Deceit

A fraudulent misrepresentation or contrivance, by which one man deceives another, who has no means of detecting the fraud, to the injury and damage of the latter. It need not be made in words, if the impression be made on the mind of the other party, upon which he acts, without the exact expression in words of the understanding sought to be created; 17 C. B. n. s.

482; Mizner v. Kussell, 29 Mich. 229.

Suspicion by the maker that his statements are false is the legal equivalent of knowledge of their falsity and fraudulency; Shackett v. Bickford, 74 N. H. 57, 65 Atl. 252, 7 L. R. A. (N. S.) 646, 124 Am. St. Rep. 933. Fraud, or the intention to deceive, Is the L. Ed. 439; for if the party misrepresenting was himself mistaken, no blame can attach to him; Poll. Torts:;.",:;; Farmers' Stock- Breeding Ass'n v. Bcott, 53 Kan. 534, 36 Pac. •j Tn; Wachsmuth v. Wachsmuth, 45 111.

App. 244.

The representation must be made mala animo; but whether or not the party is himself to gain by it is wholly Immaterial. It may be by the deliberate assertion of a falsehood to the injury of another, by failure to disclose a latent defect, or by concealing an apparent defect; but, as a rule, mere silence on the part of one party to a transaction as to facts which are important to the other is not deceit, if he is under DO obligation to disclose them; Big. Torts 12; i. 6 H. L. 377. ■ Where the seller asked the buyer whether there was any news (of the treaty of Peace in 1815) that would 'enhance the price of tobacco and the buyer remained silent, it should have gone to the jury to say whether any imposition was practised, the court saying that while the buyer need not, as matter of law, communicate special information known only to him, he must take care not to impose on the seller; Laidlaw v. Organ, 2 Wheat. 178, -1 L. Ed. 214.

In U. S. v. Bell Telephone Co., 128 U..S.

323, 9 Sup. Ct 90, 32 L. Ed. 450, it was held that if, with intent to deceive, either party to a contract of sale conceals or suppresses a material fact which he is in good faith bound to disclose, that is evidence of or equivalent to a false representation.

— General assertions, by a vendor or lessor, that the property offered for sale or to be leased is valuable or very valuable, although, such assertions turn out to be untrue, are not misrepresentations amounting to deceit, nor are they to be regarded as statements of existing facts, upon which an action of deceit may be based, but rather as expressions of opinions or beliefs; Lehigh Zinc & Iron Co. v. Bamford, 150 U. S. 665, 14 Sup. Ct. 219, 37 L. Ed. 1215;

— or as prophecies as to financial prosperity; Kimber v. Young, 137 Fed. 744, 70