67 Md. 383 | Md. | 1887
delivered the opinion of the Court.
To an action on a single hill the defendant pleaded six pleas. The third and sixth were held bad on demurrer.
The third plea.avers in substance that it was agreed between the plaintiff and the defendant that if the plaintiff would relinquish all claim to the interest which had accrued on the principal sum due, the defendant would pay said principal in full satisfaction of the debt, and that in accordance with the agreement the defendant did pay said principal sum, and the plaintiff thereupon surrendered to him the writing obligatory. The interest was as much a part of the debt as the principal, and it was necessary that an agreement to waive it should be sustained by a valuable consideration. The agreement was simply a contract to pay a portion of the sum due in satisfaction of the whole. A debt cannot be discharged in this way. Jones vs. Ricketts, 7 Md., 116, and many other cases.
The substance of the sixth plea was that the defendant owed the plaintiff the single bill in question, and also another debt, the amount of which was in dispute, and that in fulfillment of an agreement with the plaintiff he paid the amount of the single hill without interest (or, as stated in the words of the plea, the face of the hill), and also the amount of the other debt as claimed by the plaintiff, without further or other dispute in regard to the last mentioned debt, and without further delay as to the single bill, and that these payments were accepted by the plaintiff in full settlement of his claim. We do not see that the statements in the plea show any consideration for giving?up the interest due on the single hill. They show the payment of another debt; if the defendant paid no more than was due on this other debt, he gave nothing that would be a consideration in the view of the law. It
Judgment affirmed.