bequest to a second wife, already amply provided for, against a small estate greatly incumbered, and an infant grandson and heir almost starving.

As to the appellant's objection, that the decrees and proceedings had been too long acquiesced in to be now reviewed; it was said, that this objection did not arise from the demurrer, which had joined issue upon a general denial of errors. That there is no limitation of time for bringing a bill of review. That the present bill stated, and the demurrer admitted the truth of it, that the respondent was an infant till January 1729; before which time all the proceedings were had, and the inrollment completed. It likewise charged, and the demurrer also confessed, that the respondent had no notice of the errors assigned, till November 1751, from which time no laches could be imputed to him: but the appellant might find it difficult to account for

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