stitution are ended by the new. The office of public printer is abolished; printing to be done by contract. Amendments if passed by a two-thirds vote of all the members elected to each House of the Legislature, shall be published and referred to the next; if passed again by a majority of members, to the people, and if approved by a majority of the number of voters for representatives, shall be adopted. The calling of a convention, if recommended by a two-thirds vote of the Assembly, shall be submitted to the people, and if a majority of votes are in its favor, shall be called by the next Legislature. Amendments can be proposed to but one article of the Constitution at one session.

PUBLIC DEBT OF ILLINOIS.

Extract from the Address to the People of Illinois, by the Convention of 1848. The principal part of the debt is $6,245,380; a two-mill tax in 1848 will produce about $200,000. This tax will increase annually at the rate of about 7 per centum throughout the 25 years, reasoning from experience connected with Western advancement. Taking these two propositions as the basis of our calculation, in 19 years this tax will yield $6,194,000, which leaves unpaid of the principal only $51,380. There is, however, already accrued $2,248,372 of interest, which will be increased to about $3,000,000 before this provision can be carried into operation. There will accrue during the 19 years, $3,559,916, making the aggregate of interest due at that time $6,559,916, which however is subject to constant reduction from three-fifths of the mill-and-a-half fund now raised, which in the 19 years amounts to $2,784,300, leaving interest then really due amounting to $3,775,316. To this add the unpaid portion of the principal, $51,380, and we have $3,826,996, which, without any great increase of interest, is yet to be discharged. To do this we now have the aggregate fund produced from the threefifths of the mill-and-a-half tax, and from the two-mill tax, which in the six following years will produce $4,358,700, which will liquidate the whole amount, being an excess of nearly $500,000. All this, too, without materially increasing our burdens, when viewed in connection with the proposed reduction of State expenses.

ASSIGNATS.-At the end of the year 1792, there were 2200 millions of francs in assignats circulating in France. About this period, they fell rapidly to one-half of their nominal value. Their amount was, notwithstanding, gradually augmented; so that, in January 1795, they amounted to the enormous sum of 45,578 millions. But their real value was then only 18 for every 100. Again, in March 1796, one louisd'or could purchase no less than 7200 francs in assignats. These were then by law withdrawn from circulation, and redeemed by an issue of mandats at the rate of one for thirty.—[Encyclopedia Americana.]

THE WORLD WAS MADE FOR ALL.-In looking at our age, I am struck immediately with one commanding characteristic; and that is, the tendency of all its movements to expansion, to diffusion, to universality. To this I ask your attention. This tendency is directly opposed to the spirit of exclusiveness, restriction, narrowness, monopoly, which has prevailed in past ages. Human action is now freer, more unconfined. All goods, advantages, helps, are more open to all. The privileged, petted individual is becoming less, and the human race are becoming more. The multitude is rising from the dust. Once we heard of the few, now of the many; once of the prerogatives of a part, now of the rights of all. We are looking, as never before, through the disguises, envelopments of ranks and classes, to the common nature which is below them; and are beginning to learn that every being who partakes of it has noble powers to cultivate, solemn duties to perform, inalienable rights to assert, a vast destiny to accomplish. The grand idea of humanity, of the importance of man as man, is spreading silently, but surely. Not that the worth of the human being is at all understood as it should be; but the truth is glimmering through the darkness. A faint consciousness of it has seized on the public mind. Even the most abject portions of society are visited by dreams of a better condition, for which they were designed. The grand doctrine, that every human being should have the means of self-culture, of progress in knowledge and virtue, of health, comfort, and happiness, of exercising the powers and affections of a man; this is slowly taking its place, as the highest social truth. That the world was made for all, and not for a few; that society is to care for all; that no human being shall perish, but through his own fault; that the great end of government is to spread a shield over the 'rights of all-these propositions are growing into axioms, and the spirit of them is coming forth in all the departments of life.-Dr. Channing.

MAXIMS ON MONEY.-The art of living easily as to money, is to pitch your scale of living one degree below your means. Comfort and enjoyment are more dependent upon easiness in the detail of expenditure than upon one degree's difference in the scale. Guard against false associations of pleasure with expenditure-the notion that because pleasure can be purchased with money, therefore money cannot be spent without enjoyment. What a thing costs a man is no true measure of what it is worth to him; and yet how often is his appreciation governed by no other standard, as if there were a pleasure in expenditure per Let yourself feel a want before you provide against it. You are more assured that it is real want; and it is worth while to feel it a little, in order to feel the relief from it. When you are undecided as to which of two courses you would like best, choose the cheapest. This rule will not only save money, but save also a good deal of trifling indecision. Too much leisure leads to expense; because, when a man is in want of objects, it occurs to him that they are to be had for money, and he invents expenditures in order to pass the time.-Taylor's Notes from Life.

se.

BILLS OF EXCHANGE.

OF THE LAW RELATING TO Presentment for PAYMENT; AND OF PROTEST.

From Byles on Bills of Exchange, Philadelphia, 1848.

(Continued from page 273.)

And without circulating them it should seem that, if according to the course of business it be usual to retain such notes a reasonable time, that may be an excuse for omitting instant presentment. Moreover, the transmission of notes payable to bearer being attended with risk, the sender will, it seems, be allowed to cut the notes in halves, and send one set of halves on the next day, and one set the day after, or to send one set by coach and one by post. And it may make a difference in the time allowed for presentment if the notes be received by a servant or agent.

The same rules which govern the presentment and circulation of bank notes also apply to such bankers' paper as may be fairly considered part of the circulating medium of the country. Such are the bills of a country banker on his London correspondent.

A bill or note on which no time of payment is specified, is payable on demand.

Presentment for payment should be made during the usual hours of business, and, if at a banker's, within banking hours. If the party who is to pay the bill be not a banker, presentment may be made at any ume of the day, when he may reasonably be expected to be found at his place of residence, or business, though it be six, seven or eight o'clock in the evening. And even though there be no person within to return an answer. Lord Tenterden, C. J., "As to bankers, it is established, with reference to well-known rule of trade, that a presentment, out of hours of business, is not sufficient: but, in other cases, the rule of law is, that the bill must be presented at a reasonable hour. A presentment at twelve o'clock at night, when a person had retired to rest, would be unreasonable; but I cannot say that a presentment between seven and eight in the evening is not a presentment at a reasonable time."

Where a bill or note was made or accepted, payable at a particular place, it was formerly a point much disputed, whether a presentment at that place was necessary, in order to charge the acceptor, maker or other parties. At length, as we have already seen, it was decided in the House of Lords, that an acceptance, payable at a particular place, was a qualified acceptance, rendering it necessary in an action against the acceptor, to aver and prove presentment at such place. This decision occasioned the passing of the 1 and 2 Geo. 4, c. 78; by which it is enacted, that an acceptance, payable at a particular place, is a general acceptance, unless expressed to be payable there only, and not otherwise or elsewhere. On this statute it has been decided, that an acceptance is general, though the bill be made payable at a particular place by the drawer, and not by the acceptor. A declaration in an action against the acceptor, alleging a bill to be accepted payable at a banker's,

need not aver presentment at the house of that banker. "Since the statute," say the Court of Error, "a bill drawn generally on a party may be accepted in three different forms, i. e. either first generally, or, secondly, payable at a particular banker's, or thirdly, payable at a particular banker's and not elsewhere. If the drawee accepts in the second form, payable at a banker's, he undertakes, since the statute, to pay the bill at maturity when presented for payment, either to himself or at the banker's. Here the bill was accepted according to the second of these three forms."

It seems that in an action against the drawer, if the bill be accepted, payable at a particular place named by the acceptor, it is still necessary to prove presentment there. At all events, if the bill be drawn, payable at a particular place, presentment must be made there in order to charge the drawer. "The doubt," says Tindal, C. J., "which had been formed before the statute, as to the effect of an acceptance, payable at a particular place, was confined to the case where the question arose between the holder and the acceptor: in cases between the indorsee and the drawer, upon a special acceptance by the drawee, no doubt appears to have existed, but that a presentment at a place specially designated in the acceptance was necessary, in order to make the drawer liable upon the dishonor of the bill by the acceptor. Still less did the doubt ever extend to cases where the drawer directed, by the body of the bill, that the money should be paid in a particular place. Such, then, being the state of the drawer's liability at the time the statute was passed, it must still remain the same unless that statute has made an alteration therein. But it appears to us, that the statute neither intended to alter, nor has it in any manner altered, the liability of drawers of bills of exchange, but that it is confined in operation to the case of acceptance alone."

If the bill be made payable at a banker's, a presentment there will suffice. And if the bill be accepted, payable at a banker's, which banker happens to become the holder at its maturity, that fact alone amounts to presentment, and no other proof is necessary. If a bill be made payable in a particular town, a presentment at all the banking houses there will suffice; if at one of two towns, a presentment at either; if a particular house be pointed out by the bill as the acceptor's residence, a presentment to any inmate: or if the house be shut up, at the door will suffice.

But where a bill is accepted, payable at a particular place, it is not necessary in an action against the drawer to state the acceptance in the declaration, and, therefore, not necessary to state it to be at a particular place, nor to allege presentment at that place. Such a presentment as the acceptance requires is merely matter of evidence. But, if the special acceptance be alleged in the declaration, it may be necessary to state in an action against a drawer or indorser such a presentment as the acceptance requires, though a general allegation may suffice after verdict. If a bill be made payable at a particular place, it is not necessary to state a presentment to the acceptor there, it is sufficient to state a presentment at that place. An averment that a bill was presented to the acceptor will be satisfied by proof that it was presented at the place where it was made payable, though no person were there in attendance, and though the acceptor did not live there.

The statute 1 and 2 Geo. 4, c. 78, does not extend to promissory notes. If, therefore, a note be, in the body of it, made payable at a particular place, it is still necessary to aver and prove presentment

there.

But, if the place of payment be merely mentioned in a memorandum, that is held to be only a direction, and not to qualify the contract; and consequently, a presentment there is not essential. And an averment in the declaration, that the note was made payable there, has even been held a fatal mis-description.

The consequence of not duly presenting a bill or note, is, that all the antecedent parties are discharged from their liability, whether on the instrument, or the consideration for which it was given.

The acceptor or maker, however, still continues liable. And, indeed, presentment is not in general necessary for the purpose of charging him; the action itself being held to be a sufficient demand, and that But if a bill or though the instrument be made payable on demand.

note be payable at or after sight, it must be presented in order to charge the acceptor or maker. So must a note payable at a particular place, as we have just seen. But, though the absence of demand be in general no defence, yet, if the acceptor or maker pays on action brought without any previous demand, it seems the Court would, where they have the power, take the question of costs into consideration.

There are circumstances, however, which will excuse the neglect to present for payment.

Where a bill is seized under an extent, the indorsers are not discharged by non-presentment, for laches are not imputable to the Crown. Neglect of presenting for payment is, as we have seen, excused in the case of a bank note payable on demand, and perhaps of other paper meant for circulation, if the holder, within the period at which he should have presented it, puts it into circulation.

If the acceptor or maker abscond, or his house be shut up, the bill or note may be treated as dishonored; but not if he have merely removed. If the drawee cannot be found, it will be sufficient to plead that fact, without averring that due search was made for him. Under an allegation that the bill was presented, evidence that the drawee could not be found is inadmissible.

Absence of effects in the drawee's hands will, as against the drawer, dispense with the necessity of presenting for payment.

A declaration by the acceptor, before a bill is due, that he will not pay, though made in the drawer's presence, does not dispense with presentment to the acceptor and notice to the drawer.

It has been held, that neglect to present bankers' cash notes, the banker having failed, will be excused by returning them.

Advantage from such neglect is waived by an antecedent party who subsequently, with notice of the laches, promises to pay the bill, or make, or promise to make, a partial payment on account of it.

As to the proper mode of pleading, where the plaintiff relies on any dispensation with presentment, see the Chapter on Pleading.

The defendant's part-payment or promise to pay, made after the bill or note is due, is prima facie evidence of presentment.