the extent of it, and offered to pay the plaintiff 201. I think that was a sufficient acknowledgment of the contract to render the defendant liable upon it. I cannot, however, help thinking that the verdict is sustainable upon another ground. Although the other party is not named in it, it would seem to me to be a contract by the defendant with any one who may be concerned, and who acts upon it. As to the signature, Mr. Bruce does not deny that it was, according to the authorities, sufficient to bind Hoggett as principal. BRETT, J. The only question argued was whether there was evidence that this contract made by the defendant was made with the plaintiff. It was contended that it was a contract with Bilton, Williams, & Co., and not with the plaintiff. I must confess I think the case is not free from difficulty; but, upon the whole, I come to the conclusion that there was evidence to justify the jury in finding that the contract was made with the plaintiff. The contract was made with reference to a foreign ship; and, according to a well-known custom where the charterers are acting for a foreign merchant, it was proposed to the captain to insert a clause in the charterparty stipulating for demurrage in unloading the ship, but making no provision for detention in loading her. This the captain refused to assent to without receiving an undertaking which would secure him from undue detention. Accordingly Bilton, Williams, & Co. obtain for him the undertaking declared on, to satisfy his claim if the ship should be detained. The charterers, it appeared, had a contract with the colliery owners for a supply of 10,000 tons of coal within three months: and it is said that this undertaking was an agreement between the charterers and the colliery owners, in furtherance of that agreement. So treating it, it would be idle; there would be no consideration for it on either side. It is true that the defendant had no notice of the charter: but he knew from its name that the coal was to be put on board a foreign ship, and he knew that the undertaking was given with reference to a ship which traded from abroad. It is fair, therefore, to say that he knew that the agreement was made on behalf of the captain, and could not have been intended to be made for the charterers, who could incur no demurrage for 1876 WEIDNER v. delay. The captain, therefore, may be treated as an undisclosed principal. I cannot help thinking there was evidence of a contract between the plaintiff and the defendant. Further, the jury HOGGETT. were entitled to take into consideration the admission of the defendant when the claim for detention was made upon him by the plaintiff. Both upon the original making of the contract, therefore, and upon the admission, I think there was abundant evidence to justify the jury in finding that the contract was made by the defendant with the plaintiff. LINDLEY, J. The whole difficulty arises from the use of a printed form beginning "I undertake," and leaving in blank the name of the person intended to be contracted with. We are compelled to look outside the document in order to ascertain to whom or for whom the undertaking could be given. "I undertake to load the ship Der Versuch, 29 keels, with Bebside coals in ten colliery working days," must mean an undertaking either with the owner, the charterers, or the captain of the ship. Looking at all the circumstances of the case, it seems to me that there is abundant evidence to shew that the undertaking was signed by Hoggett and given to the charterers for and on behalf of the captain as an undisclosed principal. It is true that Hoggett did not know the plaintiff: but that applies in all cases of contracts made for undisclosed principals. Upon the true construction of the document, I think the plaintiff was the proper person to sue and the defendant the proper person to be sued upon it. The printed form shews the place from which the coals were to come, viz. "Bebside Colliery;" but the defendant who signs it does not profess to be acting as agent for any one. I think there was abundant consideration for the contract after it had been acted on. Upon all the grounds therefore I think the order should be discharged. Solicitors for plaintiff: Oliver & Botterell. Order discharged. Solicitors for defendant: Pattison, Wigg, & Co., for G. Armstrong, Newcastle. 1876 June 20. SEAMAN v. NETHERCLIFT. Defamation-Slander-Privilege of Witness. The defendant, an expert in handwriting, had given evidence in the Court of Probate on the trial of a case called D. v. M., in which the genuineness of the signature of the testator to a will was in issue, and had pronounced it as his opinion that the signature was a forgery. The jury found in favour of the will, and the judge of the Court of Probate made some strong observations of an unfavourable nature with regard to the defendant's evidence. The defendant was afterwards a witness for the defence at a preliminary inquiry before a magistrate into a charge of forgery. The counsel for the prosecution asked him, in cross-examination, whether he had read the remarks made, as above mentioned, by the judge of the Court of Probate, and upon the defendant answering that he had, sat down. The defendant then said he wished to make a statement about the case of D. v. M. The magistrate said that he could not hear anything about a case not then before the Court, and tried to stop him, but the defendant persisted, and said, "I believe that will to be a rank forgery, and shall believe so to the day of my death." In respect of the words so spoken the plaintiff, who was an attesting witness to the will, brought an action of slander : Held, that the statement was privileged, and the action would not lie, although the jury found that the words were not spoken by the defendant in good faith as a witness, that he spoke them as a volunteer and for his own purposes, and that he spoke them maliciously, and the Court were of opinion that there was evidence to justify these findings. ACTION of slander. The nature of the slander and the facts sufficiently appear from the judgment. The judgment was entered for the plaintiff for 50l., the damages found by the jury, leave being reserved to move to enter it for the defendant. May 19. McIntyre, Q.C., R. V. Williams, and Hollings, moved for judgment for the defendant accordingly. The statement made by the defendant was privileged. It was material because it went to his credit. It would have been competent to counsel to reexamine the witness to set up his credit, and if on such re-examination he had said the same thing it would not have been actionable. It can make no difference that he volunteered to set up his own credit by stating that he continued to hold the same opinion in reference to the case alluded to. The words were spoken by him as a witness in a judicial proceeding and in the course of giving his evidence with relation to the subject-matter of the proceeding. The findings of the jury must be disregarded, for there was no evidence to support them. It would be in the highest degree dangerous to diminish the safeguard afforded to witnesses by making it a question for the jury in every case whether the witness spoke bonâ fide in the exercise of his functions as a witness. [They cited Dawkins v. Lord Rokeby (1); Henderson v. Broomhead (2); Revis v. Smith (3); Scott v. Stansfield (4); Astley v. Younge (5); Rex v. Skinner. (6)] Montagu Chambers, Q.C., and Bowen May, shewed cause. The question is whether the defendant was acting as a witness when he made these observations. His examination was at an end. The presiding magistrate had ruled that it was so, and in defiance of that ruling and, as the jury find, malâ fide, he persists in making the statement. There must be some limitation to the witness's privilege. The statement to be privileged must be made in relation to the matter in hand. It is submitted that when the witness, after his examination is closed, in defiance of the ruling of the presiding judicial authority as to what is connected with the matter in hand, voluntarily persists in making a statement of such a kind as this, there is evidence that he was not acting as a witness, and consequently was not privileged. [They cited Bacon's Abridgment, title Slander E.; Buckley v. Wood (7); Hodgson v. Scarlett (S); Trotman v. Dunn. (9)] R. V. Williams, in reply, cited Barber v. Lissiter (10); Lake v. King (11); Kennedy v. Hilliard (12); Gwinne v. Poole. (13) Cur. adv. vult. June 20. The judgment of the Court (Lord Coleridge, C.J., and Brett, J.), was delivered by LORD COLERIDGE, C.J. This was an action tried before me at Westminster during the last Hilary Sittings; and, as the facts 1876 SEAMAN v. NETHERCLIFT. (7) 4 Co. Rep. 146. 1876 SEAMAN v. NETHERCLIFT. were somewhat peculiar, and our judgment must as it seems to me depend upon the view which is taken of them, it is necessary to state them. The action was for defamation. The defendant did not deny uttering the words complained of: but he contended that, under the circumstances, the action would not lie. The circumstances were these: The plaintiff is an attorney who had, together with a Mr. Parsons, attested a will which had been the subject of a suit intituled Davies v. May, before Sir James Hannen and a special jury in December, 1875. The defendant is an expert in handwriting; and he had given evidence in the suit of Davies v. May, to impeach the genuineness of the testator's signature to the will which was in dispute in that suit. The jury stopped the case, and found in favour of the will, adding that they thought the imputation made upon the genuineness of the testator's signature entirely groundless. Sir James Hannen stated that he concurred in that opinion; and added some strong observations of his own as to what he thought the recklessness and presumption of the defendant in persisting in declaring that, in his opinion, the signature was forged, in the face of what he the judge and the jury considered to be overwhelming evidence in point of fact that it was genuine. These remarks were published with substantial accuracy in the Times newspaper of the next day. Shortly afterwards, on the 17th of December, 1875, a charge of forgery was preferred against a person named Morphett, before Sir James Lawrence, the sitting alderman at the Guildhall in London; and the defendant was called as a witness on that inquiry for the purpose of establishing the genuineness of the alleged forgeries. I state what follows from my own notes of the evidence given on the trial of this action by the witnesses who were present at the Guildhall, and whose evidence was not in any manner impeached or qualified by the defendant. After he had given his evidence in chief, he was cross-examined by the counsel for the prosecution. He was asked whether he had been engaged as a witness in the case of Davies v. May. He said he had been. He was then asked whether he had read what Sir James Hannen had said as to his evidence in that case. He |