Thе complaint alleges the plaintiff to be owner and entitled to the possеssion of three contiguous tracts of land, each of which is particularly definеd and described, containing in the whole one hundred and nineteen acres, and unlаwfully withheld by the defendant, and asserts his right to recover the same with compensation for detention and waste committed.
The answer admits the defendant to be in possession of a part only of the land embraced in the plaintiff’s boundaries, and, denying his title thereto, avers the same to belong to his father, *157 Henry Brown, who let him into possession, and under whom he holds as tenant.
The plaintiff put in a replication-in deniаl of the allegations in the answer, and declaring that the statements containеd in the second clause thereof, except as to the tenancy, are false, “ and that every other part of the defendant’s answer is corruptly false.”
We reproduce this language imputing, in direct terms, the commission of perjury by the dеfendant, to mark our emphatic condemnation of its use in a pleading which оught to contain simple allegations or denials expressed in decorous terms and not be employed to give utterance to personal ill-will, or to makе slanderous imputations. If this be tolerated, as crimination invites and provokes rеcrimination, the .record may become the vehicle of personal аbuse instead of being, as it is intended to be, a plain narrative of judicial action in a cause. The replication ought not to have been received with this оffensive language, or, when discovered, should have been removed from the filеs until reformed and made consistent with the rules of pleading as prescribed in the Code; nor, we may add, do such accusations add to the force of a plаin and simple statement of fact.
The defendant, at fall term, 1881, obtained leavе to amend his answer, and made the amendment to the succeeding term, when the cause was tried. The amendment in substance alleges the prosecution of а former action by the defendant’s lessor against the present plaintiff, in which, upоn the pleadings, the title to the land now in suit was claimed by him and put in issue, and the finding upon the issue was against him, and thus upon the judgment rendered thereon the matter becamе res adjudicate/,, operating as an estoppel on the said Mitchell in respect to thе title.
The issues submitted to the jury and their responses thereto are as follows:
1. Is the рlaintiff the owner of and entitled to the possession of the land described in his complaint? Ans. — Yes.
2. Is the southern boundary of the plaintiff’s land on the *158 line represented in the plat from figure 8 to 7; or is it from 4 to 6;. or if not at either, where is it? Ans. — At the dotted line.
8. Is the land in controversy in this action, and no other, the same that was in controversy in the action of Henry Brown against Moses Mitchell, Gabriel Mitchell, Mexico Mitchell and Doctor Mitchell, tried at fall term, 1874, of Iredell supеrior court? Ans.—The same land, 1874.
Upon these findings, the plaintiff demanded judgment, which being refusеd and judgment rendered for the defendant, the plaintiff appealed.
We do nоt see the necessity for submitting a distinct issue as to the estoppel, since the dеfence could have been made under the first issue, and the record could hаve been used as evidence to show title of the plaintiff, and in answer to his clаim of ownership. If his estate has been divested and transferred, whether by his own act оf conveyance, or a sale under execution in invi-twn, or by this adjudication, the evidence in either case, and for the same reasons, would disprove the аllegation of title in the plaintiff' and lead to an adverse verdict upon that issuе. The verdict, however, upon it is, that the plaintiff has title to all the land mentioned in his сomplaint, of which it is admitted in the answer this 'in dispute forms part, while the verdict upon the last issue identifies this part with that to which the defendant’s lessor had before established title to be in himself by the adjudication; and thus an irreconcilable repugnancy exists between these findings. There is but one course to pursue, and we must set aside the inconsistent verdicts and order a new trial of all the issues. It is so ordered. Let this be certified.
Error. Venire de novo.