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in Ireland, in order to have the opinion of that court, whether the lease of the 3d of September 1688, from the corporation of Drogheda to Christopher Pippard deceased, was a valid lease or not.

A case was accordingly prepared, stating the several material facts already stated, and was several times argued by counsel; and on the 9th of May 1755 the court gave their opinion as follows:

We have heard the counsel for the parties in this cause, and are of opinion, that the lease bearing date the 3d day of September 1688, in the within case mentioned, and made by the corporation of Drogheda to Christopher Pippard, is valid and good. Sir George Caulfield, Michael Ward, Arthur Blenerhasset.

Upon this certificate, the cause came on again to be heard before the Chancellor, on the 22d of November 1757, who, not being satisfied with the opinion of the Court of King's Bench, directed the case to be argued before himself; and after several days argument, and time taken to consider, his Lordship, on the 3d of February 1758, was pleased to declare that the respondents were entitled to, and should be put into the possession of the lands and premises in the pleadings mentioned; and referred it to the Master to take an account in the original cause of what the appellant made, or, without wilful default, might have made of the said lands and premises, since the determination of the first lease; and also an account of the valuable and lasting improvements by him made upon the premises: reserved further directions until after the Master's report; and ordered the cross bill to be dismissed, with costs.

The appellant, conceiving this decree to be erroneous, appealed from it; insisting (C. Pratt, C. Yorke), that the reversionary lease was, in its creation, agreeable to the strict rules of law; the judgment obtained upon the quo warranto against the ancient corporation, being a judgment of seizure and ouster of their liberties and franchises; and the corporation, being by such judgment divested of all their powers and liberties, could exist no longer. That the new corporation was legally created by the new charter, and consequently all acts done by them were valid; for the persons appointed under the new charter were a corporate body, and domini pro tempore, and had a right to make leases. That the lease in question was made without fraud or imposition, and for a valuable consideration, the covenants and annual reserved rent being alone sufficient, even if no fine had been paid, and at the old accustomed rent; and it was made by a corporation, which was then a good [326] corporation in law as well as in fact, and absolute owners of the reversion at the time when it was granted. The revenue of the corporation was not hurt by it, the fine at the time it was paid, with the subsequent interest accrued during a space of fifty years and upwards, being equivalent to the fine paid upon the original lease. That the statute of William and Mary had nothing in contemplation, but to repair and remedy the arbitrary acts of the late King James II. to avoid the innovations introduced by him, and to restore the political constitution of that and other corporations in Ireland to their former state; but could not have any design to affect private property, by retrospective law ex post facto; much less to rescind all the private contracts made by the corporation, whether for their own benefit, or the benefit of those who had contracted with them, though made fairly and for good consideration, and to the benefit of which the party was well entitled, at the time when the act of parliament was made. That this construction was agreeable to the title of the act, which was expressly made for the relief of the King's Protestant subjects, because the offices of power in corporations were got into the hands of Papists; and then the act restores them to the same state and condition to all intents, constructions, and purposes, all proceedings, judgments, etc. notwithstanding; so that the act evidently relates to their political state only, without indicating the least intention to affect private rights, derived under intermediate conveyances. That the validity of the lease in question had been solemnly determined by the opinion of a court of law, which was of the greatest weight in a mere legal question, and therefore the bill of the corporation ought to have been dismissed; and as to the cross bill, it being merely a bill for discovery of evidence, and not for relief, as appeared from the whole scope of it, whatever irregularity there might be in bringing it on to a hearing, the Court of Chancery could not raise or assume a jurisdiction from a bill thus circumstanced, in a matter which was confessedly of legal cognizance. Besides, the behaviour of the corporation in suppressing the lease of 1688, and then questioning its very