86 Md. 327 | Md. | 1897
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This suit is brought to recover a balance of rent claimed to be due from the appellant to the appellees under a lease signed and sealed by the said parties. On the 6th of June, 1894, the appellees let to the appellant their property, known as Arnvoir, in Baltimore County, for a period beginning June 6th, 1894, and ending April 30th, 1895, for four hundred dollars, payable one hundred dollars in advance, and the balance in monthly or three equal instalments, of which rent three hundred dollars is claimed to be still due and unpaid. The lease provides that whatever alterations or repairs the tenant shall be permitted to make shall be done at his own expense. The declaration contains but one count, which is a special count on the lease. The pleas are : 1st, fraud in the procuring of the lease ; 2nd, eviction; 3rd, release ; 4th, that the defendant was compelled to remove from the premises by reason of their unhealthy and untenantable condition at the time of the execution of the lease, known to the appellees and unknown to the appellant. At the healing in this Court, but little attention, if any, was paid to the defences set up of an eviction and a release, and from a careful examination of the testimony contained in the record, we have failed to discover any evidence in support of either of said pleas. The only questions which the controversy presents relate, first, to the manner in which the lease was procured; and second, to the condition of the premises, at the time the lease was made, whether untenantable and unhealthy and known to the appellees, but unknown to the appellant. The appellant after having rented said premises from the appellees, in June, 1894, voluntarily removed therefrom in August of the same year, before the expiration of his term, without the consent of the appellees,
There is but one exception in the record relating to the admissibility of the evidence. The appellees having proved by Mr. Clark the execution of the lease, and the amount of rent paid, rested their case, whereupon the appellant proceeded to cross-examine the witness by asking him to state the conversation which had taken place between the appellant and witness prior to the execution of the lease, with reference to the property therein mentioned, but the appellees objected to the admissibility of the same, and the Court sustained the objection and refused to allow the question to be answered. It is very clear that it was not a proper cross-examination of the witness and we agree with the appellant’s statement on his brief, that “ the exception is not very material.”
The second exception relates to the granting of all of the prayers of the appellees and the rejection of all of the appellant’s prayers. The appellees’ prayers presented the law of the case very fully as applicable to each of the issues joined and we think the whole case was amply embraced in
In conclusion we think there is an entire absence of proof to sustain the alleged falsity of the representations made by the appellees, or that they knew them to be false, or that they were made with fraudulent intent for the purpose of inducing the appellant to lease said premises.
Being of opinion that the appellee’s prayers, all of which were granted by the Court, covered the whole law of the case, for that reason we deem it unnecessary to consider in detail the several prayers offered by the appellant and refused by the Court. It follows from what we have said that the judgment of the Court below must be affirmed.
Judgment affirmed with costs.