CHAPTER XII.

Of Judgment by Default, and the Assessment of Damages thereon.

SECTION 1. Of the default

SECTION 2. Of the assessment of damages by the clerk

618

629

SECTION 3.

Of the assessment of damages on a writ of inquiry

CHAPTER XIII.

Of Discontinuance, Nolle Prosequi, Retraxit, and Cassetur billa vel

PART FIRST.

PART I.

OF CIVIL ACTIONS AND PROCEEDINGS, IN THE STATE OF NEW YORK,
IN COURTS OF LAW; AND OF THE COURTS WHICH HAVE ORIGI-
NAL AND APPELLATE COGNIZANCE OF THEM.

CHAPTER I.

OF ACTIONS.

DIVISIONS.

The most general division of suits, or actions, is into GENERAL criminal, or such as are brought for the redress of public

wrongs; and civil, or

those by which a redress of private wrongs is sought for. Civil actions are either equitable or legal; the former being entertained by courts of equity, the latter by courts of law. The practice in the last of these alone, including certain proceedings at law which are not usually termed actions, forms the subject of this treatise.

Actions at law, of a civil nature, were formerly divided into real, (or feodal,) personal, and mixed. Those actions which have heretofore been denominated real, were anciently the only ones known to the common law for the recovery of land; but in modern times, they have given place to the more convenient action of ejectment, and had become nearly obsolete, when they were abolished by the revised statutes.1 Actions at law are now divided into suits relating to real property and personal actions.2

12 R. St. 343. P. 3. Ch. 5. T.

7. s. 24.

22 R. St. 302. 346. P. 3. Ch. 5. 6.

VOL. I.

1