17 Ga. App. 511 | Ga. Ct. App. | 1916
In the spring of 1914 the defendant executed and delivered to the plaintiff a bill of sale of a mule, in which was a recital that it was given to secure “the sum of three hundred dollars advanced and to be advanced to me in provisions and supplies by C. W. Skinner [the plaintiff] and to secure any balance on account or note that I may be due the said C. W. Skinner at any time.” The evidence indicated that the defendant had paid to the plaintiff a sufficient sum to discharge all the indebtedness to the plaintiff incurred by him during the year 1914 (except possibly a few cents — an amount so small as to be covered by the maxim de minimis non curat lex), provided that a payment made in January, 1915, had been credited on the 1914 indebtedness instead of being applied as a payment on a prior indebtedness to which we will now refer. At the time the bill of sale was executed the plaintiff held a note for $275 for the purchase-price of a different mule from the one described in the bill of sale, which note contained a reservation of title and was signed by the defendant and another, and also held an old note signed by the defendant and two other persons, payable to one Hurst, which had been transferred by him to the plaintiff. The plaintiff had undertaken to credit on the Hurst note the payment made in January, 1915, but, in view of the defendant’s direction to .credit it on the account secured by the bill of sale, we will treat it as properly credited thereon. We have considered the contention of the plaintiff on
The plaintiff brought trover for the mule, the judgment was for the defendant,' and the plaintiff excepts. The question raised by the record, as we construe it, is whether the bill of sale secured the notes which were signed by the defendant as joint maker with other persons, and which were already in existence at. the time the bill of sale was executed, as well as the advances and other indebtedness incurred by the defendant himself in 1914.
The exception to the direction of the verdict is expressly confined to the complaint that the judge misconstrued the provision quoted from the bill of sale; with the necessary implication that if the court correctly construed that provision, the direction of the verdict was not error. Judgment affirmed.