Black's Law Dictionary

Ministers of the mint; also bankers. Cowell.

A memorial, superscription or record.

In practice. A monition is a formal order of the court commanding something to be done by the person to whom it is directed, and who is calied the "person monished." Thus, when mon

Communications of warning and admonition sent from an ecclesiastical judge, upon information of scandal and abuses within the cognizance of his court.

A government by one person.

A monarch who governs alone; an absolute governor.

The marriage of one wife only or the state of such as are restrained to a single wife. Webster. A marriage contracted between one man and one woman, in exclusion of all the rest of

A character or cipher composed of one or more letters interwoven, being an abbrevlation of a name.

A special treatise upon a particular subject of limited range; a treatise or commentary upon a particular branch or division of a general subject

A duel; a single combat. It was anciently allowed by law for the trial or proof of crimes. It was even permitted in pecuniary causes, but it is now forbidden both by the civil law

In medical jurisprudence. Derangement of a single faculty of the mind or with regard to a particular subject, the other faculties being in regular exercise. See Insanity.

11 Coke, 86. It is said to be a monopoly when one person alone buys up the whole of one kind of commodity, fixing a price at his own pleasure.

The sole power, right or privllege of sale; monopoly; a monopoly. Cui vim

In commercial law. A privilege or peculiar advantage vested in one or more persons or companies, consisting in the exclusive right (or power) to carry on a particular business or t

A prodigious birth; a human birth or offspring not having the shape of mankind, which cannot be heir to any land, albeit it be brought forth in marriage. Bract fol. 5; Co. Litt. 7,

L. Fr. In English law. A showing or manifestation of right; one of the common law methods of obtaining possession or restitution from the crown, of either real or personal property

L. Fr. In old English practice. A showing of deeds; a species of profert. Cowell.

A box in which relics are kept; also a muster of soldiers. Cowell.

In Spanish law. Forests or woods. White, New Recop. hi 2, tit 1, c. 6, § 1.

Publlc pawnbroking establishments; institutions established by government, in some European countries, for lending small sums of money on pledges of persenal property. In France th

One of the divisions of a year. The space of time denoted by this term varies according as one or another of the following varieties of months is intended: Astronomical, containing

1. Anything by which the memory of a person or an event is preserved or perpetuated. A tomb where a dead body bas been deposited. Mead v. Case, 33 Barb. (N. Y.) 202; In re Ogden, 2

Co. Litt 118. Monuments, which we call "records," are the vestiges of truth and antiquity.

In Norman law. Moneyage. A tax or tribute of one shilling on every hearth, payable to the duke every three years, in consideration that he should not alter the coin. Hale, Com. Law

In Hindu law. An agent or attorney.

In Hindu law. A written authority constituting an agent; a power of attorney.

An officer in the Isle of Man, who summons the courts for the several sheadings. The office is similar to the English baillff of a hundred.

A sum due by law or usage for mooring or fastening of ships to trees or posts at the shore or to a wharf. Wharf Case, 3 Bland (Md.) 373.

In maritime law. Anchoring'or making fast to the shore or dock; the securing or confining a vessel in a particular station, as by cables and anchors or by a line or chain run to th

adj. A subject for argument; unsettled ; undecided. A moot point is one not settled by judicial decisions. A moot case is one which seeks to determine an abstract question which do

In old English law. A pack of dogs. Cowell.

A court held for the arguing of moot cases or questions.

The place where moot cases were argued. Also a council-chamber, hall of judgment, or town-hall.

The exercise of arguing questions of law or equity, raised for the purpose. See Moot.

One of those who used to argue the reader's cases in the inns of court.

Lat In the civil law. Delay; default; neglect; culpable delay or default Calvin. Sax. A moor; barren or unprofitable ground; marsh; a heath; a watery bag or moor. Co. Litt. 5; Flet

1. Pertaining or relating to the conscience or moral sense or to the general principles of right conduct 2. Cognizable or enforceable only by the conscience or by the principles of

Those only in which men have knowledge to guide them, and a will to choose for themselves. Ruth. Inst. lib. 1, c. i.

In the law of criminal evidence. That degree of assurance which induces a man of sound mind to act, without doubt, upon the conclusions to which it leads. Wills, Circ. Ev. 7. A cer

As opposed to "mathematical" or "demonstrative" evidence, this term denotes that kind of evidence which, without developing an absolute and necessary certainty, generates a high de

This phrase is one of the less usual designations of "actual" or "positive" fraud or "fraud in fact," as distinguished from "constructive" fraud or "fraud in law." It means fraud w

In fire insurance. The risk or danger of the destruction of the insured property by fire, as measured by the character and interest of the insured owner, his habits as a prudent an

A morbid perversion of the feelings, affections, or propensities, but without any illusions or derangement of the intellectual faculties; irresistible impulse or an incapacity to r

The law of conscience; the aggregate of those rules and principles of ethics which relate to right and wrong conduct and prescribe the standards to which the actions of men should

A duty which is valid and binding in the forum of the conscience but is not recognized by the law as adequate to set in motion the machinery of justice; that is, one which rests up

Lat. For the purpose of delaying or postponing payment or performance.

Delay is reprobated in law. Jenk. Cont. p. 51, case 97.

Lat. He delays In law; The phrase describes the action of one who demurs, because the party does not proceed in pleading, but rests or abides upon the judgment of the court on a ce

Otherwise called "Herm-hutters" or "United Brethren." A sect of Christians whose social polity is particular and conspicuous. It sprung up in Moravia and Bohemia, on the opening of

Lat In the civll law. A sickness which rendered a man incapable of attending to business.

Lat. In old pleading. In husband-like manner. Townsh. PL 198.

This phrase, inserted in a conveyance of land immedlately after the statement of the quantity of land conveyed, means that such statement is not to be taken as a warranty of the qu

See Marriage.

A gift on the morning after the wedding; dowry; the husband's gift to his wife on the day after the wedding. Du Cange; CowelL

Anglo-Dutch. In old New York law. A measure of land, equal to about two acres.

A placo where the bodies of persons found dead are kept tir a limited time and exposed to view, to the end that-their friends may identify them.

A social and religious system prevailing in the territory of Utah, a distinctive feature of which is the practice of polygamy. These plural marriages are not recognized by law, but

Lat Death.

Death is called the "last punishment," the "extremity of punishment." 8 Inst 212.

In old English law. A small parcel or bit of land.

Death dissolves all things. Jenk. Cant. p. 160, case 2. Applied to the case of the death of a party to an action.

This word, in its ordinary sense, never means violent death, but death arising from natural causes. Lawrence v. Aberdein, 5 Bam. & Aid. 110.

In French law. Civll death, as upon conviction for felony. It was nominally abolished by a law of the 31st of May, 1854, but something very similar to it, in effect at least, still

An ancient and now almost obsolete remedy in the English law. An assize of mort d'ancestor was a writ which lay for a person whose ancestor died seised of lands in fee-simple, and

An estate created by a conveyance absolute in its form, but intended to secure the performance of some act, such as the payment of money, and the like, by the grantor or some other

He that takes or receives a mortgage, —Mortgagee in possession. A mortgagee of real property who is in possession of it with the agreement or assent of the mortgagor, express or im

A mortgagee of real property who is in possession of it with the agreement or assent of the mortgagor, express or implied, and in recognition of his mortgage and because of it, and

A conveyance of goods in gage or mortgage by which the whole legal title passes conditionally to the mortgagee; and, if the goods are not redeemed at the time stipulated, the title

He that gives a mortgage.

Sax. Murder, answering exactly to the French "assassinat" or "muertre de guet-apens."

A murderer. Cowell.

Murder. Cowell.

In Scotch law. A term nearly synonymous with "mortmain." Bell. Lands are said to be mortified for a charitable purpose.

Lat. By reason of death; in contemplation of dcath. Thus used in the phrase "Donatio mortis causa," (q. v.)

The last moment of life is the moment of death. Terrill v. Public Admit, 4 Bradf. Sun. (N. Y.) 245, 250.

A term applied to denote the alienation of lands or tenements to any corporation, sole or aggregate, ecclesiastical or temporal. These purchases having been chiefly made by religio

These acts had for their object to prevent lands getting into the possession or control of religious corporations, or, as the name indicates, in mortua manu. After numerous prior a

In ecclesiastical law. A burial-place. A kind of ecclesiastical heriot, being a customary gift of the second best living animal belonging to the deceased, claimed by and due to the

Tables for estimating the probable duration of the ilfe of a party at a given age. Gallagher v. Market St. Ry. Co., 67 Cal. 16, 6 Pac. 871, 51 Am. Rep. 680.

A dead pledge; a mortgage, (q. v.;) a pledge where the profits or rents of the thing pledged are not applled to the payment of the debt

Lat Dead. So in sheriff's return, mortuus est, he is dead. —Mortuus sine prole. Dead without issue. In genealogical tables often abbreviated to "m.p." Mortuus exitus non est exitns

Dead without issue. In genealogical tables often abbreviated to "m.p." Mortuus exitus non est exitns. A dead issue is no issue. Co. Litt 29. A child born dead is not considered as

In Spanish law. Strayed goods; estrays. White, New Recop. hi 2, tit. 2, c. 6.

-Sax. A meeting; an assembly. Used in composition, as iurgmote, folkmote, etc. -Mote-bell. the bell which was used by the Saxons to summon people to the court. Cowell.

A customary service or payment at the mote or court of the lord, from which some were exempted by charter or privilege. Cowell.

A woman who has borne a child; a female parent; correlative to "son" or "daughter." The term may also include a woman who is pregnant. See Howard v. Pcople, 185 III. 552, 57 N. E.

The mother of one's wife or of one's husband.

In practice. An occasional appllcation to a court by the parties or their counsel, in order to obtain some rule or order, which becomes necessary either in the progress of a cause

Under the chancery practice, the most usual mode of bringing on a suit for hearing when the defendant has answered is by motion for decree. To do this the plaintiff serves on the d

In English practice. A proceeding whereby a party to an action moves for the judgment of the court in his favor. See Sup. Ct. Rules 1883, ord. 40.

A motion in error stands on the same footing as a writ of error; the only difference la that, on a motion in error, no service is required to be made on the opposite party, because

This is a step taken by a party in an action who is dissatisfied with the judgment directed to be entered at the trial of the action.

The inducement, cause or reason why a thing is done. An act legal in itself, and which violates no right, is not actionable on account of the motive which actuated it Chatfield v.

Lat. Of his own motion. The commencing words of a certain kind of papal rescript.

The dress or apparel worn by mourners at a funeral and for a time afterwards. Also the expenses paid for such apparel.

By statute in some states, the mouth of a river or creek, which empties into another river or creek, is defined as the point where the middle of the channel of each intersects the

That which can be changed in place, as movable property; or in time, as movable feasts or terms of court See Wood v. George, 6 Dana (Ky.) 343 ; Strong v. White, 19 Conn. 245; Godda

See Movable.

A term applied by Lord Coke to reni property which is capable of being increased or diminished by natural causes; as where the owner of seashore acquires or loses land as the water

Things movable; movable or personal chattels, which may be annexed to or attendant on the person of the owner, and carried about with him from one part of the world to another. 2 B