tained in the Admiralty for seamen's wages, though the agree ment was made on land. Roll's abridgement, 533, 2 Bacon 181.-In Hilary term, 8 Charles II. it was resolved by all the judges, that if suit be in the Admiralty for building, amending, saving or necessary victualling of a ship, against the ship herself, no prohibition shall be granted, though this be done within the realm.Croke Charles, p. 296. The first case opposed to that decision is, Watkinson vs. Bernadiston, 2 Peere Williams, p. 367, afterwards Buxton vs. Snee, 1 Vesey, p. 154. Notwithstanding these cases, we find Lord Mansfield declaring, in unqualified terms, that whoever supplies a ship with necessaries, has a treble security:1st, The master. 2d, The ship. 3d, The owner. His lordship adds, " suppose the owner in this case, had delivered the value of the goods in specie, to the master, with order to pay it over to the creditors, and the master had embezzled the money, it would have been no concern of the creditors, for they trust specifically to the ship, and generally to the owners." Cowper, p. 639. Rich vs. Coe. Mr. Abbot has mentioned the decision by Lord Mansfield, in Wilkins vs. Carmichael, Douglass, p. 101, as somewhat repugnant to the former. His lordship there is made to say, that "work done for a ship in England, is supposed to be on the personal credit of the employer," the amount of which is, that work done, where the owner is present, shall be considered frima facie, as done on his credit. From this review of the adjudged cases in England, it must be inferred, that the doctrine by which a lien upon the ship has been restrained to a foreign ownership, is not so clearly settled, as stated by Abbott. Judge Winchester has remarked, 1st Peters, p. 255, that "the reports of decisions in that country, are perfectly irreconcilable. That no principles can be extracted from the adjudged cases in England, which will explain or support the admiralty jurisdiction, independent of the statutes, or the works of jurists who have written on the general subject."

But, however well settled the doctrine may be in the British Courts, it cannot operate here, in repugnance to a principle of maritime law. From what source do we derive those principles They do not take effect here, as a part of the Common Law of England. The state governments adopted the Common Law, as to all

cases to which it is adapted. But this is not the medium through which the maritime code has obtained operation in the United States. The Courts of the United States are tribunals of special jurisdiction. Their powers are derived, exclusively, from the Constitution and Laws of the United States. Constitution, 3d art. 2d sec. "The judicial power shall extend to all cases in law and equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties." Various classes of cases are specified.— Among these are "all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction, and controversies between citizens of different states, and between citizens and foreigners."

As to real and personal remedies, no principles of decision are designated by the Constitution-they were left to be prescribed by the Legislature. The Legislature has not prescribed. The lex loci has therefore necessarily been resorted to by the courts, and in most cases which have arisen, the Common Law has prevailed, not as the law of the nation, but as the law of the place-not of the state where the court sits, but as the law of the place where the cause of action may have arisen, in whatever clime, or under whatever government.

Respecting maritime cases, principles of decision were recog nized and adopted by the letter of the Constitution. The terms there used are cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction."These terms relate to a jurisdiction, peculiar in its operation, and in the principles by which it adjudicates. They essentially appropriate to that jurisdiction, those peculiar principles which characterise" admiralty and maritime cases," and by which alone they must be decided. Hence, if Congress should by law enact, that a cause of action arising on the high seas, shall be cognizable by courts proceeding according to the course of the Common Law, would not such provision, by destroying the principle of decision, break down a jurisdiction created by the Constitution? We infer, that the maritime code is the law by which the right of the libellants is to be decided. That this system operates, not as it does in England, as a set of customs, forming a part of the lex non scripta, but as a separate and distinct code.

Mr. Harris, for the claimant, commenced his argument, and was stopped by the Court.

Judge Johnston. It must be conceded, that the question made in this cause, is one hitherto unsettled in the Courts of the United States. The argument in support of this libel, has proceeded on the ground, that the Admiralty Law of the United States, is the Civil Law of the Roman Government; but the civil law has undergone many changes and modifications, which we are not bound to trace. The Admiralty Law of Great Britain is the Admiralty Law here. The lien on vessels for material-men and ship-wrights, exists only in a foreign port. Where the owner is present and resident, the Common Law principle must govern. In such case, no lien on the vessel is created. In the case of an owner, who, though present, when the work and materials are furnished, is transient and non-resident, I am disposed to think otherwise, and that in such case, the lien attaches. It is proper also to state, what shall be deemed a foreign, and what a domestic port, as to this question: the seaports of the different states ought, in this respect, to be considered as foreign ports, in relation to each other. Charleston, for instance, is a foreign port, as to a claim of this nature, made in Savannah. In the present case, the ship must be considered as having become a domestic ship from the time of the marshal's sale. The decree of the District Court is therefore, affirmed..

CIRCUIT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. ¡

PENNSYLVANIA.

MAY 1811.

Munns, versus Du Pont De Nemours & Co.

In the Circuit Court of the United States, sitting at Philadelphia, before Judges Washington and Peters, and a Special Jury.... Monday, 6th May.

A

This was a cause of great interest and expectation. It was an action for a malicious prosecution, wherein the plaintiff laid his damages at one hundred thousand dollars: 1st. for having charged the plaintiff before Mr. Alderman Keppele, in Philadelphia, with having stolen a brass pounder and three drafts of machinery, and with thereupon having the plaintif imprisoned. 2d. for bringing a civil action against the plaintiff, and demanding excessive bail. 3d. with having caused the plaintiff to be indicted in Delaware as the receiver of five pieces of parchment sieves, knowing them to have been stolen-all charged to have been done maliciously, and without probable cause.

The case was conducted for the plaintiff by Messrs. Brown, Hopkinson, and Rawle-and by Messrs. Charles J. Ingersoll, Binney and Ingersoll, for the defendants.

The evidence was voluminous, and as it is very clearly set forth in Judge Washington's charge to the Jury, we forbear attempting an outline of it.

Judge Washington's Charge:

Gentlemen of the Jury,

The plaintiff having some skill in the mystery of making gunpowder, engaged with Brown, Page and Company, of Virginia, in November 1808, to superintend the manufactory of that article

which they were about to establish near to Richmond; and with a view to obtain more complete information of the art than he then possessed, or to procure workmen, or certain parts of machinery, he came to the northward early in December. On the 9th, he put up at the Inn called the Buck, within half a mile or thereabouts, of the powder manufactory of the defendants, on the Brandywine, about four or five miles from Wilmington, in Delaware. The powder of this factory had obtained great celebrity, and commanded the market, in consequence of the skill employed in making it, and probably from the use of certain parts of the machinery employed, particularly certain parchment seives.The plaintiff, immediately after his arrival at the Buck, opened a correspondence with some of the defendant's workmen, and had frequent interviews with them at the tavern, at which he made them considerable offers to induce them to leave the service of the defendants, and go to the manufactory at Richmond....He also made them pecuniary offers to procure for him patterns or models of the different parts of the machinery used by the defendants, and particularly to procure for him one of the brass pounders, or a pattern of it.

The defendants, hearing of the plaintiff's conduct called upon him at the tavern and after offering considerable violence to his person ordered him to quit the neighbourhood, which he did on the 14th. It is proper to remark that great pains were taken by the defendants to preserve the secrets of their arts, and that strangers were not, without leave, admitted into their factory. Shortly after the plaintiff had left this neighborhood, two of the defendants workmen secretly went off, and at the same time one of the brass pounders was missing. The plaintiff came to Philadelphia a few days afterwards: the defendants also came to this city. On the 22d of December, they applied to alderman Keppele for the warrant stated in the first count of the declaration and on their oath valued the property charged to have been stolen at 10,000 dollars. The officer to whom the warrant was delivered, met with the plaintiff the next day, and enquired of him if his name was not Munns. The plaintiff denied it, and assumed a fictitious name. The officer however being satisfied that he answered the description, carried him to the house of the high constable, where he ac